To Walk Among Giants: Empowering a Play To Make Them Feel Strong

             I'm back from NYC and since we discussed the magic of how to make a player feel weak and helpless last time, through disempowerment, let's talk about the opposite this time.  Empowerment is pretty easy to understand on a lot of levels.  People like to feel strong, to feel capable.  Often, they aren't strong or able to feel proud of themselves due to illness or circumstance in real life, but a game can give them that feeling.  It can make them feel good about themselves.

It would feel good to be Kenshiro, punching a tank to death...games can give you that awesome feeling.

            Sadly, while it is easy to understand why empowering someone is so enchanting, it is often botched by those who attempt it.  See, there are a number of ways to empower a player and give them that feeling of strength and pride in themselves.  However many game designers fall prey to cliche or the idea that by simply making a player hard to kill or a game easy that it will have the same effect.  This is far from true, because hollow empowerment, an experience which tries to empower but which is plainly false and not convincing, is even worse than disempowerment.  It doesn't just make you realize your own situation.  It makes you feel like a sham for trying to be strong.  Real empowerment doesn't make you feel ashamed for trying or hollow or empty because it doesn't live up to the experience promised.  It gives you a real feeling of weight behind your actions and the play you make.

A shell of empowerment will only make you feel a shell of yourself...it will make you feel weak, not strong.  That must be avoided at all costs in games meant to empower.

            There are a number of very good ways to empower a player.  In fact, many games ramp up the difficulty for the sole purpose of this, as struggle and a little bit of disempowerment make an eventual victory even sweeter.  Dark Souls 1 and 2 are games that have the potential to be very frustrating, but the difficulty actually makes the victories you have very satisfying.  You start out at a decent power level.  You're not naked, unless you choose to be, and can fend for yourself.  However, the bosses and many enemies you face will be better equipped or just massive.  You will feel small and weak in comparison, but the game is built in such a way that you can win, no matter how weak you are, if you are able to recognize patterns or train yourself up.  It feels AMAZING to down a demon that can one shot you and which is 2-4 times your size.  So, while it can be disempowering to come across such challenges, building a game that is challenging, but balanced enough so that you can overcome it, makes victory feel all the more sweet.

This thing is just huge...downing it for the first time, I felt like such a bad ass.

            Personally, my favorite method of empowering a player is through sensory feedback.  Obviously, games cannot cater to all five senses, but sight, sound, and even touch can be catered to in video games and if they are sufficiently satisfied, then the player will actually feel closer to the character onscreen or more engaged in the action.  This will make their power feel all the more real, all the closer to home.  Warhammer 40K: Space Marine is a great example of sensory feedback.  The actions on screen are all beautifully animated and make the player feel strong, showing the overwhelming strength of the space marine you control compared the hordes you are fighting.  However, I would argue that sound design is where this game really shines.  You see, the standard weapons are bolters.  They are guns which have explosive shells and whenever one is fired, the sound is very satisfying.  It doesn't sound like a tiny pistol or even the insubstantial racket of a machine gun, it feels very solid and strong.  It's a nice blunt burst, followed by a tiny explosions to remind you of the power of the gun.  In fact, at once point, you get a machine gun version of the bolter called a twin combi-bolter, which doesn't sound like a machine gun at all...it sounds like something more akin to a minigun coupled with a rocket launcher.  Ironically, it's pretty weak compared to the other weapons later on.  However, I stuck with it for a while because the sound was so satisfying and it just felt good, hearing it whenever I fired it off in rapid succession.  With a rumble controller, games like Space Marine or other titles can even give you a touch sensation feedback.  It can help the game give you a real feeling of the weight of your actions.  This kind of sensory feedback can help you to feel strong and empowered because it is both satisfying, making the actions on screen resonate with the players, and it is also able to give them a feeling of importance through the sheer force of the senses.

The look, the sounds...everything in this game assaults the senses...and it feels good.

            A sense of realism is not necessarily needed when trying to empower a player.  Yes, I've talked about making the player feel more in tune with their game avatar through the senses, however that doesn't need to be grounded in reality...and indeed, most games feature physics or players wielding weapons that would be impossible to use normally.  However, there needs to be a feeling of weight behind the weapon.  Not heavy weight necessarily, but some weight.  For example, one of the satisfying things to do in Devil May Cry is to juggle an enemy with your guns.  To hold him up in the air and keep him there with gunfire.  If you took this out, the guns would have almost no weight, because they don't stagger enemies who are standing and if they couldn't hold an enemy in the air, they would have no power behind them.  They'd still do damage, but they would feel weak and would not empower the player.  Likewise, any game where you hit something?  There needs to be a feeling of weight behind each attack.  Light attacks can be somewhat weightless, since they are meant to be quick, glancing blows, but if a player throws a heavy attack it doesn't feel like it does anything, then you've done something wrong in designing the game.  One reason Dark Souls is so deep is because each weapon has weight behind it.  A different weight.  So, some attacks will be slow, laborious affairs that will shake the ground or stagger an enemy when they hit.  This gives them a feeling of weight that makes each action meaningful and allows the player to feel as if they are stronger than they are.  Sadly, Splatterhouse doesn't always do this.  I love the game, but the fists feel a bit pointless...weapons and the super form are a bit slower in their swings and do more damage/stagger the enemy and they feel satisfying because of it, however the regular fists are a bit unsatisfying.

