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.