Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
or “Wouldn't it be fun to play a game as Indiana Jones?” These are reasonable ideas,
and of course many games have been made from both of them. However, you can-
not make a game from a setting or character alone. The first step toward turning
the idea into a game concept is to answer the question, “What is the player going to
do?”
This is
the
single most important question you can ask yourself at the concept
stage. You don't have to assign activities to input devices yet (“the X button kicks
and the O button punches”), but you do have to know the activities that you want
to offer the player—the verbs of the game. For games in some genres, the answer is
simple and obvious: drive a race car or fight in a boxing match. For games in other
genres, such as role-playing games, the question may have many answers: explore,
fight, cast spells, collect objects, buy and sell, talk to dragons.
Video games allow someone to play—that is, to
act
. The player has purchased the
game in order to
do
something, not just to see, hear, or read something. Interactivity
is the
raison d'être
of all gaming; it is what sets gaming apart from presentational
forms of entertainment such as topics and movies. The correct answer to the ques-
tion, “Wouldn't it be fun to play a game set in ancient Rome?” is another question:
“Yes, it would. What kinds of things could a player do in ancient Rome?” The more
precise you are, the better. Avoid generalities such as “the player builds a city,” and
think of the exact verbs to assign to the input devices: buy land, sell land, con-
struct a road, and so on.
DESIGN RULE
Think About Player Actions First
Do not start designing the story, avatar, game world, artwork, or anything else until you
have answered the question “What is the player going to do?”
Defining the Role
Playing a game, especially board games and computer games, often involves play-
ing a
role
of some sort. In
Monopoly
, the role is real estate tycoon. In
From Russia
with Love
, the role is James Bond. Defining the player's role in the game world is a
key part of defining your game's concept. If the player's role is difficult to describe,
that role might be difficult for the player to grasp as well, and that may indicate
conceptual problems with the game. This doesn't mean that the role always has to
be simple or that the player sticks to just one role per game. In many sports games,
for example, the player can be an athlete, a coach, or the general manager. In team
games, the player often switches from one athlete to another as play progresses.
Shifting roles work well in a sports game because the game's audience understands
them, but if your game takes place in a less familiar world with less familiar objec-
tives, you must make the roles especially clear. If the player's role changes from