Imagine how much less bad ass you'd feel if your guns couldn't do this...the weight of those attacks matters.

            I would even go so far to say that this does not just extend to games where you fight.  A game like Harvest Moon or Rune Factory can give meaning to your farming by making the swing of your hoe feel heavy or the flow of your fishing line light because it's only a bit of wood with twine attached to it.  These different feelings of weight add, not necessarily a sense of reality, but a sense of value to the actions.  A player who feels their actions have value is a player who feels empowered.  It makes them feel strong because what they are doing has meaning in the world of the game.

If each swing of the hoe has meaning and value, then the game will make you feel good.

            Another important thing to think about is challenge.  Now, I've already talked about how disempowering a player only to have them rise from the ashes stronger than before can be a great way of empowering them, however challenge as a whole is a very important aspect of game design to consider.  Many game developers think it's fine to just let players follow a linear, easy path to the end, leading them by the nose so that they can see the sights and be done with it.  However, without challenge, without a feeling of resistance by the game, then the victory feels meaningless.  It is hollow.  I don't think a game should be so brutal that players cannot win, like say Ghouls and Goblins or Silver Surfer on the NES, because those games are so unfair in their design that it feels almost pointless to try, because without hours of work, you can't even advance past the third or fourth level.  However, don't make it so easy that the players feel like they're being given a win.  They have to earn it on some level, otherwise it won't be empowering.  Tiny Barbarian DX is, in my opinion, a decent balance in this regard.  The game gives you infinite lives, so you don't get kicked back to the beginning arbitrarily, however when you die it puts you back to the start of that particular section.  You still have to win each boss battle with no more than six pieces of health and each section is still a platforming and combat based challenge.  It requires skill and work to get through, but it's not necessarily hard, because you can try as often as you want.  I think this balance is important in making a game both empowering but also accessible to players who may not be the best in terms of skill.

Tiny Barbarian DX may not be hard, but it ain't easy.  This game strikes a nice balance.

            Choice is another aspect of game design that allows for a player to be empowered.  I am NOT talking about arbitrary choice.  Not talking about a button at the end of the game which gives you either ending A or ending B.  I'm talking about meaningful choice.  Doing something that feels like it matters.  Sometimes these choices can be organic.  Demon's Crest lets players go to levels in whatever order they choose.  Some of these levels will be impossibly hard than others, because you won't have the skills you need, however the choice, where you can go and the ability to not just stick with it, but change it, is powerful.  It lets a player feel in control.  This is why sandbox games are so popular these days.  Because while you will have a story based mission, the plethora of side missions and open world interaction, organic interaction like driving a cab or an ambulance in Grand Theft Auto, allow you to play your way and gives the player the feeling that they are in control of their own destiny.  That feeling of choice and power over how they play in a game like Skyrim can be very empowering, because they are not restricted, like they might be in real life.  In real life, we need to work, sleep, go to school, do assignments, whatever.  In a game, being able to choose not to sleep, or choose to go against the beaten path or the established formula...it feels refreshing, because it gives us a feeling of freedom we don't get in normal life.  And that's why choice is so empowering.  It gives us the power to do what we cannot in normal life.

Choose your own path, be it the path of the crook or the path of the savior.

            Now, I have given several examples of ways to empower players.  The feeling of weight behind actions, choice, sensory impact, disempowerment peppered with hope for the future, challenge, etc.  But don't try and shoehorn everything into one game.  These are ways of empowering a player, not a checklist.  Every game needs to try and do it in its own way and sometimes that way may be derivative or even completely unique from these examples I'm given.  They don't all need to be included, but I'd say that at least one or two couldn't hurt.  Because, for the player to feel empowered when that is the game's intent?  That's important...not just for the designer, but for the player as well.  It can help them face the demons they're dealing with in their life by giving them an outlet where they can build confidence and be strong.  The most important thing a developer can do, is play a game and ask if they feel strong while playing it.  Not, is the story good, or is the music beautiful, or are the graphics AAA.  Ask if you feel powerful while playing it.

If you feel powerful, you'll be less afraid of the demons, real and make believe, that assail you.

            I recently bought a game called Risk of Rain for the PC and for a while, I just felt weak playing it.  However, it had many different characters with different play styles to choose from and eventually I found one I liked.  A poison beast called Acrid who had to fight up close so enemies could easily wail on him, but he could destroy great swathes of them if he poisoned them, since the poison was strong.  Now, this mixed both a feeling of challenge, choice, and something I can't quite put my finger on to make me feel tough.  I was well aware the enemies could kill me easily, and I did die, but I walked through them like a giant, laying waste to all in my path for a while, even the large bosses.  It just felt good.  And if a developer can play a game and say, I feel good...I feel strong...then they know they've got a winner on their hands.

