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2,580,822 Views • Oct 7, 2022 • Click to toggle off description
Being a game designer means being a problem solver. In this video, I share stories of how game creators overcame huge design conundrums, so you can fix your own issues when they crop up.
Bonus Video on Patreon: www.patreon.com/posts/bonus-video-five-73005627
=== Before you watch ===
Content warning: Blood, Gore, Violence
=== Sources ===
[1] Bridging the Gap Between UX Principles and Game Design | GDC on YouTube
• Bridging the Gap Between UX Principle...
[2] DD2018: Maciej Binkowski - Creating experiences with numbers | Digital Dragons on YouTube
• DD2018: Maciej Binkowski - Creating e...
[3] Mining Your Own Design: Crafting the Crafting System in Astroneer | GDC on YouTube
• Mining Your Own Design: Crafting the ...
[4] Through the Grinder: Refining Diablo III's Game Systems | GDC Vault (Free)
www.gdcvault.com/play/1017794/Through-the-Grinder-…
[5] Changing the Time Between Shots for the Sniper Rifle from 0.5 to 0.7 Seconds for Halo 3 | GDC on YouTube
• Changing the Time Between Shots for t...
[6] An excerpt from Sid Meier’s Memoir! on the making of Civilization | PC Games N
www.pcgamesn.com/sid-meiers-memoir-civilization
[7] Check Point Design | Yacht Club Games
www.yachtclubgames.com/blog/check-point-design
[8] How We Made The Last of Us's Interface Work So Well | Kotaku
kotaku.com/how-we-made-the-last-of-uss-interface-w…
[9] Iwata Asks: New Super Mario Bros. Wii | Nintendo
www.nintendo.co.uk/Iwata-Asks/Iwata-Asks-New-Super…
[10] Intelligent Game Design on Rainbow Six Siege | GDC Vault (Free)
www.gdcvault.com/play/1025166/Intelligent-Game-Des…
[11] Gamasutra Plays Prey with lead designer Ricardo Bare | Twitch
www.twitch.tv/videos/142411945
=== Chapters ===
00:00 - Intro
01:44 - Identify the problem
03:35 - Iterate on solutions
05:14 - Identify the levers
06:48 - Make big changes
08:02 - Flip it on its head
09:06 - Solve it elsewhere
10:17 - Solve multiple problems
11:27 - Study player behaviour
12:27 - Implementing solutions
14:44 - Conclusion
=== Games Shown ===
Gears of War (2006)
Super Mario Maker 2 (2019)
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017)
Super Mario 3D World (2013)
Dying Light (2015)
Astroneer (2019)
Assemble With Care (2019)
Diablo III (2012)
Diablo II (2000)
Halo 3 (2007)
Dark Souls (2011)
Darkest Dungeon (2016)
Civilization (1991)
Shovel Knight (2014)
The Last of Us (2013)
Slipways (2021)
New Super Mario Bros. Wii (2009)
Factorio (2020)
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege (2015)
Prey (2017)
Alien: Isolation (2014)
DOOM Eternal (2020)
=== Credits ===
Music provided by Epidemic Sound - www.epidemicsound.com/referral/vtdu5y (Referral Link)
Halo 3 (MCC) Team Snipers Gameplay | FatRat
• Halo 3 (MCC) Team Snipers Gameplay - ...
Old Games - Civilization 1 | Old Nerd Playing Old PC Games
• Old Games - Civilization 1 / #1 / No ...
New Super Mario Bros. Wii - Full Game (Multiplayer) | SullyPwnz
• New Super Mario Bros. Wii - Full Game...
Proving I'm The Best Shotgun Player in Rainbow Six Siege | bAd
• PROVING I'M THE BEST SHOTGUN PLAYER i...
=== Subtitles ===
Contribute translated subtitles - amara.org/videos/8u1tgVK5LcpK/
Views : 2,580,822
Genre: Gaming
Date of upload: Oct 7, 2022 ^^
Rating : 4.937 (1,736/108,399 LTDR)
RYD date created : 2024-05-04T13:23:58.34829Z
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YouTube Comments - 1,713 Comments
Top Comments of this video!! :3
The last bullets doing more damage also make it more likely you would kill an enemy just when you needed to reload, making you feel like you barely made it.
9.6K |
The Sid Meier thing reminds me of an old engineering trick where, if you don't know the source of a problem between point A and point B, test the spot halfway between them. Then, if the problem exists there, test halfway between there and point A; otherwise test between there and point B. Repeat until you find where the problem originates. Mathematically it's the most efficient method of pinpointing the source. If halving the world had been too drastic, Meier probably would have gone back up to three quarters, and kept dialing it in until he hit the sweet spot.
2.8K |
I'm surprised they didn't include a famous one from Silent Hill. The PS1's draw distance was limited, so they covered much of the town in mist. Not only did it make the world feel bigger than what the game could actually show at a time, but as a horror game, it really amped up the suspense and made you curious about what you couldn't see, thereby incentivizing you to get closer.
1.1K |
Working on Endless Legend back in the day, players could ally with one another, but at the end of the game, only one would win. This caused frustration as they felt everyone in the alliance should be declared the winner. I brought this up with the Sr Producer on the project, who told me we had very little resources in terms of programmers or designers on the project, as most of the studio was working on Endless Space 2 at the time. After considering our options, I suggested, not to make a significant change, but just a little one, aimed specifically at the player. The game checks whether you meet a victory condition. The game checks whether you are in an alliance. If yes to both, it asks you if you want to share your victory. If you select yes, it displays the victory screen to the rest of your team.
