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Games Entertainment

Balancing Player Input and Developer Vision? 77

Chris_Jefferson writes "I work on a simple iPhone puzzle game called Combination. Probably the most frequent request I get from users is for an in-game hint system, to help them out on the harder problems. However, when I tried beta testing such a system, almost every user would just hammer the hint button as soon as they got stuck for longer than 30 seconds, spoiling (I believe) their enjoyment of the game. Should games programmers decide they know what's best for users, and not give them features they are crying out for? Has anyone ever seen a good middle-ground, where users are helped, but can't just skip their way through the entire game?" This question can be generalized for just about any game that's being continually developed — where should the game's designer draw the line between responding to feedback and maintaining what they feel is is the greater source of entertainment?
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Balancing Player Input and Developer Vision?

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  • How about "just about any product". No one ever got rich ignoring their customers' requests.

    Except Apple, I suppose. But they usually tell their customers what to want anyway, so it all works out.

    • by Edgewize ( 262271 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:10AM (#26841961)

      You need to give your customers what they want, but not necessarily what they ask for. There is often a very gulf between the two, and unless your customers are professional designers they are very likely to mistake one for the other.

      The job of a designer is to incorporate feedback and continually improve the design. That does not mean implementing every request, but rather addressing the root problem that leads to the requests.

      In other words, don't give people a free hint button if playtesting shows that it reduces overall accomplishment. Figure out why people are finding certain puzzles so frustrating, and do something about that instead. Or else incorporate the hint mechanic in a way that rewards players for using it sparingly.

      • by Tridus ( 79566 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:46AM (#26842405) Homepage

        Yeah, this. A lot of the time the customer doesn't really know what they want, they just think they do. You give it to them and discover that they didn't actually want that.

        WoW raids are a good example. People said for years "we want easier more casual raids!" In Wrath, Blizzard did it. Now people are bored to death because everything is so easily PUGgable, there's no sense of accomplishment that comes from hitting your head against a wall for a while before doing something hard.

        What they really wanted is some of the bureaucracy removed from raiding, so they could get some friends together easily and try stuff. They didn't want every boss to become a total joke. But they couldn't articulate what they actually wanted properly.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by cgenman ( 325138 )

          I assume this [iphonegamenetwork.com] is the game they are referring to?

          As a game designer, 30 seconds actually does sound like a long time to be unable to make even interim progress towards a goal. I personally try to make sure that people aren't stuck for more than 15 seconds without being able to make some perceived progress, though I work on very different types of games.

          If people are abusing hints, perhaps there could be a pre-visualization system, or some other way of helping players understand the consequences of complex i

          • (Question Author) - Yes that is the game I'm talking about!

            You make a very good point about the artwork - I'm a terrible, terrible artist, both in terms of drawing, and just being good at composition. Getting some better artwork could well be a good idea to make the game smoother to play. You should have seem some of the earlier UI designs. They were REALLY horrible.

      • by Jurily ( 900488 ) <<jurily> <at> <gmail.com>> on Friday February 13, 2009 @10:20AM (#26843939)

        You need to give your customers what they want, but not necessarily what they ask for. There is often a very gulf between the two, and unless your customers are professional designers they are very likely to mistake one for the other.

        Holy shit that is SO true. If they always get what they ask for, they won't enjoy the game. Nobody enjoys a game they always win.

        What you need is an optimum: when they win just slightly more than they lose. Instead of a hint button, you could allow them to give up on, say, 3 of 50 levels and move to the next one. Being limited, the level-skip feature becomes a new aspect of the game, and not just an outside cheat. Say, if you want to beat your high score, you don't skip the level worth the most points. If it's time, you skip the slowest level etc.

      • by nahdude812 ( 88157 ) * on Friday February 13, 2009 @10:29AM (#26844089) Homepage

        You need to give your customers what they want, but not necessarily what they ask for.

        Exactly right. And I'd wager to say that this is more true of games than of other products. Customer requests are based on a superficial analysis of the product. Sometimes what they want isn't feasible from a logical perspective (ie the consequences are unconsidered, they only know they want X not that X comes at the cost of Y).

        I've done some game design and balancing (see my sig - that's me in the primary copyright). My players often wanted things that made their life easier, but which would represent a game unbalancing. For example, perhaps I designed in a requirement for the player to make a decision between two trade offs.

        Such decisions are critical to enjoyable game play - if every decision has an obvious right and wrong choice then you are on a rail and that's not as much fun. Players often asked for these trade offs to not be a decision they have to make, or asked that the consequences of the decision not exist; maybe asked to be able to have it both ways.