I may be small, but my poison is fierce >:)

            Empowering a player may seem like a no brainer, but making it feel genuine is actually pretty tough.  It's something I encourage not just developers, but players to think about.  Because we all need that boost to feel powerful sometimes and nothing is more pitiable than trying to unwind and feel strong with a game, only to feel cheated, frustrated, and weak by the end.

            I enjoy games that can genuinely make me feel powerful, because many games will actually go that extra mile to not only make you feel strong while playing, but to make you feel strong even after you stop.  By making a hard choice or doing something challenging, you can feel the empowerment of your game and avatar even after you've stopped playing and it can help you through your trials.

We all need to feel powerful sometime.  Confidence will help us survive the trials ahead...so empower through gaming.

            Disempowerment has its uses, for story, to teach us about fear so we are ready when life throws challenges our way, or just because we want to feel low for a bit...but empowerment, I believe is just as if not more important, because it helps us with living our lives.

            I hope you've enjoyed this discussion on power fantasy, both disempowerment and empowerment.  Next week, I believe we'll go back to a creator spotlight, like I promised so long ago, however I have to say that alongside writing for my other blog, I'm also preparing to go to China soon.  So...my updates may be a tad sporadic.  Sorry if that's inconvenient, but it is what it is.  I have my priorities after all.  I don't intend to stop, but if I need to take time to get done what needs doing, I will.

            Thanks to everyone who continues reading this silly little blog of mine, even now.

Month of Characters Follow up: What Makes a Good Character?

Following my month of characters, I thought I might give some context to the lists and discuss what makes a good character and how so many writers and designers end up screwing up potentially iconic characters.

            First, let's start with heroes.  There are two basic types of heroes in video gaming that are very common.  The first are heroes who we find admirable, personable, or otherwise likable.  They are our avatars, but they are not us.  They have their own character, their own arcs, and their own agenda.  What makes a good hero?  Well, for starters, they need vulnerability.  The story may suggest that the hero can never die, however a hero is only compelling if the illusion of failure is hinted at through fallacies and weaknesses that the hero possesses.  For example, a personable hero having specific emotional triggers, phobias, or personality flaws is very humanizing, as we can often recognize those within ourselves.  These are sometimes the hardest to pull off in video game characters convincingly, because while a tragic past is rather easy to concoct, it can be difficult to make a hero vulnerable and weak, but still admirable and strong. 

Kratos is just not a well designed character from a story standpoint.  He's angry before his tragedy, he's angry after his tragedy and his back story barely ever comes up.  As a character, he's just a ball of rage with no reason to be but to kill.

            Kratos from the God of War series is an excellent example of a hero who fails to be relatable.  While he does have a tragic past, his personality is all rage, sarcasm, cruelty, and disdain.  He never shows signs of human weakness during battle or even during much of the plot.  And when he does attempt to show some weakness, it feels contrived because the character has not been built to actually support that weakness.  It is being jammed in where it is not wanted.  On the flipside of that, we have Ness from the Earthbound/Mother series.  Despite being a largely silent protagonist, Ness has several humanizing factors to him through game design.  Over the course of the game, Ness can come down with a number of status ailments that make it clear that he is, in fact, still just a kid and not some immortal super being.  Ness can get homesick and need to call his mother for support.  Ness can get the flu or a cold and need medicine.  Ness can get sick from allergic reactions and need homeopathic healing.  These small touches show that Ness is in fact a kid and vulnerable to childhood maladies, both physical and psychological.  It provides a nice perspective, showing that for all the new age hippies or knife wielding thugs you can take down with your psychic powers, you do still need a cuddle from your mommy or a teddy bear to start the day.  Watching a character act human is so much more relatable than a tragic back story.  If you are going to give a character a tragic back story, have it directly relate to their character and their vulnerabilities.  Dante, in the original Devil May Cry on the Playstation 2, lost his mother to demons.  While a great deal of information is not given, it comes out that this was a momentous event for him that shook him, through the story.  He takes a job from a woman named Trish primarily because of her resemblance to his mother.  When she betrays him, it hits the devil hunter very hard and after she is killed, he sheds tears for her.  His past directly relates to his character development in the game and it shows that he is vulnerable to being deceived because of his past.

Despite his cocky attitude, Dante has a tragic backstory that actually affects how he decides to act in the game, causing him to both grow and show signs of vulnerability.  This makes him a far more well rounded character than Kratos or your average shooter character.

        The other type of character is a power fantasy character.  Largely, these characters are avatars for the human players, with little to no personality of their own, allowing players to feel strong by playing the role of these characters in the game.  While this can lead to some interesting political, religious, or philosophical commentary, too often it is used for somewhat...reprehensible dreams.  A power fantasy character done wrong is where the game is built around appealing to the most base instincts of the human psyche, things like the desire to fornicate, the desire for wealth or power, the desire to kill in order to feel strong.  Modern warfare shooters appeal to players by allowing them to fit the stereotypical soldier, a walking death machine who kills without remorse in the name of the greater good(in the narrative at least) without consequence.  God of War, while not strictly a power fulfillment game as Kratos isn't a blank slate, does allow players to have sex with random women without consequence, and actually rewards the act.  Sexual games in Japan are also catered towards this style of play, allowing gamers to take on a character they can put themselves into as they either woo or abuse women for their own enjoyment.  These kinds of games do, sadly, fill the power fantasy requirement of giving characters the ability to make themselves feel strong, virile, or well off, however the actions that give off these feelings are, in my opinion, tragically flawed and can at times promote unhealthy views towards different races, genders, or the world in general. 