Allied victoried were in, at the cost of a modal text window.
720 |
I feel as if the fundamentals of each of these approaches are incredibly useful techniques for all kinds of creative projects. Great video, dude!
2.8K |
Poltergeist really was one of the most memorable enemies in Prey, at least for me. The first time you see objects flying around you really get that fear of the unknown feeling.
1.1K |
My favourite story about solving a problem is when Blizzard wanted to make sure hardcore players didn’t grind for 10+ hours every day and leave other players in the dust. They started with giving XP-penalties after a few hours of gameplay, but after some backlash, they reversed it entirely, giving players XP-boosts that increased based on how long since they last played. Falls very well in line with your 4th point :)
597 |
The way I usually think about 6:49 is in terms of upper/lower bounds. Lets say you think/know that 10 mana is too cheap for a spell; its too spammable. You could increase it to 12, but then oh, its still too cheap. So before you knew the answer was somewhere between 11 and infinity, now you know the answer is between 13 and infinity. But if you instead increased it to 25 and realize thats too expensive, well now you actually have a useful upper bound. Overshooting makes it so much easier to fix something in 2 or 3 passes, rather than being stuck trying every single number between your first guess and the right answer.
73 |
I once saw a talk from a developer of Marvel’s Spider-Man for PlayStation speaking about their massive performance challenges. He said something like "it's not a cutscene, it's an animated loading screen". That kind of blew my mind.
1.7K |
Bruh, Prey's team didn't have time to make a whole new unique enemy model? So they just made an invisible ghost?
And not only that, but they made it use the pre-existing physics objects as its weapons??
That's really funny but also kinda genius lmao
874 |
"Small change of 0.2s" That's massive balance change! 1.4x original cooldown ie. 40% increase. Especially considering a weapon that gets this every cycle.
171 |
Wow, never expected to get featured in a GMTK video 😅. Excellent compilation Mark, and honored to be included amongst such fantastic examples!
507 |
game design is the embodiment of solving problems you created for yourself
194 |
One of my favorite games of recent years Darkest Dungeon had a problem with players just simply mowing down the front line of enemies causing the back ones to move forward and rendering them useless because of positional placement needed to cast spells/attack. So Red Hook had the genius idea of adding corpses which would serve as temporary placement holders. They would appear if an enemy died but only if it wasn't by a critical attack or damage over time effect.
130 |
The poltergeist situation in Prey reminds me of why the added Goombas to Super Mario Bros. They needed another enemy type to help fill out the roster of the early game levels, but they didn't have much space left on the cartridge. So they made an enemy with comically simple AI (if you can even call it that) and only required one sprite that just flipped horizontally for its walking animation.
54 |
I can vouch for the success of the bubble system in New Sup Wii. My mom, dad, brother, and I would frequently come across tricky sections, so if one person made it through, everyone else would get in a bubble and get popped.
434 |
Currently working on a local multiplayer indie game with a friend, and we've certainly hit similar roadblocks in our design (and still struggle with a few). It's nice to know that even industry professionals with years -- if not decades of experience also sometimes run into a design hiccup that can take a lot of effort to smooth out and resolve.
378 |
This video really is a great summary of why I love game design so much. There are many times that I tell people that my goal is to be a game designer, and they don't understand what that means. I feel like this video would help people understand why the field is not only important, but captivating.
I'm reminded of one of my favorite dev stories, from the Killer Instinct reboot. Jago's healing was seen as a menace to the meta, with a lot of player complaints. The common request was to reduce the amount of health that Jago could heal, or even remove his healing capability entirely (which thankfully the developers saw as an untouchable lever!).
The devs followed the advice of "Your players are great at finding problems, but terrible at finding solutions". Rather than simply doing as players requested, they asked themselves why the healing was so frustrating. Lead combat designer Adam "Keits" Heart described it as curing the disease, rather than alleviating the symptom. They took 4 months to study Jago, and what they found was, Jago didn't have any bad matchups, and was solid anywhere on the screen. His long range was strong, his short range was strong, and his mid range could transition way too easily into short range via his Wind Kick. So they nerfed Wind Kick, making it punishable on block. Players reacted negatively, but within weeks, the Jago complaints vanished, and updated rankings now gave Jago several bad matchups.
This was discussed more in-depth in Hold Back To Block's excellent documentary, "FIGHT ON: The Killer Instinct Story". I recommend it to anyone interested in fighting game design, reboots, and metagame balance.
Anyway, excellent video, Mark! Thank you for these. I genuinely think this one might be my new favorite from you. God bless!! <3
64 |
Just want to add that the Potions made it back in Diablo 3 at release, but with a 30sec cooldown.
The health globe system worked great when the game was about killing a bunch of monsters, but then there were bosses and you're no longer killing things which broke the system again.
They tried to change it with stats that gave a % life steal on hit as well but changed it to a set number per attack instead, then that got nerfed as well.
42 |
@GMTK
11 months ago
Want more problem-solving stories? Here's how Nintendo solved its big open world issue in Zelda: Breath of the Wild - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZzcVs8tNfE
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