How Jonathan Blow Designs a Puzzle | Game Maker's Toolkit

JONATHAN BLOW: It was very clearly the case that more ideas came out of the development process,

and ended up in the final game, than I put into it as a designer.

The process of designing the gameplay for
this game was more like discovering things

that already exist than it was like creating
something new and arbitrary.

And another way to say that is that there
was an extent to which

this game designed itself

This is Game Maker's Toolkit, I'm Mark Brown.

That was Jonathan Blow talking about the rewindable
platformer Braid at the Game Developer's Conference

in 2011.

What Blow's describing here is a philosophy
of game design that he used when making both

Braid and The Witness where rules and puzzles
were discovered through programming and play-testing,

rather than designed through the implementation
of some preconceived idea.

So with the Mario-like platformer Braid, he
started with a mechanic - the ability to turn

back time by a practically unlimited amount.

In the process of coding that, new ideas emerged.
If he was rewinding the position of everything

in the world, he could choose to not do that
for certain objects, and thus make them immune

to your ability to manipulate time. A rule was born.

After implementing these new rules, Blow could
play the game and look for consequences that

he perhaps did not foresee. Like how if a
moving platform was immune to time travel,

the hero could rewind to a point where the
platform is no beneath his feet, and would fall

down as soon as he stops manipulating time.

That's kinda cool.

So each puzzle became an illustration of one
of those phenomena, so that by solving it,

the player would stumble upon that interesting
fact about Braid's unique universe - the same

fact that Blow himself discovered while programming
the game.

A similar process was used in The Witness,
where Blow made rules and puzzles by exploring

the mechanic of drawing lines on a grid. Play
testing this showed Blow that he was often

partitioning grid cells - perhaps that could
become a rule?

Which leads to situations like this. This
puzzle is pretty easy to solve: you just loop

around here and you're away. The next puzzle
looks identical but you'll notice that the exit

has moved. Now, using that same solution will cut
off your access to the exit. So you have to

solve it like this.

Here, the mechanic of drawing a line inspired
a rule about partitioning cells which had

the consequence of cutting off your exit,
which led to a puzzle illustrating this fact.

Describing the invention of this puzzle type
at IndieCade in 2011, Blow said...

JONATHAN BLOW: That came from asking these little known questions.

It didn't come from a top-down imposition 'I want to make a puzzle type that... blah'

Rather, it came from this very simple process of exploration very early in development.

While Blow may have largely abdicated the
duty of designing puzzles to, I dunno, the

universe, he still has some important roles
to play.

First, is making sure the ramifications of
each change are explored to the fullest. In

The Witness, Blow asked how every part of
the game could be twisted, and that includes

the grid, the cells, the line, the environment, and the panel.

And in Braid, you'll notice that the consequences
of each rule change are explored by every

object in the game.

In the world where objects can be immune to rewind,
for example, there are puzzles where enemies,

keys, doors, clouds, platforms, and even the
player character have this property.

Blow's second job is to present the resulting puzzles
in a way that will give the player the best

possible set-up to discover the interesting
fact at the heart of the conundrum.

For example, he frequently uses misdirection
to lull you into making a seemingly obvious

move - only to show you that this is not correct.
In the Braid puzzle "Hunt", you're told to

kill all the monsters but they're set up in
a way that if you kill them in the most obvious

sequence, you're unable to solve the puzzle.

Misdirection like this stops the player from brute-forcing
the puzzle and failing to grasp the interesting

fact. And showing the player why something
doesn't work is often part of that fundamental

truth that Blow is illustrating in each puzzle.

The designer also uses sequences, pairings
and reprisals. If you come across a simple

puzzle - like this one about trying to unlock
two doors with one key - you'll likely come

across a more substantial version in the same
area.

And by using familiar layouts in different
worlds, with different rules, you can see

how the consequences have changed. This level
is essentially repeated in Worlds 2 and 4,

but the way time works in each means the solution
is unique.

Jonathan Blow also subverts the rules you're
used to. In the level Irreversible, you have

to realise that you must not use your rewind
powers. And throws in traps, to catch out

those who aren't thinking hard enough. In
this level, the wacky way that time works means

only one of these gates can be opened...

Blow's final job is to be ruthlessly curatorial,
and edit out mechanics, rules, and puzzles

that lack a sense of surprise, or overlap
with each other, or fail to say anything interesting.

Both Braid and The Witness were spin-offs
of games that were shelved because their main

mechanics didn't present a rich enough space
to explore. And Blow killed off rules, like

Braid's weird turn-based world, because their
consequences weren't surprising, or the rules

felt contrived.

But where Jonathan Blow will differ from other
designers is that he deliberately left stuff

in, even if it wasn't fun - simply because
it was interesting or would make the game

feel incomplete to remove it.

Like this super weird puzzle where a key can
bumble along on its own. It is, after all,

a surprising and interesting consequence of
this game's universe.

Because for Jonathan Blow, a puzzle is never
just a puzzle. It's a communication of an

idea from the designer to the player. And
solving the puzzle is the player's way of

saying "I understand".

And I think "I understand" is a significantly
different concept to "I finally figured it

out", which is how many puzzle games operate with
their arbitrary steps and intricate sequences

and red herrings and obtuse mechanisms.

But the puzzles in Blow's games feel more
fair. And that's why this design philosophy

isn't just about letting the design help direct
you to the next rule or the next puzzle - it's also

about helping you make better, and more honest puzzles.

Braid and The Witness introduce all the elements
upfront and teach their mechanics quickly

with introductory puzzles - from there the
harder puzzles are only about understanding

the consequences of those known mechanics
in different set-ups, combinations, and layouts.

And the puzzles can be blisteringly simple.
Most are about exploring just one idea and

the stages are small enough so you can consider
all the moving parts at once. And there are

no, or very few, red herrings, and also few
arbitrary steps to finish. Once you've found

the solution, it's relatively effortless to
execute it.

So solving a puzzle in this game isn't like
solving a Rubik's cube or trying to guess

at the answer to a riddle. It's simply seeing
something that was there all along. The answer

was right in front of your eyes, if only you
knew the right way to look at the world.

Kinda like those hidden puzzles in The Witness.

So that "a-ha!" moment you get when solving
a puzzle isn't about finally putting together

all the pieces or finally understanding what
the hell the designer was asking you to do,

but it feels like you just saw the world a
bit more clearly.

As Jonathan Blow told Gamasutra, "the more
that a puzzle is about something real and

something specific, and the less it's about
some arbitrary challenge, the more meaningful

that epiphany is".

Thanks for watching!

One of my goals with GMT is to pass on the
philosophies of the best game designers around

so you can use their ideas in your own games.

If you're interested, I've put loads of links
in the description where Jonathan Blow talks

more about the process.

And it's not just for puzzles games - Blow
reckons that this process of letting the design

dictate the rules and mechanics could be used
in other genres, too.

As always if you liked the show you can leave
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