Ninja Gaiden 3 is power fantasy done very poorly.  It outright forces you to do acts that are horrific, even if they are empowering, without any set of consequences...they even reward you for it.  The infamous scene of Ryu killing a begging soldier, being forced to kill a begging soldier, is a sign of how flawed the game approaches making players feel tough.

            So, how do you pull of power fantasy heroes?  Well, there are a few good ways to do this.  The first is to supplant some of the more base desires and hit the itch to explore.  Power fantasies aren't just about base instincts, they are about being able to do in a game what you cannot do in real life.  Crafting a world or an environment that fosters exploration and rewards it, not necessarily with money or items, but with sights and experiences they cannot see elsewhere really helps grant players a reward for their effort.  Dark Souls does this quite well.  Though the world may be bleak and lonely, it offers a unique experience where the very act of exploring allows players to see things they could never hope to see in the real world, be it giant monsters, or unforgettable sights, such as crawling through a huge tree to reach an acid lake at the bottom.  Another good way to do power fantasy characters is to make the hero generally a good guy.  This allows you to not only enjoy the world that's been crafted around you, but also it allows some of those baser instincts to be sated without some of the guilt.  Adol Christian, for example, is an explorer and a swordsman who frequently makes romantic acquaintances with beautiful women the world over.  However, Adol does not take advantage of their affections as he is a character who acts with honor.  Adol is silent, so the interactions of those around him give us context to this effect, making the players accept the lack of ability to take advantage of those around us.  Also, Adol is a skilled swordsman and the combat in the Ys games is fast and enjoyable, allowing players to feel good about defeating monsters and protecting the innocent, rather than killing other human beings for some vaguely defined hyper masculine idea of patriotism.  Above all else, power fantasy should be about freedom, though.  Freedom to explore, freedom to challenge conventions, freedom to do as you wish.  This may lead some players to running over hookers in Grand Theft Auto, but a good power fantasy game does show that your actions have negative consequences, such as increased notoriety score and the possibility of being arrested or killed, and that while it is possible for you to hurt others for your own enjoyment...it's not the wisest idea.  In this way, they can subtly guide the player to a more fulfilling experience.  Power fantasy characters use the world and our own human impulses to affect us, often without our realizing.

While often cited as a highly adult game, Grand Theft Auto actually does do power fantasy very well.  You can do horrific acts to people around you, but it comes with consequences, like being arrested or killed.  In contrast, if you act like a good citizen, the game actually will award you money for saving people.

            Now, for villains.  Once again, there are two main types of villains.  Tragic villains and despicable villains.  Before we go into that, however, let me just say that in many games, villains are much easier to make than heroes.  If you do not have a villain who looms over the party for much of the game, you merely have to create a character at the end who has ties to the characters or the game world, has a view that is horrific or unjust, and who has a good reason to fight the main characters.  Final Fantasy Legend is a good example of this, in my opinion.  There are six main villains.  The four who guard the main worlds, Ashura, and the Creator.  The four who guard the main worlds are using their power to oppress the peoples of their worlds and/or block the way up the tower, as the higher up characters get, the stronger they become and are therefore more of a threat to these villains.  We don't have much prior contact to them, but the facts that they act in a manner that is clearly evil, that they don't replace someone more interesting or who we've had an investment in, and that they have a reason to want to stop us justifies these actions.  Ashura and the Creator are very similar in this regard.  However, they make ingratiating offers of the player, showing that while they have views that may be unjust, they are not entirely unreasonable, feral, or evil for the sake of being evil.  This shows some depth and allows the players to feel as if they have made a real triumph in refusing the offers these two make.

Bowser is fine as a simple villain.  He opposes Mario and wants to rule the Mushroom Kingdom.  Simple and to the point.

