DEV Community: Alejandro Salas

Availability of game's contents over the years

Alejandro Salas — Sun, 04 Aug 2019 02:46:33 +0000

The year is 2019 and gaming today is "obviously" not what was before. There was a time were you could unlock everything on a game by completing sections of the game, like challenges, puzzles, battles, etc.
In the old days, games were compiled and packed on a device, a cartridge , a disk, right into an arcade's storage.

What were the implications of this?

This was the era before internet, games were not connected to the "World Wide Web". Once the games were compiled and put into a cartridge their contents would stay in the exact same way. That's right, no updates, there wasn't any DLC because there was nothing to download. If the game had bugs, well, the game would keep those bugs. There was no way to fix bugs since the cartridge was isolated from everything. The way bugs would get fixed was by informing a game company about the bugs, they would fix it and produce new physical copies with the updated code. The cycle could repeat over and over, fixing bugs was not something we could just get today.

Another way developers could fix bugs and add features to a game was by creating an Expansion. Expansions were the DLC of that era. This was most likely seen for computer Games, not console games. For example Age of Empires was released in October 1997, and then one year later (October 1998) it an Expansion Pack was released with the name of Age of Empires: The Rise of Rome. Starcraft got an expansion too, that was Starcraft: Brood War. An lastly I'm also going to mention The Sims. The Vanilla game was released in 2000 and it got 7 expansions until October 2003. As I mentioned before, this was a way of adding new features and fix bugs.

When the internet was something affordable for people and it started to become common to have an internet service, game companies were ready to launch updates through Patches and thus you would get what we are so used to call: "Hey!, That's version 1.1!". The idea was to not distribute a physical media to update the game, this would help the finances of game companies, since it would save money for physical distributions. I have to mention here, that there wasn't any "Auto Update". The first iterations of "patching" had to be manual, the users/players had to download the patch and apply it themselves. If you want an example, Warcraft III would be the one I would choose, because back in the day, I waited a long time to play Act 2 and Act 3 of Rexxar's Campaign.

This became popular year after year. Information Technologies would improve over the years as well, as expected, game services would slowly help players to update their games, to the point where today we just have to have an active internet connection and a patch can be downloaded and applied automatically, or they could just prompt for permission to update the game, this would require just one action for the player: confirmation. That is the gift of newer technologies: transparency.

Game Contents

Time to talk about the central topic of this essay: the availability of game's contents over the years. Let's consider an old game, a game that can't get patched or updated with content. In The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time the player can collect items like the Goron Tunic, the Big Bomb Bag, the Biggest Bomg Bag and more. The Goron Tunic might seem at first just like a cosmetic item, it changes the appearance of Link in the game, to a red tunic, instead of the original green one. Now, you can finish the game without this tunic and also without the Big Bomb Bag, it is optional, but the content is there. Over the years this never changed, you can get your cartridge, boot up your Nintendo 64, and you can get that Goron Tunic, no matter the year you are reading this essay, you just have to make your way to that part of the game, that tunic is available for you to get, just go to Goron City as Adult Link and get one.

The Goron Tunic: Cosmetic at first, but it makes you heat resistant!

Now, for another game, take into consideration Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow. It's and old game, the first generation of Pokémon. The gimmick here is to catch them all, that is well known, there's 150 Pokémon in the first generation games. If you only own one version of the games, you will only be able to get 130/150. You cannot get the 150 Pokémon with just one game, the idea is to get help from another players to get the missing 20 for you to catch them all. With only 2 games, you will get 2 of the 3 starter Pokémon, so you will need a third game, to get the missing starter Pokémon, where you will be getting the 150 Pokémon. Right to the point, there are 20 Pokémon that are inaccessible, unobtainable. While the data of those Pokémon exists in the game, so you can use them in battle once you get them, the areas in the game are programmed with a set of certain Pokémon per game. Once you got the 150 Pokémon, you would get a completion diploma.

Exclusive Content

There's one last thing here, there exists a 151 Pokémon in the game, it's called Mew. Mew cannot be obtained in any game, Mew doesn't appear in any wild area, but at least this Pokémon is not needed to get the completion diploma. While you can use a glitch to make a Mew appear, this is not the intended way to play the game, and for purposes of this essay, glitches are not valid.

Chances are that you are curious on how was the official way to get a Mew on the first generation games. You needed to go to a special event.

In this events, there was a machine were you had to put your cartridge and Mew would be transfered to you. The machine looked like this.

What can we argument about 151 Pokémon?

Once the events are gone, there's no way to get a Mew. That means that today, if you play the first generation games, you can't get a Mew using Official methods, EVER. I think the point is getting clearer. Mew is exclusive content to Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow. Today, players can't complete the Pokedex with 151 because of this "Limited Time Only" gimmick. The first generation of Pokémon games would be released in 2016 digitally for the 3DS Eshop. Once again, the only way to get Mew, would be via a special distribution event, missing this event makes Mew once again unobtainable. Sadly, this kept happening with the new games, these limited edition Pokémon were called Mythical Pokemon. Today we have the 7th generation of Pokémon games, the 8th one is around the corner in a few months, there are about 20 Mythical Pokémon. That's correct, 20 of these are limited edition, considering only the official ways to obtain them. Not only that, when you transfer your Mythical Pokémon to newer generations, you lose them FOREVER in the your old games.

In Hearthstone, players have to win 5 ranked matches through the season (which lasts one month), once a new season starts players will be awarded with an exclusive card back (cosmetic item) for that participating that month. Newer players don't have access to any of this card backs, since they never played during those months, and while on one side of the coin you are rewarding your community for playing your game, new players will also feel left out and might feel they missed the opportunity for not being there with locked content. Fortunately Blizzard made an event where previous card back could be awarded (through a timed limited event.....) and that card back could be obtained for a second time.

Platform exclusivity

The next example is platform exclusive content. Different companies create their own platform for you to play games, and those companies will have agreements with video game publishers to create platform exclusive games, and also, platform exclusive content. Ever seen a Mario game on a Sega console? Ever seen a Mario game on a Sony console? That's part of the gimmick. Platform exclusivity it's the biggest segregation, those are called first party games.
Soul Calibur II was released in 3 different versions. One for each console of that time. The GameCube, The PlayStation 2 and the original Xbox. Each version introduced a different guest character.

Link from The Legend of Zelda : GameCube
Heihachi Mishima from Tekken : PS2
Spawn from the Spawn Comics : Xbox

An HD Version release made its way on 2013 for the Xbox 360 and PS3. Both consoles would get Spawn and Heihachi Misima. But this means that Link is the missing content for this HD release. This exclusive content is spread around different consoles. Unlike Pokémon there's no way to have the three guest characters avaliable at the same time. This specific generation of consoles was very interesting, since many third party games were.

DLC

DLC stands for DownLoadeable Content. And by its name, it just means that, it's content that you can download through an internet connection.
Remember those patches I mentioned for Warcraft III? Well, strictly talking, those are DLCs, you had to download the patch from the internet, that patch has new content for the game, therefore it's considered DLC. But they were offered for free and improved the quality of the game, plus added extra content.

DLC became a huge thing on Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii. Those consoles had internal Wireless cards, meaning that these consoles could connect to the internet. And while many companies went to the direction of adding Expansion packs as DLC, others saw a potential opportunity to increase the profit.

Let's talk about Season Passes, consider them as pre-sale of future DLC. You buy the DLC and you will have access to the listed DLC for that Season Pass. The bold letters are there because this doesn't necessarily mean that you will ALL future DLC, personally I think that should be the standard for a Season Pass, but there's no such thing as a standard here. For example the Fighters Pass for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate will net you all the future fighters to be added in the game, what I personally like about this example is the that the development of those fighters begins after the game was released, the bad thing is that this only nets you the fighters, this Season Pass doesn't include you any of the cosmetic DLCs. There was a time, where only one Season Pass was on sale, but there are games like Dead or Alive 6 that have multiple Season Passes, I would totally expect them to make everything available by selling a second season pass, but this is not the case, let me quote the note from the digital store.

Downloadable content not included in the list above may be released during the same period, but it will not be covered by this Season Pass 2.

Here's another example. For the game Asura's Wrath, player won't have access to the "true ending" unless they buy the "True Ending DLC". It is very straightforward, you pay money, you get access to the actual ending that matters.

In 2006, Bethesda decided too launch a DLC for the game Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. This would not to expand the game, nor add new features, or make skill balancing, but they decided to add a Horse Armor DLC for $2.50 dollars. This included a new quest to get 2 different kind of armors for a horse, and that's was it. Over the years DLC became such a joke that an Indie studio called Going Loud Studios created a game called DLC Quest, in this game the player would have to collect in-game currency and buy game mechanics to progress in the game.

The Horse Armor ~ Cosmetic DLC

Another DLC controversy was for Resident Evil 5. Capcom released a "Versus Mode", this is a new game mode, this expands the game, but there was a catch. The download size for this DLC was 1.86MB. Players argued that this allegedly new game mode was already on the game's data, and that small 1.86MB download was just a digital key to unlock the content. Capcom mentioned that while it's a small download, the new game mode uses the game assets already in the game, but they developed new code for this game mode. If the "DLC" was already in the game, it would be a similar situation like the Mythical Pokémon, the data for them it's there, but players have a wall if they want access to that content.

