Making Jump-Out-Of-Your-Seat Moments in a Game
In our final article detailing the Game Design Canvas, we talked about the Aesthetic Layout, the icing on the cake, the visuals and sounds and interaction methods that give games their artistic spark. Many games are revered for their gameplay, but not as many games nowadays are praised for fun Aesthetic Layouts.
However, this is still an area ripe for innovation. Playing with visuals, sound, or interaction in a way that hasn’t been done before is a highly underestimated way to add originality and memorable moments to games. Some of my all time favorite anecdotes from childhood game experiences come from these little Aesthetic surprises, that are built not from the Base Mechanics or the P&R Systems, but from the developer’s fun ideas about making it more than a game and bringing it into a real world experience.
To illustrate, I’d like to highlight three of my favorite Aesthetic surprises, all of which made me practically jump out of my seat and say, “Wow! This is so fun!” With an open mind centered around a game’s Core Experience, developers can easily create these kinds of moments in their own games. Thinking outside the box in this area also makes your game very noteworthy; it’s definitely the kind of moment that would be shared online or in person with fellow players.
Note that this post contains spoilers for all three of these titles. So if you’re ready, my three picks for the best jump-out-of-your-seat-moments:
Star Tropics’ Secret Letter
This one goes waaaaaaay back. In this tidy little action adventure title for the Nintendo Entertainment System, the player sailed and yo-yo’d all over the world in search of their lost uncle. The puzzles were simple, consisting mostly of Zelda-style button and switch challenges. The battle system was fun and the music was snappy; not a bad title in my book.
But the moment that made this a jump out of your chair game for me was when you needed to find a secret password. A character in the game told you that you needed to dip his letter in water. The game came with a letter which, surprise surprise, revealed the numbers “747″ when dipped in water. Wow! A real secret message that was activated by water! This made players really feel immersed in this tropical world; a real treat.
Metal Gear Solid’s Psycho Mantis
Metal Gear Solid is such a classic. The Playstation juggernaut that revived a dead franchise had its fair share of twists and turns and story elements. We could probably spend an entire post or more talking about the ways Metal Gear Solid manipulated its Aesthetic Layout for the player’s benefit and excitement. But for the purposes of this discussion, I want to focus on one specific moment that involved manipulating the Interaction Design.
During one portion of the game, Snake encounters an enemy named Psycho Mantis that has the power to control his mind. Moving Snake around as though someone else were pressing the controller buttons, the Colonel eventually tells the player that they need to break free from Psycho Mantis’ control. And since control is dictated by the controller, the way to do this is to unplug the controller from the P1 port and put it into the P2 port. A fancy little trick indeed.
Trace Memory’s Stamps
Trace Memory was a fun little mystery game for the Nintendo DS that didn’t seem to make a huge commercial splash. Nevertheless, I played through the entire game a while ago and really enjoyed the endearing story and the non-violent puzzle solving. While the game wasn’t one of my all time favorites, it did contain a moment that blew my mind.
In one part of the game, the player was required to stamp some paper to progress in the game. The player was told that the stamps needed to be pressed onto paper shown on the opposite screen, but actually how to perform this action was left as a mystery. Eventually, you figure out that you need to actually close the Nintendo DS as though it was an actual stamp book, thus putting the ink on one screen onto the other screen. It was a really neat moment that I’m sure was replicated in many other DS games, but it really helped to give that section of the story an extra umph.
Caveat
All of these moments were fun, and it’s difficult to mess something like this up when putting them into your own titles. It’s important to realize, however, that these little moments are part of the Aesthetic Layout, not the Base Mechanics. The most common mistake is to try and incorporate them into the entire game instead of just a single moment. However, trying to treat these Interaction Design tricks as Mechanics is asking for trouble. If the player has to change controller ports, close the DS, or soak paper more than once, it’s going to get monotonous, and the experience is ruined. The reason is that the player has already mastered the single interaction that’s required; anything more is boring and repetitive. So be careful that you don’t overstay your welcome.
Do you TGP readers have any other favorite Interaction Design moments that were left out? Comment away!
Comments
5 Responses to “Making Jump-Out-Of-Your-Seat Moments in a Game”Leave a comment, and if you'd like your own picture to show up next to your comments, go get a gravatar!
Metal Gear Solid had a lot of great jump-out-of-your-seat moments. In addition to the switching the controller ports thing, I thought it was pretty clever when Psycho Mantis moves your controller “with the power of his mind”, and when he looked at your memory card for other Konami games.
The DS game Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass had some cool moments too. Like requiring you to blow on the microphone to move windmills.
Another one that comes to mind is the first DS Phoenix Wright game. The last case had you do some fingerprinting. You would tap on the screen to spread fingerprinting powder, then blow on the microphone to blow the powder away and reveal the fingerprint.
Good article, I think games that make these kinds of efforts really stand out from the crowd. It’s something that doesn’t get considered often enough.
The idea with the closing of the DS also was used in Zelda: Phantom Hourglas which really excited me there too.
I experienced another of these moments when i played Wii Sports Tenis the first time. I started the game but didn’t know how to perform a service, so i just coppied the movement of the profi tenis players from TV with the Wiimote in my hand and it actually worked! That really made me feel that this was a complete new way of gaming.
Darius, the memory card trick was another great example that I forgot about. Obviously you wouldn’t make a game out of these, but they’re fun little touches.
Phil, it’s interesting that you bring up the Wii remote, because in a way the motion control of the Wii isn’t robust enough to warrant new gameplay; it belongs more along the lines of these other aesthetic tricks. I’ll be posting an article on this phenomenon soon.
The most recent jump-out-of-my-seat moment that I can remember was while playing No More Heroes for the Wii. There is a moment at the game that the character’s cellphone rings, and you have to listen to the caller using the wiimote’s speaker, just like you do using a real cellphone. By the way, there are several games that make a good use for the wiimote speaker, like Zelda. You can hear the sound of Link’s sword when swinging it.