The Design Challenge

Design a fun cooperative multiplayer action game

What made this design challenge unique

• A fast-pased game over the network – fighting latency

• Fun is quite subjective

• E-sports is for the hardcore, most of our paying customers are not

• How to introduce new players in a “multiplayer only” game

• E-sports is about the audience - making the game easy to follow, effects understandable and make acts of player skill noticable

Some of our design results

• Developed a new and more intuitive control system

• Developed a playful interactive new player introduction guide

• Using line-of-sight and positioning to create intuitive tactical depth

• The game was easy to understand even for new players

• Making delays before actions visible to give instant feedback over latency 

What worked out design-wise

• Intuitive controls pave the way for excellent gameplay

• A great experience for new players = growth

• Designing gameplay mechanics from our artist's concept art

What we learned from our design decisions

• Monetization should be designed with the game, not attached afterwards

• Intelligently matching player's with equal skill is crucial

• Adding complexity does not always add tactical depths

• Ingame chat is not essential for building community

• A lot of our GUI and features did not provide much game value in the end

• Special effects at a certain point can take away more than it gives

• We could have considered the e-sport audience watching streams more

• The game could have been even easier for casual players and had an even greater reach, without making the game worse for the hardcore

Why I chose this project for the portfolio

I hope this shows I have a deep understanding of user interaction design with quick feedback cycles. That I understand the constraints and tradeoffs around latency and consistency.

I hope it shows that I cared a lot about putting the user first, and I know how to conduct user research and get design metrics from playtesting.

I also hope it shows that I have a great understanding of working with other expert disciplines (programming & art) and that it shows that I understand that the final result depends more on that cooperation than on just the design ideas themselves.

I also hope it shows that I know a lot about game design & story telling.

Gallery

Details

Stunlock Studios
Startup 2009 -->

Team size: 15 people
Time: 3 years
My roles: {
  Project Manager,
  Designer,
  Lore Writer,
  Network Programmer
}
Link: Steam

Click to view screens from the game