Game mechanics
In tabletop games and video games, game mechanics specify how a game will work for the people who play it. Game mechanics include the rules or ludemes that govern and guide the player's actions, as well as the game's response to them. A rule is an instruction on how to play, while a ludeme is an element of play, such as the L-shaped move of the knight in chess.[1] The interplay of various mechanics determines the game's complexity and how the players interact with the game. All games use game mechanics; however, different theories disagree about their degree of importance to a game.
Some forms of game mechanics have been used for centuries, while others are new. The process and study of game design includes efforts to develop game mechanics that engage players.
Common examples of game mechanics include turn-taking, movement of tokens, set collection, bidding, capture, and spell slots.
Definition of term
[edit]There is no consensus on the precise definition of game mechanics.[2] Competing definitions claim that game mechanics are:
- "systems of interactions between the player and the game"
- "the rules and procedures that guide the player and the game response to the player's moves or actions"
- "more than what the player may recognize, they are only those things that impact the play experience"[3][4]
Categorization
[edit]Scholars organize game mechanics into categories, which they use (along with gameplay and theme) to classify games. For example, in Building Blocks of Tabletop Game Design, Geoffrey Engelstein and Isaac Shalev classify game mechanisms into categories based on game structure, turn order, actions, resolution, victory conditions, uncertainty, economics, auctions, worker placement, movement, area control, set collection, and card mechanisms.[5]
Game mechanics vs. theme
[edit]Some games are 'abstract'—that is, the action is not intended to represent anything. Go is an example of an abstract game. Other games have a 'theme'—some element of representation. For example, in Monopoly, the events of the game represent another activity, the buying and selling of properties. Games that are mechanically similar can be thematically different, and visa versa.
Game mechanics vs. gameplay
[edit]Some game studies scholars distinguish between game mechanics and gameplay. In Ernest Adams and Andrew Rollings on game design, the authors define gameplay as the combination and interaction of many elements of a game.[6] Video games researcher Carlo Fabricatore defines gameplay as:
- What the player can do
- What other entities can do, in response to player's actions.[7]
However, popular usage sometimes elides the two terms. For example, gamedesigning.org defines gameplay as the core game mechanics that determine a game's overall characteristics.[8]
Examples
[edit]The following examples are not a strict or complete taxonomy of game mechanics.
Capture/eliminate
[edit]
In some games, the number of tokens a player has on the playing surface represents their current strength in the game. A central goal is capturing an opponent's tokens, which removes them from the playing surface.
Captures can be achieved in a number of ways:
- Moving one of one's own tokens into a space occupied by an opposing token (e.g. chess, parchisi), also known as a replacement capture or displacement capture.[9]
- If the space immediately opposite must either be off the board or a marked trap space, it is known as a push capture.[10]
- Jumping a token over the space immediately occupied by an opposing token (e.g. draughts), known as a jump or leap.[9]
- When the opposing token can be any distance along an unobstructed line, it is known as a flying capture.[10]
- Occupying the adjacent squares of an opposing token (e.g. tafl), also known as a custodian capture,[11] custodianship or interception.[9]
- Occupying one immediately adjacent square to an opposing token, also known as approach.[9]
- The reverse of approach: capturing an adjacent opposing token by moving away from it in a straight line (e.g. fanorona), also known as withdrawal.[9]
- Capturing two opposing tokens by occupying the single square separating them, also known as intervention.[9]
- Declaring an "attack" on an opposing token, and then determining the outcome of the attack, either in a deterministic way by the game rules (e.g. Stratego, Illuminati), or by using a randomizing method (e.g. Illuminati: New World Order).
- Surrounding a token or region with one's own tokens in some manner (e.g. go), also known as enclosure.[9]
- Playing cards or other game resources to capture tokens.
- Other specialized mechanisms that do not fall neatly into any of the above categories.
In some games, captured tokens are simply removed and play no further part in the game (e.g. chess). In others, captured tokens are removed but can return to play later in the game under various rules (e.g. backgammon, pachisi). Some games allow the capturing player to take possession of the captured tokens and use them later in the game (e.g. Shogi, Reversi, Illuminati), also known as conversion.[9]
Many video games express the capture mechanism in the form of a kill count (sometimes referred to as "frags"), reflecting the number of opposing pawns eliminated during the game.
