Blog Quest 3: Becoming a Critic

            How do the formal elements of Terraria create such effective gameplay that makes Terraria such a popular game? First what are the formal elements? The formal elements of video games are players, objectives, procedures, rules, resources, conflict, boundaries and outcome.

Players - deals with how players interact

Objectives - deals with specific goals for the players

Procedures - actions or methods of play allowed by the game’s rules

Rules - dictate what the player can and cannot do

Resources - objects with high value for the player

Conflict - the procedure and rules that prevent the player from accomplishing goals directly

Boundaries - rules applied only in the game

Outcome - satisfying resolutions for emotional investments of players

            Player formal elements in Terraria allows for different interactions. The game can be played singleplayer or multiplayer. In singleplayer, the player interacts with the game itself, facing against A.I controlled enemies. In multiplayer, the player as many choices of interactions such as, multiple individual players vs the game, player vs player, Unilateral Competition, Multilateral Competition, Cooperative play and Team competition. As you can see, multiplayer gives the player freedom of how they would want to play the game as well as the Terraria lets the player choose and change how they would like to play the game at any time.

            Objectives in Terraria are not specific at all. The main reason is that the game is a sandbox game which gives the goals of the game to the player. The player creates his or her own goals within the game itself and can choose to complete these goals. These goals could be to beat a certain boss, get better gear, build structures, upgrade the structures, invite NPCs to live in your town, etc. If the player finds that a certain objective is too difficult, they can drop this objective and move onto a new one.

            Procedures in Terraria are pretty straight forward. First the player has nothing but a few basic tools. They then must gather resources and slowly build structure and create better tools/weapons. They can use these upgraded tools to fight monsters that will drop specific items that will be needed to craft more powerful equipment. The player can also build their city, which allows for NPCs to move into their city to give more options to the player. The cycle continues on and on until the player chooses to stop. Since sandbox games generally don’t have a clear end objective, the player will only be finished the game, when they decide so.

            Rules in Terraria tell the player what they can and cannot do. The rules are the building blocks of the game. There are certain conditions that must be met throughout the game. When crafting an item, the player needs the correct items as well as the correct number of items before they can create the new item. Some of the restricting actions in Terraria are that the player has a jump limit (it can be changed with certain items), and the player can only player blocks within a certain range. Determining effects in Terraria is that the player has a certain spawn point. This spawn point can only change when the player has a bed placed on the ground.

            Resources in Terraria are plentiful throughout the whole world. The game gives the player more resources than just the bare minimum to reach maximum status. Some of these resources are used for crafting such as minerals (diamonds, iron, gold), wood, etc. Other resources affect player stats such as heart containers that increase player’s maximum health capacity, and stars which can be used to increase the player’s maximum mana capacity. There are other resources such as materials dropped by certain monsters, money, or items that only spawn in a certain location.

            Conflict in Terraria plays a large part in how the gameplay works. The player cannot evade conflict within the game. Some of these conflicts can be broken down into obstacles, opponents and dilemmas. An obstacle in Terraria would be how the environment is set up. There could be certain blocks that prevent the player from advancing. To continue the player would require a higher tier pickaxe or navigate around the blocks. There are many opponents in Terraria from weak common monsters to big bosses that can give the player additional resources. Dilemmas are also frequent in Terraria. When the player’s inventory is full, and they find a new item, they must decide what item to toss away or to leave this new item that they have acquired.

            Boundaries in Terraria limit what the player can do. The player has a certain number of inventory space. The player cannot exceed this number no matter how hard they try. There is also a limit of how much health the player can have. As well has a limit to how much stackable items can be held in a single slot (typical blocks stack up to 999 whereas potions stack up to 30).

            Outcome in Terraria is what happens after the player’s action. If the player dies, the outcome would be that the player will lose something. If the player creates a softcore character, the player will lose money. If the player creates a mediumcore character, the player will lose items. If the player creates a hardcore character, the player will lose the whole character when they die. After the player builds a room in their city, a NPC may move in to their down to provide services for the player such as selling items or healing the player.

            This gameplay is effective because the formal elements work well with each other. It created a world that is a sandbox game at its core, with options to upgrade certain aspect of the game. Limitations are placed to control and create challenges for the player to overcome. The player can show their creativity by building and expanding on their town or customizing their character to their own style. The player is given multiple ways to play the game with or without other players.

            The owner chose these game design elements because they wanted to create a world where the player has the freedom to build but with many difficulties and limitations that the player will face as they progress through the game. They will find that if they do no beat a certain boss or explore the world, the player is strictly limited into what they want to do in the world. As they progress through the world, some of these limitations will be removed giving the player more freedom to expand their world and their character.

