Generous Authority

Last week I introduced you to the work of Priya Parker. Her book, The Art of Gathering, has not only inspired me but has shaped the way I approach game design. In my previous post, I outlined the qualities that distinguish a meaningful gathering, which I believe closely align with the work of a game designer. This week I like to focus on one of those qualities, which Priay beautifully names generous authority. 

"The kinds of gatherings that meaningfully help others are governed by what I call generous authority. A gathering run on generous authority is run with a strong, confident hand, but it is run selflessly, for the sake of others." 

Those two simple words are the guiding characteristic that can transform an ordinary gathering into one of meaning. This insight should come as no surprise when we consider the attributes of God. Verses like James 1:17,  Phillipians 4:19, and John 3:16 illustrate God's generosity towards us, and passages such as Psalm 135:6 and Isaiah 43:13 leave no doubt who is in charge of this world. 

A person could spend tens of thousands of words trying to unpack the depth and beauty encompassed in the phrase generous authority. Nevertheless, for brevity's sake, I will narrow my scope to two ideas concerning game design.

Game Designer As Advocate

Generosity springs from care. It's tough to be generous when you don't care about someone. The example we see in scripture is that God loved, so He gave—and not just a little, but generously. Jesus gave up everything for us, including His life. Another way to say it is that Jesus became our advocate.

An advocate is someone who adds their voice of support to a person or cause. In our case, a game designer should be an advocate for the player. We should be looking out for the player's interests at every step of the development process—from initial concepts clear through post-launch support.

Your team will make innumerable decisions through development that will affect the player. Every decision will require you to think about one question: what is in the player's best interest? It's probably self-evident that making decisions in the player's best interest should be an ever-present design pillar. However, in previous posts, I have touched on how a studio's financial interests can sometimes compete with the players' interests. So it's probably worth repeating.  

Not all advocating will be external, though; sometimes, we need to turn our attention inwards. It's no surprise that game designers are an opinionated lot. When you spend thousands of hours conceptualizing, designing, and analyzing a game, you're naturally going to form opinions about what makes the experience fun. Still, we don't have to limit the game to only what we think is enjoyable.

Over several years, there has been a growing movement within game design circles to allow players to enjoy the game on their terms. Game designers like Maddy Thorson are leading by example. In their 2018 release, the Celeste team created an Assist Mode for their brutally challenging platformer. With options like slowing down the game's speed, extending the air dash ability, and even adding invincibility, the Celeste team not only allowed gamers to determine their idea of fun, but these same features have enabled gamers with disabilities to enjoy the game.

Famous game designer Sid Meier confessed in his Memoir! that he was resistant to the idea of allowing modders to tinker with Civilization in the beginning. He was worried that if players were allowed to change too many of the game's parameters, they would inadvertently ruin their experience. With decades of hindsight, he now credits the modding community with Civilization's sustained popularity through the years.

It's time to be generous with players and allow them to enjoy games on their terms. With over 2.7 billion gamers on the planet, there is a diverse landscape of players with varying needs and play styles, all of which need designers advocating for them.

Game Designer As Protector

Have you ever had someone ruin an experience you were looking forward to? I certainly have, two of which occurred at movie theaters! Magical moments are delicate ventures. They are hard to create and easy to destroy, so we have to work hard to protect them.

Parker writes, "Protecting your guests is, in short, about elevating the right to a great collective experience above anyone's right to ruin that experience. It's about being willing to be a bad cop. And it's generous, because you are doing it for your guests so that they don't have to."

Protecting players has many facets; take online multiplayer games, for example. There are whole businesses built on services that protect players from abuse in chat and audio channels or detect and prevent cheating. 

Protection doesn't have to come through third-party services, though. Most of the security we provide players will come through our design choices. Take VR games—one of the early findings developers discovered is that players felt uncomfortable and even violated when other players entered their personal space without consent. Some players even reported being virtually groped in multiplayer experiences. Developers quickly added distance safeguards to ensure a player's personal space is protected.

A different example of protection is in Minecraft Dungeons. Minecraft Dungeons is a game my kids and I like to play together on the Switch. I purchased it for them as a kind of introduction to RPGs. During our adventures together, I noticed an exceptional design decision around loot drops. The game designates each of the loot drops to a specific player. That might not seem significant, but that decision prevents one player from seizing all the valuables and has undoubtedly prevented thousands of fights. Mojang's design choice is substantial considering the game's younger audience, who are still learning to cooperate and share resources for the benefit of the group.

So far, my examples have focused on multiplayer scenarios, but protecting a player in a single-player experience is just as important. A typical example you have no doubt encounter is a safe zone. Safe zones are areas that allow players to master new skills, mechanics, and controls without the fear of threats. Absent of danger, players are free to experiment and practice at their own pace. These areas are essential because they give players a much-needed reprieve from the challenges they face. It's like relaxing a muscle or taking a breath when playing an instrument; it's needed rest so the players can sustain themselves.

The last form of protection I want to touch on is protecting the player from themselves. Sometimes players can get themselves into situations where they can't get out. One such example from my gaming past was on the original Playstation. I painted myself into a corner in the game Final Fantasy Tactics. Having invested around 30 hours into the game, I became stuck in a battle I could not beat. I can't recall the specifics. But, I clearly remember that proximity of the save point to the encounter left me with only one choice. And that was to continually play a battle I was not strong enough to win. Eventually, I made the difficult decision of saying goodbye to my 30-hour investment and started over. Because of that experience, I am conscious of building in plenty of fail-safes for players to fail back on if needed.

When we fail to protect our players, it creates chaos and anxiety. In the absence of protection from an authority, players will feel like they need to shoulder the burden to protect themselves. In the best case, that can lead to frustration, and in the worst case can lead to stress, blame, arguments, or even abuse. When you think about it in those terms, the role of game designer starts to take on some weight of responsibility. It reminds me of the old quote, "It's all fun and games until somebody gets hurt."