Worker placement
[edit]Worker placement is a game mechanism where players allocate a limited number of tokens ("workers") to multiple stations that provide various defined actions.[12][13]: 160–163 The worker placement mechanism originates with board games. Stewart Woods identifies Keydom (1998; later remade and updated as Aladdin's Dragons) as the first game to implement the mechanic. Worker placement was popularized by Caylus (2005) and became a staple of the Eurogame genre in the wake of the game's success. Other popular board games that use this mechanism include Stone Age and Agricola.[12] Although the mechanism is chiefly associated with board games, the worker placement concept has been used in analysis of other game types. For instance, Adams and Dormans describe the assigning of tasks to SCV units in the real-time strategy game StarCraft as an example of the worker placement mechanic.[13]: 307
Set collection
[edit]Engine building
[edit]Engine building is a mechanism that involves building and optimizing a system to create a flow of resources.[13]: 311–313 SimCity is an example of an engine-building video game: money activates building mechanisms, which in turn unlock feedback loops between many internal resources such as people, job vacancies, power, transport capacity, and zone types.[13]: 313 In engine-building board games, the player adds and modifies combinations of abilities or resources to assemble a virtuous circle of increasingly powerful and productive outcomes.[14]
Tile-laying
[edit]
Many games use tiles - flat, rigid pieces of a regular shape - that can be laid down on a flat surface to form a tessellation. Usually, such tiles have patterns or symbols on their surfaces that combine when tessellated to form game-mechanically significant combinations.
The tiles themselves are often drawn at random by the players, either immediately before placing them on the playing surface, or in groups to form a pool or hand of tiles from which the player may select one to play.
Tiles can be used in two distinct ways:
- The playing of a tile itself is directly significant to the outcome of the game, in that where and when it is played contributes points or resources to the player.
- Tiles are used to build a board upon which other game tokens are placed, and the interaction of those tokens with the tiles provides game points or resources.
Examples of tile mechanics include: Scrabble, in which tiles are letters and players lay them down to form words and score points; and Tikal, in which players lay tiles representing newly explored areas of jungle, through which archaeologists (represented by tokens) must move to score game points.
Victory conditions
[edit]Victory conditions control how a player wins the game. Examples of victory conditions include the necessity of completing a quest in a role-playing video game,[15] or the player being suitably trained in a skill in a business game.[16] Some games also feature a losing condition, such as being checkmated in chess, or being tagged in tag. In such a game, the winner is the only remaining player to have avoided loss. Games are not limited to one victory or loss condition, and can combine several at once.[17] Tabletop role-playing games and sandbox games frequently have no victory condition.
Catch-up
[edit]Some games include a mechanism designed to make progress towards victory more difficult, the closer a player gets to it. The idea behind this is to allow trailing players a chance to catch up and potentially still win the game, rather than suffer an inevitable loss once they fall behind. For example, in The Settlers of Catan, a neutral piece (the robber) debilitates the resource generation of players whose territories it is near. Players occasionally get to move the robber, and frequently choose to position it where it will cause maximal disruption to the player currently winning the game. In some racing games, such as Chutes and Ladders, a player must roll or spin the exact number needed to reach the finish line; e.g., if a player is only four spaces from the finish line then they must roll a four on the die or land on the four with the spinner. If more than four is rolled, then the turn is forfeited to the next player.
Other games do the reverse, making the player in the lead more capable of winning, such as in Monopoly, and thus the game ends sooner.
Chance and randomization
[edit]Dice
[edit]The most common use of dice is to randomly determine the outcome of an interaction in a game. An example is a player rolling a die or dice to determine how many board spaces to move a game token.
Dice often determine the outcomes of in-game conflict between players, with different outcomes of the die/dice roll of different benefit (or adverse effect) to each player involved. This occurs in games that simulate direct conflicts of interest.