        They also wanted certain elements which were designed to be highly rewarding but also very rare to be made dramatically more available. Such as having their drop rate increased, or being able to purchase them for prices which would turn them from rare into common.

        I could do these things, and it would be easy for me, and you would be glad that I did... today. Tomorrow you'd be like every other player because everyone made the same choice or didn't have to make a choice at all. Success (however you measure that) would come after a fixed number of clicks.

        There's already a game for people who want that out of a roleplaying game: http://www.progressquest.com/ [progressquest.com]

        No, you have to decode what your users are really asking for and give *that* to them, not the literal request. In the case of games, they are asking you to make it more fun. It's not fun when you get stuck in a puzzle game and can't figure out how to proceed. These times it makes sense to have a Suggest button. However that should be detected and only offered when the user is stuck, because if you offer them it immediately it amounts to a "solve this for me" button (aka an I WIN button), and that isn't fun. Offer the suggest button, but only when they haven't made a move in some amount of time (long enough that it's not viable to use for every move, but short enough that they don't get frustrated and close out your app). Also make it have a cost. Give them either a fixed number of total uses, or make it dock their score in some significant way (if scoring on time, add 30 seconds for each use, if scoring by points, deduct 10 moves worth of points). They choose whether they want to pay that price.

    • Customers don't always know exactly what they want, or at least don't express it accurately.

      Users don't actually want a hints system. They want not to be frustrated and irritated by a tricky puzzle. A hints system is the obvious solution but there may well be others.
  • Timers? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Lostlander ( 1219708 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @07:53AM (#26841809)
    How about puting a timer or trigger to reset the hint button. 1 hint per minute/several minutes or 1-3 hints per level. Give the user what they want not what they asked for.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      Exactly, make the hint button inaccessible for several seconds after a move has been made, justifying it by saying they haven't tried long enough to try figure out the next move. Imagine if you were sitting next to the player, what kinds of hints would you give them, and how often?

      Developers should respond to the requests of their users, however, those requests should be tempered be the social aspect of user (player) interaction with the software (game).

    • Agreed.

      I would want a hinter. But I know in my heart of hearts if there was an unlimited hint button I would just start ramming that sucker like a heroin addicted lab mouse on a drug dispenser toggle.

      Don't give the users unlimited hints. But make sure they never get reallllly stuck.

      You can deliver what they want and teach them the game however. Make a mode with unlimited hints and no time recharge but call it "Practice Mode" and don't keep track of score. That way everyone who's actually competitive (Wh

  • by thebes ( 663586 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @07:54AM (#26841815)

    I don't find ultra "realistic" or difficult games fun to play. As a casual gamer, I want to play a game to pass the time and enjoy a sense of accomplishment. If I can't make any progress in what I feel to be a reasonable time, I drop the game and move to something else.

    • Sadly, I have to agree, I want a sense of progress. If I want frustrating difficulty, I'll go attempt to implement some of the customer "requests" at work... :-D

      --Maven

    • by KDR_11k ( 778916 )

      For what definition of "progress"? Physically progrssing the game or just the feeling that you've come closer to the solution (e.g. figured out a part of the boss's pattern and can now avoid it)? To me it's frustrating when I don't feel like I can improve, when I can't tell what went wrong and needs to be done better next time.

  • by zwei2stein ( 782480 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @07:55AM (#26841823) Homepage

    Easy/Normal/Hard mode.

    You can compromise Easy mode challenge and much as possible, up to including auto-solve button.

    Then, you can throw your most sadistic version of game on users in hard mode.

    • Good idea, but it's not enough. You have to let people switch between modes at some point, so they don't have to re-start in order to get the hints. Or if they get better quickly they can turn up the heat. But there has to be some incentive to use normal or hard, otherwise they can get the experience of playing through it without actually getting the feeling and atmosphere the game dev was trying to create.

      I'm guessing you're a console gamer, where these are common tricks, and maybe these details were as

  • by DarkDust ( 239124 ) <marc@darkdust.net> on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:00AM (#26841863) Homepage

    Three things come to my mind:

    First, if your game awards some score or something then getting a hint must cost them.

    And/or you only give a set amount of hints throughout their session. Maybe allow for an additional hint every x levels.

    And/or make them aware that they have not succeeded themselves. I remember a good Solitair back in the MS-DOS days which also gave you a hint if you asked it to. When the game was finished it displayed ''You won (with my help)''. The ''with my help'' was what encouraged me not to press the button.

