Did you know that your chances of winning a game of Pandemic are lower than your chances of hitting the lottery or being gnawed to death by a pack of angry buffalo?
Okay, yes, I made that up; buffalo don’t travel in packs. But it is true that Pandemic is a very hard game, and is weighted against the players in a number of ways. Why, then, do I like it so much? If I lose most of my games (which I do), why do I keep playing? Why do I find it fun?
The answer is simple: your decisions matter. In a game of Pandemic, every decision you make has weight; if you make one boneheaded decision, it could lose the game for you. Even though you’re fighting an uphill battle pretty much the whole way, the fact that every action counts is actually pretty empowering.
I’d argue that this is actually true of any game: the more your decisions matter, the more fun you’re likely to have. I’ve talked about player agency in the past, and this is exactly what I’m talking about when I use those buzzwords. Decisions matter. Choices have weight. Consequences are real.
When you’re designing a game, this is something you should keep in mind. Players want to be able to make decisions about what they’re doing within the confines of the game world, but the ability to make choices alone isn’t enough.
There’s a reason why the term “railroad” is often used pejoratively in this hobby. If thing A leads to thing B leads to thing C and nothig I do can change that or have any impact on the outcome, I’ve lost my ability to affect the way the game plays out. Suddenly I’m just going through the motions, making choices that don’t have any tangible effect on anything. The illusion of choice can mitigate this to some extent but that’s a dangerous tightrope act; if your players start to suspect that their choices don’t matter, their investment in the story starts to evaporate.
A word of warning, though: there’s such a thing as making a particular choice matter too much. Often this goes hand in hand with not explaining the weight of the choice enough.
I’m going to say something that’s probably controversial now: I hate Settlers of Catan. It’s one of my least favorite games to play. Why? Because you make a very important choice at the very beginning of the game, before you’ve gotten a chance to learn what it means, and making the wrong choice can prevent you from making further choices in the game. The last game of Settlers that I played ended for me really before it started: my initial placement was flawed, I never got any resources and, as a result, I never got to do anything interesting. For two hours.
I guess my point is that, if you’re designing a game, make sure that the players have the ability to make decisions that affect how the game turns out. Also make sure they know something about the potential consequences of those choices. If the players don’t know what their choice might effect, they’re effectively throwing a dart blindfolded; that’s just another way to rob them of their agency.
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