Elements of Game Design part 1

The term “Gameplay” is a very general one, encompassing multiple aspects of a game’s mechanics that contribute to the player’s experience. Good gameplay is essentially what makes a game “fun”. Some companies have developed reputations for having created games with great gameplay, such as Valve with the Half Life and Portal series. New examples of great gameplay are being released all the time, though some genres people latch onto as they are seen as a winning formula. For example the current market contains a lot of notable FPS games, though this doesn’t mean that their kind of gameplay is always superior.

In the Design Document stage of development, the greatest factor that affects the gameplay of the final product is the genre of the game. While really all game mechanics can be boiled down to the same kind of thing (such as collision detection- don’t hit this wall in this racing game or don’t get hit by this bullet in this action game) it’s the application of these little bits of code that make games feel different.

Of course, different genres can also afford to be weak in certain areas of game design and still be considered good. For example, a game’s story is highly important if the game is something like an RPG or maybe a stealth game, but with racing or fighting games? Sometimes a story isn’t even featured at all. Character backstories are usually at least implied to flesh them out but in the end even they can be done away with if the gameplay is strong enough. Note that the more a game lacks in some aspects the more the consumer will expect it to compensate in others.

The way the player interacts with the game also can make or break gameplay. You don’t input simple commands like directions by typing full words with a keyboard. But that’s obvious, and with that in mind, the importance of intuitive, responsive controls and ergonomically designed menus is key.

In the end, that’s the kind of thing that separates digital games from things like board games. The scope of what happens upon each of the player’s actions, as the complexity of the programming dictates. That’s how video games can become much more exciting, as the player becomes engrossed and forgets that all they are doing is pressing buttons.

Why.

Art direction is important in making similar gameplay elements feel like something new. For example, many games have guns, but the visuals and sound are what really makes you feel the difference between something like a tiny pistol and a huge canon.

This is why gameplay is what defines a game. All other aspects of the design contribute to it, and it all blends together to turn the game into a memorable experience.  I love games that are visually beautiful, but if actually playing the game isn’t fun then I’m not going to remember these environments. You can have a game with barely any graphics, you can have a game with a bad story, but a game that lacks gameplay is hardly a game at all.