    • by MBCook ( 132727 )

      I think Zak and Wiki did this well. As you played through the game you earned coins that you could trade for hints. The thing is that hints got progressivly more expensive, and not slowly. If you used many hints early on in the game, you wouldn't be able to buy them later. You had to really weigh the decision on if you wanted to use those coins.

      Also, predictably, your score for the level would be lower if you used hints.

      It seems like a very good compromise for this kind of problem.

  • analyse the stats. Do a version with hints and one without. if more people buy the full copy of the hint one, the it obviously added value to the game. if not, then your fears are right and the hints ruin the fun.
    Nothing beats hard data, even when it comes to game design.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      (Article Author) While I think hard stats are better, I'm not sure the way you suggest going about it is the best.

      I bet if WoW offered two identical releases, one where you started level 1 and one where you could start on any level you wanted most people would choose the second. However, long term that would probably give WoW a worse reputation and an overall loss of sales.

      • I think that the worse reputation would be because people would be even worse at their class than they all ready are.

        I like how they required you to level 1 toon to 70 before it would allow you to roll a Death Knight which starts at level 55. I just wish it would let me start a warrior at 55 though.
        • people would be even worse at their class than they all ready are.

          Something I am about to experience. Rolling my first Tank class ever (in any game), starting at lvl 55 seems a tad intimidating. Normally people would expect at that level, that I would know how ot tank. Lucky for me, everyone assumes that since your a DK, you don't know your class!

    • There's no way to make that test work unless you can make the buyers of one copy unaware of the existence of the other one.

  • If your goal is to make the most fun game for you, then do whatever you want. If your goal is to make money, put in the features that will sell the game. Why are you even asking this question? Do we really have to ask slashdot for common sense now? I thought it was for questions that smart people can't answer for themselves with two seconds of thought?

    • (Original author of the post here)

      What about the obvious third option - I want to make a game that is the most fun for everyone else?

      Even if the aim is the sell the game, what are the features that will sell the game? Just because a bunch of users say they want something, doesn't actually mean that adding that will make the game better, or more popular.

      The real question is (I think) one of self-control. In your (and other's) experience, how easy (if at all) should it be to skip through parts of a game?

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

        What about the obvious third option - I want to make a game that is the most fun for everyone else?

        You will never please everyone! Stop trying now.

        Once again, you are either making a game which is fun for you or a game which produces some profit, whether it's money or an increased sense of self-worth due to believing that you enriched the lives of others. If you are trying to do the former, then stop! You're done. If you're trying to do the latter, put in the hint feature. It's their choice whether they use it, or not.

        • by cgenman ( 325138 )

          You're simplifying a complex question. If you give players an unbalanced sword in an RPG, they will abuse it horribly even though it reduces their enjoyment of the game. The player's goal is never to have fun, the player's goal is to reach the end of the level / beat the boss / save the world / whatever. Enjoyment is actually a side effect of achieving that goal.

          Your goal, as a game designer then, is to establish a goal in your player's minds, then create the most entertaining impediments possible to the

          • You're simplifying a complex question. If you give players an unbalanced sword in an RPG, they will abuse it horribly even though it reduces their enjoyment of the game. The player's goal is never to have fun, the player's goal is to reach the end of the level / beat the boss / save the world / whatever. Enjoyment is actually a side effect of achieving that goal.

            If you give the players the option to get the sword (to borrow your example) through some clearly out of character mechanism or via some other differentiating factor then you can please both types of gamers. I like cheat codes because they completely break the game's metaphor, you can't ignore the fact that you just typed "GIVEMESTUFF" or what have you.

            If what is fun to the player is reaching the end game, then you should make it possible for them to reach the end game. I resist the notion that you can't al

  • I would suggest hint tokens. Completing a level quickly or in a certain way will earn a user hint tokens. Later, if they get stuck, they can spend a token to get a hint.

    You don't need to make the tokens very scarce. The simple fact that they are not unlimited will likely cause most players to conserve them for when they really need them. If they know the system exists and they know they might need it on level 99, they'll be more inclined to save tokens.

    If you have a multi-level hint tree, the token syst

  • Frustration! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Aladrin ( 926209 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:19AM (#26842049)

    So, you're saying that your game can only be enjoyed by the user if they are constantly frustrated with it?

    Maybe the problem has nothing to do with the hint button at all, but rather the game itself. It's apparently not what your test group wants. (What gamers in general want is probably different yet.)

    Also, don't forget that the iPhone is for gamers on the go. They don't -want- to spend more than 30 seconds staring at the screen and doing nothing. They'll also probably be quite a bit more distracted than if they were at home on their PC/console.