Dice curves
[edit]Different dice formulas are used to generate different probability curves. A single die has equal probability of landing on any particular side, and consequently produces a linear probability distribution curve. The sum of two or more dice, however, results in a bell curve-shaped probability distribution, with the addition of further dice resulting in a steeper bell curve, decreasing the likelihood of an extreme result. A linear curve is generally perceived by players as being more "swingy", whereas a bell curve is perceived as being more "fair".[18][19]
Risk and reward
[edit]Some games include situations where players can "press their luck" in optional actions where the danger of a risk must be weighed against the chance of reward. For example, in Beowulf: The Legend, players may elect to take a "Risk", with success yielding cards and failure weakening the player's ultimate chance of victory.[20]
Action points
[edit] |
Each player receives a budget of "action points" to use on each turn. These points may be spent on various actions according to the game rules, such as moving pieces, drawing cards, collecting money, etc. This type of mechanism is common in "German-style board games".
Game modes
[edit] |
A game mode is a distinct configuration that varies gameplay and affects how other game mechanics behave. A game with several modes presents different settings in each, changing how a particular element of the game is played.
A common example is the choice between single-player and multiplayer modes in video games, where multiplayer can further be cooperative or competitive. A sandbox mode allows free play without predefined goals. In a Time Attack Mode, the player tries to score, progress or clear levels in a limited amount of time.
Changing modes while the game is in progress can increase difficulty and provide additional challenge or reward player success. Power-ups are modes that last for a few moments or that change only one or a few game rules. For example, power pellets in Pac-Man give the player a temporary ability to eat enemies.
A game mode may restrict or change the behavior of the available tools, such as allowing play with limited/unlimited ammo, new weapons, obstacles or enemies, or a timer, etc. A mode may establish different rules and game mechanics, such as altered gravity, win at first touch in a fighting game, or play with some cards face-up in a poker game. A mode may even change a game's overarching goals, such as following a story or character's career vs. playing a limited deathmatch or capture the flag set.
Turns
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A turn is a segment of a game set aside for certain actions to happen before moving on to the next turn, where the sequence of events can largely repeat. Some games, such as Monopoly and chess, use player turns where one player performs their actions before another player can perform any on their turn. Some games use game turns, where all players contribute to the actions of a single turn. For example, in board-game simulations of American football, players pick plays and then determine the outcome; each 'play' or 'down' can be considered a turn. Some games combine the two. For example, Civilization uses a series of player turns followed by a trading round in which all players participate.
Games with semi-simultaneous turns allow for some actions on another player's turn. Games with impulse-based turns, such as Star Fleet Battles and Car Wars, divide each turn into smaller segments or impulses where each player does some of their actions at one time, and then reacts to the current situation before moving on to the next impulse.
In some games, not all turns are alike. For example, Imperium Romanum II features a "Taxation and Mobilization Phase" in every third turn. In Napoleon, every third player turn is 'night turn' when combat is not allowed.
Economics
[edit] |
Resource management
[edit]Many games involve the management of resources. Examples of game resources include tokens, money, land, natural resources, human resources and game points. Players establish relative values for various types of available resources, in the context of the current state of the game and the desired outcome (i.e. winning the game). Game rules determine how players can increase, spend, or exchange resources. The skillful management of resources lets players influence the game's outcome.
Auction or bidding
[edit] |
Some games use an auction or bidding system in which the players make competitive bids to determine which player wins the right to perform particular actions. Such an auction can be based on different forms of payment:
- The winning bidder must pay for the won privilege with some form of game resource (game money, points, etc.) (e.g.: Ra).
- The auction is a form of a promise that the winner will achieve some outcome in the near future. If this outcome is not achieved, the bidder pays a penalty. Such a system is used in many trick-taking games, such as contract bridge.
In some games the auction determines a unique player who gains the privilege; in others, the auction orders all players into a sequence, such as the sequence of turn-taking during the current round of gameplay.
Movement
[edit]
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Many board games involve the movement of playing tokens. How these tokens are allowed to move, and when, is governed by movement mechanics.
Some game boards are divided into more or less equally-sized areas, each of which can be occupied by one or more game tokens. (Often such areas are called squares, even if not strictly square in shape.) Movement rules specify how and when a token can be moved to another area. For example, a player may be allowed to move a token to an adjacent area, but not one further away. Dice are sometimes used to randomize the allowable movements.
