Adding Features Versus "Keeping it Simple"

As mentioned earlier, our First-Person Shooter prototype is just begging for extra features, such as health and ammo. Why not start with all of these extra systems already in place, as opposed to starting with just the simple core system? There are a few reasons to start with a simple, core rule set and then add on one rule at a time, instead of trying to design the entire game in one big effort:

If the basic, core rules don’t work, then adding extra rules on top of it will generally not make it work. Get the basics working first, before you start adding complexity.
In fact, if you build extra rules on an unstable foundation, the real underlying problems in your design could be obscured! Something mightseem wrong, but if there are a lot of systems and resources and game objects it can be hard to tell if you’re experiencing a problem with the core mechanics, or the balance of a particular resource, or the design of the map, or something else.

Early on in a design process, it’s generally better to keep things as simple as possible. For every rule or mechanic or object or resource that you want to include, ask yourself: is this really necessary right now? At this point, let your laziness override your creativity. It is far easier to add something to your design than to take it away, so add the minimum possible to have a working, playable game.

If you have trouble with this, try writing down a list of all of the ideas you have that you want to include in the game, and then cross off as many as you can. Ask if whatever items are left on your list would make a complete, playable game. If so, try to cross off more, until you absolutely can’t anymore.

It may also help to run your idea by another designer who is not personally and emotionally attached to your pet idea. Invite them to be merciless in deciding which of your rules can be trashed. For the purposes of this course, you can offer a trade with any colleagues in your area: you look at my prototype, I’ll look at yours!

Moving Forward

Once you have the core gameplay, and it works, then you can add new features. The temptation at this point is to add everything you originally thought of. Resist this temptation. Instead, add one new feature, and playtest again until the new feature works, or you have decided that it doesn’t work and it needs to be abandoned.

Why not add everything at once? Because every new thing you add may have some problems with it. If you only add one new rule and a critical game system becomes broken in playtesting, you know exactly where the problem is, because you only changed one thing. If you add ten new rules and something breaks, it’s harder to isolate which rule (or combination of rules) caused the problem. Incidentally, this part is similar to programming: if you write code in small chunks and then unit test, it’s easier to find bugs than if you write ten thousand lines of code between tests.

Yes, this is tedious. You have to playtest, then change one rule, then playtest again, then change another rule, and keep doing this dozens (or even hundreds) of times. The first few playtests are fun, but you will quickly become sick of the whole business. This is part of the process of design. Sometimes, game design is hard work that is not particularly fun. This is something you need to accept if you have aspirations to become a professional designer. Just remember that the purpose of this is to make a game that is fun, and if it’s not there yet, that should be your incentive to change something and playtest again until you reach your goal.

In making an actual game, the next step after the physical prototype (once you’re happy with it) is to document it. These documents do not have to be 500-page Game Design Bibles. They can be small sets of rules and design and playtest notes that you’ve accumulated as you went through the iterative process, but formatted into something that is readable and understandable by someone who has not seen the project before. This documentation will be valuable reference material for later, if you ever forget what you were doing. Sometimes you have to put an idea to the side for a few months and return to it later, and I guarantee you will forget all of those details that used to seem second-nature to you when you were fiddling with the rules early on.