Game Design Taboo #1 lazy recolor

 The issue itself isn't the recolor but rather that many games and MMOs tend to just recolor and re-shade the enemy. This isn't the only issue; the main issue is, that recolor doesn't come with any gameplay changes.

No increase in HP, dmg output, and more. You need interesting changes or even simple changes; things that force the player to learn or consider combat from a different perspective.

Think about it like this; would you like a puzzle in Portal if it was just a different colored room like a blue room instead of it's normal look? No, you wouldn't because the gameplay is outright the same, no real difference.

You need differences, something that makes the player tackle the content in a new way or a new manner. So many MMOs do this sin, when in reality it's not hard to make minor changes that makes the player not have to grind the same mob but a slightly different mob.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Psychological manipulation #2 Big numbers

 This is a fine balancing act for players but the goal of the matter is to keep going for the big numbers and keep the big numbers with them getting bigger, and bigger then you get the picture. With this not only having one set of numbers get bigger but having the other numbers get bigger as well. You need some form of system to keep the players wanting the numbers to get bigger. For idle clicker games you use the reset system to get the player coming back; with the MMORPG system you scale down those numbers in updates so you can keep numbers getting bigger or use the shared power system for the players to use. Personally I like using an XP reset system; once the XP hits max for the level, the XP subtracts from the XP cost bringing it down to 0 and as thus allowing that big number of XP to still feel big. Then you might be asking about the player leveling up which there is always the COD reset level system where once the level hits a big enough number you have it where the progress...
Read more

Power Creep

 Power creep can be both a good and a bad thing. With power creep you have it where players are being fed more powerful items or cards where they ditch old equipment for the new toys and make it so players will actually use it. On that same note you're trading the learning the items/ understanding how to make oneself more powerful through strats by relying on your given powerful new toys and making players throw them away again once more toys do show up. It's a useful investment strat for card games but does get boring for games where the only thing you have to look forward to is bigger more powerful numbers instead of different strats/ tactics you've never seen or used before with the bigger numbers feeling meaningless. Person experience; with Yu-Gi-Oh playing the rogue format was more fun even if I lost because I wasn't losing to the FTK format and actually scaled down in power with having fun seeing different strats/ tactics, that the limitations that were self impos...
Read more

Deck Size matters

 Small decks These kind of games make it where the game is being given a more consistent/ predictable strategy. The outcome being much more predictable but having it where players are dealing with mill and burn strats far too often making them busted. Large decks These kind of games make mill/ burn strats basically useless but have less reliance on consistent drawing what you want; however in a game where search abilities exist with the more search power the more options that open up and remove the down side of having a larger deck becomes.
Read more