Level Up.pdf

376 LEVEL 13 Now You’re Playing with Power
too many clicks, keep the game screens down to a minimum, use icons
over text, and so on, to keep functions and intent clear.
• Alternate endings. Will the player turn out good or evil? Save the world
or get blown up? Get the girl or get the boy? Many RPG, adventure,
action, and survival horror games offer multiple endings to their stories.
Examples include Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, the Fable
series, Heavy Rain and the games in the Resident Evil series. Multiple
endings are a great way to get the player to replay the game, as long as
the player knows there are multiple endings to be seen. I ’ ve found that
it ’ s no longer enough to just have a few different endings based on the
decisions made at a few key moments in the game. The struggle
between good and evil is much more interesting if they are evenly
matched. Build systems and opportunities for the player to “ course
correct ” towards one outcome or another. Make the outcome be the
player ’ s choice, rather than one decided by the game.
• Cheats. Cheats are usually reserved for use by the development team
during production. Cheat modes can be enabled to give the player
unlimited resources like health, ammo, lives, or just plain ol ’
invulnerability. I suggest that you don ’ t enable cheats until the player has
played through the game once, otherwise they are CHEATING!!! …
themselves out of experiencing the game the way it was meant to be
played. Some games go as far as to encourage “ proper ” play: cheats
might not get the “ good ” ending of a game or they might be marked out
as a cheater as in GTA. In Team Fortress 2, anyone who didn ’ t use a
cheat received a special wearable angel ’ s halo called “ the cheater ’ s
lament. ”
As an industry, we are really, really good about making the player feel really,
really bad. We kill player characters at the drop of a hat, force them into
near impossible situations, and then mock them when they fail. We’ ll steal
from them in a heartbeat and we ’ ll mess with their minds any chance we