Game Design Case Study: ByteMC by dimpetrop.me
Enterprise Minecraft Server Game Design Services by DIMPETROP.ME
On today’s first installment, we will be discussing ByteMC
ByteMC is a unique Prison Server. Containing many different activities for players to complete, adding a sense of uniqueness and adventure to the already boring game mode of Prison.
Players start at a stranded island, with only a few tools and no money to their name.
Let’s take a deeper look at each feature separately, before approaching the server as a whole.
Gangs
It was clear from the beginning that Gangs would be one of the most important mechanics. Gangs are a way for the competitive scene to take place. Mining blocks, and participating in events that will help the gangs climb the leaderboards.
It’s a basic principle in co-op games, that every player needs to feel like part of the wheel. There is also the need for an adventure and challenge so that players who love to brag about achievements and accomplishments can freely!
Other than players who love to flex, we also have players who love to socialize and expand their network. Gang chat helps do exactly that. Direct member-to-member communication!
There are also gang upgrades, which when maxed greatly impact certain aspects of the gameplay for every gang member.
Upgrades such as Sell Multipliers, Storage, Maximum Member Capacity, Mine upgrades, and Special Block upgrades.
So many upgrades and stuff already?
Yes! The more stuff to upgrade, the longer the season! That was the aim of ByteMC. How easy or how hard is to max a gang upgrade is something we can not reveal, but it’s sure going to be interesting to see top gangs.
Fishing
We call these AFK Mechanics.
We came up with the idea to twist Prison Grinding a tiny bit, and add a custom fishing system.
There are 2 sub-mechanics, revolving fishing
First, one being the instant catch mechanic. As soon as the fishing blob hits the water, boom! You caught something.
The catches are random rewards that help players. Either these being points, tokens, money, or crate keys. Players can stay AFK for up to 4 hours and take as many rewards as possible. There is a slight delay between the catches to avoid overall abuse though.
The second one is the Largest Fish Competition! At a certain time and date, the instant catch mechanic will be disabled and for 15 minutes, players will fish normally. The plugin will allow players to catch custom fish, which have a random weight assigned to them. The player who has fished the largest one wins!
Fish caught, can also be sold at the fisherman, near spawn’s lake for money so even if the player did not come first, selling the fish would be beneficial for them.
Mining
Okay, mining!
Mining has been a huge brain teaser ever since the Alpha version. Some players found it useless cause the fishing was too overpowered, some other boring, and too slow. Generally, the overall mining experience and feedback were meh.
Solution: Implemented a couple of Balance Changes.
- We made the starting pickaxes way more overpowered. Starting at Efficiency 30, Fortune 30.
- We added LuckyBlocks and RNG mechanics.
- We nerfed Fishing and added a threshold for how long players can AFK before being removed.
- We added a slight delay on fishing. Now, no matter how much players spam, they will only be getting two rewards per second.
- Raised the economy, from thousands and millions to trillions and quadrillions. It is way more satisfying to see huge sums of in-game money.
Outcome: Players no longer find mining boring, and are willing to spend an increased amount of time, mining.
Mineworld
What a unique Exploration Mechanic.
Mineworld is a pretty sophisticated mechanic as it includes many different aspects, which when combined create the ultimate world
To enter, player must have prestige 10 times
King of the Yard
Nothing special here, just a gang-based KOTH (King of the Hill). The twist is, that players have two goals.
One is that they need to kill cops (NPCs) that spawn throughout the area, and the other is to stay alive as enemy gangs can kill them!
Winning Gang is the one with the most cop kills!
Quests
Pretty self-explanatory. Complete quests, get rewards
Dungeons
Dungeon portals are located in the side-walls of the mineworld’s mines. When entered, the player will be teleported to an instanced dungeon which will have one of the three activities. Maze, Parkour, or PvE.
We won’t talk about the PvE dungeons yet, but players will need to kill a mini-boss in order to be rewarded!
Final thoughts
ByteMC is indeed a work of art in all aspects. There is so much stuff to do, and everything is interlinked in order to “make sense” gameplay-wise.
It has definitely been fun working with the ByteMC team, and conceptualizing the mechanics that make it stand out!
Before ending this case study, here are some in-game pictures!
The team said:
Did a wonderful work and always was willing to help us whenever we needed it. Jim has created an amazing server with wonderful game design.
Till next time, see you at the next Case Study!