            Now, that said, that kind of template only works for the most basic of villain.  Really interesting and memorable villains are those with nuance, who you develop an emotional attachment to, and who are iconic in their own right.  Tragic villains usually have a back story that is depressing or has altered their view points so that they are acting in a manner that seems evil, but which is justified to them.  Like characters with tragic back stories, for these villains to really succeed, you need to interweave their current actions with their past, otherwise they become stock villains.  Evoland is a game which charts the history of adventure and role playing games in a satirical fashion and the main villain, who comes out of nowhere, is revealed to have a tragic backstory of his race being hunted for some reason, despite never mentioning it, hinting at it, or showing and trace of bitterness or regret until the final battle.  This is the definition of a stock villain, and Evoland created him in that way to parody the RPG stock villains of past and future.  A tragic villain with some bite is one who knows that what they are doing may not be justifiable, but still believe it is best for them or those dear to them.  Kato from Shadow Hearts: Covenant is this kind of villain.  He carries himself with an air of melancholy and early on he and Yuri discuss the loss of his love.  This melancholy and reference to his tragic past carry on throughout the game through his interactions with his superiors, who he has contempt for, and his resurrection of his lost love, albeit without her memories.  In the end, Kato decides to try and alter fate for the sake of love.  While he recognizes all the people he can and likely will hurt through these actions, to him it is justified because of all that he has lost.  This is a really well defined villain that players feel for and grow attached to.  They are lucid, reasonable, likable even, and are not deluded about the course of actions they have chosen to take.  A good way to mess up writing a tragic villain, apart from a stock backstory that is only mentioned once for the sake of pathos, is to have them be unreasonable, petulant, and whiny about their tragedy.  I honestly believe that Luc, from the Suikoden series, is a rather poor villain because he not only does he have immense power, but he has fought on the side of justice before and has a stern, but loving teacher and girl friend.  He should be perfectly content with his life.  However, the source of his power, his "true rune" of wind, which grants him mastery over wind and eternal life, seems to cause him distress as he believes his destiny is not his own.  So, he seeks to free himself from this burden by destroying the true rune, in an experiment which could wipe out an entire country.  Really, this is like saying "Wah!  Wah!  My whole life, people have made choices for me, I never got to live MY life!"  The truth is, Luc HAS lived his life, has made choices, and even if it felt like his destiny was being controlled, it was still ultimately up to him.  We all have choices.  But this attitude makes him seem whiny and ungrateful.  A sharp contrast from his previous appearances.

Kato is an excellent tragic villain, having his tragic backstory shown in the original Shadow Hearts and explained fully in the sequel.  His back story affects his actions and he sees what he is doing as justified, even if he has to commit horrors to do it.

            Despicable villains can be a bit more fun than tragic villains, as they're not meant to be liked.  They are meant to be hated for their actions, which are still justified in their eyes.  Despicable villains do what makes them happy or what advances them without care for others, so they can be pretty shallow character wise.  However, their actions can speak great depths about the kind of person they are and give them some memorability.  Going back to Suikoden again, in Suikoden 2, Luca Blight is the main villain for most of the game.  He has his father poisoned and wages a bloody war across the country to spill as much blood as possible to empower the "beast" rune inscribed in his castle.  However, he really just likes killing.  Luca is a textbook case of an anti-social psychotic who gets enjoyment out of bloodshed.  Yet, he's not an impotent villain who just loves killing because it makes him feel big.  He's trained his whole life as a warrior and can hold his own, frequently taking part in the killing himself.  In fact, to bring Luca down it takes a squad of six soldiers against him, after he's been wounded, a barrage of arrows, and a final duel against the enemy commander while he is near death, bleeding out, and pumped full of holes.  This kind of villain is memorable because of how despicable he is.  Same for Kefka.  He's insane.  He wants power for his own sake, so that he can do as he pleases and takes great pleasure in causing suffering.  He's not afraid to fight on his own, but he's memorable for his quirky personality, something Luca was rather missing, and his unique visual appearance, resembling a harlequin.  Despicable villains can be well spoken or thoughtful as well, such as Grahf from Xenogears musing on the nature of human existence or on the darkness and evil which resides within us all, even though he freely kills his subordinates and wants to destroy all.  So, how do you destroy a good despicable villain?  Make their plan not make sense within the context of the world or for their character.  Barthandelus from Final Fantasy 13 is a good example.  Despite having a memorable look, his plan is very, very stupid.  He wants to reduce the entire world to nothing.  Now, you could argue that this is stupid, and I have, because he acts as a god, lives in luxury, and his children basically rule the world.  But, devil's advocate, let's say he's gone insane and wants to reduce the world to nothing.  Why doesn't he do it himself?  He is a god after all.  Why does he need to rely on proxies to do it for him?  And why does he think destroying the world will bring his creator/father back when there doesn't seem to be any evidence it will?  Why does he, if he wants himself to die to, fight and hound the players?  See, a despicable villain does not have to be terribly deep, but their plan needs to make sense from a certain perspective.  Luca likes killing, so he starts a war.  Simple.  Kefka wants power and is selfish, so he weasels his way into a position of power and then turns himself into a god of magic.  A bit contrived, but sensible.  Barthandelus wants to reduce the world to nothing, so he and his organization actively try and stop the people he manipulated into becoming the tools for the end of the world...wait, what?

Luca Blight is an excellent despicable villain who simply has a deep rooted need for slaughter.  He is absolutely reprehensible, but very memorable because, as he said, it took hundreds to bring him down, but he killed thousands with abject glee.

