Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
player that dodges the other player's attack can counterattack and gains
the most points. A scenario in which both of them attack yields a little
less value, and both of them dodging each other yields almost no value.
It's not one-to-one, but you get the point.
If you study game theory you'll find deeper, more interesting dilem-
mas that are tougher to solve. And the thinking associated with solving
them is much like the thinking a player must do to excel in a game—that
is, predicting opponent behaviors.
Symbology and Graphic Design
If your game includes graphics—and most (but not all) video games and
board games do—then you need to study graphic design and symbology.
You'll be surprised not only at how difficult it can be to express certain
game actions with an icon, but also at how much explanatory power a
good icon can have.
Graphic design can help teach you how to organize your informa-
tion on your HUD (heads-up display) or game board. A game that is
well designed graphically is simply easier to play. You could always hire
a graphic designer to help you with this, but the advantage of learning
some of it yourself is that you'll sometimes find that a system's graphic-
design problems can be a sign of game-design
problems. If your infor-
mation is really hard to organize, there may either be too much of it or it
may not be related closely enough.
Teaching Your Game
The greatest game in the world is of no value to anyone if people can't
figure out how to play it. In ancient times, games were taught via oral
tradition: one generation passed down the rules to the next, and along
the way (as tends to happen with such systems) there was probably some
random mutations. The invention of writing allowed for the invention
of the game manual, which allowed for more complex rulesets. More
recently, the interactive tutorial has been introduced as a way to show
people how to play video games. Regardless, teaching your game is go-
ing to be difficult, and the more interesting and new your game is, the
more difficult it will be. Manuals have the advantage of being completely
voluntary for the user, and can be very in-depth, but they can have the
disadvantage of being harder to understand and requiring more focus.
Interactive tutorials allow the player to play while learning, which can be
good, but many games make the terrible mistake of forcing tutorials on
players by making the first hour of play a tutorial that can't be skipped.
