Too many options are too many. A lot of us experienced players love having options. We like to choose our skills, increase our stats manually, and micromanage every little detail of our character and play because it’s part of the fun for us. For most people, that isn’t the case. Even for the people like me, there’s a point that there are just too many options, and I become gun-shy about making bad choices. Too much of anything is simply too much, and if you want an accessible game, avoid giving players too many options.

A “required feature” for your game’s genre may not be required for your game. Sometimes new features appear in almost every new game of the same genre. Mounts, for example, seem to be required as a baseline feature for a traditional MMO. Are they? Of course not. Not all burgers need cheese to be delicious, and not all MMO games need mounts to be great. An example in the FPS genre is BioShock — it doesn’t have all of the features of an FPS (or any other genre), but it’s still an amazing game. Never include a feature in a game because you think it’s a core feature to the genre; always include a feature in a game because it’s a core feature of your game.

Play your game. It sounds natural, but it isn’t always easy. Play your game like a player does, not just on your GM account, because the lack of power makes it a whole different ballgame. You need to at least understand the perspective that players have, which is hard to achieve when you know all the numbers — all the intricacies of the game — but lack the insight about how players really play. I know it’s hard to play your game that way when you made it (and to find the time to do so), but it’s a skill that you have to nurture. And, your employer better let you play while you’re at work, or they don’t know what’s good for them.

Perception is reality. When it comes to game balance, what really counts is how it feels while playing the game, not what the numbers tell you. It may be perfectly mechanically balanced–you have all the numbers, you’ve made all the calculations, and it is balanced. But, if that’s not how it feels when you’re playing the game, it isn’t balanced and needs to be changed. This is one of many reasons that it’s 100% vital that you play your game as a player does (a lesson unto itself).

Make it easy to come back. If someone has quit your game (See: Lesson #26), make it so easy to come back they can’t believe they quit in the first place. I’ll apologize right now for not making this lesson short and sweet like I usually do, but this one’s worth elaborating on. I’ll start with what you shouldn’t do, then I’ll give a few ideas for what you could do to make coming back easier than ever. Continue Reading »