Blog Quest 2: Design your game item

            In most MMORPGs, the player is only able to wield a single weapon such as a sword, axe or bow. What if the player can equip a hybrid of these weapons, such as the gunblade from Final Fantasy 8 and Final Fantasy 13? The gunblade feature two different weapons in one, a gun and a sword. This can change the play style of typical MMORPGs where the fighting style is static, (for example melee fighters would always be melee fighters).

            Having a hybrid weapon in a MMORPG can change how the general combat system would work. If a warrior now wields a gunblade, they can either choose to brawl with the enemy up close with the sword or choose to kite the enemy with the gun. With two types of weapons, at least two new play styles can be used in a fight. A more dynamic battle system would change how the game is played and may create more strategy for the player.

            Hybrid weapons would also remove a “profession/class/job system” since now a warrior can both shoot from afar and fight in melee range. This gives more freedom to the players. They do not have to be limited in their own role but they can choose to be. An example of this would be a player who loves melee fighting could have a hybrid weapon of a large 2 handed sword and dual daggers. This will create a melee oriented player, but it also as two different styles of play. A high damage with a large reach but slow 2 handed sword and a quick but low damage with a short reach dual daggers. With the removal of a “class system” the spells and skills of a player would now be with the weapons themselves. The player will learn sword skills if they equip swords, where as they will learn gun skills if they use guns. Instead of having multiple weapon skills generalized in a class (such as a warrior), it is much more specific and more oriented to the weapons the player use. General skill/spells would be given to all players and the players may choose to train these skills/spells.

            With the skills/spells being given to weapons instead of classes, this gives more freedom to parties. A typical party would have a tank, high damage dealers, and healers, but with hybrid weapons and no classes, this lets players play multiple roles at a time. Players don’t have to and can focus on a single role, but it gives more diversity to a party. In MMORPGs, finding the right party members are difficult because maybe there is no healer, or a tank. But a with hybrid weapons, a player can play different roles and also swap roles with their teammates. This creates a more strategic battle and can also create a more competitive fight with other players or clans.

            With so much freedom, limitations must be placed for these hybrid weapons. Some limitations could be that only 2 types of weapons can be combined, (gun + sword, not gun + sword + staff). This gives the player enough freedom to swap between two roles, but not allow a single player to be the “god” player where they can use every weapon and play every single role.

            Hybrid weapons create a more dynamic combat environment because the player can play multiple play styles during combat. There would be no more class system because the player can now freely wield any combination of weapons that they so choose. This creates multiple roles that can be played by each player because there is no more class system. The player can choose to play a specific role though, so if a player enjoys playing the backline healer, they can use weapons that are specific to that class and play that role out during fights. I know a few MMORPGs that allow the player to use multiple types of weapons, but none of them can change during combat or it is not effective to change weapons during combat. With the addition to hybrid weapons such as the gunblade, the player can have more freedom during combat in MMORPGs.

Blog Quest 1: Emotional Contagion

I have played a lot of video game in my lifetime, and none of them has particularly moved me emotionally. But, there were a few games that sparked my imagination. When I play some video games and I get really interested in the game, I feel as if I was the main character and that I am the one living the life of these characters.

One of these games was The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time that I played a lot of when I was little. This was probably my first game I played where you have a no-named child become a knight and saves a princess. I thought that was really cool and that Link, the protagonist, was amazing for doing all of this. He was just a little kid just like I was, yet he went through all these adventures, fought his way through difficult monsters and dungeons just to save one person. I imagined myself in Link’s shoes playing through the story of Ocarina of Time all the time when I was little. The stories of a hero saving a princess are really common but Ocarina of Time was one of my first games that had a story like this. I have read books with this kind of scenario, but reading and playing a video game is completely different. I feel video games are more in-depth because not only do you get immersed in the narrative, the visuals and audio are well done to make it feel as if you are in Link himself.

Another game or game franchise that sparked my imagination was the Kingdom Heart series. I loved how Kingdom Hearts had one of their themes as the classic Darkness verses Light. They had a unique story of how these enemies called Heartless would take people hearts and turn them into Heartless themselves. Another interesting thing that I thought was cool when I was little was that the main weapon in the game was a sword called the Keyblade. The Keyblade was a giant key that the protagonist used like a sword. When I was little, I would always think what would happen if this situation happened in our world, where a key is a mighty weapon that can open many locks and that it can defeat any enemy. If I had a keyblade I would be able to open many doors into the different worlds and explore all of them. I think that would be an awesome thing to do if I had a keyblade.

Stories are a very interesting asset that could emotionally grab a person’s interest. I think a video game with a great story is the middle point between a book and a movie. The details and visuals really help bring players into the video game world where their character lives in. Everyone has a game they can never forget. These games are the ones where the players have been emotionally moved or these video games had sparked the imagination of the players. I hope I can find a game in the future that could make me feel the same way as Ocarina of Time and Kingdom Hearts.