Later we would see that expansion DLC would be less common than cosmetic DLC. In a free to play game, you don't have to buy the game, but when you start to play the game you don't have access to all mechanics in the game.
The next example is for League of Legends. There are over 100 characters that you can play with, but you don't have access to all of them, instead, you get a "starter roster", which is around 10 characters. Players are presented with different kinds of digital currencies. They can get a kind of currency called Blue Essence, this currency is obtained by leveling up your account level. The other currency can only be obtained using real money, it's called Riot Points. Players can pay money to unlock other characters, and not only that, just like I mentioned in Oblivion, players can also buy cosmetic items called Skins, these change the appearance of the characters in the game. Remember, characters have game mechanics with them, it's what makes them unique.

Thanks teemo.gg for the models

Retailer Exclusive DLC

We are now going to talk about retailer exclusive content. That's right, the industry now also wants you to buy from an specific retailer in order for you to obtain an specific content. Let's consider Hyrule Warriors for Wii U. Depending on where you pre-order the game you would get different cosmetic items for the characters.

Pre-order from:

Amazon -> You get Twilight Princess costumes.
Best Buy -> You get Skyward Sword costumes.
GameStop -> You get Ocarina of time costumes.

Given these conditions, how can a player collect all the content in the game?
Let's not forget that these are pre-order bonuses. The player has to buy the game three times in order to get all costumes. Brand new games are $60 dollars, it is time to pay $180 dollars to get just costumes. This is not fair at all. These are not even game mechanics, it's just a cosmetic item. Hoe can this be called a complete game? It's not complete, it's locked , the costumes are already there because it's a pre-order bonus, it's what its called a Day One/Day 1 DLC. There's also this Fear of Missing out feeling that we, as humans, get when we know that things are exclusive

Day One DLC

It is worth mentioning a bigger example for Day 1 DLC. There is a game called Evolve. On release day it costed $60 dollars and it launched with many different DLCs, the total value of them all is $136 dollars. Once again, you are buying an incomplete game and the only way to unlock that content is behind a pay wall. Do you think it's fair to pay $196 dollars? A Free to play game makes more sense, since they have a different business model.

Content lock due to external sources

In Fable 2, there's an achievement called The Fowl Player. This is the achievement's description.

How can you dress as a chicken? The old school way would be to complete a section of the game and then the chicken costume would unlock for NPCs to be able to sell it. But Lionhead decided that you had to play a small web based game, and that you could make three different choices that would net you different rewards, one of those rewards was the Chicken Suit. You had to go to this site if you wanted to play the game, since it's an xbox site, it would link to your account and that would unlock the Chicken Suit to be obtained throught NPCs in the game, but today this website is not available anymore, you can't unlock your Chicken Suit, also, we just have no access to this complete game and with that the three special rewards. It does mean that to unlock this content you need to go to an external source, in this case it's another game that you play on your browser. This little gimmick is locking a costume that is needed to unlock an achievement, while not all gamers are completionists, how can completionists complete this game over the years? It is always nice to think around all players. But there's this other part of the description that mentions "see another Hero kick five chickens". The description says that you don't have to get the chicken content yourself, you can go online and play with other person that has it to unlock the achievement. But over the years this would become a problem, single player games "die" quickly, it is well known that players move to another activity after finishing a game, most likely speed runners are the segregation that keep playing single player games, and it's not for completion, it's for speed's sake. If in the present time a new player decides to play Fable 2 and complete the game, this new player would require help from a veteran player in order to complete the game, this new player will look on fable 2 websites to ask for help and hope that a fish will bite. With the web game unavailable, this situation has created a dependency with other players in order to unlock everything in this game, if the player can't find someone who can help them, the content will remain locked.

Microtransactions

Moving to other examples, let's talk about how in Mortal Kombat there's a mechanic called Fatalities, when you defeat an enemy, you can a very mortal and astonishing move, it is very impressive and it requires an specific input to execute a fatality. This has been something that players like to learn and it can get very satisfying. Turns out that for Mortal Kombat 11, there's a DLC that can make you perform easy fatalities,for $1 dollar you can get 5 easy fatalities, or it can get better, for $5 dollars you can buy 30 easy fatalities. It's not even a permanent unlock! For this example, we can specify that there's no way to unlock easy fatalities in the game, they are behind a paywall as well, once again, progression would have been the usual way to deal with this. Perhaps something like achieve 25s fatalities will all characters could unlock the easy fatalities, this would mean that the player has "mastered" them, and it can now be possible to make them easy, another option would be just to just unlock it when playing the game versus an easy AI. Microtransactions are meant to not last forever, they will always deplete and companies want you to keep buying. Back when people didn't have home consoles or personal computers, arcade machines were the microtransactional business model, skilled players would have to pay less credits.

Subscription based

The most common example for this one is a Massive Multiplayer Online game (MMO). First you have to buy the game, and then if you want to be allowed to play the game you have to pay in advance for a subscription, this subscription is time limited, the most common is a month by month subscription. How does this locks content? Well, You have access to the content as long as you pay. This can be considered a "Game as a Service".

Loot boxes

While these are very popular today, they first came around 2004. The concept of these is based on toys like Kinder Surprise, you buy an item but you don't know the contents of it. Buy first, discover later. While it's true that people like surprises, now content is locked through random elements, items are categorized by rarity and loot boxes will drop different items, rarity implies that they won't be something easy to get. While many games offer loot boxes for free, there are games where you can only get them by buying them. Card games can fall into this as well, if the way to obtaining cards are behind a "surprise mechanic", it is a loot box, this is really common, as cards also have a rarity categorization.

Opening an overwatch loot box

Content is now locked behind randomizers. While some can be cosmetic items (E.g Overwatch Skins), others can be mechanics (E.g. Hearthstone's Cards, each card is a different mechanic). Another example denying rewards through progress. Players must grind an activity to earn a loot box, investing time, instead of money. And it makes sense to make a system like this, because if this was task based, people would find a way to maximize more loot boxes. There's a concern about loot boxes, the psychology behind it's very similar to gambling. Gambling is about surprises as well, and it can become compulsive, which is why the industry should be concerned of how people can behave with this. Randomizers are the opposite of knowing exactly what will happen, predictability has a correlation with fun, the more predictable, the less fun.

Total unavailability

There are times where not just some content is locked or unavailable, but a whole game becomes inaccessible. Let's consider Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World: The Game, the game was digital only, no physical release. At the end of 2014 the game was delisted from the Xbox and PlayStation digital stores. The only information I found about why was delisted, was because of License expiration. Regardless of what are the real reasons, the real point here is that today you can't play this game, unless you bought it before it was taken down. I still have the game on my Xbox 360, but for anyone interested, there is no way to play this game.

Connections to game design

Game Design is still at the very core of these documents I make. If you want to be a developer, not just a game developer, you have to know that most of these changes will come from upper management, you might love games, you might have passion and dislike how content has been caged over the years, but in the end, it is well known that a company's objective is to make profit from things, not just a game company, but all game companies. Indeed, game development it's a complex discipline, mostly because of how many different disciplines are needed to create a product, but as time goes on, companies also improve their work methodologies. Making video games it's easier today, software has evolved to increase productivity, that's why you can see how everyday new games are released on the digital stores, the whole production loop has been improved several times. How come that in the old days, when making a video game was harder, when it could only be released physically, companies would deliver a complete experience for players? How come those old games didn't have locks and they would choose to be games of skill, instead of games of chance (Lootboxes)? Yes, digital distributions are very helpful, it can help small developers publish their games immediately, but at the same time, big companies can abuse the digital distributions and plan ahead to not release a full game and sell it in pieces, removing physical distribution costs it's actually a good amount of money, that money can be assigned to research and development, helping the production loop. There's also a correlation on how with new developers join the industry, money segregation increases. When you invite more people to your party, people will get a smaller piece of cake. But not only supplies have increased (developers), but also demand (players), so the cake have also gotten bigger. It's clear to say that game design has found new ways to profit over games, which I understand for many readers it has been pretty much the obvious conclusion, let's not forget that for others it's not obvious, those are the ones that are learning new things from this document. Indeed, money is needed for game developers to be able to sustain their product. If developers are independent, they need money to do their everyday lives, groceries, rent, services, transportation. Bigger companies will require money for salaries; programmers, artists, sound effects, music, marketing, publishing. Both types of developers will need software licenses, buying computers, special hardware depending on the needs, like drawing tablets, microphones, musical instruments, even trips to certain places to draw inspiration for newer games, to name some of the many things that are needed in game development.

It's also about Ethics

Yet, from my point of view I think this whole situation IS something ethical as well.