            Aside from a poorly realized master scheme, there are two final pratfalls to avoid when writing villains.  The first is comparison.  If you are going to have a really impressive villain in your game, one who follows the outlines set up above, you don't want to create something more impressive or more dangerous or more interesting than them.  This will leave the audience feeling cheated, as they invested time in believing your important villain was important, but then something bigger, cooler, and more evil comes along.  This is why you don't have a giant evil demon boss BEFORE you have your human trying to force people to act a certain way for the greater good.  The taste of the villain sours after you've had something bigger and more impressive.  Second is supplanting the main villain.  Especially with tragic villains, we, the audience, grow just as attached to the bastard we want taken down as we do to the heroes.  So, if we spend most of the game hating and fighting and preparing to fight one big villain, only to have him be replaced by a lamer, stupider, less powerful/intimidating villain, it will really sour the games taste.  Seymour Guado in Final Fantasy 10 should've been our final final boss, but he was replaced by Yu Yevon, who was barely alive to begin with.  Satan killed the Lord of Necromancers in Castlevania: Lords of Shadows because "Evil muahahahahaha!"  Look, I get that you want a twist, but you can do better.  Replacing an iconic villain like Vaz in Far Cry 3 will just make us call bull shit.  The only time when this can work is if you have a villain we are equally familiar with, either masquerading as a hero or hiding in the sidelines where we still know he exists but he's not the top priority, come out and one up our main villain.  The twist in the original Bioshock where Andrew Ryan is replaced is one of the more subtle and brilliant plot twists in modern gaming.  It can be done, but it takes finesse, proper scripting, and good pacing.  Not to be tried by amateurs and not to be used for shock value.  You will only piss off your audience if you throw in a twist just for the sake of having a twist.

Vaz is the face of evil in Far Cry 3...so why isn't he the final final boss?  Why waste such a good character?!

            And so, that's my follow up to the month of characters.  Aspiring designers, script writers, or storytellers, take notice.  I've given you the secret to making good heroes and villains on a silver platter.  It amazes me how, even to this day, poorly written characters just get a pass.  We, as gamers, demand better from our heroes and villains.  We want them to be memorable, but not for how bad they are.  So, I hope this has given a little bit of context to why I did the month of characters in May.

AAA Illusion: Working to Create an Immersive Experience

It feels like all I do these days at the start of these posts is apologize…so I’m going to stop doing it.  Time’s going to pass, but I hope I don’t abandon this blog, because I think it is important.  With that said, let’s get right into it.

            On my last post, a friend commented on my discussion of games and limitations.  While they could understand my perspective and how limitations were important, they offered an interesting counter-argument and asked that I explore it.  The idea being that, as limitations became fewer and games became more powerful, they could create an immersive experience through far more advanced smoke and mirrors.  Using illusion, the game designers were able to craft an experience that was far more engaging than in previous gaming generations, where people could literally get lost in the game worlds.

If you want to craft an immersive game world, you can't rely on futuristic visors.  You need to rely on smart design choices.

            Appropriate examples of this were games like Skyrim, Dark Souls, or Half-Life 2, which offered rich, engrossing worlds that tried to make the player feel as if they were part of them.  As if they were real.  However, my friend also asked me to comment on one important aspect of these illusions.  They seldom ever hold up.  You see, for all the power of modern gaming, people still like to take short cuts or they make bad design decisions, or they just can’t check games as well as they should.  And this hurts the illusion they’re trying to sell and overall, the experience of the game.

            Two perfect examples of this are the Grand Theft Auto games and the Silent Hill games.  While Silent Hill has always benefited from limited graphics, making monsters more unnerving and the environments more haunting, they can be incredibly frustrating for not selling their illusion.  In almost every Silent Hill game, a good 70-80% of all doors you see will be locked and unable to enter.  Now, this might make sense if it’s late at night and you’re in an office building or what have you…but if the buildings are abandoned or part of some demonic other world, why even put the doors there if they’re just going to be locked?  It’s like teasing the players with worlds they could explore, but can’t because the designers got lazy or ran out of money.

The floor plan for the apartment building in Silent Hill 2.  Note the obscene amount of X'ed out entrances.

            Likewise, in Grand Theft Auto, there are so many places people can go and things they can do, offering an illusion of real freedom, but the least explored part of the game?  The inside of buildings.  So much work is put into making the city look and feel alive however players see so many office buildings, shopping centers, car dealers, etc. and they can approach them on the outside, but often, they can’t go inside.  Same with Prototype or Infamous…there are so many places to explore outside, but the use of a door is a mystery to the main character.  And herein lies a big problem for modern gaming.  They are making design choices that simply aren’t immersive for the purpose of aesthetic value.  In a Silent Hill game, everything is tense because of all the doors and the dread of what could lurk behind them.  And in a GTA game, the city would look weird if it was just a whole bunch of walls with no doors.  Aesthetically, they aid the game’s atmosphere and overall look, however, they also hurt the illusion of a real world the game is trying to make.

Hey, hey!  See all those buildings?  Those windows?  Those doors?  Yeah...you're not allowed into those.