    • I spent literally months being frustrated by various levels in Lemmings (not that I would claim any puzzle game can compare with that), but I still don't think I would change any of it.

      Of course back when I played Lemmings, the only hints I could get get was from the other people I went to school with. Now I could just jump on the internet when I get stuck.

      • Seems you have two options: You can create a game the customer wants or the game you want.

        I think the previous suggestions about hints being unlimited on a "practice" mode and limited on regular is the best solution. Those that want easy mode get it, adn those that want a challenge get it too.
  • by 91degrees ( 207121 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:28AM (#26842165) Journal
    Getting stuck is irritating. Getting a total solution is unsatisfying. There must be an in-between option. Could you just tell them how many pieces are in the right place, or just that they have some in the wrong place?
    • I feel mirror's edge does an ok job with this, using their runner's vision, and look button. Granted it usually shows you just about every move you need to make. But there was one part where it didn't give too much away and I actually had to figure out how to get where I was suppose to.
  • Make a number of versions and divide your beta-testers into groups. A control group playing the current version, perhaps one where hints are unlimited and have no penalty, one where there are limited numbers of hints, or some penalty is associated with using them. After they've played ask them to fill out a questionaire rating their enjoyment of the game overall, and in specific areas.

    That way you'll have useful, qualitative data about the overall "enjoyment factor" of your game, as apposed to using gues
  • What's the purpose of the game? If the developer is making it to amuse themselves then player input can be zero. If the developer is making it for a target audience, assuming they have a target audience in mind, then player input should supercede all other considerations. There's plenty of room to compromise somewhere in the middle.

    Most failed games that aren't the fault of pushy investors seem to be the case of developers missing or not defining a target audience or else not catering to that audience. I
  • Bad design (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Moraelin ( 679338 ) on Friday February 13, 2009 @08:41AM (#26842313) Journal

    However, when I tried beta testing such a system, almost every user would just hammer the hint button as soon as they got stuck for longer than 30 seconds, spoiling (I believe) their enjoyment of the game.

    So you're telling me that almost every single user would reach several points in your puzzles where, for a whole 30 seconds they have no bloody clue what to do, and essentially have to surrender and use that button? And you think they should enjoy the frustration instead?

    I'm sorry, but that's not a case of mindlessly hammering away at the "help" button. If they hit it each second, ok, I could see it that way. But if they first did try 30 seconds, that's really an "ok, I give up" gesture. It's reaching a point where it's either that button or they uninstall the stupid game.

    But, at any rate, if almost every user gets stuck repeatedly in your game, I'd say that's bad design. The help button may be a band-aid fix for the symptoms, but the underlying problem remains. And forcing the players to stay stuck there, is only going to build up frustration, not fun.

    • by KenRH ( 265139 )

      So you're telling me that almost every single user would reach several points in your puzzles where, for a whole 30 seconds they have no bloody clue what to do, and essentially have to surrender and use that button? And you think they should enjoy the frustration instead?

      IMHO, if the game has a timer and you lose when it runs out then 30 seconds is long time to be stuck. But if it is a game with specific puzzles where when you have solved it once you know the solution and no timer, then spending 30 seconds thinking should be minimum for solving a level.

      • I don't read it as "solve the level in 30 seconds" but as "30 seconds of being stuck." There's a massive difference there.

        As a partially silly example to illustrate that difference, think Tetris: a whole game usually takes a lot longer than 30 seconds, but the time you get for each piece is a heck of a lot less.

        That's the case I'm trying to make: 6 times thinking 5 seconds is ok. A combined 30 seconds of looking at it and having no bloody clue what next isn't. A game or a level can be made arbitrarily long

      • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        IMHO, if the game has a timer and you lose when it runs out then 30 seconds is long time to be stuck. But if it is a game with specific puzzles where when you have solved it once you know the solution and no timer, then spending 30 seconds thinking should be minimum for solving a level.

        But consider the play environment - unless you're playing your iPhone for hours at a time, you will probably have use periods of anywhere from 10-30 minutes (during commuting) or 1-5 minutes (waiting for something). For the c

    • Bah. Slackers.

      The Portal puzzles I enjoyed the most are precisely the ones that made me think for longer than 30 seconds.

      And no one can say that Portal is bad design.

      I have seen people, mindlessly hammering away at the hint button is pretty much what I would expect from 70% of them.

      (But as I said in another post, if you don't display that button for 30 minutes no one will try to hammer it, and no one will complain.)

