How to Keep Players Engaged (Without Being Evil) | Game Maker's Toolkit

I never finished Doom.

And I love Doom!

It’s amazing.

It’s got some of the best shooter combat
in years.

But I just lost interest at a certain point
and never ended up finishing it.

Whereas other games, games I don’t even
like as much as Doom, have kept me utterly

rapt until the very end.

And this has left me wondering about how games
can do better to keep their players engaged.

That’s the word i want to use here, by the way.

I’m talking about engaging games, not addictive
games - which I don’t think responsible

designers should be trying to craft.

So I’m not interested in games that are
designed in such a way that players can’t

stop themselves, and I won’t be talking
about games that use psychological tricks

like skinner boxes, daily rewards, resource
decay, loss aversion, and the like.

This isn’t that video.

Instead, I want to talk about fun things that
games can do to make you want to keep playing

- but without completely hijacking your brain.

So this is Game Maker’s Toolkit, I’m Mark
Brown, and here’s how to keep players engaged

(without being evil about it).

A crucial factor is pacing, which describes
the rhythm of the gameplay you’ll be experiencing

and is paramount to making sure a game doesn’t
become boring or repetitive.

So if we take a game like Uncharted we’ll
see that it has lots of different types of

gameplay, which are often called pillars.

That includes combat, climbing, puzzles, cinematic
set-pieces, and even non-interactive stuff

like cutscenes.

What you’ll notice is that Naughty Dog swaps
between these pillars constantly, never lingering

on one type of gameplay for too long.

And what that means is as soon as you start
to get bored of, say, shooting enemies, the

game will switch to something else entirel.,
and hopefully regain your attention.

But you can also consider the intensity of
each pillar, as a puzzle is often much calmer

than a frenzied firefight.

And it’s important to move fluidly between
different intensities, as spending too long

on calm gameplay can obviously be boring - but,
at the same time, trying to keep the game

at max intensity for too long will lead to
exhaustion or desensitisation.

So Naughty Dog modulates these moods carefully.

Look at how we go from calm puzzle solving
and climbing, to an intense firefight through

the city.

Then a slightly calmer exploration of the
train yard, followed by rising intensity as

you fight your way along a train, leading
to a very intense cinematic moment.

But that all leads to the calmest section
of the entire game as you recover in the Tibetan

village and explore a puzzle-filled mountain
with Tenzin, before it all kicks off again

with an intense siege back at the village.

Uncharted 2 has some of the best pacing I’ve
ever seen in a game, and personally I found

it almost impossible to put the game down
when I first played it.

Now, of course, this sort of cinematic pacing
is a lot easier in a tightly controlled, linear

experience, than an open world game where
the player can do whatever they want.

But making sure the player has lots of different
types of activities they can do, so they can

modulate their own fun if they get bored,
will certainly help.

Pacing is not just about how well the developer
juggles its gameplay pillars, but also how

often it introduces entirely new ideas - whether
that’s areas, mechanics, enemy types, and

so on.

The Mario games are wonderful at this, as
you never know what to expect from stage to stage.

So even though there’s not such a diversity
in types of gameplay - it’s mostly just

platforming - by consistently introducing
novel new ways to play, the game really keeps

players engaged and keen to see what’s in
the next level.

Novelty can work even better when paired with
mystery, anticipation, and foreshadowing,

which is when you tease a player about something
new coming up so they just can’t stop playing

until they see what it is.

Take a game like The Witness, where you come
out of the starting area and, if you’re

like most players, you’ll quickly stumble
upon this door which features a puzzle that

is essentially impossible to solve with your
current knowledge.

It really sticks in your head, though, and
you’ll need to know what’s behind that door.

This sort of stuff can keep you playing for
ages.

Remember when you saw Sen’s Fortress in
Dark Souls, and just knew you had to see what

was behind that giant door?

The mystery of what’s around the next corner
is one key reason that makes the Souls games

so damn hard to put down.

Metroidvania games do this well, also, as
a game like Hollow Knight quickly establishes

that you will be getting interesting new powers,
but it doesn’t tell you what they are.

It just teases you with things in the environment
that you can’t bypass yet, leaving you to

anticipate what cool new ability you’ll
be getting next.

The thing about giving players new stuff is
that each drop is an exciting motivation to

stay engaged, but this burns out rather quickly
and the player needs another one soon after.

But if you tease the player, you can get them
excited before you’ve even dropped the new

content, which increases the amount of time
you can go before dropping new stuff.

It’s economical!

Perhaps the most obvious place for mystery,
though, is the narrative.

Traditional media uses cliff hangers and unanswered
questions to keep you turning the page or

watching after the adverts, but it's surprising
how few games really nail this.