            To further demonstrate this idea, I want to look at three current generation games.  Skyrim, Xenoblade Chronicles, and Dark Souls.  The first two attempt to create a truly immersive world, but fail for relatively simple reasons, while the third actually manages to create a world that feels alive.  Starting off, Skyrim.  While one could argue about the aesthetic quality of the menus in the game, the user interface, character creation, and various abilities that the game allows players to indulge in, such as smithing, tanning, or alchemy, give it a feeling of freedom, as if the players are in total control of their destiny.  They can go anywhere and do anything.  However, Skyrim, big as it is, has limits.  And those limits tend to be invisible walls.  Skyrim is a game that suffers from the developers simply creating a box and saying, “You can’t go past here, even if you can see past it.”  Forests or mountains will simply have a wall where players cannot move past, even though they can see past it.  This happens far too often in sand box games.  Some can circumvent it, but when people simply choose to indulge in invisible walls, it greatly hurts the immersion.  And the many bugs, while amusing, also hurt the game’s realistic feel.  Seeing a dragon flying upside down or a mammoth floating in mid air might be fun the first time, but if it keeps happening, players will just continually be reminded that they are in a game…not in Skyrim.

Do I even need to say anything?  "You cannot go that way."  Really?!  Tcch...lazy invisible walls

  Xenoblade Chronicles, ironically, fails for almost completely opposite reasons.  It creates a lush, beautiful world for players to explore with tons of details, such as a giant, looming in the background that players will actually get to climb on.  And, more importantly, no invisible walls.  Players can jump, run, and swim nearly anywhere they can see.  Sometimes those jumps will be too much for them and the fall will kill them, but the point is, if their hit points are high enough, they can literally go anywhere.  The environments allow a true freedom of exploration that is free of bugs.  However, where the game fails is in the combat.  While the overall aesthetic is impressive, as character appearance changes with different armor and there are no random encounters, the gameplay is built like a faux MMORPG, which forces players to auto attack, rely on computer controlled AI, and spam their skills without really feeling in control of their character or their party.  The combat makes players very much aware that they are playing a game and this is heartbreaking.  For all the detail and immersive elements in the game, the combat just pulls players out of the experience.  It is sticky, slow, and teeth grindingly frustrating, as it is heavily focused on grinding.  However, rather than having one to one control like in a Dragon Quest game, the designers took control away from the players for this baffling choice of battle system.  There are also several “time saver” features, such as the ability to manipulate time to make it day or night whenever players feel like.  While this may aid in the unbelievably monotonous and boring quests in the game, it really hurts immersion.

See that scenery in the distance?  You can go to all of that.  There are no walls here.  Pity the combat sucks so hard.

 In my opinion, Dark Souls is probably one of the few games to create an immersive, illusory world that players can get lost in and invested in.  Made even more so by the online element.  Dark Souls features a world that, with a few exceptions, such as being warped to a new area, is completely interconnected, with varying shortcuts and ways to get around with no loading screens and, more importantly, no invisible walls.  No intentionally invisible walls at least.  The game does have several hidden walls that players can find however, anywhere a player can see, they can go.  And, they have one to one control over their character in the game.  What makes the game even more immersive is that players can encounter phantoms of other players, who will attack them, aid them, or leave them messages, creating a truly living world with other players who act like real people, sometimes leaving fake clues, helping out of kindness, or who act with malice for no other reason than they enjoy it.  The game isn’t perfect, as players who die of falling can get hung up on certain objects to humorous effect and there are a few spots here and there where, even if you can get to them, they impede your character when they really shouldn’t.  However, on the whole, Dark Souls offers one of the most immersive experiences in gaming, which is important, since there is very little story.  The game relies on its dark atmosphere and crushingly realistic design choices to sell the world.

Look at that level design.  You can go anywhere you can see, including off the ledge if you so choose.  Total freedom.  You know...until the game kills you.

 Now, looking at these three games, some tips can be gleaned.  First, if you’re going to make a game where players can go anywhere, don’t create an overly complicated battle system or one that removes control from the player.  It will only annoy them.  Second, if you want to release a big, immersive, sandbox type game, check it for bugs.  Check it.  And check it.  And check it again.  Patches might be needed to fix the game, but don’t use a future patch as an excuse or a crutch.  Make the game right the first time.  And finally, most importantly, make the game feel organic.  No invisible walls.  In Dark Souls, they have limitations in place but they’re not invisible.  Crevices, mountain walls, deep patches of water that players can see and that any respectably armored warrior would be unable to swim through all dot Dark Souls and they act as boundaries.  They are all visible and players know to test their limits at their own peril.  Skyrim, however, can have players going through a forest and hit a wall, even though nothing is in their way.  This is remarkably easy to fix.  For example: If you want to create a wall that separates Skyrim from other areas in the world, why not put a literal wall there.  Like a border guard that refuses anyone entry and cannot be opened from that side.  It creates a literal wall, teasing players about what’s beyond but also telling them that their goal lies within that wall.  Or, if you have an area bordering the ocean, create several cliffs around the edge.  Allow players to jump off the bluffs, but line it with jagged rocks.  They might die if they jump, but they’ll feel like the world is organic, as if they did that in real life it would have the same effect.  There are countless ways to make a world bounded, but in an organic way so that players do not notice how gamey it is.  Dark Souls may occasionally use warps, but they try to make them seem organic as well, such as having a crow or a gargoyle take players places rather than just a fade to black and a loading screen, something that even Xenoblade falls prey to at times, so that it seems like all the worlds are interconnected.  And while players need control over themselves, don’t let them control their world.  Don’t give them a weather controller or a timer feature.  They might think it’s cool and useful the first time they use it, but more often than not, they’ll eventually forget about it and using it again will only take them out of the game.

