|
|
| Line 18: |
Line 18: |
| | *Threat-Reward Inversion | | *Threat-Reward Inversion |
| | **That which you chase, becomes that which chases you, and vice-versa, on-and-on, like a snake eating its own tail | | **That which you chase, becomes that which chases you, and vice-versa, on-and-on, like a snake eating its own tail |
| − | *Think Before You Act (The La Mulana Principle)
| |
| − | <pre>"Naramura wondered if it might not be possible to incorporate the sense of tension in newer games like Metal Gear into La Mulana. After thinking about it for about an hour (Pretty quick!) we decided to put the fear of death in La Mulana. Let's say you were an archaeologist. You're standing in front of a dark hole that you can't see the bottom of. Would you jump in? In real life, your response would probably be, "Heck no!" After all, you don't know what's down there. Or say you're in a room filled with corpses and a bunch of switches. Would you just press them haphazardly at random? In this case too, you'd probably never do something so reckless. We wanted to try and incorporate this type of tension--a "Proceed with caution" type of feeling into the game.
| |
| − | Recently--or actually a lot earlier than that, a lot of games have been set up so that "if you just check everything, the puzzle is easily solved" and "if you screw up, just reload" and a lot of people have been thinking, "are these sorts of games really all that fun?" So what would happen if we took those two trends away from gamers used to easy games?
| |
| − |
| |
| − | With this in mind, we ended up making La Mulana a lot harder than we had been intending when we started the project. We tried to make it so that people wouldn't get hopelessly stuck anywhere, but if you just whack walls at random without thinking you'll die. If you think "Ooh, a treasure!" and run charging toward it without thinking, you'll die. If you just operate a mechanism without thinking about how it works, you may end up not ever being able to get a specific item. If you think "I'm trapped, I'm going to warp out!" and do so, you won't be able to get back into that room from the outside. Once you do finally manage to find your way back in, you may be confronted with an even more obnoxious mechanism to overcome than before. If you make enough big mistakes it will even become quite tough to complete the game.
| |
| − |
| |
| − | To be honest, we have our doubts whether or not people will like a game that has elements like "If you make a mistake there's no going back" and "There's always the tension requiring you to think ahead." But at the same time we have confidence that it makes La Mulana a deeper game for it. Some people may think "this game is a pain!" But we hope you can find enjoyment with a "to keep this from being pain, I'd better think before acting" sort of playstyle. We think if you use your wits to the fullest, the sense of accomplishment you'll get when you finally finish the game will be all the more rewarding."</pre>
| |
Revision as of 11:26, 22 July 2025
Design Principles
"The code is more what you'd call guidelines, than actual rules." - Captain Barbossa
- Bushnell's Law
- Intrinsic Motivation
- Tactile/Kinaesthetic Satisfaction
- Flow state/the zone
- Elegance
- Minimize Context Sensitivity
- Maximize Gameplay Parity
- Modularity/Sandbox Design
- Gameplay Density
- Mechanical (skill-based) Progression
- Unlocks should help guide the player without overwhelming them (clarity/comprehension-gating), the dopamine hit of progression is just the cherry on top. Inverting this relationship to focus on the dopamine hit is gambling design.
- Punish Inattention, not Ineptitude
- Threat-Reward Inversion
- That which you chase, becomes that which chases you, and vice-versa, on-and-on, like a snake eating its own tail
