A short commentary on games design

by Oz Mills, Tuesday, April 30, 2013, 08:15 (4006 days ago) @ Cody Miller
edited by Oz Mills, Tuesday, April 30, 2013, 08:23

First of all, there seems to be some confusion here as to what certain terms mean, so I'd like to lock them down so that we can move on with the discussion while using a set of terminologies. I am also going to start all the way at the beginning, not to try to belittle you, but so that everyone who reads this is on the same page.

Rewards

A "Reward" I shall define as:
"Something you receive which intends a positive feeling or reinforcement."

Now, this can indeed mean "level 2" as you suggest, as can cutscenes, dollops of story, items, chunks of XP, in-game currency, lore segments, achievements, unlocks in-game, etc etc etc. The reach of this word is far-flung and many people far smarter than me have discussed it to great length.

The important thing about "Rewards", however, is that they tie intrinsically into what makes a "Game". Games (in general, not just videogames) are simply a variety of structured human interaction with an environment which has goals, rules, challenges and rewards (even if that reward is "You won" or "You didn't lose").

Compulsion Loops

In videogames (and, indeed, many other games), what you very-often find is that they are designed around what are known as the "compulsion loop". This term has been given a bad rap recently due to it being linked to slow-burn Facebook games such as Farmville, et al. The Compulsion Loop, however, has always been a part of videogame design from the get go.

A compulsion loop is (at its core) four main steps:

1. Commitment
2. Trigger
3. Action
4. Reward
(5. Repeat)

These may be called different things depending on who you are talking to at the time.

So, to break this down

1. Commitment.
This is your simple act of playing the game, or taking an action in the game, or even paying to play the game. This sets up your mind for what is to come. This includes "I will get to the other side of this room" and "I will finish this level".

2. Trigger.
This is a sudden disparity between how you want things to be (or are told they should be) and how things appear. The prince needs saving, or 3 Grunt Aliens and an Elite Alien enter a room that you must progress through, or a door is locked that you feel like you need to open.

3. Action.
This is the action you take to resolve the trigger. Killing the aliens, progressing through the level towards the kidnapped prince, or you search and enact for a method of opening the door.

4. Reward.
This is what you are given for completing the action succesfully. Ammo, Resources, In-game relationships or reputations, XP, etc as I previously stated.

It should be clearly understood that these aspects are spread throughout games in many different ways, and you will have short, medium and long-term loops, all of which offer rewards. For example, at any given time you may be attempting to:

• Aim at one moving enemy (for the reward of reduced numbers of enemies you are currently facing)
  
• Kill the entire squad of enemies (to allow you to progress the level)
  
• Navigate the specific building/area in which you are currently playing (to see and experience more content)
  
• Finish the current level (To see more story, whether or not you've seen it before, and/or see more content)
  
• Finish the game (To feel a sense of completion)
  
• (Meta-loop) Play the game and feel good.

Motivation and personal commentary.

Now, different people may have different views on what motivates them. You state, for example, that you do not particularly enjoy finishing a game. You do not enjoy the "longest-term" goal (excluding the meta-game of community engagement). Now, this is fine, but the fact that it is there should never be assumed to "undermine the inherent value of the game's moment to moment pleasures" for other players.

Personally, I adore rewarding players in all sorts of ways. When Call of Duty added XP and unlocks, while I rarely played Call of Duty I was very happy with the direction the videogame industry was going. I never enjoyed the "One-Shot and lose it all" methods of Counterstrike, or the original Halo/Halo 2, but loved the addition of XP in later Halo games.

Conclusion (tl;dr)

The point I am trying to make here is that you have ALWAYS had a reward in games you play, of a multitude of different types. Your post, however, seems to suggest that you only like very specific kinds. I would ask that you, simply, understand that one man's meat is another's poison, and that your apparent dislike of long-term rewards is an outlier in the gaming industry's design mantras, let alone business mantras (ie keeping players playing for longer periods of time using XP-based multiplayer).