"Level with Me", my level design interview series at RPS

[Jetsetlemming]

None of these examples can beat Pathologic, just saying. Ice Pick Studios games in general are on a god-tier class far above anything cited here.

[arhurt]

None of these examples can beat Pathologic.

It's not a contest

[Jetsetlemming]

What is the point of artsy dick waving if not for contest? Russia's art dick is way bigger than Japan's tiny little tentacle art dick.

[arhurt]

What is the point of artsy dick waving if not for contest? Russia's art dick is way bigger than Japan's tiny little tentacle art dick.

This post is art.

[Campaignjunkie]

What actually annoys people about art games is that the descriptor ‘art game’ puts them on a level above other games, their favourite games, by insinuating that they are mere games. Which is enforced by the sheer pretentiousness of many art games and

It’s the same strategic labelling as “serious games,” which implies normal games are incapable of being serious.

I agree that "art game" and "serious game" is a bad thing to call these games, but unfortunately those are the labels that have stuck. Though a segment of "serious games" today is getting re-branded into "games for change." The other "serious games" like work training simulators are so boring and banal that ideally they should be called "boring games" or something.

Me as a player, however, am absorbing, observing, questioning and being entertained by what is presented on the screen as well as all the other meanings that come attached to it: In that moment I'm Batman, bringing the Joker to confinement, my mind is already wondering how I came to capture him and the fight that we had prior to me bringing him here.

See, I don't think that's input. Arkham Asylum cannot read your mind and access variables in it. The real input is how you move Batman, how you dive bomb / glide kick / jump from gargoyle to gargoyle. That's what you're doing 99% of the time, thinking, "oh that NPC is going to attack me, I better counter him" or "where can I fire my grappling hook"

In order to properly analyze a subject, we need to define those boundaries, and for me games need gameplay, ergo they need to be "fun" as in: they must engage the player in an interactive fashion that challenges and rewards mastery of the mechanics according to his own expectations.

Okay, so anything that has "gameplay" is a game? Well according to you, "thinking about the Joker" counts as input / interaction, or even transcends input, so watching a cutscene and thinking about the Joker, that counts as gameplay? I think you need to explain what you mean by "mechanics" because I thought I knew what you meant, but I don't think it fits with what you say above -- that thinking = interacting with the game?

i don't think so, but chess is a competitive game.

I disagree. Competition can be meaningful because at it's core, competition is a kind of conversation. If you watch really high-level Starcraft or Street Fighter play, suddenly a fireball can be a taunt, because that might be Daigo's way of saying "I knew what you were going to do before you knew, so don't even try those tricks with me, play more seriously." Read Frank Lantz's "Go, Poker and the Sublime" (http://www.third-helix.com/blog/?p=1169) which talks about 2 very competitive, but very deep games that are so meaningful they're akin to meditation.

None of these examples can beat Pathologic.

I sort of agree, but here are two questions addressed to anyone here:

(a) Assuming you agree with what arhurt said before, can you explain how Pathologic meets your definition of "fun"? Or if it doesn't, why is it better than something similarly confusing and complicated and unorthodox, e.g. The Path.

(b) Is it bad if the apex of an art form is totally inscrutable and takes 20 hours to play and multiple playthroughs? Take James Joyce's Ulysses. It's very important, but at the same time, I'm pretty sure only a handful of people in the world might read it and genuinely like it. If it were a game, we would say that's bad game design because it's too confusing.

[ElectroSheep]

":30c5f62k]The prime example for me as a very artsy game is Mirror's Edge.

Ho yes!

I'm so "wow" everytime I look a picture of ME

[arhurt]

Okay, so anything that has "gameplay" is a game? Well according to you, "thinking about the Joker" counts as input / interaction, or even transcends input, so watching a cutscene and thinking about the Joker, that counts as gameplay? I think you need to explain what you mean by "mechanics" because I thought I knew what you meant, but I don't think it fits with what you say above -- that thinking = interacting with the game?

From my earlier statement: Gameplay must engage the player in an interactive fashion that challenges and rewards mastery of the mechanics according to his own expectations.

The mechanics are defined by what the player can do in the game: whatever the game can read as an input. On a basic level it is only what the game can interpret in its logics and respond via an output (sound/video/motion feedback). That comprises gameplay input and output. Es.: I press space and Batman does a glide kick.

Then comes the basics of rewarding the player according to his own expectations: If he presses X and Batman punches, he expects that if he presses X again he will punch again. He expects that if he punches a Bad guy the bad guy will be hurt and eventually be defeated.

From here we can go one step deeper and start analyzing the gameplay not only based on the direct input/output mechanics of the game. Game and Level design, combat design, sound and graphical FX start to support the basics of gameplay I/O to deepen the experience and further reward the player: Exploring the levels via the basic movement I/O (space to jump > character jumps) with interesting platforming (rewarding mastery of the basic input). This is still gameplay because it is related to how well you coordinate the major player behaviors still defined by how far you allow the player to interact with the game.