As a game developer myself, my personal opinion goes towards passion in games, and I know the industry overall doesn't work like that anymore, we've seen how actually independent developers are the ones who care more about that. Yet I don't think it's ethical, nor professional to have Day 1 DLC, that pretty much indicates that the DLC content is already on the base game and that it aims for just a digital key to unlock the content. Do you consider that ethical? We learn ethics in our childhood, the pivot of our futures. It is also worth mentioning that many gamers today are adults now, and they played video games as well since they were kids, they were in that age where games were complete and their contents were not split in pieces. As mentioned before, the Sims 1 had 7 expansion packs. As of today, the newest game is Sims 4. The franchise has gone through many iterations, lots of work have been put into this, I can't imagine how much research has to be done with human behaviors to make this possible. And then, a very relevant thing happened when The Sims 4 was released: the game launched without being able to play with Toddler characters (which were introduced in The Sims 2 base game). Toddlers were released 2 years after the release! How can a life stage that was present in previous games not be in this one? The game is a simulation of Human lives, how could they not release this feature having done so much work for this franchise? How could this content be lost in a new Sims game? If they didn't add a core mechanic to the game, it is less likely that they will add features from past expansion packs. Sims 1's last expansion was the Magic expansion, why does every Sims game has to have a "Magic" expansion? Why not make it part of the base game since players love those mechanics? It is understandable that they have to redo many features because they change the game engine, but then again, I think the core gameplay and features must be made first in a logical model first, and they need to minimize the coupling with visual and sound effect modules. Keeping the iterations over this life simulation model will keep and keep improving the game, helping the new games come to life quicker and with a warranty seal, by using the new and improved model. Ever wondered why new Pokémon games come out very soon? Because the battle and Pokémon models are very similar between games. A Pokémon's data structure is very very similar in all games, that's how you can transfer Pokémon across newer games, they polished and stick to a model during development.

When developing a game, a lot of features are on the drawing board. As much as we love games, it can take a lot of time to add all features in the game and chances are that not all that we plan makes it into the game. Planning is hard, it takes a lot of patience and team organization. This is of higher importance for independent developers, since they have to fulfill different disciplines by themselves, since they are usually a smaller team.

Considerations to make as a game developer biased to passion, not profit

Let's ask the question again.

Can we say a game is complete when there's things like DLC or Expansion Packs?

Here are some points to take into consideration, these are my personal considerations, they are not simply made because that's my opinion, my experience as a consumer and developer are here.

If content can't make it to the base game, I can only approve (ethically speaking) to add the missing features only if they start development after the release of the game. If people like the core mechanics of the game, it is very likely that they want to support future content, players must know that their money will go to something that hasn't even started yet. As a developer and designer, core mechanics must be polished, otherwise people will know developers didn't fulfill their job.
- This is how game patches work.
- This is how expansions used to work with the old games.
- A Season pass is perfect for this. Remember that a season pass is a pre-sale of content that will be released in the future, like the Smash Bros. Ultimate Fighters Pass. The Season Pass should offer all future DLC.
The base game's cost should ideally be reduced. The development team knows that the game is "incomplete" and that they will release newer features later. For a AAA game, it could be $40 and add a $20 season pass to add all features later. This way players will only spend the usual $60 dollars for a game, knowing other $20 will help with funds to develop the future stages of the game. Price considerations have to vary depending on how much work is needed for its development.
I think cosmetic items are a grey area, since they don't add mechanics to the game, but it is well known that players like to have visual options because everyone has different likes. Cosmetics are an extra feature, and I think they ideally should be in the base game. Remember the Goron Tunic example? It makes Link appearance to be Red, instead of Green, remember that Ocarina of Time never had any type of expansion.
- Ideally, cosmetic items should be VERY cheap. I find shameful to charge $10 dollars for a skin, many games are worth that. How come a cosmetic item has the same or more value than game's mechanics? League of Legends skins are more expensive than 1 Smash Bros Character, and that one includes 8 different skins. And let's not forget the Horse Armor DLC.
- Any future cosmetic item has to be included in the season pass, like the Dead or Alive Season Pass that includes dozens of skins.
Game as a service are not inherently bad. But developers can't expect to price their games or services equally to games as a product. Remember that games with subscriptions enter in this category.
- Ideally, the base game should be free. Alternatively, if the base game is sold, you have to give players a substantial amount of subscription time.
- These games should add content more frequently than a typical game. Because you are constantly paying money if you want to access the contents.
- Part of the profit has to go for research and development for Backend programmers and Dev ops.
- As a consumer point of view, it is healthy to just stick to just one game as a service. Use your time and money wisely.
- Future content should be free as well, because players are constantly paying money. What would happen if people don't get new content during a subscription period? Is that fair for the players? They paid money for a reason.
As a whole, I don't approve microtransactions nowadays. Mostly because they give you a temporal reward, it is not something you will keep forever, and yes, this is part of their business model. Perhaps an analogous solution to arcade machines can be the way to go for microtransactions, biased to skill. I can't imagine buying a Chess piece by piece, instead of buying the whole set together.
Developers should stay away from loot boxes (which are also microtransactions). As a developer aim to make a game of skill, not a game of chance, remember that these are tied to gambling, this is not something we want to teach children. If adding loot boxes, these are best considerations.
- Only include them in free-to-play games.
- Let players be able to get loot boxes for free. If an example is required, Heroes of the Storm is a perfect example.
- They might just be a mini game, but nothing that could lock game contents or progression.
DO NOT release Day 1 DLC. At this point, it's content that exists on the base game, it was already developed. Or, perhaps developers worked the first 24 hours non-stop to release a new DLC? Very unlikely.
Do not release retailer exclusive content. How is this fair for players? Besides, after all, those will be released digitally in a later date, which makes them "Timed Exclusive Content".
Using external agents to add more content to the game are not a bad ideas, they can enrich the game experience. Yet, I still believe that those external sources have to be available for every player, everyone has to have the same opportunity to unlock new stuff. For example, a companion app can be helpful for certain games, and it should not give extra or exclusive content to those who use it. If this this external source is deprecated, then the main game has to inform all players and address this issue with a patch that unlocks this new content for future gamers that play this game after deprecation. Fable II could just add a new patch to the game that could make the Chicken Suit available through the various NPC shops, that way they would have a measure against their web-based game that unlocked the chicken suit, making possible to players to get the
Do not implement time limited content. As mentioned with Hearthstone, people will feel that they were left out from time-limited events, as well as the rarity of mythical Pokémon. Seasonal events are something fun to play because of how a game can change through different seasons/holidays, specially since they keep returning every year, I find better to introduce those new items during that season. Making those items easier to get across the season, and increasing the difficulty of getting that content when the season is not available, players can feel rewarded because they did something harder. By not adding time limited content, you preserve the contents of the game over the years for new generations of gamers.
As far as games that are not available anymore. The only point that I can make here, is that while emulation is another ethical dilemma, let's not forget that emulation can help preserve game contents, while they can encourage piracy, there are still tons of old games that haven't seen the daylight in modern times.
New content is created to increase a game's lifespan, and it's very debatable that single player games are dead. That's why patches and expansion packs helped to increase the lifespan of games, but new content can also be "a love letter" for the fans of your games, they will spend their time in your creations, this will also encourage them to buy your new products, and you will be marked as a developer that respects and cares about their fanbase.

Closing statements

As a game developer I would like to see games that can be preserved over the years. By not locking content with gimmicks, preservation can be achieved. Just remember how the vast majority of old games still let us enjoy the whole package, there's even some digital re-releases that don't patch the original glitches, to preserve the original glory adding also some enhancements. I encourage people to be passionate about making games, think about how some business models might be unethical. Not only as fans, but as clients, there has to be respect for the gamers. I strongly believe that content must be accessible to all gamers, of course they have to earn it, by increasing their skill in the game, completing the the various objectives that game designers make for them. As developers we also have to make our difference, because we are consumers as well. Treat others the way you want to be treated, one of my very first lessons in life.

Components of a Top Down Game 🎮 ~ A Legend of Zelda Case Study

Alejandro Salas — Thu, 11 Jul 2019 10:32:18 +0000

Original Link: https://arekusunaito.gitbook.io/knowledge/introduction/components-of-a-top-down-game-a-legend-of-zelda-case-study

I've been thinking for a long time that I should create a database of in-game components, or a list of things that have to be created to put in-game. While is intented to help me visualize what is needed in a video game, it should also be helpful for others. I'm going to use the very First Legend of Zelda for this, and then (if no other project intervenes) use a second top down game, to see how many similiraties exist. The reason why Mario Maker exists and why you can skin the game with the different Mario styles, it's because there are design patterns in those games, and naturally, top down games have the same too. Who knows, this could potentially be a Youtube video for later. 🎥

Heads up! This is a very long post, as it analyzes pretty much all the Legend of Zelda game in a technical way, this post is aimed for enthusiasts of how things work from the inside.

Screens

Title Screen

The first thing you will notice is a title screen in games (ignoring that at some point, splash screens are the first things we see). The objective of this screen is to present the game without playing. Old video games used to present an intro to the game or show how the games were played. This screen is the lobby before an adventure. In The Legend of Zelda

You can see it presents an animated logo of the game.
The year it was created
The studio/company who created this game
An background
An animated waterfall (which appends to the background)
The "Press Start Button" text that indicates, well, that same thing, that you should press the start button to trigger another action. (Which takes you to the next screen)

As mentioned before, the title screen presents the game, but you are not playing just yet. A programmer must

Place the background image on the screen.
Play the title screen music
Animate any sprites that need to be animated.
- The waterfall
- The logo
Animate and make that "darkening" of the sprites before the transition to the next screen.
- Once the darkening has been completed the transition begins.
Detect input for "Push Start Button"
- This will trigger a transition to the file select screen
Create transitions
- To the Intro Screen
- To the File Select screen
There's an invisible logic here. Which is probably a timer. After a certain amount of time, if the player doesn't push the start button.
- The Screen must go dark
- Must make a transition to the Intro Screen

The Intro Screen

We could say that this is a separated screen even if they share the same song. This is a scrolling screen where that presents

A big text with the story of the game. Also take into account that someone has to create the frame of the intro, which is the same frame around the game's logo.
The list of treasures in 2 columns.

