Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
So far in this chapter, we've discussed resistance in ways very similar to traditional ideas of dif-
ficulty. Games that try to create flow require players to push into the system with increasing skill
met by increasing challenge, often involving the development of a verb. Other games eschew
flow in favor of other kinds of experience and understanding. Let's think about yet another way
of looking at resistance: opening and narrowing the space of choice for the player. In a game
like
To mb ed
, a lot of the resistance comes from the constant “push” of the descending spiked
ceiling. The player has
to figure out how to act, right now, or face certain death, and the game
grows more difficult as the player masters more ways to use its verbs.
Anna's game
REDDER
at first: the player travels
deeper and deeper into the ground through a series of tunnels and chambers, albeit as an
astronaut exploring a seemingly alien landscape of mysterious and dangerous technology.
REDDER
, however, has a much more open feeling compared to the tight, constrained feeling
of
To mb ed
, because the player can wander in many different directions (see Figure
might seem thematically similar to
To mb ed
). Even
though some of the challenges are similar, sometimes involving dangerous force-fields mov-
ing toward the player's avatar and requiring quick timing to move past them, the feeling of
resistance is very different.
6.10
Unlike
To mb ed
, the player can decide to retreat from a dangerous-
looking room and explore in another direction, since
REDDER
allows the player to move off the
screen to other areas, traveling left, right, or upward as well as downward. This puts some of the
shaping of the game's resistance into the hands of the player.
Figure 6.10
A scene from
REDDER
providing the player with different directions to explore and
hazards to avoid.
