Black Hydra,

First off id like to say that i think your thread brings up a phenomenal concept, yearning to be discussed on these forums. I usually dont post much on these forums and act more as a voyeur but this got me interested....

Your idea of TRULY designing gameplay first, because gameplay is king is definetly something to address. You make an excellent point and i have to say i like your ideas very much, but im still going to have to disagree with you. Perhaps in certain cases you may be able to follow your design principle....but i think (and of course this is IMHO) that a game has transcended, what it was and what it could be. Let me elaborate.

Many people dont yet see it, some may never see it, and im not sure if you have or will myself, but i see a potential in games that could make them the leading form of entertainment...and i dont mean in a sales way. Whether games are art really depends on how you look at art, you can argue film is an art, you can argue against it. Right now this is besides the point. If games are art or not doesn't matter; instead what matters is what they convey artistically, for me definitions hold little meaning.

I think Interactivity is a way in which we can tell stories and express ourselves in ways we couldn't through other forms. Its very difficult for me even to say how, because the real potential is only but blistering now, but i know that games were meant for something higher. This is why i think you shouldnt start with the gameplay first...now hold on, that doesnt mean i dont think its important, i think its VERY important, because like a movie has visuals, a book uses words that provoke your imagination, games has its gameplay to express itself to an audience. clearly the gameplay is the key. But you shouldnt start with it in mind, because your gameplay should revolve around your idea, and not the other way around...you first need an idea (not neccesserily a story) just a message, a point for making your game, because really, if you have no reason to make the game why do it. once you have your message/theme/story/ or whatever you want to express to the world, you begin arching the gameplay and the fine tuning of the story (if there is one) around that...and you make it sync together into a masterpiece (a lot easier said than done lol), but you get the idea.

So basically i believe in concept first, gameplay second, not importance second, but design second, because if you dont know what you wanna make and why, you cant design jack for it...

well thats my rant, its only my opinion so dont go and get all fiesty on me :-P...but id appreciate it if you would tell me what you think.

For the most part, I think I agree.

I think it's essential for the designer to have a clear vision as to how the game should feel to actually play, as early as possible in the development of the game. Without this vision, you have no real goal to work towards, no real yardstick to determine whether a design decision is right or wrong for your game.

while i read the posts here, i wonder if the game design (story, scenes, architecture, level layout, etc) is being built around the actual gameplay. the game will be actually limited by what the player can do. as opposed to having the story dictate what the player should be capable of doing.

i'm having a hard time deciding which is a better route.

I think gameplay is like any other part of game design. You have to start with whatever it is that fires you up and gets you motivated to actually bother finishing the game. If that something is gameplay, so be it. But if you go into every project with a checklist of what has to be done in what order, sooner or later you'll find a project that makes you go "ho hum, another gameplay design phase...time to go do something entertaining like watching the grass grow".

Every person is different, and every project is different. If you try to force conformity on the process, you'll just end up screwing yourself up.

That's an extremely interesting take on things. At the very least it would rid this board of all the "I wanna make a game about this guy who is, you know, just this guy, and living his life and stuff and with his girlfriend and work and stuff". Because it's an aspect that's easily forgotten, apparently, by inexperienced game developers (or, more often, designers).

But, back to the subject matter. Sure, storyline and drama and lot's of other aspects are make/break factors, but what is it that determines if I come back to play the game again? The word in itself contains this meaning, game-play, that part of the game which is there to be played.

An analogy, I can build this truly spectacularly looking theme park, but if the rides aren't cool, who would come back to it, after the theme isn't a surprise anymore?
Ofcourse it works the other way around too, BUT slightly different, now who would go to the blandest looking theme park in the first place?

Ofcourse it's a little more complex than this, even movies and books, which are usually without any meaningfull interaction can sometimes be good enough to watch a couple of times.

I'd pick the themepark that had a rollercoaster with steeper longer hills and more loops and corkscrews over the one that had a really cool theme but more boring rides any day of the week. But that's just me :)

Someone said that Halo was just a standard FPS, and that it didn't offer anything new with regards to gameplay. I'd have to disagree. FPS gameplay is more than just pointing your crosshair and shooting. Halo did an awsome job of making strategy a part of it. It forces you to make choices. When a dropship lands a group of two elites and a bunch of smaller enemies, it'd probably be a good idea to kill the elites first with a sniper rifle, before they get too close. If you start taking out the little guys first, the elites would be up in your face and you'd be in a much bigger mess than if you had to take down the little guys up close. Also, you can only carry two weapns at a time, so picking the right ones is important. You're in trouble if you've got a thousand tiny 'facehuggers' coming at you and all you have is the sniper rifle and a pistol. You'd be much better off with a shotgun.

Bad FPS games doesn't give you that many choices, or they're not that important. Maybe the weapons are all the same and it doesn't make much of a difference as to which one you're using. Or the game could lack new challenges. I often find myself finding a "procedure" in such games that i repeat every time i enter a new room. like, Shoot enemies, (if they get too close, take a few steps back) pick up items, move on. The same sollution to the same problem over and over and over again. In halo, you constantly have to do things a little differently, which is why i've played through it about 10 times, while Doom3 isn't even interesting to play a 2nd time. I already know how the story is going to turn out, and the gameplay provides no new challenges.

And if I remember correctly Halo was also pretty revolutionary in it's use of vehicles. It's only since then that practically every FPS has some vehicles for the player to drive.

Many of you have made the claim that a game is a form of art. I couldn't agree more. I find games often more exciting and dramatic than most movies, because you get immersed inside them.

But I will have to correct you. My plan does NOT sacrifice artistic design. If done right, the only difference would mean that the artistic design (i.e. story, visuals, ect.) would encorporate the gameplay.

One example I would like to bring up is the Final Fantasy series.