Next, you will notice that after a bit of spacing, the "all treasures" section appears.

You can notice that same sprites for the frame are used as a separator for the section, as well as the sprite letters.
I think it's easier to do the separator with the game engine, since you can make a grouped object containing the frame and the letters.

Next, you will notice that for the 34 treasures here (plus one, which is the triforce), we can create a common object with the Treaure sprite and the label of the treasure.
We would have a base item like this, the idea is to use this same item 35 times, 17 times on the left column, 17 times on the right column and make a specialized animated version, for the Heart, Rupee and Triforce.

This is the base item that we will need. As I mentioned before, this is represented by the treasure sprite and the label with the treasure's name.

The next thing to do, would be either manually or by code, to place the the treasures on a column invisible object and just scroll the items.

At the very end, the game suggests the player to take a look at the game manual.

Yet these two sprites are going to stay centered on the screen and they still stop at the very center. These two can be a third invisible center column with their own logic.

So, in these screen the sprites for every treasure are used. They must be ready here, but a placeholder can be used. There's a total of 35 treasures in this screen.. Notice that the triforce is animated too.

A final transition will be made, it can be once the song has finished playing, we are going to transition to the Title Screen.

The File Select Screen

This screen is the hub to select your file. A file saves data for your personal adventure. This screen was made so you can have up to three different adventures, or that three different players could play the game in different times by sharing the cartridge.

This screen has a solid black color background. There are labels to indicate information on the screen. If you press the "Select" button you can change between files and the last two options, which are "Register your name" and "Elimination mode".

The heart to the left is the cursor of the current selection.
- By pressing Select you move to the next selection.
There are three file rows.
There's a Link "Icon"/"Sprite" to represent the game character.
- First Column
  - There's a name to that character
  - There's a death count. This is, how many times you have died during your adventure.
- Second Column
  - A row of heart sprites to indicate how much health the player has collected during the adventure. The player starts with three hearts. ### The Register your Name Screen

This screen will prompt the player to name the main character/protagonist. While the canonical name is Link, the player can choose to name it whatever they want.

Here the player will only be able to select an "Empty" file, which is pretty much a file that doesn't have a name. It is worth noting that the player can name the three files in the same screen if they don't have a name. Once the "Register End" is selected, any files with 1 or more characters will be considered as playable files.

Once again, we can see here that we are recyling Link's sprites, the heart and there's a red square on the file selected. This red square represents the next letter that will be drawn, this is feedback for the player, this way will know how the position of the next letter.

At the bottom of the screen you can see a box with letters. Let's call it a Symbol Matrix. This 11x4 Matrix is where the player will choose the symbols for the name of main character. The gamepad's directional pad will move between the letters. Here, at the matrix, the purple frame is a resource that needs to be placed as well.
If you press the A button, the selected letter will be added to the file name.

The Elimination File Screen

This is called "Elimination Mode". You will be transitioned here if you select the "Elimination Mode" from the "File Select Screen".

Similar to the other screens. You move between files using the "Select Button".

Link sprite is here as well
The heart sprite is now white.
The Symbol Matrix doesn't do anything here. I would get rid of it.
By Pressing the start button it will delete (without any prompt) the selected file. Design wise, it seriously needs to ask the player if its okay to delete everything from their adventure.
- This will also play the Link's hurt sound effect
Selectint "Elimination End" will make a transition to the "Register your name" screen

Gameplay Screen

Now that that player has selected the file they are going to play and pressed the "Start Button". There's going to be a transition that look like this.

HUD

The HUD (Heads Up Display) presents relevant information about the game. The NES Zelda HUD presents the following

A Minimap of Hyrule
How many rupees the player has
- A HUD Rupee Icon is needed
How many keys the player has
- A HUD Key Icon is needed
How many bombs the player has
- A Bomb Key Icon is needed
Which Item (treasure) is assigned to use with the B Button
Which Item (treasure) is assigned to use with the A
- As note, it's always a Sword
  - Wooden Sword
  - White Sword
  - Magical Sword
The maximum Life the player has
The current Life the player has

The HUD is always present during gameplay. This is the kind of information that the player must know all the time.

Observation: Notice how the purple frame from the Items is the same frame for the File Select Screen, The Symbol Matrix and the label separator Register your Name and Elimination Mode

Map

The complete map is a:

4096 x 1344 pixels, 16 x 8 rooms, and 256 x 88 tiles in size
- This is 128 rooms in total
Tiles are 16x16 pixels^2
Each "room" is 16x11 tiles ##### Minimap

From the information about the map, the Minimap reflects this 16x8 matrix.

The green dot on the grey rectangle represents the location of Link in Hyrule.
If Link moves to another room, it must change to the new location.

The Rooms

Now that we talked more in depth about the HUD, we can talk about the rooms (or areas) of hyrule. Each room is 16x11 tiles. You might be asking what a Tile is...
A tile is a sprite that is placed on a grid (matrix).

As you can see, there are many parts of this area that are pretty much the same thing. The main purpose of this was because of the limitations of the hardware of that time period, yet it's not a bad technique to create a map in any game, even today
Observation: You can see that the cream color could just be the background and not a tile itself, the other tiles make the ilusion that the solid background could be another tile in Zelda for NES.

And many of these tiles are just a recoloration of other tiles to let the player think that it's a totally different area, take a look at this.

Those trees are the same thing, but different color, we call that a re-color!

Link

Now it's time to talk about the most complex system in this game, which is Link. Let's talk about the first thing that Link can do, moving.

Link's Movement

Link can move in the four cardinal directions (North, West, South, East), but we usually call them just Up,Left,Down,Right. And it has the following sprites.

In the previous image you can see 5 different sprites. These 5 sprites make the illusion of moving.

First row are the Down Sprites
Second row is the Up sprite. This sprite gets mirrored horizontally, and it makes the illusion of walk.
Third row are the Right sprites, but just like the Up, if you mirror them, it will create the Left movement as well, there's no need for further movement.

Link taking damage

Link without Items is pretty simple. The other thing that Link can do without any items is.... to take damage. There's no different sprite, in this case Link's sprite flashes of different colors informing the player that Link has taken damage.

Link is pushed to the opposite direction where he's facing. Yet, it is not always the case, probably another way to push him would be to push him in the direction where the enemy that collides with Link is facing.

Link is defeated

When Link runs out of Life, he's defeated, it means there's a Game Over.

The Screen turns red
A sound effect is played
Link faces down and then the sprites rotates in all four directions.
Link's faces Down
The Screen darkens
Link's sprite changes to grey
A death animation is played. (Like a small explosion)
Another sound effect is played
The Game Over Screen label is shown at the center of the screen.

The Game Over Screen

Move between scenes

If you hold the Gamepad at the edge of the screen (in this case holding the RIGHT button) you can go to another room, this is how you travel around Hyrule. Here, there's a need for a camera, this camera will move to the next room and it will be rendered, this is a very simple camera, as it just moves to the center of the next screen.

Notice how Link's move animation is played to the direction where he's moving.
Enemies appear after the camera scrolls.

Collision detection

Ok, so we do have our sprites on screen, but there has to be a disctintion between a sprite that can just walk over. Notice how Link can't get throught this sprites.

This has to be done, it's called Collision detection, and once detected, we are telling Link's sprite to not go throught them.

Link Gets an Item

The next sprite that needs to be created is when Link gets an Item. It looks like this.

This occurs after you get the Wooden sword.

Link using a Treasure

When Link uses a treasure (or Item), it will be using 1 of 3 new sprites.

This is the most common thing you'll see, since you use the Sword all the time. Yet, when Link uses any treasure it uses the same sprites, only that they are sped up.

Here are the differences with some treasures.

E.g. The following is using bombs

E.g. The following is using the Boomerang

This is different that the actual functionality of the Item. This section was about what Link does when using a treasure, which is pretty much On Input.

Active Treasures

Now it's the time to talk and analyze the treasures.

The Shield

Link's shield can block basic projectiles, such as arrows, the octorok rocks, yet it's not possible to block magical attacks.
From what I can gather, there could be a child object in Link that has another collider, that would be the shield, the thing here would be to manipulate the collision box every time Link faces another place. When a basic projectile hits the shield:

It will play a SFX
It will destroy the projectile

There's an upgrade to the shield, the magic shield.

It has a different sprite
It has a bigger collision box (so, it should be easier to block things)

Boomerang

It plays a continuous sound while traveling
The sprite rotates indefintely until caught
Travels to the direction where Link is facing
- Althought it's not 100% true, it actually uses the current Input from the gamepad, you can throw a boomerang Diagonally.
It will travel half the screen, starting from Link's hand position.
When collides with most of enemies, it will stun them.

Note: When upgraded to the Magical Boomerang, the only difference is that it can travel across the whole screen.

