Angry Birds was the very first game that made I realize that how simple and easy a game could be with still lots of fun. All you need to play the game is drag the birds on the slingshot, adjust and release. Surprisingly simple, also surprisingly fun.
After that, I downloaded Tiny Wings, I was once again astonished by how simple a good game can be - all you need to do is just to hold your finger on the screen and release at a proper time. This is probably the easiest game I've ever seen.
Consider all these games together, I realized that, as a high school boy, they all have one thing in common - the easiness is only for the players. The levels, the monsters, the power ups, everything behind the easiness are really delicate which seem to need lots of efforts to finish. So a simple but good game could probably be composed of not only extremely easy operation, nearly no learning curve, but also quite complicated and delicate "backend" design and implementation, as well as a great and creative idea. In other words, to begin with a good idea, do all the heavy works and save all the easiness and effortlessness for the players.
This topic is something that has interested me for a while. It is interesting to see what "simple" games I find fun and which ones I find boring or too easy. So what takes a simple mechanic out of the realm of the mundane and into the realm of fun and addictive games? I'm not entirely sure and I don't know if you have the answer either. But you touch on something that I think is important--the back-end design of the game. A lot depends on the initial creative idea, but I think more is dependent on the implementation of that idea. And that means that the back-end design of the mechanics and meaningful artistic design decisions must all serve the user experience.
ReplyDeleteHi Tim!
DeleteI cannot agree anymore with what you said.
Most importantly, a simple but creative idea. Then all other necessary factors like execution, robust back-end design and implementation, meaningful and appealing artistic design work together to make realize that idea.
But like I said to Saagar and Tianwei, all other factors are extrinsic and only necessary for a good simple game, but not sufficient. In fact, except a Simple & Creative idea, all other efforts are needed for any kind of successful game, or even any kind of successful product.
I've been wanting to figure out some intrinsic and unique factors which make those simple game successful. So far the only two things I've thought about is, like I said a million times, a simple but creative game, and very simple and easy player operation requirement.
Ironically, in some way it sounds like bullshit, anyone in the world knows something like a good game need a good idea.
Still a long way to go to figure out the golden principles.
I like this post a lot. Since I'm an avid player of strategy type games, I tend to makes things complicated when I design. It makes a lot of sense that games can be simple and fun, too. I think a big part of it is aesthetic. If temple run was made with stick figures, I highly doubt it would have been as popular as it was. Especially as the mobile market gets bigger and bigger, simple games using the touch interface look like they will be a big market. I'd love to see if you have any examples of simple games that you've made.
ReplyDeleteHi Saagar, I totally buy it that aesthetic is an important factor and necessary of the charm of these games. No one wants to play an coarse ugly game nowadays.
DeleteBut is aesthetics related to the game mechanism in any way? I'm not sure about that.
To me aesthetic appeal is just like other necessary factors, like bug-free, to a successful game, but it's far from sufficient to make a good game, especially for mobile games - there are a bunch of beautiful games with fantastic visual effects turn out to be boring.
So I've been wondering what are the sufficient factors for a good simple game? I kinda have a feeling the most important one is the idea, which sounds kind of going back to the very beginning of the experience of game designers.
Your post reminds me of Jesse's words during BVW that we should find a really fun mechanic and really build it up. And I think that is the principle of all mobile games. Since mobile games are usually very cheap and even free to play, there aren't too much the maker can do considering the budget. Besides, the platform requires that mobile games need to be simple to play or otherwise why people would play the game on a mobile device.
ReplyDeleteI agree with that the mobile platform to some degree requires the games to be simple, and it's one of the reason why many successful simple games hit the mobile game market. However, I don't think the platform necessarily decides the complexity of games. There are also great but complex games on iOS, like Order & Chaos Online, Heroes of Orders & Chaos, etc. Also, there are many popular simple games on windows or web, like Candy Crush Saga (which I'm actually not quiet into).
DeleteSo I think the platform is just a extrinsic factor, the charm of simple fun games still lies somewhere inside of the games themselves, which is quite intriguing for us to explore and figure them out.
Recently "simple and fun" is the phrase I heard a lot which makes me think is it a universal rule of being simple means easier to achieve fun. Then two thoughts come into my mind. First, it is easy to get simple but it is not easy to keep simple while having fun. It's just a kind of experiment to try every possible simple ways that match human's instinctive way to having fun. Some of them have relationship with human's physical joy and the new control method from mobile - like swiping or taping open a new wide field to achieve that goal. And the second thought is that not all people would enjoy simple fun for a long time. For example many people would prefer strategical games which is complicated. And normally these kind of game would addict people for quite a long time. Thus I feel the games' world is quite diversified.
ReplyDelete