What Makes A Good Game?

[Atrocities]

Over the years I have spent a new house on video games and the like and in all of that I have perhaps four or five games that I keep playing, not because they are good games, but because they are superior games.

I think that those games all share some common traits that most new games have seemed to over look. Important features that keep people interested in the game and make for a truly good game.

I believe that game play as much as depth of play are key points to any game. What sperates average games from good games are the details such as moddability, support, and replayability.

Most games are a once through then toss in the box experience while other games are consitantly played and replayed.

We all have our personal favorites so I ask you, what makes a good game good?

For me it has to be involving with strong replay desire. It has to be moddable and well supported. The game play has to be fun, almost captivating in nature, and above all else, the has to be sufficently designed as to allow for a new experience each and every time I play by having significant and affective customizable settings.

Games like Tribes and later FarCry provided for breath taking expansive game maps that allowed players to advance upon a target in multiple way thus providing for the onset of tactics and strategies. These games set a standard with their non-liniar, non scripted game play. The same can be said about Space Empires IV, no two games are ever the same.

I enjoyed being able to make maps and mod Tribes which gave the game an edge over most simular games of the time. SEIV also provided for moddablity on an unprecidented level which unquestionably has been a key factor in its lasting appeal over the years.

However, SEIV has gone way beyond the typical 4x game by providing for extended customizable races and game settings. Most 4x games have locked in, limited or token settings such as those in GalCiv or MOO3 as recent examples.

SEIV allows players to play as any race they choose and they can even make their own. No other 4x game in the last five years has given the player so much unobstructive game play.

If more and more game developers would recognise the value of making their games easy to mod, with sufficent cheat protection, and allow for customization of the game settings then more and more games would become good games over average games.

Lets face it, what characterisitics do all of your favorite games share? Mine were, customizable, moddable, replayable, addictive, and allowed for emerrsive reality forgetting game play.

Not many games can make the claim to have all, but thankfully I found a few that did.

[Slick]

One thing I have noticed over the years in games that I think are superior is how they handle the introduction of new things during a game - specifically the rate.

Take SEIV for example. You are constantly exploring, expanding (4x) gaining new techs, building more ships, upgrading, growing your population. Lots of games attempt to do this very thing. But think for a moment about the RATE at which you get these things. The optimum rate is one that truly gives you that "just one more turn" feeling so that I can get that XXX on the next turn. If the game is too long and drawn out, it may be good, but eventually you lose interest because it is simply too slow. Too fast a development rate and you'll master it and play it every which way you can and then get bored with it relatively soon. SEIV controls this better than any game I have seen.

This doesn't have to apply to only 4x or even strategy games. Any genre has to keep you interested for the long term, in whichever relevent way makes the most sense for that particular game. The pace at which this is accomplished is absolutely crucial to being a winner.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I spent hours playing Frogger when I was a kid. I want a game to be fun. Everything else is a bonus.

[Arkcon]

Well, one thing that makes for a great game is the "one more turn" function. You have that in SE4, and other empire-type games. When I got a modern computer (a Pentium-90 Gateway back in 1995) I was obsessed by this game called, well, Empire. It was a public domain, DOS character graphic game, that I would just spend hours playing, trying to conquer the world of green blocks, in the middle of that blocky blue ocean.

Pretty much, anything that requires character development to increase survivability is going to suck me in. Back in the old days it was Moria, or Rogue. Then there was Warcraft, and now I still play Diablo II from time to time. Then SE4 was created to consume my free time.

I was never good at those twitchy, multibutton console/arcade street fighter games, which seem to be the only thing produced these days. Though, back in the day, my favorite was a game called Xenophobe. Not many people liked that game, but I seemed to have a knack for it and its strange controller. Go figure.

[Parasite]

I like a games that exercise my mind. Games that can allow me to think through problems and find answers. In order to play a game more than once, the problems must be changing or changeable. Games that make me jump over this rolling barrel... NOW. and Again, and another one... just don't do it for me.

Scheming, planning, seeing a "good plan come together" all appeal to me. If I can play it with others, that is an unexpected bonus.

Although no longer stressed in the Sherlock Holmes books, he used heroin to keep his mind active when not on a case. I would much rather use games instead.

[Senator]

For me it's the "one-more-turn" feeling that defines a superior game over a good game. Now as Slick mentioned this feeling is created by the rate at which you get things. Equally important is how significant these things are. I think this is where space empires makes a difference.

Compare it to civilization. Roughly that game creates its one-more-turn feeling with 2 types of "waiting". First of all it's the relative long term projects of research. Second it's the short term projects of building units. Units in civ are simple and linear in a way, the more high-tech a unit is, the stronger it is. Allthough there are a few things to spice this up (like flight and nuclear weapons and the resources aspect) it is my feeling that civ comes down to that in the end (don't get me wrong, I'm a great fan ).

For a game like Space Empires it's not that simple.
First of all it allows players to design units. Units can vary in size and strength from a simple escort to that full-blown defensive starbase that turns a warp point into an impenetrable wall for enemy ships. Thus waiting for a new unit can be anything from a short process(for a cannon fodder destroyer) or very long(for a game-balance-changing new baseship). Furthermore even the very powerfull, expensive, "takes-long-to-build" baseship has weaknesses. It's not allways a case of the bigger, the better.

This is because research is much less linear in space empires. Choice being the key word here. You can actually chose which techs you are going to develop and in what order. A lot of other games offer you limited choice (You have some choice, but the big milestones have to be researched in a certain order). Again compare to civilization, you can't race towards electricity while you are still fighting with cavemen. An effective ship design(being the offspring of good research CHOICES and maybe even a clever combat tactic you have developed in your mind) can totally shift the game's balance. This makes the "one-more-turn-waiting" to finish building that newly designed ship, or to finish that cleverly chosen research project just a lot more interesting.

What also adds to the feeling of "one-more-turn" is the sheer magnitude of some projects. Just take the simple invention of "Ice planet colonization", it can really can double your growth potential. Take dyson spheres, technology to blow up stars, create black holes, create planets or technology to board, take over and analyze a high-tech ship from your opponent. There are numerous other examples and they have one thing in common, they can alter the gameplay environment and the balance in ways I have never seen before in this kind of game. Logically it makes waiting to finish that project much more interesting.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Hi, welcome to the forum. Carrot?

Para: You want complex? Try this: http://home.cwru.edu/~jnt5/Planarity/

[Renegade 13]

What about the cheese Narf? Not giving out the cheese anymore? I remember my first cheese

[Kana]

Definately the 'just one more turn' feeling helps a game to stay fresh...if it's like a good book you can put down, you want to keep playing just to see what will happen next...

For lasting playabliity in the marketplace and all I would think that being able to be modded and improved by the fan base is almost a requirement now. There are many games that if they didn't have a modding community would have fell by the way side...

Kana

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Renegade 13 said:
What about the cheese Narf? Not giving out the cheese anymore? I remember my first cheese

Well, he can have cheese if he wants. I just thought a rabbit would like a carrot.

I have been forgetting the cheese, though.