Q: In the past you have talked a lot about how games should always be a series of conversations between the designer and the player. You've mentioned several times the importance of asking the right questions, of creating dramatic Yes / No moments for the players. How do you create meaningful conversations in games? What are your priorities when designing these segments?
A: First, let me clarify that I wasn't talking about conversations between player avatars and in-game NPCs. I meant that games can allow me - the designer - to engage in a conversation of sorts with you - with each individual player. It's a virtual dialogue, not a literal one.
In that sense, the way I approach the development of a game is to insist that my designers not force players down a single path and never, never to judge players for the path they choose to take through the game.
In other words, you create problems for players, give them as many tools as you can reasonable provide that might prove useful and get out of the way to see how players use those tools - singly or in combinations, in ways the designer anticipated and ways he or she didn't - to solve the designer-created problem.
Then game systems track how the player dealt with the problem and the simulation changes in some way - a way that's visible to players - to give the player a new problem or set of problems to solve.
The key to making the "conversation" between designer and player meaningful is to give players a real voice, some real power to affect the unfolding storyline and that's where nonjudgmental design comes in. If a designer creates a problem with a right/good/correct solution and a wrong/bad/incorrect solution, the choice was false, the player's action meaningless and the dialogue between the two parties was just a waste of time and effort all around.
Q: Game difficulty is a very recurrent topic nowadays that can make or break a game. How do you handle player rewards without overpowering the player and breaking the game? In what forms do you escalate difficulty?
A: I've always felt that "difficulty" per se wasn't a very interesting thing to track and adjust. If your game is nothing more than a test of skill then, sure, measure and adjust difficulty on the fly (or, at least, build in some escalation of difficulty as the game goes on). We all ramp difficulty to some extent in skill-based games - I mean, as players get better, challenging them becomes harder so the game has to get harder.
But I have two thoughts about difficulty - one is, if you offer just a single way to solve a puzzle, then difficulty really is a factor. If you're not good enough to overcome a challenge or smart enough to solve a puzzle, you're stuck. You might as well just stop playing the game before it becomes en exercise in controller-hurling frustration. But if you make a game where every problem can be solved in a variety of ways, when one solution proves too difficult, you can just try something else. Speaking personally, I suck at driving in games like GTA, which means I'm just no good at the game. In, if I may, Deus Ex, you're not a very good shot, try not shooting... do something else... find another way... keep playing.
So that's one thought about difficulty. The other thing I've been thinking a lot about lately is how skill-driven games are and the implication that has for design. Playing through Walking Dead and Heavy Rain I was struck by how little skill they required and yet how compelling their seemingly interactive stories were. Setting up situations that are ethically and morally challenging rather than challenging skill - in other word, games that exercise the muscle between your ears rather than the muscles that govern your ability to mash buttons and move joysticks... that seems like a more interesting space to play in - as a designer and as a player. The difficulty should be "what's the right thing to do here?" not "am I good enough to do this thing?" Not enough games ask what I'm beginning to believe are the right kinds of questions. Difficulty isn't much of an issue once you start asking a different set of questions.
Q: You are one of the most recognized figures in game development and a veteran in video game design. Since you have seen this medium change and evolve from its early years to what it is today, do you think we, as game creators, have a responsibility with society? And if so, what is it?
A: I don't want to speak for all developers, so I'm not going to say "game creators have no responsibility to society"or that we all do. All I'll say is that I've always felt a responsibility, first, to be true to what I believed to be important - I've always wanted the games I've worked on to say something about the world we live in and offer players the opportunity to experience things in-game that might inform their experience of the real world. Speaking personally, then, I think anyone working in any creative medium has a responsibility to society - not to coarsen it... to contribute positively to it... and so on. But there are a lot of ways to do that - as many as there are people making games, I bet.
My pet peeve about the games business - or creators of games, I guess I should say - is how few people bother to think about anything other than making some money or doing something badass or outdoing the competition in some way. Most game developers don't even bother to ask themselves the question whether they have an impact on or a responsibilty to society. "We're just making games..." "It's just entertainment..." "Don't take yourself so seriously..." That kind of attitude drives me nuts.
It's okay - stupid, but okay - to decide you have no responsibility to the millions of people who might play your game (other than to distract them for a few hours) but at least decide that. And to do that you have to think about what your work means and how it fits into a larger cultural context. I'd love it if more developers did that openly and publicly - or at all.
