Looking to improve your next game? Take a look at these 7 steps to improving your game

1. 7 tips and tricks for game
designers
Asher Einhorn

2. Emergence from common elements
What it is
● Actions not directly resulting from the core mechanics.
● Hugely increases player options without having to tutorialise them.
● Allows players to solve problems in interesting, counterintuitive ways, and can make them feel smart.
When to use it
● When a game has a degree of problem solving (even in combat)
● Often in a slower game (Hearthstone, Stealth)

3. How it's done
Common elements tie many things together - money, damage, sound, a colour…
SOUND
Gun
Grenade
Footstep
Window
Guards
Sensors
Dogs
Birds

4. Simple dependency tracking for safer scoping
What it is
Prevents you from cutting out something important (Story, but most importantly - gameplay mechanics)
When to use it
Whenever a game has an unwieldy mission structure

5. How it's done
As a lay-over on the mission flow graph
- Simple, Lightweight, Minimal additional work (very important for crunch)

6. The twisted third step of mechanic progression
What it is
A third step that subverts your expectations - surprising and challenging.
When to use it
Often in puzzle games. To trigger something that wants a more complex interaction to activate.
How it's done
Have your mechanics have a side effect, and then require these side effects for something.

7. The benefits of a bond between space and mechanics
What it is
Techniques that provide:
● Variety in gameplay
● Excitement of seeing the possibilities in a level
● Not having to teach a new mechanic
When to use it
Any time you can
How it's done
Momentum. Enemies that throw you off things. Environmental kills. Cover mechanics. Skateboard games. etc.

8. Transferring problems to an easier design space
What it is and when to use it
Allows you to solve for restrictive design spaces
(Realistic settings, or designs where you’re in charge of a specific element)
How it's done
● Solve the problem in a less restrictive design
● Work out exactly what that design is fundamentally doing
● Achieve the same result in a different way
(I would change the core mechanics)
(Levels influence gameplay)
(Design enemies that knock you off ledges)

9. The limit of player attention (and playing with it)
What it is
A simple way of estimating if you have too much going on in a design - Players can only actively think about one thing.
When to use it
When teaching. When designing a harder encounter.
How it's done
● Introduce more elements once a mechanic has become second-nature
● Add more mechanics by separating them, for example with context. Spatially. With time.
● (You can occasionally increase this to put pressure on the player)

10. The game design ‘Razor’
What it is
A way of keeping a game focussed, and communicating that to the whole team
When to use it
Almost always
How it's done
● Encapsulate the core of the game in a phrase
● Should guide every artist and designer

11. Questions
@ashereinhorn