Player expectation has to do with the difficulty curve and scope of gameplay: some people like racing games, others like fighting games, others like shooters. Some people like intricate and difficult games to master, others like easy and engaging. This is a widely subjective parameter to grade gameplay, but unless something out of the basic gameplay is badly designed and hinders it (small fonts and a messy UI) it should be considered a characteristic, and not a defect of the game (combat is too difficult is a designer's decision, it's one of the differences between Devil May Cry and God of War, and is purely gameplay related).

The above is what I consider to be gameplay. Again, it's not a black and white contrast of what is and what is not gameplay. Each game can have it's own gradient.

To summarize, gameplay is how well the game rewards player interaction with its systems in order to engage the player. Be it basic loops of input/output (I press space and I jump, with good timing and precisely) or how these I/O loops are tied in the game's system (good platforming sequences that reward player exploration of the level boundaries).

Anything else beyond that is not gameplay, but is also not irrelevant to the enjoyment of a game. Characters, narrative, sound and music, graphics, cinematics, they all serve little purpose for the gameplay itself, but they do help a great deal of immersing the player in the game's universe and help in conveying the game's message.

If you take Batman: Arkham Asylum. Remove all of it's cenimatics and replace Batman, Joker and all the cast with a theme of Dogs versus Cats its still gonna be a good game with good gameplay. It may not have the same appeal, and it may not be a good product, and it will definatelly convey a different message and feelings. But the gameplay will be the same.

Consider the example from "A Theory of Fun" where Koster describes a game – if I remember correctly, don't have the book with me here – about throwing prisoners in a pit for execution. You have to manage the way you throw them in the pit as to not overflow it and let them escape. When you can fill the pit entirely with their bodies, they will suffocate, die and deteriorate, making space for more prisioners. From that description you may think of a horrible game about genocide, but once you look at the other page and realize that he has reskinned tetris so that you are not anymore turning block pieces, but piling up contorted bodies, you realize that the gameplay would be as fun as tetris is.

Gameplay =/= message. Gameplay is what constitutes a game, if the work is centered around gameplay, and everything else found in it is a support for that gameplay, its a game.

I'm sorry for the long post. I hope it helps you understand what I see is gameplay and what is not. To further analyze your reply, everything that has gameplay is a game, but remember that we are talking about videogames here. Can a book be a game? Yes. Can a music be a game? Yes it can. But remember that the further you push the boundaries of something, more and more you run the risk of losing identity and becoming something else, or something entirely new. Just as Tower defense games pushed the boundaries of RTS games so far as to become its own category.

Edit:

I believe my above statements explain why QTE are so loathed by us: they are not good gameplay and are an interactive mechanic created not for the gameplay, but for the narrative and plot. In God of War they are part of the gameplay (executions, boss battles) with proper logics and gameplay I/O rewards, but on other games they are simply an interactive exception and usually end up doing more harm than good.

[Evert]

I like you Arhurt

[Jetsetlemming]

None of these examples can beat Pathologic.

I sort of agree, but here are two questions addressed to anyone here:

(a) Assuming you agree with what arhurt said before, can you explain how Pathologic meets your definition of "fun"? Or if it doesn't, why is it better than something similarly confusing and complicated and unorthodox, e.g. The Path.

(b) Is it bad if the apex of an art form is totally inscrutable and takes 20 hours to play and multiple playthroughs? Take James Joyce's Ulysses. It's very important, but at the same time, I'm pretty sure only a handful of people in the world might read it and genuinely like it. If it were a game, we would say that's bad game design because it's too confusing.

I actually don't agree with the premise that fun is necessary for a good game. I feel like that claim is too hung up on the "game" part of videogames. Pathologic is NOT fun, unless you brute force it to be fun by breaking the rules and making your doctor go hunt down burglars at night, or exploit physics to parkour on rooftops. It's a very dreary, oppressive game, and it is not about entertaining you. But when I play it, I feel an immersion no other game has remotely come close to matching, and I mentally take on the role and responsibility of my character. The closest things to positive feelings the game inspires are "duty" and "intrigue", and I love it for that, and have beaten it with two of the three characters.

Before I really got into games as a teenager, I was a super hardcore reader. Two or three novels a day, all my free time spent in a book. Maybe that's why I have a different perspective on what a game NEEDS to be. I don't need to be shooting terrorists and watching awesome cutscenes and getting mad points. What I do need is a mental engagement.

e: oh lord you got me to make a serious post. I wasn't planning on that

[e-freak]

Arhurt, you just won the GamesIndustry!

