WHAT HARD GAMES CAN TEACH US ABOUT GAME DESIGN
(Posted 2007-08-25 20:24:46 by basscomm)

Nearly 5 years ago, I wrote a piece [ http://crummysocks.com/node/4 ] about
my perception that video games are getting easier, and implied that the
degrading difficulty makes the games less rewarding to complete. I'll admit
that it's supremely frustrating to make it to an end boss or a particularly
tough snag and lose a hundred times (or more) in a row, but the draught of
elation you enjoy when you finally clear it is made all the sweeter when
it's chasing so many mugs of bitter defeat. 

Games that provide a genuine challenge are one of the main reasons I like
to keep my old systems around. The games and their tasks present a set of
goals to achieve rather than a 'to-do' list on your tour of the virtual
game world, slogging through the elements that break up the story. 

There is a rather lengthy feature over at Gamasutra [
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/1640/game_design_essentials_20_.php ]
with a retrospective on some of the most difficult games and what they can
teach us about designing games today. Though he paints games like Defender
in a more favorable light than I would [ http://closeoutwarrior.com/?p=181
] he makes a lot of good points. I particularly liked this bit:

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

"But this is not to say that games must be easy. The impulse to make video
games easier can be traced to a fundamental change in perception over what
a game should be. The older school of thought, which dates back and beyond
the days of Space Invaders to the era of pinball, is that a game should
_measure the player's skill_. Arcade games, in fact, must make it difficult
for a player to last for any great length of time in order to keep money
coming into the coin box. The newer concept is that a game should _provide
an experience to the player_. The player is to feel like some character, or
like he's participating in a story, or that he's making some difference in
a fictional realm."

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Of course, there is room for both. _Indigo Prophecy [
http://closeoutwarrior.com/?p=20 ]_ wasn't hard in the slightest, but still
very good, and by all accounts _Ninja Gaiden [
http://www.gamespot.com/xbox/action/ninjagaiden/review.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=gssummary&tag=summary;review
]_ was supremely difficult while _simultaneously_ a whole lot of fun.

The article is certainly worth a read, _especially_ if mentions one of my
favorite overlooked games, _Mischief Makers_.

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