Bomb

It plays a sound effect on spawn
After about [0.75 - 1] seconds it will spawn an explosion that can damage enemies, this is a big collision box.
It has an explosion animation using a single cloud sprite, the animation has 7 clouds. In this part of the animation where the enemies can get hurt.
- There's another cloud effect that indicates that the explosion is fading.
- From my understanding, enemies are not hurt from here, this is just a follow up.
Bombs can open secret doors, on collision with an explosion the lock wil dissapear.

Bow & Arrow

In this game, these are considered two different items.
Even if you manage to get arrows, you cant shoot'em, because you don't have a bow. On the other side, if you get the Bow but you don't have arrows, well, you can't shoot what you don't have. How does it work?

The bow is just a requirement to shoot arrows (you don't see Link using the arrow, just shoot an arrow in front of him.)
Spawn an arrow in front of where Link is facing.
There's a sound effect when shoot
The arrows follows the trajectory where Link is facing.
It is destroyed
- When it gets at the end of the screen
- When it collides with an enemy
You can see a destroyed animation

Candle

It spawns a flame in front of Link
A flame SFX plays
The flame has an animation that makes you think the flames are moving
The flame object moves aproximately 2 Units ahead of Link in a slow speed.
The flame can hurt enemies
The flame can hurt Link
It dissapears after a couple of seconds

In dark rooms, the flame lights the way

Recorder

This is a teleporter item. It takes you to other dungeons you have completed.

It plays a Sound effect
Every other game object in the game is frozen while the SFX plays.
If you get hit, the tornado won't pick up Link
It spawns a cloud on the 0,Y coordinate Link currently is.
A tornado spawns from 0,Y of the screen
The tornado moves horizontally across the screen
The tornado has a "moving animation"
IF it touches Link, Link's sprite disappears, making the player think its inside the tornado
- Once it reaches the end of the screen, the game will make a transition (apparently) to a random room that has an entrance of a dungeon
- Once at the new room, the tornado will repeat the spawn steps and move horizontally
- Once it reaches the Center X, it will make the Link sprite appear.
- The tornado will dissapear
- Link will face to the right

Food

This treasure's functionality is to make enemies think the food is Link, this is, bait. This is, enemies will now (not always) target the bait, instead of link.
Note: Works as a usable key item to get past an enemy inside a dungeon.

Letter

A treasure that by its own doesnt do anything. Nowadays it could be considered a Key Item, it is needed to "unlock" the potions by taking the letter to the old lady.

Potions

When you use a potion, every game object freezes and it waits until Link's health is completely refreshed. Once the red potion is used, there's a second potion that can be used as well.

Magical Rod

Pretty much the functionality of the sword, but this always shoots a projectile. What's important about this is how the sword code can be manipulated and recycled, changing stuff for the road.

Note: In order to be able to shoot a flame, the player must find a passive treasure called the "Book of Magic". The fire has the same functionality as the candle's fire, so, we would pretty much just instantiate a flame.

Passive Treasures

All of these treasures are not activable with B, rather, their effects are used in different conditions. As mentioned before, we would call this items nowadays as "Key Items"

Raft

The raft is a key item by itself, you can use it to cross the sea and reach a dungeon and an optional cave. This is what it does.

Keep moving through the green wood
The raft sprite will appear above Link
Link's walking animation is activated
The change screen logic is applied too, we will move to the next screen with it reaches the end of the screen.

Book of Magic

As mentioned before for the Magical Rod, if the player has collected this, it will allow the rod to spawn a flame on collision with an enemy or touching the edge of screen.

Blue Ring

This item pretty much just has to alter the logic of taking damage, in that function it will divide the damage by half.

When collected it will change Link's sprite to a blue tunic.

Red Ring

Just like the blue ring, but this divides the damage by 4. Link takes a quarter of the original damage.

When collected it will change Link's sprite to a red tunic.

These share pretty much all the functionality, just a matter of changing a 2 (half damamge) to a 4 (quarter) and changing the sprite to another one.

Stepladder

The stepladder is a very interesting item. The logic can be created in many many ways. And depending on how the map logic is created this item could be potentially be activated. Let's discuss the functionality first.

The ladder lets you walk through an unwalkable tile (that is not a wall) where Link will place the ladder in front of him, this will allow Link to walk through

Here comes the interesting part, there are many unwalkable tiles in many rooms, yet apparently you can only use the stepladder where it could potentially be useful, notice how the two rooms are very similar, but you can only use the stepladder in one of them.

It could be unlocked via a list of specific rooms where you could use it. (It requires to makes this list, manually)
It could be unlocked by checking if there's a particular type of tile on that room, if that tile exists in that room, then you can use the stepladder (this just requires to check the existence of it as a validation)

Keys

The keys are items that allow you to unlock a door, that will the next room available to enter. As mentioned before the game keeps track of how many keys the player has.

The player has to walk towards a locked door.
If the player has at least one key, it will substract a key from the counter.
- It will open the locked door, making the door object dissapear.

There's another item that the player can collect, it's called the magical key, this key allows the player to open any lock, removing the requirement of having keys.

Power Bracelet

When Link gets the power bracelet, it allows him to push these kind ofs rocks. It requires just a collision, and it requires that the tile in front of the rock is free of collisions.

Dungeon Map

When you collect a Map in a Dungeon, the minimap will automatically fill the squares of the map, this way the player can see find the way around easily.

When you press start, you can see how the map is completed when you walk through rooms, sadly, collecting the Dungeon Map doesn't complete this map, yet it's useful to compare to where you have been. It even tells you which the directions where you can go, it's a nice bonus. (Once again, the green square is Link. )

Compass

This is an item that every dungeon has, just like the Dungeon Map. Once you collect it, it will marked on the Minimap the of the Triforce Shard, this way the player will know where the Boss is located, so they can defeat it and get the Triforce Shard. It is not neccesary to get this shard in order to complete the dungeon.

Triforce Shard

Collecting a Triforce Shard doesn't do anything by themselves, they are just Key Item, they are only needed so the player can get throught a room at Level 9 ~ Death Mountain. If the player has completed the Triforce, then the player can proceed and have their adventure at the final dungeon, other than that they are useless.

This item only has quick change color animation, the same sprite can be used and just change it's color back and forth.

Pick up treasures

These treasures have some similarities, like the way they spawn, and that they disappear if the player doesn't collect them. Also, some of them have an Idle Animation which is just changing colors. By the way, Link can collect these Items with his Sword, it becomes an extension of his collision box.

From the Wikia there's information about that, when Link defeats 10 enemies they will drop 5 Rupees. If the 10th enemy is defeated using a bomb, that enemy will drop 4 bombs. If Link defeats 16 enemies, they will drop a Fairy.

Recovery Heart

When collected it will restore 1 Heart to the player's life.
You can collect as many as you want.
If you have full life, nothing will happen, you will remain full health.
When it spawns, it flashes quickly for a very very short time, it then changes to the Idle Animation.
Has an animation, it changes to another color and goes back to the original one, this animation repeats indefinitely, for a total of 2 animations.
If it's not collected until X amount of time, it will disappear.
Enemies can drop this item when defeated.

Heart Container

This item increases the player's max life. The player starts with 3 Hearts.

Fairy

Collecting a fairy restores Link's health by 3, it's pretty much 3 recovery hearts.

Clock

When collected the enemies will freeze on their current position.
When it spawns, it flashes quickly for a very very short time, it then changes to the normal sprite.
If it's not collected until X amount of time, it will disappear.
When it spawns, it flashes quickly for a very very short time, it then changes to an unanimated sprite.
Enemies are STILL ANIMATED.
Makes Link's sprite flash, this is the provided feedback to let the player know that the clock is under effect. The effect lasts until the player leaves the room.

As you can see the Clock doesn't have an Idle animation, it's just the sprite on screen.

Rupees

There are two types of rupees.

- When it spawns, it flashes quickly for a very very short time, it then changes to the Idle Animation.
1 Value Rupee
- Increases player's rupees by 1.
- The Idle Animation is flashing between blue and orange.
5 Value Rupee
- Increases player's rupees by 5.
- Doesn't have an idle animation, it's just the blue rupee sprite.
If it's not collected until X amount of time, it will disappear.

Differences

Orange Rupee (Worth 1)

Blue Rupee (Worth 5)

Enemies

This section will now analyze the enemies as components as well.

Every enemy that collides with Link will make him take damage.

Octoroks

These are the first enemies the player will encounter, they just wander around the room, they are not actively trying to find Link.

They stop moving (but the animation doesn't change) before they shoot the projectile
They shoot the projectile even if they are seeing Link
If the projectile hits Link, he will take damage.
- The projectile gets destroyed if it collides with walls.
- Link's shield can block this projectile
They collide with tiles. They are solid.

There's also Blue Octoroks, have more health than the red ones.

Tektites

These enemies just move in a very weird and unpredictable pattern. They move have a Parabolic movement. They probably choose a point where they want to land and then a parabola pattern is created to move to that point.

Ignore map collisions completelty.
From what we can see on the GIF they are not actively looking for Link
They have an Idle animation, and when they jump they always have a "falling" sprite, which is the second sprite from the idle animation.

They also come in blue and red. The wiki claims that red ones jump more than the blue ones and both have the same health. And they have more chances to drop rupees and the clock treasure, I'd assume blue ones are the ones that have bigger loot change.