[arhurt]

I don't need to be shooting terrorists and watching awesome cut scenes and getting mad points. What I do need is a mental engagement.

I never said Blockbuster explosions and awesome cut scenes are where the fun is on videogames. I love Sim City because of the extremely polished gameplay. Sim City's gameplay is a mix of the relation between its various systems (land value, public services, taxation, pollution etc...) and the incredibly polished UI. There's no story other then the graphs and charts that show how my economy has grown from 50 years ago, and how my citizens are happier then ever! The Myst series have awesome gameplay as well (for their time and category), clever puzzles and an engaging setting and story. Do I play JRPGs because of the amazingly detailed CGI or because of the leveling and combat systems? The CGI acts as rewards for my mastery of the combat and leveling system, and if the combat and leveling systems are crap, arcane and unbalanced, no amount of CGI and explosions will make it a good game. Same goes for CoD: it breaks the records for exploding setpieces, and yet we have already grown tired of the repetitiveness and shallow gameplay (SP).

I have never played (and likely won't play) Pathologic, but I'm sure that the gameplay in there is at least some fun.

It may not be the main appeal of the game for you, and that's ok. But the core question is: is Pathologic a videogame? Does it have gameplay? In order to unravel the mysteries of the plot, do you need to level up, defeat any kind of monster with a set of weapons/abilities? Do you need to solve puzzles? Do these challenges feel rewarding to master? And mind you the reward doesn't need to be bigger weapons: it may as well be simply access to more of the backstory and setting. Maybe Pathologic doesn't have greatly balanced gameplay and the physics are glitchy and quests are buggy, that makes it a bad game. Can you still have enjoyment from a bad game? Surely. Does that make it a good game? No. Do you need to feel bad for liking a bad game? No! But you might as well admit that it is a bad game =P even if it has the most intriguing setting and engaging story.

Now try to imagine if Pathologic had great gameplay. So great that it feels so natural to play it after learning the basics that you can enjoy everything else the game has to offer and still come out the other end with that happy feeling of accomplishment that mastering a game lets you have.

[Jetsetlemming]

I have never played (and likely won't play) Pathologic, but I'm sure that the gameplay in there is at least some fun.

It may not be the main appeal of the game for you, and that's ok. But the core question is: is Pathologic a videogame? Does it have gameplay? In order to unravel the mysteries of the plot, do you need to level up, defeat any kind of monster with a set of weapons/abilities? Do you need to solve puzzles? Do these challenges feel rewarding to master? And mind you the reward doesn't need to be bigger weapons: it may as well be simply access to more of the backstory and setting. Maybe Pathologic doesn't have greatly balanced gameplay and the physics are glitchy and quests are buggy, that makes it a bad game. Can you still have enjoyment from a bad game? Surely. Does that make it a good game? No. Do you need to feel bad for liking a bad game? No! But you might as well admit that it is a bad game =P even if it has the most intriguing setting and engaging story.

Now try to imagine if Pathologic had great gameplay. So great that it feels so natural to play it after learning the basics that you can enjoy everything else the game has to offer and still come out the other end with that happy feeling of accomplishment that mastering a game lets you have.

Pathologic's gameplay base is sound. It's basically a first person shooter, except that there are almost no enemies, and certainly nothing you ever need to kill. If you do decide to scrape together what meager resources you have, trade in your food and medicine, and buy a military rifle, you can have fun intentionally going out in the middle of the night to find some burglars and fight them. You don't need to. You progress in the game by talking to people, essentially. Going about on chores for the various important figures of the town, working to help prepare the town for the disease that's ravaging it, finding medicines, sending messages, helping refugees, investigating possible sources of infection, etc. You have personal stats to manage: Hunger, tiredness, infection, immune system strength, reputation, etc. But there are no skills to level up, no significant amount of loot. The gameplay is not the focus, it's a medium that enables the true purpose of the game, which is the story, and participation within it, and the mood, which is incredibly dark and damp. What you "play" in Pathologic is there to immerse you in what you "feel".

Also the game's not buggy or glitchy. The collision on some surfaces can be weird, to the point where if you try you can jump climb up nearly vertical sections and get on rooftops.

The game's got outdated graphics, and does not bother itself with trying to give you fun, and for that a lot of people will not play it, but if you've got the patience to play, say, a Sierra adventure game, or Phoenix Wright, you should be able to handle the burden.

If you want to try something newer, and on a smaller scale, by the same developers, get The Void on Steam. http://store.steampowered.com/app/37000/ Also a fantastic game, but (imo) way harder, due to even more desperate resource management.

[Sentura]

CJ: watch this (thanks bunglo)

[Sentura]

power through it because the point is really fucking good

[Tisky]

Sentura, everytime i read your nick i hear the voice from Ace Ventura in my name, but instead of "Ventuuurraa!!" its "Sentuurraa!"