Level Up.pdf

378 LEVEL 13 Now You’re Playing with Power
a pirate - themed playground. Guests at Pirate ’ s Lair can interact with several
items, including a bilge pump and a turn wheel.
As you turn the wheel, a rope on a
pulley starts to pull a treasure chest
up from underwater. In a video game,
once the treasure chest is revealed,
the player would get their treasure
and go on their way.
However, if you keep cranking the
wheel and raising the chest, a
clinging skeleton is revealed who is
trying to keep the chest for himself.
The skeleton serves no purpose other
than to get a laugh out of the viewer.
There ’ s no reason why video games
can ’ t have little moments like this. Some game developers do similar things
such as Marvel Comics creator Stan Lee appearing in Marvel Ultimate
Alliance 2, Ape Escape’ s monkeys in Metal Gear Solid 3’ s jungle level, or
Braid’ s homage to Mario ’ s World 1 - 1.
Some will argue that progression isn ’ t much of a reward, and that the
player shouldn ’ t be rewarded for merely finishing the game; after all, isn ’ t
the point to finish it? There are a lot of things competing for your player ’ s
free time. What can be done to keep them engaged? You only need a great
story, intriguing level design, ridiculously cool boss battles, and awesome
upgrades. Easy, right? But what if more than one player wants to play? Well,
that ’ s why we ’ re moving on to Level 14!
Level 13 ’ s Universal Truths and Clever Ideas:
• Create power - ups that are compatible and complementary
to the player ’ s actions and attacks.
• Love thy player! Give them the tools to succeed like DDB
and rubberbanding.
• If something in your game is too difficult or boring,
then it is. Get rid of it.
• Never underestimate the greed of the player, and use it
to prompt interesting scenarios and challenges.