Those games, IMO have some of the most dramatic storylines for any game. Is it any wonder that when polled (for a gaming magazine) most people rated the most dramatic moment in a vidio game was when Sepharoth killed Aries?

I love those games, however, I'm never fully satisfied with the gameplay. I always feel it doesn't express the often rapid pace excitement of the story and the drama present. Now, thats personal opinion. Many others love this style.

But, in my opinion, it is here where we see a displacement in my previously mentioned GOAL//CHALLENGE theory.

In a game the gameplay is the CHALLENGE or the obstacle. It is what makes a game fun. Nothing else makes a game fun. (Drama is another thing, but I'm getting to that) And, fun, in essence, is what defines a game. Without the interactiveness and 'fun' you have a movie or a book, not a game.

The GOAL is the forward motion. It drives the game. Forces you to accomplish challenges and continue onwards. It is what makes the game 'dramatic' and 'immersive'.

You cannot realistically design every facet of gameplay before a storyline. Usually because gameplay is patternable and logical. Whereas storyline is complex and almost organic.

However, you can set the foundation for what you feel would make the game fun, and use those as guidelines. So if you decided that in your game you were going to have a smooth flow of action and no specific jutt's in and out, you may have to present goals before other ones are quite finished to continue the storyline. Or if you decided you wanted modular gameplay to allow the player to sort of 'look back' at their accomplishments you could modify the story slightly too.

Storylines can be modified this way with little impact to the final result. Whereas, if you design the story first, your gameplay tends to just fall wherever the story had left it. Example:
Lets say your story dictated that after a battle with an evil mage there was little going on for awhile. Then upon going somewhere you find that the mage had unlocked a great demon before being destroyed.

Now if you had designed the story first you may be content with allowing this 'lapse' in gameplay where there is a brief lapse in driving force. However, if we set up how we want the game to be played first then you could do this instead:

After the battle with an evil mage, you notice he was wearing a pendant with an odd inscription. Your guide tells you to ask an artificer about the makings of the inscription, and he tells you it is of the royal family in a desert land. Upon visiting there you realize that a demon has come out and is terrorizing the land.

Despite my crappy storytelling, you can see how in this example there is given a continuity in driving force as dictated by your gameplay design. It requires a minor modification to story, however, when playing the game you won't have the problem of players quitting your game when they feel that there isn't much to do now.

The individual gameplay cannot be pre-designed. It must be experienced or defined by your artistic design. However, a good general layout can be used as a foundation to ensure that the CHALLENGE aspect of your game is never brushed aside for the usually more obvious GOAL aspect.

But, its only a theory. If you don't agree, by all means don't do it.

Side comment on FF7 gameplay and other problems:

The problem with FF7 is that it's nothing like old school RPG's. Every now and then you get to do something, but most of the game is FMV crap. When did designers decide players wanted to sit there watching 90 minutes of dramatic stuff instead of participating in dramatic stuff via actually playing? I know a lot of players love this game, but the way I figure, if I'm going to get stuck in a place where I can't pause the game for 90 minutes so I can pee or fix a sandwich, I might as well be watching TV. At least it has commercials.

Another thing I don't understand is why lots of RPG's have button mashing mayhem, in the context of realtime fights. If I wanted a realtime fight, I'd play a FPS. I don't mind the style of combat in Chrono Trigger, but a lot of games made after that decided that turn based combat was boring so they'd use something else, thus making them unplayable to lil' ol' me with the crappy reflexes.

I think your illustrating my point with the FF series. They often have great storylines but a sacrifice is made to gameplay for it.

Whereas if you had designed some basic layouts for a gameplay then when making your storyline and the likes, you could say stuff like: "Alright I may have to modify how I communicate this to the player to coincide with one of my gameplay guidelines."

Here is an example I'm setting forth. Here are some (not yet finished) of the guidelines I am setting for the next game I want to make. I basically chose the elements I find the most fun. I'm still trying to work out an easy and modifiable difficulty system, but I haven't spent that long on it.

Here is the first part of my gameplay design and what I've decided:

- The game will have constant gameflow (i.e. not sectioned off into missions/distinct blocks)
- There will be no numerical base (except in extreme circumstances) in the game. I don't want players to have to do calculations for efficiency, everything should be based on observation and perspective.
- The game will make itself interesting throughout the entirety of the game by introducing new commands (note: commands could mean different things in different games. They could be weapons in an RPG, units in RTS's, ect.) consistantly throughout the game. Also the level of complexity for completing the challenges will steadily increase, but will be patternable (i.e. making sure that the increase in difficulties isn't sporadic throughout the entire game but sensical).
- The game's challenges will mostly consist of tactical or strategic logic. Skill will be needed, however, it will not be the major factor and should provide only a very small amount of the difficulty in the challenges. Geometric logic may be present but I am not making it a focus, as it often either requires extreme patternable problems, or presetting them which would be a lot of work to make the game have a long play time.

So there you go. As you can see, the gameplay doesn't specify. I still don't know what genre I want to make. However, setting these guidelines assures me that I am making a game I, myself, would enjoy playing. I also made restrictions based on my physical restrictions. I didn't want a huge geometric type of challenge (like Legend of Zelda) as that would take a long time. Instead I decided to use strategic logic, which by varying complexity usually provides enough challenge with less preset coding.

I'm still not done as I haven't addressed the issue of 'difficulty isolation' I feel is very important. Basically, I want to ensure that the largest range of skill levels find my game at that right level of 'challenging'. So crappy players won't find the game incredibly hard, and skillful players won't find the game too easy. There are many ways of doing this so I am going over my options.

After I'm done this I will decide what type of genre or storyline I'd like to fit with this game. But at least I will have gotten the gameplay issue done as a grounding before anything else.