Other games, such as miniatures games, are played on surfaces with no marked areas. A common movement mechanism, in this case, is to measure the distance that the miniatures are allowed to move with a ruler. In naval wargames, the direction of movement is restricted by use of a turning key.
See also
[edit]- Ludology
- Ludeme
- Chess clock
- Kingmaker scenario
- Pie rule
- Gamification
- Dynamic game difficulty balancing
References
[edit]- ^ Boller, Sharon (17 July 2013). "Learning Game Design: Game Mechanics". Knowledge Guru. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
- ^ Lim, T; Louchart, S; Suttie, N; Ritchie, J.M.; Aylett, R.S.; Stanescu, I.A.; et al. (2013). "Strategies for Effective Digital Games Development and Implementation". Cases on Digital Game-Based Learning. 12. IGI Global: 168–198. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-2848-9.ch010. ISBN 9781466628489.
- ^ Rubin, Steve (2010). Introduction to Game Development (2.ed). USA: Cengage. p. 70. ISBN 978-0-84003-103-7.
- ^ Boller, Sharon (17 July 2013). "Learning Game Design: Game Mechanics". The Knowledge Guru. Retrieved 11 August 2020.
- ^ Engelstein, Geoffrey; Shalev, Isaac (2020). Building Blocks of Tabletop Game Design: An Encyclopedia of Mechanisms. CRC Press. ISBN 978-1-138-36552-0.
- ^ Adams, Ernest; Rollings, Andrew (2003). Andrew Rollings and Ernest Adams on game design. New Riders Publishing. ISBN 1-59273-001-9.
One or more causally linked series of challenges in a simulated environment"; "Gameplay is the result of a large number of contributing elements. .. gameplay is not a singular entity. It is a combination of many elements, a synergy that emerges from the inclusion of certain factors. .. The gameplay emerges from the interaction among these elements, ..
- ^ Fabricatore, Carlo (2007). "Gameplay and Game mechanics Design: A Key to Quality in Videogames" (PDF). OECD. Rome, Italy. p. 5. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2018-03-29.
- ^ "What are Video Game Mechanics? (Learn for Free)". 11 March 2017.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Parlett, David (1999). The Oxford History of Board Games. Oxford University Press Inc. pp. 232–33. ISBN 0-19-212998-8.
- ^ a b "Geeklists of capture move types for Boardgames". BoardGameGeek.
- ^ Bell, R.C. (1979). "Games of Position". Board and Table Games From Many Civilizations. Dover Publications. p. 97 (Hasami Shogi). ISBN 978-0486238555.
- ^ a b Woods, Stewart (2012). Eurogames: The Design, Culture and Play of Modern European Board Games. North Carolina: McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-0-7864-6797-6.
- ^ a b c d Adams, Ernest; Dormans, Joris (2012). Game Mechanics: Advanced Game Design. California: New Riders Games, an imprint of Peachpit. ISBN 978-0-321-82027-3.
- ^ Engelstein, Geoffrey; Shalev, Isaac (2019). Building Blocks of Tabletop Game Design. CRC Press. p. 438. ISBN 978-1-138-36549-0.
- ^ "Effective Quest Design in MMORPG Environment". Archived from the original on 2005-08-12., Game Developers Conference 2005, March 11, 2005
- ^ Greco, Marco; Baldissin, Nicola; Nonino, Fabio (2013). "An Exploratory Taxonomy of Business Games". Simulation & Gaming. 44 (5): 645–682. doi:10.1177/1046878113501464. S2CID 62597836.
- ^ "Pokémon Trading Card Game Rulebook 2012" (PDF). p. 8. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-09-11. Retrieved 22 June 2016.
- ^ "D&D and the Probability Curve". Awesome Dice. 2023-11-22. Retrieved 2024-03-05.
- ^ "Dice Probability Explained". Game Master Dice. 2019-09-03. Retrieved 2024-03-06.
- ^ "Beowulf: The Legend DESCRIPTION". Fantasy Flight Games. Archived from the original on 15 December 2010. Retrieved 20 May 2010. "the player who took the risk instead takes a "scratch," a minor wound that has the strong potential to ultimately undermine the player's chances of success. These frequent risks are remarkably nerve-racking"