      • by Deosyne ( 92713 )

        Portal puzzles can be actively worked through rather than just idly stared at, though. You walk around the level, determine what the next step is, and then figure out what chain of events would need to occur in order to accomplish that step. Often, some trial and error experimentation was needed to determine what was feasible and to lock down the positioning and timing. Rarely did any single step ever require the player to be idle for more than a few seconds, and even when they did it was for a specific pur

    • by geekoid ( 135745 )

      Jeez, are you saying that any problem that take more then 30 seconds to solve is worth the time?

      • Jeez, are you saying that any problem that take more then 30 seconds to solve is worth the time?

        I'm saying: it depends.

        1. If we're talking about inventing cold fusion, yes, it's worth spending more than 30 seconds on it. But then I'd presumably be paid for that, one way or another.

        If it's a game I play to relax, then no, it's not worth it.

        2. A well designed game would split that in several steps that take less than 30 seconds each.

        A trivial example is Mahjongg or Shisen-sho: a whole game takes much longer t

        • by Pulzar ( 81031 )

          His own market research shows that most of them give up after 30 seconds. That's his market research data. He can factor it in the design and get their money, or he can stick to his vision and lose their business. It's really that simple.

          His market research says that they be using the hint button after 30 seconds if available... It doesn't say that they'd be closing the game down and asking for a refund if one was not available.

          I remember the games where I had to sit down and think for more than 30 seconds,

          • His market research says that they be using the hint button after 30 seconds if available...

            ... and that they keep asking for such a button if not. It doesn't exactly sound to me like they're appreciating the extra time to think.

  • Easy:

    Don't show the button until after half an hour have passed.

    The people that ask for the button is probably the ones that have invested that much time trying to solve a problem.

  • There's nothing worse than a developer who refuses to listen to his users. It annoys me, greatly. You don't have to concede everything (otherwise you'd end up with the Turbo-Hyper-Fighting edition where they can play multiplayer across the Internet with Mario, based on real-time data sucked from their personal Facebook account, etc.) but you do have to listen.

    If *several* users are saying that the hint button would be valuable, then to those users, it *would* be valuable. You can make it optional (i.e. a

    • by ledow ( 319597 )

      Oh, by the way, I converted/ported/maintain an SDL port of Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzle Collection to the GP2X. I know *exactly* the problem you are talking about. I end up fixing what people see as problems myself, because it's hard to get code to go upstream and a lot of my user's problems are related to the nature of the port (running on a device without a mouse or keyboard, just a joystick, for example). I've had to tweak several games to make sure they don't do stupid things and work around a lot

  • Wars with the users about which features of Pidgin [pidgin.im] to implement, and why certain features have been dropped or changed have been waged repeatedly. If I may be so bold, I think I can summarize the Pidgin devs' attitude: "We're writing Pidgin for our own enjoyment and not for the purpose of attempting to gain as much IM client market share as possible. Nobody's forcing you to use it." They also use the "patches welcome" approach: "If you want a feature, write it, and we'll consider it." I have probably mis-s
  • and what they actually want are two entirely different things.
  • I love this game because it is so difficult and does not offer any help. You get a real sense of achievement when you complete a level. Which is a really good early morning boost on the daily commute. It also really brings out my competitive side, I want to do better than my peers who also have a copy of the game. We have started emailing each other to tell which of the super hard levels we have completed. It is just like sudoku you often stare at that for 30secs not knowing what to do, but when you work
  • If I'm stuck, I'm not having fun. The end. There's more than one kind of gamer. Many play for the challenge, to be sure. Some play for diversion from frustration, and frustration with the game does not help. I play to "see stuff" as Penny Arcade once put it. If I'm stuck, screw that; I want to see what comes next. Granted, the last doesn't apply to puzzle games, but the developer needs to realize that he may have a significant number of players who aren't playing to be challenged.
  • Do not comply. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by mfh ( 56 )

    Designers have creative license to do what they want to do. If a gamer doesn't like something, they can move on to another game or learn to create a game themselves.

    As a designer, you have an obligation to your process and your field not to pay any attention to the people playing the game.

    Unless of course, you are doing it for the money -- then you better listen to them or you'll be broke soon! :)

    You can't please everyone. You can please some, but not all of them. If you please them all you please nobody, l

  • To answer your question and to quote Malcolm Gladwell, that users/consumers do not know what they want.
  • Divide the modes out from Easy, Normal and/or Hard.

In practice, failures in system development, like unemployment in Russia, happens a lot despite official propaganda to the contrary. -- Paul Licker

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