Leevers

These are enemies that spawn from the ground. Just like the previous ones, they are two kinds, a red one and a blue one.s

They have an spawn animation, making you think that they actually come from the ground.
Both red and blue will go back to the ground after a while.
- They are invulnerable when on burrowed.
Red Leevers are actively trying to find Link, once they spawn they will target Link's direction.
When they hit Link, they go back to the opposite direction

Blue Leevers have a random pattern, they just simple don't mind Link at all.
Blue leevers have more health than the red ones.

Peahats

They also ignore collisions
Are semi-actively looking for Link
They are invincible until they stand still (they supposedly to be flying), meaning they are on ground.
They have a wind-up animation, that makes them feel like they are starting to move.
- They move a bit slower during this time
They slow down when they prepare to ground.
- Their movement animation also slows down.
The movement animation is just 2 frames.
They can move diagonally, and it seems they try to do a circle pattern, surrounding Link.

Moblins

Very similar to Octoroks
They collide with things
They shoot Arrows, rather than rocks.
Blue Moblins have more health

Armos

They start immobile
Start moving when collides with them.
They have different movement speeds
They collide with the room.
Not actively Looking for Link
They always start moving south.
- Meaning, that Link will immediatly take damage if he collides with them from below.
- If Armos is facing south, Link can collide from North and not take damage.
They have a sprite when they move north.

Ghinis

These are very interesting. They only appear on the cementery. When you enter the room, there's only one Ghini there.

Like an Armos, if you touch a stone, a Ghini will spawn.
Like an Armos, after spawning, they start moving south first, then they change their direction.
It has a lot of health.
The Spawned Ghinis are invincible
The only way you can defeat the other Ghinis is by keeping track of the "Original Ghini" and defeat him.
The "Original Ghini" DOESN'T IGNORE COLLISIONS
Interestly enough, when you kill the Main Ghini, the other spawned Ghinis will be defeated INSTANTLY, they can drop stuff as well.
Spawned Ghinis ignore collisions
Spawned Ghinis can move diagonally
Ghinis can keep spawning, even if you have killed the "Main" Ghini.
If you manage to get a clock, you can see that you they can spawn and they won't move, as mentioned before, you can't kill them, since you defeated the Main Ghini.
The following image makes me wonder that the limit of enemies on a room is 11.

Lynels

If you played Zelda Breath of the Wild, you might remember the big horse-lion enemy, well, this is the actual game where they appear first.

They seem to be the same enemy behaviour like the Octoroks and the Moblins.
They have more health.
High chances to attack when it stops moving
Only the Magical Shield can stop the sword projectile
Their projectile hits a lot more.
Very poorly looking for Link

Zola or Zora

Spawns from a (apparently) a random water tile.
It shoots a projectile directly to Link. Simple angle between Zora's position and Link's position.
The projectile has an animation
Could it be that those projectile that it miss, are predictions on where he's going to move?

Rocks

While they are not enemies since they cannot be defeated, we will put them at the very end of the overworld enemies since they are entities that need to be programmed.

They seem to appear in X=Random,Y=0.
They do a diagonal movement.
Are always looking for Link
They seem to change direction every time they make a move. (1 diagonal movement)

The Dungeon/Underground Enemies

These enemies only appear inside certain dungeons and not on the Overworld.

Zol and Gel

They seem to work similar to many enemies that have the "roaming" behaviour.
- Like the Octoroks, Moblins, Lynels
When you kill a Zol, 2 Gels will spawn.
- Killing a Zol with a "strong weapon" will not spawn anything.
Gels cannot drop anything, it's pretty useless to kill 'em.

Rope

They slowly roam
If Link its on their X or Y coordinate, they will charge to him.
- Untl they collide with a wall

Keese

Very similar to Peahats as a behaviour
They speed up and move in circles
They stop after a while
Can be hit at any time
2 frame animation that speeds up

Vire

Seem to have the wander behaviour that has been describen previously.
They only jump when they move horizontally
If you defeat them with a weak weapon, they will spawn keeses
They cannot jump obstacles

Stalfos

Simple wander behaviour. As mentioned before
Mirror walking animation
Only damage Link with collision

Wall Master

These enemies seem to only appear on the edge of the map. As the name indicates, they come from walls.
They seem to store Link current's position when they spawn and move to that position. They are not chasing him constantly. They have a programmed path
- Required to programm that movement
When collide with Link, he will take damage, and then it will be transported to the entrance of the dungeon.

Goriya

Similar to many other more, has a simple roam pattern.
Instead of shooting arrows or other known projectiles, they shoot the Boomerang
- Like other enemies, they stop before shooting the projectile

Wizrobes

Orange Wizrobe

After some time, these will appear at the same X or Y coordinate than Link.
- If there are 2 orange, chances are high that one will be at X and the other at Y.
- It is possible to be both on X, or both on Y.
They have a small invincivility time gap.
- You can hurt them after that
After appearing, they will shoot a projectile

Blue Wizrobe

These are roaming like other enemies, not very actively looking for Link.
- But then they decide to make a "warp" to another location.
  - During this time they are invicinble.
  - This warp can help them ignore obstacles, as they can just pass them through.
If they match Link' X or Y coordinate they will shoot a projectile.

Darknut

Similar roaming behaviour as mentioned before.
Blue Darknuts have more health.
You can only hit a Darknut with your sword if you hit on their side or back, not in front of them. The shield blocks your attacks.
Bombs are very useful, they hit no matter the side.
They are like enemies that want to make you feel they are unstoppable.
They dont appear to have knockback. Can really confirm with my game because I already got the strongest sword.
Just a reminder than most enemies just have 2 frame animations.

Pols Voice

Roaming with extra behaviours.
- They can jump horizontally
- They can jump vertically
- These jumps can jump obstacles. And they will jump whenever they find one.
- They jump 2 tiles.
- If they jump on another obstacle, they will jump again and so on.
It takes a lot of hits to defeat.
Inmune to bombs
Arrows can defeat them in one hit
They hit very hard.

Lanmola

Worms that seem to follow the roaming algorithm mentioned before
Blue ones are very very fast
When they move, their attached body parts follow the head. Apparently they have 4 parts and the head.
- This gives the illusion of complex movement.
When you hit them, their body parts are destroyed.
- Once all of them are destroyed, the head will continue moving, so you justs have to defeat the head to completely defeat them.
They dont seem to have any kind of knockback or staggering. They keep moving even if you hit.

Like Like

Simple roaming behaviour.
When they collide with Link, they will eat him.
- When Link is inside, Link can't move.
- You can use your sword while inside them, you can defeat them this way.
- If Link has the Magical Shield (Shield Lv. 2) this enemy will eat it and you have to get a new one.
  - It's not immediate, but it takes a bit for them to eat it.
- From what I can gather, Link is immune to other sources of damage when inside this enemy.
- You can hit other enemies even if you are inside, sword collisions keep working, you can use your treasures too.

Gibdo

They seem to be a copy paste of the Stalfos.
Have more health than stalfos, so you could say these are the "blue stalfos".

Moldorm

A worm enemy, very very similar to Lanmola.
This enemy can move diagonally. Biggest difference
- Plus not that fast and it's easier to evade.
It doesn't stagger or have knockback.
Parts follow the head, you can only know which part its the head by following their movement. The one leading its the head.

Bubble

I consider this enemies more like obstacles.
You cannot defeat them.
If you collide with them, they will "curse" you.
- This is, Link can't use his sword.
Medium fast roaming behaviour.
- Seem to like to collide with something to change direction.
- Not neccesarily need to collide to change direction.
They don't do any damage.
- There's a hit animation for Link, and you can use this time to make yourself invincible while the animation lasts.

Trap

Obstacles that are just waiting for Link
They come in pairs.
3 states
- Idle state. Not moving at all.
  - When they match Link's X or Y coordinate, they will charge to that position, going to attack state.
- Attack state.
  - When they collide with another trap, they will go to the "return state".
- Return state
  - Slowly go back to their original position.
  - During this time, they will not charge at Link.
  - When back in original position they will go to Idle state.

Patra

It's considered a mini boss.
An enemy that has 8 small patras rotating around him.
It's invincible during this time.
Blue patra moves very slowly.
It flies, so it ignores collisions.
You have to defeat the 8 parts to be able to attack the blue patra.
They have a circle behaviour.
- It can change the radious where it rotates around the blue patra.
It doesn't stagger/knockback.

Bosses

Bosses drop a Heart Container when defeated on a specific position on the room.
Bosses can drop ruppes and other items too.

Aquamentus

Moves very slowly.
Moves only horizontally
- Moves only in 3 tiles
  - This is, from mid goes to the right.
  - From right, to left, or mid. And so on.
You can only hit the head.
When hit, it will flash to orange.
Body and head are separated animations from what I can see.
Intervals to shoot 3 projectiles.
- These seem to store Link's current position.
- Link can evade them after they are launched to a predictable location.
- These projectiles change animation after certain distance.

Dodongo

This boss seems to have a simple enemy movement behaviour.
Simple roaming.
Can only be defeated by making it eat a bomb.
After eating a bomb, it will have a "hurt" animation. Sprite changes to its body exploding from inside.
Takes 2 bombs to defeat it.
- It continues walking after the first hit.
- Flashes when its defeated.
Immune to all damage, except bombs.

