Video Game Design: Super Mario or God of War

No, not like that, although...

One of the many great things about teaching Video Game Design (Besides, you know, EVERYTHING) is that i get to use such ridiculous crossovers like the one you see above while trying to explain something.
 

The "Super Mario or God of War" spectrum is a tool I've found to be incredibly useful when explaining Gameplay mechanics and how they shape the overall experience and, more importantly, Identity of the game, and I've decided to share this tool with you guys. So, without further ado, this is the first of many articles on Video Game design, i give you "Super Mario or God of War".
 
Before explaining the concept behind "Super Mario or God of War" (Which from now on we'll call "SMoGOW") i need to first give a little background. SMoGOW is an analogy about Gameplay Mechanics, more specifically about creating Mechanics for your Video Game, a topic which i will address first.
 

On Gameplay Mechanics...
 
One of the many problems i see students dealing with is "How many mechanics should i add to this game?" but that's not the real problem, sure, there is always the risk of having an Over-Complex Game, or a Repetitive one, but before worrying about Quantity you should figure out Purpose, it's not about "How many", its about "Why". There are Two specific situations that illustrate this:
 
-1) The New Weapon: Let's say you are making an FPS, you have your Handgun, Shotgun, Assault Rifle, Sniper Rifle, Rocket Launcher and Minigun, pretty standard, and you decide to add a new weapon, the "PLASMA-BUTTBLASTER 9000". 
  

Pictured: PLASMA-BUTTBLASTER 9000

    

Sure, it's an awesome weapon, but is it relevant? Why would the player use the weapon? What role does it fill?:

• Rapid-fire: we already have a Minigun.
• Area of effect damage: we already have a rocket launcher.
• Single target damage: we already have a Sniper Rifle.

If the weapon has no role to fill, it has no identity, so it becomes just Variety for the sake of Variety. This happens A LOT in Shooters, especially in Multiplayer focused ones, but it isn't restricted to these games, Fighting games with "Clone" characters, RPG's where a new spell is only a stronger version of the old one, it happens everywhere. 

 

When adding a new Individual Mechanic (like weapons) Always make sure there is a purpose to the mechanic before adding it, it needs a reason to be used! If your Strategy game has 5 different Civilizations that specialize on the same "Rush the enemy with Cheap Long-Range infantry units" strategy, chances are the players will find out which one of the 5 is the most efficient, and there will be no reason to use the others, so they might as well not be there. Make sure you are not adding variety just for the sake of variety. 
 

"What do you mean there is no Variety in Call of Duty? there is that weapon with... the numbers, and that other one with... different numbers..."

 

-2) The Side Quest: Ok, so you have a good selection of fun and unique weapons, now what? well, eventually the player might get bored of shooting, so we need another Core Mechanic to achieve interesting AND balanced Gameplay. 

 

The problem that comes with adding new Core Mechanics is that they need to make sense inside the Game's Universe, they have to add to the overall experience and, most importantly, they need to feel relevant. Now, let's say you've decided what new Core Mechanic to add:

"I want to give the player the ability to take the uniforms from his fallen enemies and make Kites with them, then he can Level up his Kites to unlock new attachments, like different strings or tails".

 

"HA! this will send them running in fear, Quickly! bring me the red string with sparkly ribbons... sparkly ribbons of BLOOD!"

 

First of all... what the f*ck?, second of all... seriously, what the f*ck? this example shows a Core Mechanic that does everything wrong:

• "...they need to make sense inside the Game's universe..." Unless your shooter takes place inside a facility full of Benjamin Franklin clones, there is no reason for the Kites to be involved. Most shooting games take place in War or in some kind of armed conflict, scenarios where the presence and use of firearms makes sense, so, unless your Kite is explosive or shoots something, there is no reason for it to be there.
• "...they have to add to the overall experience..." What does the player gain from doing this? better Kites! a mechanic so self-contained like this one adds nothing to the Core Gameplay, it exists only for itself, what you gain  or lose in "Kites" affects only this particular mechanic, it does not affect the overall experience, so unless it holds some significance in the narrative or mythology (Which, as established before, it doesn't) there is no reason for it to be there.
• "...most importantly, they need to feel relevant." The idea is boring, it has nothing of value for the player that came looking for a shooting game, and it accomplishes nothing, there is no reason AT ALL for the player to do it other than just for the sake of doing it, there is no reason for it to be there.