But every now and again I’ll play something
like Firewatch, which is a game about a man

who works at a fire lookout tower and gets
embroiled in a thriller that will keep you

going until you find out exactly how it ends.

And yes, the ending is satisfying.

You just didn’t get it.

Now, one of the most compelling things a game
can do is let you make progress towards a

long-term goal.

Give someone a level cap they can work towards,
or a map full of collectibles they can find,

and they can be stuck in for weeks.

But let’s dig a bit deeper into that.

So a game that does this really well is the
charming farming sim Stardew Valley which

comes with an implicit long-term goal - you
start with a messy patch of land and no money,

but in time you’ll have transformed the
land into an incredible farm that makes you

loads of cash.

And it’s that dream that can sustain many
hours of toil, hard work,

and, to be honest, kinda repetitive gameplay.

So why does it keep us going?

Well, I think it’s cool that you can make
your farm however you like.

You get to express yourself, set your own
goals, and build something you are really

proud of.

The game has lots of short term goals to keep
you going.

Smaller rewards like the community centre
and important milestones like adding buildings

or improving your house give you something
immediate to shoot for on the way towards

the longer term ambition.

There’s also a huge element of planning,
as you must think long term about decisions

when it comes to different crops and animals,
seasons, romantic partners, and so on.

You’re not just trudging mindlessly towards
the goal, but making strategic choices to

help you get there faster.

There’s also the thrill of exponential growth.

In the game you’ll make a bit of money,
so you can buy more seeds and better tools.

This lets you make more money, to buy even
more stuff, so you can go on to make loads

of money.

This positive feedback loop is at the heart
of lots of engaging games, such as looting monsters

and upgrading your character in Monster Hunter.

There’s also something really fun about
optimising the system in Stardew Valley.

You start out by watering every crop by hand,
but eventually you’ll come to have sprinklers

that do the hard work for you.

A game that does this sort of thing wonderfully
is Factorio, which tasks you with building

factories.

You start out by digging up resources manually,
but eventually create machines to do it for

you.

And while those machines initially need to
be fed fuel, you’ll eventually have them

powered by natural resources that don’t
run out.

Maybe its just a thing that appeals to programmers,
but the desire to create an optimised system

that works on its own is very potent.

One final reason we like long term goals is
that players can fantasise about what it will

be like when they finally reach that point.

An example is a skill tree in a game, where
the player isn’t just ticking off these

skills because it’s something to do - but
because they’re looking forward to the day

when they can use all of these skills, to
absolutely wreck shop and make light work

of stuff they found difficult at the beginning.

Oh, and speaking of difficulty: Another huge
motivator is a compelling challenge.

A game that is constantly pushing you to show
your mastery of the game, in varied and interesting

situations, can really keep you going.

This requires pitch-perfect difficulty, though.

As we talked about in the Resident Evil 4
episode, players only get into an engaging

flow state when they meet a challenge that
isn’t so easy as to be boring, but isn’t

so difficult as to be stressful.

Resident Evil uses dynamic difficulty to keep
players in that sweet spot, but for most games,

a finely tuned and fiercely play-tested difficulty
curve is the way to go.

Remember, though, that failure isn’t a bad
thing.

Some of the most engaging games like Tetris
and Spelunky are filled with failure, but

people will keep coming back if the runs are
relatively short, if they feel a sense of

getting better each time, and if they know
the next session will be markedly different

from the one before - often due to random
generation of some kind.

Also, note that there are different ways to
challenge a player, so its not always about

having a constant stream of reflex and skill
checks.

Consider challenging a player’s problem
solving skills, or spatial awareness, or decision

making for a mental stimulation to balance
out the more physical challenges.

So, those are the factors that I’ve found
really work on me, and can help explain why

I’ve found certain games irresistible.

For me, nothing gets me going quite like a
game filled with novel experiences, that are

teased through mystery and anticipation.

Games like Dark Souls and Metroid and The
Witness are impossible for me to put down.

But it also helps me understand also why I didn’t stick with other games.

As good as Doom is, the pacing is way off
with long stretches of high intensity combat

that gets pretty exhausting, and there's just not as much
novelty as, say, Titanfall 2.

But different things will work for different
players.

Maybe you need competition with other real-life
gamers or rewards you can show off to other

people.

I dunno, I don’t know you.

So in the comments below, think about the
last game that you found totally engrossing

and tell me why you think you just couldn’t
put it down.

Thanks for watching!

One of my goals with GMTK is to get you thinking
about why you like the games you like, and

hopefully I’ve given you some food for thought
here.

As always, this show is only possible thanks
to my incredible Patreon backers.

Go team!