Manhandla

Big enemy.
Made of 5 parts.
- Center and 4 cardinal directions. Cardinal directions are pincers.
- Pincers have their own idle animation.
You can only hit the pincers.
You defeat it when you destroy the 4 pincers.
Every time you destroy a pincer, it will move faster.
Each pincer can shoot a projectile. It's quick and it shoots to Link's current location.
- No feedback to know when it's going to shoot.
I'd love to describe it as a ping pong movement. But it's not always like that, seems like a combinationn of ping pong / bounce with the the roaming behaviour for other enemies.
- The fact that this enemy is very big, made of various parts and that every time you destroy a pincer it moves fast, makes you think that it could have a very different movement algorithm.
- Biggest difference I see is that it "bounces" when it collides walls.

Gleeok

Just like Aquamentus it's a "horizontal" fight, Gleeok's battle is a vertical fight, it has the advantage in vertical directions.
Made of 2 or 3 heads, and its body.
- Body doesnt move.
- Only heads/neck move.
To defeat him, you have to defeat their heads.
- When you defeat a head it detach and have it's own red sprite.
- Detached heads seem to have the Manhandla move pattern.
- Detached heads can shoot projectiles
- Detached heads are invincible. You have to defeat every attached head.
Attached/undefeated heads move diagonally (pretty much the neck it's the one that moves). Yet they seem to also be made of small parts from the neck, neck parts seem to follow the head.
- These heads also shoot projectiles.

Digdogger

An invincible enemy.
- Unless you play the Recorder
- When the recorder is played, the big Digdogger will be destroyed.
  - It will then spawn up to 3 mini Digdoggers.
  - Mini Digdoggers are slighly faster.
  - They seem to have the same movement behaviour than the big one.
  - Apparently, when you hit them, they will increase their speed.
  - Can't stagger or have any knockback.
The big Digdogger moves very slowly.
Seems to have the simple roaming behaviour with diagonal movement.
It is flying, so it ignores collisions.

Gohma

Moves horizontally and vertically.
Seems to evade collisions, it tries to not touch collisions, it changes direction before even colliding with something.
Can't move diagonally.
Invincible to everything.
It has its eye closed, but after some time, it will open it.
When the eye is open, you can shoot an arrow to damage it and be able to defeat it.
Shoots projectiles.
- From 2 places, their legs. Right and Left legs.
- Doesn't shoot from the eye.

Ganon

Very cheater. It feels very cheap, and because of this, it's very hard.
Ganon is made up of 4 tiles.
Invisible the whole time.
It has V, or U pattern.
It has ceirtain points on the map where it will "appear". But still, it's invincible.
The player has to "guess" where Ganon will appear.
Ganon hits INSANELY hard. It can hit the player if the player collides with Ganon at the position where it "appeared". This is, not just Ganon's projectiles can hurt Link.
When hit, it's hurt sprite will appear, feedbacking the player, it then goes invisible again.
From what I can gather, it shoots a projectile from the last position it "appeared".
After many hits, Ganon will change to a orange/brown sprite.
- This means you can finally defeat him when this orange/brown Ganon appears.
- You defeat him by shooting ONLY a Silver Arrow.
- If you don't hit him with the arrows, it will go back to it's usual behaviour. The player has to hit it once again and make the orange/brown sprite appear and try to shoot an arrow.
- Once defeated...
  - It will trigger a death animation.
  - It will spawn a triforce shard, presumably the triforce of power.
  - It will spawn his remnants, a red powder/ashes.
  - When grabbing the triforce, it will play a flash animation, feedbacking that you got it and you can finally proceed to the next room.

The End

For now that's what I'm covering up. To summarize, we saw.

Game Screens
- Menus
Collisions
- Used by the player, treasures and enemies.
Player's Movement
Items / Treasures
Enemies

We analized how they could be working internally. And I just want to remind you how many things are getting recyled here.

Many enemy behaviours are similar.
- Some differ in different move speeds
- Different health
- Different damage they do
- They all have the same death animation
- Some can move diagonally
- Some can ignore collisions (fly)
There's a base collision detection that every entity uses.
Many items, like projectiles use recycled code.
- Projectiles are used by both the player and enemies.

I hope this is not just useful for me, since this document was made for the R&D work I'm doing. But also it can be useful to others.

~ Thanks so much, this was me, Alex, with another document/essay of Game design. 😊

What is Game Design?

Alejandro Salas — Sun, 10 Feb 2019 22:14:18 +0000

The objective of this essay is to define what Game Design is.

Definitions

Game Design

"Game design is the act of deciding what a game should be." - Jesse Schell

"The process by which a game designer creates a game, to be encountered by a player,from which meaningful play emerges" - Salen & Zimmerman

Game Designer

"A game designer uses the interaction of players and rules to create an experience for the audience". - Gary Austin

But for all of this, we need to understand what a Game, there are many definitions, seriously. But to me, these include very well pretty much all games, from board games, video games to sports.

Game

“A game is a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.” - Salen & Zimmerman

"A game is a rule-based formal system with a variable and quantifiable outcome, where different coutcomes are assigned different values, the player exerts effort in order to influence the outcome, the player feels attached to the outcome, and the consequences of the activity are optional and negotiable" - Jesper Juul

"An activity among two or more independent decision-makers seeking to achieve their objectives in some limiting context A more conventional definition would say that a game is a context with rules among adversaries trying to win objectives." - Clark C. Abt

But from my experience, there's a missing component in those definitions. That is, Fun, these definitions don't mention anything about having Fun.

The Game is Fun. If it's not fun, why bother? ~ Reggie Fils Aime, President of Nintendo of America

The President of Nintendo of America mentions Fun immediately. He even mentions a battle which, with the previous definitions we can consider as the Conflict and Objectives, since we have to win the battle_._

Conflict

Here are some dictionary definitions

"An incompatibility between two or more opinions, principles, or interests."

"Clash of interest".

"A Battle derived from an opposition"

And this is what Chris Crawford says about conflict.

The player is actively pursuing some goal. Obstacles prevent him from easily achieving this goal. Conflict is an intrinsic element of all games.It can be direct or indirect, violent or nonviolent, but it is always present in every game. - Chris Crawford, The Art of Computer Game Design.

Fun

Here are some dictionary definitions

Enjoyment, amusement, or lighthearted pleasure.

In Spanish the definition is different.

"Enjoyable activity that makes time pass on" - "Diversión"

I agree with the Spanish definition, how can we forget that famous ...

"Time flies when you're having fun"

Because that sensation of time passing by quickly is what we like, we get entertained. Considered as well a Hobby or a Pastime, because Time passes.

But there's also Work, apparently Work and Fun are mutually exclusive, or that's what adults teach us when we are kids. We know it's not true, because we can enjoy our time working. But we are not talking about Work, so let's not dive deep into that topic (Don't get me wrong, we can dive more into that and it can help us discern even more!)

Rules

We can say it's what delimits what the internal game systems are allowed to do. Not just what a player can do.

Making a new definition of game.

Alright, with all of this we can try to add more substance to the definition of Game. Here's a definition

A collection of fun activities defined by rules, where players must interact and overcome a conflict with their decision making.

Notice how I didn't use the word System. Since those elements together, fulfill the system's definition.

System

" A set of elements that interact with each other to solve a problem" .

We can change problem for Conflict.

Where these elements are:

Fun
Rules
Players
Decision Making

Finally I propose this...

Game Design is where a Game Designer creates a collection of fun activities defined by rules, where players must interact and overcome a conflict with their decision making. This is, a meta decision making, where a game designer makes decisions on how the game and the players can interact with each other, crafting an experience for the players.

References

Gary, Justin. Think like a Game Designer: the Step-by-Step Guide to Unlocking Your Creative Potential. Aviva Publishing, 2018.
Schell, Jesse. The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, 2008.
Salen, Katie, and Eric Zimmerman. Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. The MIT Press, 2010.
Cover Photo by: Georgia Institute of Technology

An Essay about The Iconoclasts

Alejandro Salas — Sun, 10 Feb 2019 06:38:23 +0000

Foreword

This is an essay I made back in August 2019. I published it in my blog but I am now also publishing it here.

Preface to my essays

Hi, My Name is Alex, I studied Computer Science, but my college called it Computer Systems Engineering, so I know a couple of things about informatics, my passion is Game Development, I'm an aspiring Game Designer as well. I wish that my Video Games touch Hearts, Minds and Souls. I thank my family and friends because they inspire me to keep learning not just about games but about Life, because Life is kind of Simple.

Satoru Iwata helped to shape the world of video games. He enjoyed what he did and he's always going to be remembered for that. That was the President of Nintendo Japan.

Iwata met a young man as well, one who he worked with in HAL Laboratories, his name is Masahiro Sakurai, the creator of Kirby and also the creator of Super Smash Brothers. This person has worked insanely to bring every Smash Bros. to the masses, he doesn't work alone, and that's what I'm getting at, Sakurai has a team that helps him to get the job done everyday. Did you know that his Wife designed Kirby's Air Ride Menus? and that those designs carried over to Smash? Having a team that can back you up anytime will increase your productivity and will help you achieve the objective, this is not only true to game development.

