In the last post, we examined the criteria for making “easy to learn” games and “hard to master” games individually. What can we do to have it all in a single game?

Let’s try to find out! It won’t be easy though, since many aspects of those two approaches seem to be contradictory to one another.

Seeking Elegance

The combination of clarity and mastery sounds like a Holy Grail.

Capture this perfect couple in your game and you will have what is often called an elegant design. Easy-to-understand rules that create complex deep systems. From a few carefully planted seeds emerges a beautiful and rich ecosystem.

In other words, a thoughtful mix of several systems leads to a gameplay full of interesting, unique decisions and gameplay situations. Simple actions performed by the player result in a plethora of complex game states.

From a few carefully planted seeds emerge a beautiful and rich ecosystem.

Framing Elegance

Elegance is a rather elusive thing. A game can feel elegant but recognizing the exact things that make it that way can be challenging.

Nevertheless, here are several aspects that I think many elegant games share:

• Multi-purpose Systems — one action is used in many different contexts to avoid complexity. It helps to learn faster — once the rule is learned in one context, it can be applied to the rest of contexts without a further do (it also speeds up the development process!).
• Trade-offs — an action by the player has both positive and negative consequences at the same time. Players do something to strengthen their position, but simultaneously, the same action weakens their position elsewhere. Players are left constantly calculating if a given action is worth the accompanying disadvantage.
• Combo-friendly — rules are constructed in a way that promotes making combinations or sequences. Very often, a combination is worth more than the sum of its parts.
• Modularity — additional rules can be added or removed from the game without hurting the game’s core. Rules alter the possibility space forcing players to adapt and create new strategies.

Adding New Rules

In talking about “easy to learn, hard to master “ we won’t get definitive answers. I cannot imagine a single mechanic that would change one side of the equation without changing the other. Adding a new thing will always affect the way we learn and the way we master it. So instead of seeking an impossible solution, we need to think of a ratio:

How to minimize the process of learning and maximize the process of mastering?

The better the ratio, the more our game is “easy to learn, hard to master “.

So, we add a new feature. It’s cool. But think of the ratio. What do I need to do to put it in a game to make it work? Is it simple? Does it work well with existing features? Do I have a place to introduce it? Does it need a lot of feedback? And what do I get in return? Does it enrich the gameplay? Does it give me enough new interesting scenarios and new interesting challenges?

Consider that every time you add something new to the game. Get better at answering those questions and, with time, your games will flourish by being more and more “easy to learn, hard to master “.

Summary

Let’s sum up what we have discovered in both parts of the article:

1. An easy-to-learn game has a thoughtful amount of logical rules to remember, rules are introduced progressively throughout the game and can be learned smoothly by providing a good interface and feedback.
2. A hard-to-master game consists of many actions a player can perform and lots of moving parts that sum up to a huge possibility space. Learning is obfuscated by uncertainty in the form of randomness, an opponent's behavior, changing plans, and tempo. At the same time, the game is fun to master.
3. We strive to minimize the process of learning and maximize the process of mastering simultaneously.
4. Elegant design brings a thoughtful mix of several systems that leads to a gameplay full of interesting, unique decisions and gameplay situations.
5. Elegant games tend to include multi-purpose features, lots of trade-offs, combo-friendliness, and modularity.
6. Adding a new feature will always affect the way players learn and the way players master. Be sure that the new feature improves the clarity/mastery ratio of the game or you have other good reason to add it.

Your Turn

Now it’s your turn. Ask yourself these questions, summarizing all we have talked about, to make your game more “Easy to Learn, Hard to Master “.

Have a wonderful day!

Easy to Learn, Hard to Master Template

1. Is my game inherently simple? How many rules do players need to remember? Are there any exceptions to the rules?
2. Is my game coherent? Do rules make logical sense together? Can players draw analogies from the real world to understand them?
3. What does the progression look like? Are the rules introduced in the right order and time?
4. How does my game communicate with players? How does the interface communicate possible actions? How does feedback communicate the result of an action?
5. Is my game complex enough? How big is the possible space? How long does it take to master the game? How many actions does the player have? What are the moving parts?
6. Does my game include enough uncertainty? Do I make use of randomness, opponents' moves, changing plans, and tempo?
7. Is my game fun to master? Do I provide a fun environment for the learning process to happen?
8. Does my game use multi-purpose features? Can I combine some systems to do more than just one thing?
9. Are trade-offs present in my game? What are the actions that give advantages and disadvantages at the same time? Can I change some of them to include both good and bad? Can I spot a dominant strategy and find a counter for it?
10. Is my game combo-friendly? What are the actions that create sequences? Is the sequence more than a sum of its parts?
11. Is my game modular? Can I add and remove features without hurting the core? Do secondary features force players to think in new ways?
12. Is my game easy to learn, or hard to master? Does the game provide enough complexity out of simplicity?

That’s all for today. In a bonus workshop part of the series, I will take one of my recent pet projects — Tetra to find out, if it meets the “Easy to Learn, Hard To Master” criteria and get you familiar with analyzing your designs. See you soon!