So what makes a good Core Mechanic? Let's look at what other Shooters have tried:

• Adding Stealth Mechanics: The Crysis games give the player the ability to become invisible, this lets him sneak past enemies, ambush them, escape from them or even explore the environment without danger, increasing the amount of possible scenarios and giving the game a higher replay value.

 

"They'll never SEE me coming" (Achievement progress: 1 out of 4 Puns)

 

• Introducing Squad Gameplay: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas puts you in command of a S.W.A.T-like team, you can tell your companions to flank, retreat, watch over an important position, and more, this adds a lot of depth to the skill and strategy involved in successfully completing a mission and gives the player a sense of accomplishment when they use it at it's fullest potential.

 

"Quickly! He's out of bullets! He doesnt have a SHOT at escaping" (Achievement Progress: 2 out of 4 Puns)

 

• Create a Leveling System: Borderlands gives the player the ability to gain experience and advance in levels throughout the game, giving him options to gradually customize his character and gameplay style to his liking (It also gives you a Rocket launcher that shoots many rockets that divide into smaller rockets... because ROCKETS!).

 

"It's time to LEVEL the playing field!" (Achievement Progress: 3 out of 4 Puns)

 
Every one of these meets the previous requirements, they make sense inside the game world, they add to the experience and they feel relevant, yet they are completely different from each other. There is no Golden Rule as to what makes a great Core Mechanic, but if your idea meets these 3 guidelines then you are on the right track.

 

The "Super Mario - God of War" Spectrum:

 

Not even close, good try though.

Ok, before i do anything else, let's just reveal what SMoGOW is:

"Super Mario and God of War represent the two sides of a Gameplay spectrum. God of War is the side where the evolution of Gameplay occurs with the character, the Kratos we meet at the beginning of the game is NOT the same Kratos we say Goodbye to at the end, they are completely different IN TERMS OF GAMEPLAY.

Super Mario, on the other hand, represents the side of the spectrum where the evolution of Gameplay occurs in the game's universe, the Mario we control at the start remains unchanged until the end of the game, he jumps, runs and dies the same way throughout the game, but the world around him is always evolving.

What this means is that in God of War, the challenge comes from learning the new mechanics involved in controlling our character, every time we get a new weapon or combo our character grows in complexity, and the ultimate goal is to master all of his abilities to beat the game.

In Super Mario the challenge is not on learning new movements or attacks with our character, but rather on using the abilities we learned at the beginning to overcome every new obstacle, the world changes and grows in complexity as we progress to put our skills to the test with new enemies or environments, and the ultimate goal is to adapt to beat the game.

The SMoGOW spectrum shows us how different 2 games can be, not because of their content, or genre, but because of how the Mechanics that define how the player interacts and shapes the world around give a unique Identity to the Game and it's universe."

That's the SMoGOW spectrum, or at least that's the short version. You see, i kinda lied at the beginning when i said i was going to explain something first before going into SMoGOW, truth is, i was talking about it trough the entire article!.

"What a Twist!" - M. Night Shyamalan.

 

The idea behind SMoGOW is not just the comparison between the two titles, it is about how a Game's mechanics can build it's identity, and how important it is to consider this when creating them.

 

God of War is known mainly because of it's combat, the gore and how it handles Greek mythology, but when we look at it's Core AND Individual Mechanics we see a clear Direction and Identity. And the same goes for Super Mario, it not only is the most iconic Video Game in history, with one of the most famous characters in the world, but it also represents a very clear way of designing Gameplay Mechanics.
 

The SMoGOW spectrum shows us how truly important Gameplay Mechanics are when creating a Game's identity, we don't need to have 35 weapons that differ only in name, we don't need to see every aspect of flying a spaceship when that includes cleaning the spaceship's windows or flushing the space toilet, we don't need to give the player the option of running a small farm in a game about Assassinations (Thought i forgot about you Assassin's Creed 3?). 

 

What we need is Gameplay that builds an Identity, Mechanics that are focused and work well with one another, all of this with the purpose of giving the player a fun, interesting and memorable experience that feels as a whole, and not just as many individual things.

-The End.

Well, i hope you enjoyed what is the first of many articles on Video Game design to come. Thanks for reading, and I'll see you next time, when we'll talk about the illusive "Invisibility Manifesto" (Achievement Unlocked: 4 out of 4 Puns), see you then.