When you want to play a game, the only question you should ask yourself is: "Is This Game Fun?", because that's what makes a game valuable. You could say it's a collection of fun activities, and if a "game" is NOT FUN... Then, why would you even bother playing it? So, as a game developer you have to do this as well, "am I creating a Fun game?"

Play what you like, what you enjoy, what makes you feel incredible things, play what takes you to the worlds you want to meet, because you will meet incredible characters and you will learn something awesome from them.

Chances are high that you know this person, that is the President of Nintendo of America. He's right, why would you even bother, if it's not fun you have better things to do, like play an instrument, listen to music, learn a choreography, watch some shows online, read a book or hang out with those you love.

This is my first "formal" essay about Game Design that also combines Software Engineering. I have never published any thoughts or notes about games I've think are very clever and interesting. Yet I want to learn and improve because I Love Games. I also intent to make use of mnemonics to help you learn and also have fun, because if you have ever read any formal research articles, well... they tend to be extremely boring and unappealing, at first glance, I mean that's not their fault, research articles have to be formal, I had to write a boring document as well when I made my college thesis, but there has to be better ways to help people learn something without sounding like a robot.

A small introduction

The Iconoclasts is a very clever game, it is also very deep in terms of Lore and leaving a message to the players, even if the creator mentions that "he didn't have a script" to organize the story. You play as Robin, an optimistic mechanic, her father died some time ago and she's living alone in her house. She likes to help people, and that's what you do in the game, and because you like to help people you get in lots of messes, specially since being an "unauthorized" mechanic is considering a sin in this society 😢, this is how the story develops, by helping people using your mechanic skills.

Now, I will focus more on game mechanics, not much in the story/lore. Keep in mind that I will indeed spoil game's content, so if you don't want to be spoiled, come back after you have played the game, also, you don't have to play the game to understand the contents of this essay.

As I mentioned before, having a team will help you increase productivity, but it has to be mentioned that pretty much all of the The Iconoclasts work was done by a single person. This persons's name is Joakim Sandberg* (aka konjak). The game took nearly 8 years to develop and what it seems to be the average of playtime is 12 hours. We can't simply claim that it takes 1.5 years to make 1 hour of gameplay. When you create a game, you are creating a system, a system is a bunch of things that work together to a solve a problem. I also want to add one quote from Shigeru Miyamoto on his designs: "A good idea is something that does not solve just one single problem, but rather can solve multiple problems at once". Sounds like we can change idea to system and it actually fits . This is something that Iconoclasts does, and it works awesomely well!

The Mechanisms of a Mechanic

There's a PC gamer interview where Sandberg mentions that the game had "much more complicated power-ups", so, Sandberg decided to "give players exactly what they needed" , rather than having stronger gear, the players have to find the right strategy to what they are facing, the needed strategy is presented thanks to the system he created.

So, now that you read a lot of stuff you surely want to know exactly you can do in the game, let's get into it. Grab yourself this is a big list, seriously, it is.

Robin has or can:

An Idle Animation
- She has a boss battle Idle animation
She can walk
- Her footsteps make a sound
She can crouch
She can crawl
She can collide with things (like the walls, or the ceiling)
- If you collide with an enemy she will knockback and take damage
She can interact with beds
- The bed will replenish health
She can change between areas
- By going to the edge of a map
- By using doors
She can Jump
- Whe she lands she makes a sound
- There's a falling animation
- She can grab on a ledge after jumping
  - She can jump to the opposite direction to the ledge
  - She can let go and fall
- She can step over certain enemies
- She can ground pound
- She can press switches by stepping on them
She can shoot her Stun gun
She can charge her Stun gun for a powerful shot
After she gets another weapon, you can switch to that weapon
You can swing her wrench
You can turn nuts to activate mechanisms (and there's a lot)
- If a nut is not on the ground, you can hang to it
  - You can jump from the nut
After swinging you can make the wrench spin
- She can electrically charge her wrench with an upgrade
After getting the electric upgrade she can ride magnetic rails
- If your wrench is charged you ride the rails faster
She can climb ladders
She can inspect things
- It would probably display a text
She can pick objects
- Like keys
- Like Cubes
- Like People (not very often)

So far I've listed things that Robin can do, and probably while you were reading it, you skipped that part and thought, "Ugh, too much text, that's boring my dude" because it was overwhelming to read and I don't blame you. So here's a video of the first room after you get the wrench, in this single room you can see many of the things I listed.

So here it is! 👆 Why read when you can watch it in action?

Yes, that's the first room. In about 50 seconds you witnessed a great game system, specially with the enemy at the end of the video. The enemy interacts with you in different ways. I did shoot him before turning him over, the enemy reflected my attacks, so I had to change my strategy.

By ground pounding him
By deflecting his attack with your wrench (did you see those small green wrenches when the enemy attacked?)

Once he's turned over, you can defeat him by

Attacking with your wrench
Attacking with your stun gun
Or you can ground pound him again (this is what I did in the video)

These interactions are screaming "I'm a good system, notice me senpai!". And we barely have talked about the mechanisms in the game. Once again, we have to go to a place where you you can see it.

Notice how this room is combining.

Charging electrically your wrench
Jump on a rail so you can move to an upper section of the map
Evade the Green Thorns, they will hurt Robin!
Use of another weapon the Roller Bomb, so you can push the green/red blocks, these blocks need a strong impact so they can move, so, once the bomb explodes they move.
To get to these blocks first you have to crawl to them
You now have to charge your Roller Bomb so it will become a Missile.
- You have to be at a certain distance, so the Missile can push the blocks away.
Now the blocks are to the far right, to correcly position them, you have to impact them from below so you can push them upwards.
To position them you have to charge your wrench and let the coil (that white sphere with a purple base) automatically interact with your electricity, the coil will move the yellow platform to the left, as long as the coil has electricity.
You will then shoot a roller bomb between the yellow and the green/red blocks so you can finally push them forward.
Show a missile from right to left so you can position the blocks where you can climb the ladder.
Go back to the Magnetic Switch to blue
- (This switch is the one that decides which direction the rail will go.)
- The idea of this puzzle is that you have to change the rails to blue, so you can destroy the red blocks.
Charge the coil again so you can climb the blocks
Once you get to the rail with the red blocks, just charge yourself and ride the lightning!! 😊⚡

Wow, that was another big chunk of text. You probably skipped it too 🤔. Anyway to summarize, all these mechanisms combined.

Your Weapons
- Wrench
- Hang on nuts
- The Electric charge ⚡
  - To activate the coil
  - To ride the rails
- Roller Bomb
- Use of Missile shots
Platform mechanics
- Crawl
- Jump
- Hang on ledges

All of these things made that puzzle. This is how the game tells you "You already have what you need, perhaps if you think out of the box?". It might seemed easy because you watched the video, but this is one of those rooms that make you feel that "AH!! I GET IT NOW!", and if you got it, it will make you feel very smart, you will have fun, and if you have fun, then this game was worth of your time.

Here goes a third example, this time I won't write the full explanation of the puzzle. Just what this room combined

You can notice here, how I was trying to understand what was going on in this room. While it's possible to do it on the first attempt, (like the previous videos I've shown), it took me like 5,6 attempts to solve it. And I have to mention that this room doesn't punish you, you are not forced to do it in one attempt, you can take things on your own pace and solve it step by step. The objective is to pull the chain all the way down. That's the gimmick here, it's one of the new things of the area, you've been hanging from nuts that don't move, but here, you descend using the chain.

What did this room combine?

Riding an elevator
Your weapons
- Wrench
- Hanging from a nut.
  - And descend using the chain!
- The electric charge ⚡
  - Charge the ⚡ cubes
  - The cubes will activate the coil
- The Roller Bomb
- To make them "roll" and activate the green/red blocks.
- With a new upgrade your bombs and missiles get charged ⚡ as well.
- Use of Missile Shots

This room pretty much just added one single thing, that way you won't get overwhelmed, that chain is the newest thing you are mastering, because you already know how to use your weapons and how to interact with other things using your ⚡ charge.

Developing Development

There's another thing I want to talk about, and that's the relation between the game engine and the development team. Iconoclasts was made in Construct Classic, we could say it's a very old engine (as of 2018), Construct 3 is the current supported version. I remember a bit of tinkering around with Construct as well, it's a non-programmer engine, it has visual tools to create games. This is a strength and a weakness, similar to how using any RPG Maker or Game Maker do the same, you get the best by using the scripting systems, or if you use Unity you will know that pretty much you need to work with scripts to create small things, even if you don't program, you work with other's scripts.

For example, by programming specific tools for the team you can increase productivity by a lot, the team would be aided by the Software Engineering part, it's not even a game thing. The programmers will find patterns and connections between the game systems, they will adapt scripts and explore a methodology to reduce workloads. They will create the right interfaces for the needs of the team and the game.

For Sandberg to create this synergy across the game systems in an older engine and highly possible without using scripts at all, it becomes an even more admirable work. (And let's never forget that he did all the art and the soundtrack as well).

Can you really imagine 8 years of work? The process of changing everything at some point? Like lore? or scrap ideas which would make you scrap current graphics, which would also make you scrap areas in the game? And then you have to do the process of redesigning your work for the next ideas that come up. Games that took years to see the light and with small teams are games that are very likely to touch your Heart, Mind and Soul, you will have fun, and those fictional characters will be meaningful 😊.