You want to create boundaries for the players?  Can't do better than an island.  Invisible walls not necessary.

 There is one other tip I have for game designers.  Put forth more effort.  I know game design is difficult.  Ridiculously so at times.  There are deadlines and changes that need to be made, testing for errors and recording voices or crafting cinematics and far too often the publisher can dictate additions to the game that may not make sense or which are far too time consuming to be reasonable.  However, if you are going to put three years into making a game, you may as well go all the way and make it as polished as possible.  Make the illusion complete.  Even if a room has to be copy pasted from others, that’s better than a locked door or one that’s painted onto a wall.  Now, not all games need to adhere to his.  Games like Culdcept Saga on the Xbox 360 have a distinctly gamey feel to them as part of their design.  They play similar to monopoly with a TCG element added in, so immersion is a non-issue with that kind of game.  However, if you’re trying to use illusion to create an immersive game experience then make sure the illusion is flawless.  Don’t get lazy.  Make the game world feel so real that players are literally scared of looking around them when they play a horror game or so intense that they can hear the birds and feel the breeze in an open world game.  Don’t put in invisible walls to save time rendering cliffs.  Don’t create battle or gameplay systems that are counter intuitive to the overall feel of the game just because it’s popular.  Don’t be satisfied with good enough.  If you’re going to create a world, create it the right way.

Nothing kills immersion like this crap.  Don't be lazy.  Close the gate, make the bridge broken, have a troupe of guards stopping you, do something!  Don't just say "Sorry, can't go this way any longer."

 This can be considered a big problem for modern gaming.  With the rise of technology, games have certainly become more beautiful, but they are also far more time consuming to create and thus, making a cliff or ten for Skyrim could take weeks, compared to adding in a room or two in Silent Hill which might only take a few days with existing resources.  On this, I can’t really offer any advice other than learn from the work of others.  Many games have preceded this current generation.  Some, like Half-Life and its sequel are truly immersive for different reasons.  Look at these games during the conceptual stages of game development and use them as a baseline for how to make the game world more engaging.  You don’t need to reinvent the wheel.  Learn from past mistakes.  Skyrim, for example, has the same invisible wall problems as its predecessor Oblivion.  If the developers had taken a lesson from their previous game and from fan feedback, they might have been able to rework the map of Skyrim a bit to solve the issue of walls.  Or in Xenoblade Chronicles, if you want a world without random encounters, why not look at other games that avoided them?  Chrono Trigger side stepped random encounters and even allowed players to battle without having to create a separate screen or interface for it.  Dragon Quest 8 and Blue Dragon from the previous and current generations respectively allowed enemies to be seen on the map screens before engaging them.  Developers may not play games as much as gamers do, but they should at the very least know their history and competition.  If their competitors or previous games have made use of a feature like theirs, learn from it.

Don't wanna break immersion?  Then random battles are not necessary.  But...be smart about it.

I know it is easy to say, “Well they should do this, it was better in this game, I’m smarter than you, etc.” and it might seem unfair or ungrateful for me to ask for more effort from already overworked and often underpaid game developers.  However, the truth is, if you want to make something that people have to pay for, you need to provide a better product.  The world is saturated with games right now, from the current and previous generations.  Dark Souls offered me an immersive experience that I managed to enjoy despite its frustration and while it was similar to games I’d played before, it went in a different direction that captivated me.  It was polished and even when I got frustrated, I still wanted to keep playing.  Xenoblade, by contrast, was heartbreakingly beautiful to watch, but was absolutely no fun to play.  The combat was so frustrating and took me out of the game so much that I gave up on trying to finish it because it simply wasn’t fun.  Why should I try to beat a game I don’t want to play, when I have at least five other games in my library that do what it does, but better?  I understand that game developers aren’t perfect.  They can make mistakes or overlook certain things, but at the same time, if I have to pay $50-$60 for a game, then I want my money’s worth.  I want something that I can enjoy, be immersed in, and not be taken out of.  I want illusion.  I want the game to tell me the perfect lie.  And, like with real life, if you’re caught in a lie…you ought to own up to it and have to suffer the consequences.  Above all other things though, I just want effort.  When looking at comic books, the critic Linkara said that sometimes poor design choices are ok.  That a lame idea can turn out great or at least decent in its execution.  And that sometimes, with a little common sense or research, a bad idea can be made better.  He stated that he didn’t want his comics to be re-written.  He just wanted good stories to be told.  He wanted effort.  And that is what I want.  If you’re going to try and sell me a world, don’t put up invisible walls or remove my ability to control my characters in combat.  Sell the illusion.  In this modern era of gaming, you can’t use limitations as an excuse.  Sell the illusion or don’t expect any of my money.