Ancestors

Toot

Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:18

🧵 GRAVEYARD OF MECHANICS ⚰️

Mostly 4 fun, I though in doing a thread of mechanics with a history of being implemented and causing problems. I'm not saying they are unredeemable, keep reading, but they tend to be appealing but tricky to deal with. Sorta my opinion mix with facts, at least be aware:

[#]gamedesign

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Descendants

Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:22

MECHANIC: Living environment

HOW IT WORKS: Enemy spawns are designed to stop happening after certain number of enemies are defeated. The idea is to inject some realism into the game, maybe it run out of enemies, or the monsters can't reproduce anymore, or they realized that they are outmatched and abandoned the area.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:25

PROBLEM: Normally defeating enemies is rewarded in games, so this means wiping out a possible valuable resource from the player. Not to mention it, it usually also creates an area with nothing to do. It makes lore sense, but doesn't with the game mechanics, the player is punished for playing it with less resources.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:29

EXCEPTIONS:

One I can think of is Undertale, but it took the whole game to be designed around it. It takes advantage of the emptiness to create a sense of dread to the player. The more the player does it, it emptier the game becomes.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:35

MECHANIC: Naturally improving stats

HOW IT WORKS: Player stats improve with use, not with level ups. Taking damage makes the character more resilient, attacking, stronger, and so on.

INTENTION: The idea is to character grow to happen intuitively, the more you do one thing, the better the character will become at it.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:39

PROBLEM: Stats grow tends to not catch up with the gameplay, by the time they becomes necessary it's already too late, so the player faces a wall that requires grinding. For example, the current area has only low hp enemies, so the player units never grow up defense, since they can defeat them before they can react. However, next area has units that can survive a hit, so they give a hard time, because the player never got the chance to train HP.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:44

Worse, training might be difficult, and very tedious. The player needs to know how to improve each stat and find the means to do it. Otherwise, they'll be just stuck, having to brute-force it somehow.

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Written by Fred :godot: on 2024-12-27 at 00:47

EXCEPTIONS:

Xcom2 has a mod that it's in essence this idea, but because it doesn't rely on it, the units have regular level up for stat increases. In this way, stat increases feel like just a nice bonus. I believe it can still be exploited, but a bit better.

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