I am doing a podcast with my friends about games (check out The Adventure Mechanics here) and I decided that I need to try for accountability on actually releasing a game this year. To that end, I'm going to go through the development process to release a game. Here is the transcript from the fifth episode on innovating versus polishing your game:
Welcome to the adventure mechanics side quest, and, once again, it's just me, Chandler. As we prepared for upcoming mainline episodes, I couldn't help but notice that the two games we were playing were case studies on each side of the polish/innovation spectrum. On one hand, the super polished Forza 4 Horizons has almost no innovation, only polish. On the other hand, Phasmophobia, is very innovative, but is extremely janky. Now, before you say it, yes, these games are in completely different genres and the developers have vastly different resources at their disposal. That being said, they do highlight what I see as the balancing of polish and innovation. Today, I wanted to talk about this somewhat subtle issue in game design.
First, let me define some terms. For the purposes of this episode, when I say innovation, I mean a new or novel take on artwork, mechanics, soundscape, or whatever else is being done in the game. Innovation doesn't necessarily mean that it has to be completely unique in this case, only that whatever idea is implemented hasn't been commonly used in similar games. Polish in this context is how much effort is put into making the existing assets or mechanics look/sound or feel better. For a case study on polish, I'll link to a Game Developers Conference from the art director of the Forza Motorsport series, Matt Collins, where he talks about refining the art direction for the series.
So, what do I mean about the polish/innovation spectrum? Well, in an ideal world, the development team would have infinite resources and would be able to both innovate and polish to create their perfect game. The real world doesn't allow for that, however. So, what is the balance to be made? Well, it depends on how much time is dedicated to each aspect, innovating or polishing what is already in the game. The right balance between the two will vary wildly from project to project. In a more mature project, like a game sequel in a long-running series for instance, innovation may be small and not take much time for the team to complete. With new intellectual property, on the other hand, the team may need to spend more time on innovation before starting the polishing stage. Knowing when to call it on one and start on the other is a tricky art to master.
In the Forza series example, it's obvious that the genre is mature, along with the series itself. Innovation isn't going to come in the form of radically different gameplay or a wholly new art style, like cel-shading. If you look at the changes visible between Forza Horizon 3 and Horizon 4, the lion's share of them are different cars, new location, quality of life updates, and if you're looking really closely, subtle changes in how the screen is optimized and drawn. These all don't seem radical, and that's for a reason. With such a storied franchise, major changes and innovations are going to risk turning away established players. In this specific case, most innovation has been optimizing the workflow for the team, something that almost no player will be able to see, unless they are counting down the days to play. If you are one of those players, perhaps you should look into QA as a career. Having an eye for detail that fine is a hard skill to master.
Let's get back on topic, though. If your genre is resistant to change, or you can't touch what's already there in a large way, what can you do to improve? Polish. It's not sexy. It's not going to get people fawning over your game. It will, however, make sure that what is there will shine. Applying that to Forza Horizon 4, that's exactly what we see. Well, that and an annoying amount of Skinner boxes added to motivate the lizard brain to play it more than the content included can really support. In this context, it only highlights the need for a highly polished product, so I'll save all my opinions of Skinner boxes in Forza for the episode on it. It's all about keeping the players playing, and a well polished game will keep them playing longer. Polish in this example is king. Innovation is going to be incremental at best.
With the other example, Phasmophobia, it has no name to live up to. It can't rely on older entries or IP that can carry a mediocre game to success. What did the developer do? He had to innovate and do a very smart marketing campaign to succeed. From what I've seen of the ghost hunting game genre, most have the player or players combatting the ghosts after they are found. Ripping that mechanic out of Phasmophobia was a good innovation. Coupling it with voice to text and leveraging features built into Windows 10 to allow the player to talk with the ghost directly is downright genius. The strange attractor of this game is almost too much for a large swath of players. It gets them to play it, though. And that's the point. They tried out the game and, perhaps more importantly, got their friends to play it, too. That's huge. It's one thing to satisfy one player. It's another thing entirely to get them to be a fan of the game where they want to push their friends to play it, too.
So Phasmophobia is innovative and got a huge player base. What's not to like? Polish and content. The game has issues and many players will get bored of it after around a dozen rounds of investigating. The rest of the content just isn't there to keep them in the long run. Coupled with janky animation and a host of bugs, it does risk turning away more enthusiastic players and losing the community that has cropped up around it. It may not be fair to say that of a game that is nominally in early access, but it is something that a developer should keep in mind. Doubly so when the game ends up with such a wide appeal and needs to have a lot of players to make sure lobbies aren't empty.
The other risk is to transition over to polishing too soon. If there aren't enough innovative things there first, there may not be enough to polish to make a truly complete experience. For Phasmophobia, this means not having enough maps, tools, ghosts or other things to keep the player base playing longer. If the developer transitions too quickly to polishing what's here, they risk turning off more players who felt like they've seen it all. They may then have to go back and do another cycle of innovating to attract them back. That's a hazard of early access, specifically, but the transition between innovating and polishing can still be painful, even for a hobbyist scrub, like myself. I always find that it's a challenge to change between modes and it only slows me down. Your experiences may vary, though.
One trap that I personally have experienced, and have seen others fall into as well, is assuming that once the innovative core of the game is done, it's about eighty to ninety percent done. If you're lucky, you're about halfway done. New content, polishing that animation, re-recording that sound for the millionth time all take up a shocking amount of time. For me, it ends up being about ten percent coming up with that core and ninety percent polishing what I've made. I tend to be a much slower artist and will rework my code multiple times before I'm really happy with it. With all that in mind, I can start really budgeting what time is needed to get my idea across the line. I'm not even done putting in all that I want for The Mapper, so by my own math, this is going to take a looong time.
Well, I guess it's time to finally apply what I've been ranting about to The Mapper. Obviously, since I'm not done implementing all that I want, I'm still in implementation mode. That being said, I think that what I've been calling the map space is pretty much ready for polishing. The core of what's interesting there is already in place, so I'll be putting it on the back burner, only touching it to add a few features from feedback in the near future. What has been taking up most of my available development time has actually been what I'm calling the meat space, where the player moves their avatar and interacts with the world. This is going to take a lot more time testing and experimenting with a variety of ideas to really get where I want. Although more prototyping than innovating, it's still what the game needs to really get it where I want it to be. I've kind of been going through this episode almost using them interchangeably, so there's that. Keep in mind that prototyping is only part of innovating. You may find yourself playing other games for inspiration, reading, or even just daydreaming when you end up innovating.
Anyhow, that's about all that I have on this topic for now. I'm sure that I'll have something later as I work through The Mapper more. If you have any comments, feedback or whatever on this episode, let me know! You can leave a comment on this episode or reach out to me on Twitter as @jcsirron. This has been the adventure mechanics side quest and I'll talk to you next time.
