The Genius Goal Loops of Dave the Diver

I have been unable to put down Dave the Diver since it was released on Nintendo Switch in late October. I initially played the demo for 10 minutes. It didn’t hook me. When the full game was released, I decided to take a another chance and download it. Boy am I glad I did. After an hour as Dave, I was completely hooked. I’m now 60 hours into what is largely expected to be a 25 hour experience. The credits rolled on the main story hours ago. And I just keep going back.?

I wanted to understand why I’m so enthralled by this game. What specifically makes Dave the Diver such a rewarding and addictive gameplay experience? The answer is a core facet of game design itself: goal loops.?

WHAT IS DAVE THE DIVER?

Officially, Dave the Diver is “a casual, singleplayer adventure RPG featuring deep-sea exploration and fishing during the day and sushi restaurant management at night.” In reality, it’s much much more than that. You play as Dave, a deep sea diver, tasked with helping open a new sushi restaurant alongside the Blue Hole - a mysterious and ever-changing spot in the ocean packed with secrets. By day, you dive for creatures and explore the Blue Hole. By night, your haul from the depths becomes a vibrant menu in Bancho Sushi, which you must make a success.?

This alone would make for a great game. But through its expansive story and brilliant cast of charming characters, Dave the Diver throws one gameplay curveball after another, deepening your dives and expanding your world in really unexpected ways. On paper, it seems like a dizzying mashup of a ton of genres. RPG! Action! Roguelike! Management sim! Rhythm? Stealth?! But it all works. And it works REALLY REALLY WELL.?

WHAT IS A GOAL LOOP?

A goal loop is an ongoing set of objectives that a player is given to achieve in the moment, on new levels, or to complete the game. It is the building block of gameplay design. They are called “loops” because the player’s action produces results that feed into that same action, unlock other actions, and (for more complex games) can create an interlocking web of feedback loops. For a game to hook you, it needs to make a great first impression. To keep you coming back, it needs clear and dynamic goal loops that introduce varying, interesting, and escalating obstacles.

Goal loops come in various sizes: moment to moment, short, medium, and long. A great way to understand loop sizes is through the lens of Super Mario. Shorter loops include collecting power-ups and stomping enemies. Longer loops involve reaching the castle or defeating Bowser.?

I always recommend that folks try defining goal loops in games they love to get a better understanding of what they’re all about. Here’s one I did a while back for Animal Crossing: New Horizons.?

There are dozens of goal loops across the at least 7 types of gameplay found in Dave the Diver. To save some of the game’s most exciting secrets, I’ll focus primarily on the 2 main areas of the game: below water and above water. Each area offers dozens of things to do on its own. It’s in how they feed into and build on one another that makes Dave the Diver soar.?

Note: Light gameplay and story spoilers ahead!

THE BLUE HOLE

The Blue Hole provides the perfect setting for Dave the Diver’s core mechanic: diving. This mysterious spot in the ocean is a playground for dynamic and ever-changing diving loops. Though some key landmarks stay in place, the Blue Hole changes each time you enter via procedural-generation. As you level up your equipment, you can dive deeper and for longer periods. There are 3 main levels to reach in each dive: the Shallows (0-50m), Medium Depth (50-130m) and the Depths (230-250m). Each new area unlocks creatures, hazards, and rewards of their own. You’re never given a clear map with icons to find your next fish, collectible or destination. Dave must rely on context clues and advice from other characters to find a lot of what you’re looking for.?

Diving consists of 2 kinds of goal loops: hunt and explore.?

HUNT

Hunting is a simple loop where you’ll use a variety of tools and weapons to catch or kill over 100 different kinds of undersea creatures. There are tons of moment-to-moment and short loops in here. Shoot, tranquilize, kill and capture creatures. Quick time events help you dodge and take down aggressive sharks and jellyfish along the way. Be mindful of how you pursue your prey: your strategy can affect the quality of their parts as ingredients in sushi.?

EXPLORE

There is much more to uncover in the Blue Hole than just fish. You are rewarded with dynamic and ever-changing goal loops just for exploring. Collect plants and other anchored wildlife. Mine precious metals. Acquire new weapons. Photograph natural wonders and mysterious artifacts. Unlock totally new areas off the beaten path that you’d never expect.?

These shorter underwater goal loops grow to longer ones as the story progresses. The developers at MINTROCKET masterfully subvert player expectations by introducing a series of story elements that deepen, enhance and vary your dives. Dave must take down a violent environmental group, unlock the secrets of a hidden civilization and investigate a series of earthquakes that are threatening all life within and above the Blue Hole. As these longer loops are introduced, the shorter ones take on more urgency.

One fantastic example of Dave’s expanding and deepening diving loops is the reveal of an entirely new underwater civilization. The Sea People Village includes its own series of activities alongside social and monetary currencies meant to enhance your dive and feed into life on the surface at Bancho Sushi. I won’t spoil all the fun there is to be had there. But rest assured, there are goal loops aplenty that you would never expect.

BANCHO SUSHI

Diving may be an endlessly-rewarding long goal loop. But what good is all your undersea loot if you don’t have anything to do with it? This is where Bancho Sushi comes in.?

Bancho Sushi consists of 3 kinds of goal loops: serve, manage and grow.?

SERVE

Over the course of the game, Dave must bring Bancho Sushi from a no-name hole-in-the-wall to a world-renowned destination for foodies of all kinds. With no budget at the beginning, this means it’s just you and Bancho (the head chef) to start. Your initial goal loops are almost entirely moment-to-moment and short. Pour green tea. Serve dishes. Replenish the wasabi supply. Clean up dishes. Rinse and repeat. It’s a fast-paced race to satisfy your customers at the moment. And even as Bancho Sushi grows, this core loop never loses its charm.

MANAGE

At Bancho Sushi, Dave is not just a server; he’s the manager. Curate the menu for each night’s guests. Select the dishes that will be served. Enhance dishes as you get new ingredients and supplies. Once you get going, an entirely new hiring and training mechanic unlocks. Post job ads. Hire cooks and servers. Train employees to skill up. You even decorate the restaurant itself with loads of furniture items.

GROW

Growing Bancho Sushi is the longest goal loop above water. Each dish has 2 main stats: price and taste. Price is how much gold the dish will net you. Taste is the quality of the dish that directly impacts customer satisfaction. This satisfaction translates into likes and follows on Cooksta, the in-game mobile social media app. Notoriety on Cooksta enables you to rank up, gaining more menu slots, staff slots and menu items.?

At the end of each night, you receive a full report of that night’s shift, including the gold you made, likes you acquired and best-selling dishes. These all convert into an overall rank that yields Artisan’s Flames, yet another currency that is spent on researching new menu items. Earn as much gold and acclaim as possible to re-invest in growing your sushi empire.?

As with the Blue Hole, MINTROCKET introduces a series of variables to spice up life at Bancho Sushi. Treat VIP customers with exciting new dishes in order to unlock new features in the restaurant. Compete on a cooking TV show for more followers. Prepare parties celebrating specific ingredients to gain bonus gold.?

The goal loops of Bancho Sushi seem to have no end to their variety…until 3 entirely new areas are thrown your way. Along Dave’s journey, you unlock a farm, fishery and finally an entirely new Bancho Sushi branch. Grow crops and rear chickens for additional ingredients on the farm. Breed creatures from all parts of your dives at the fishery. Multiply your profits with a second Bancho Sushi branch. Each of these areas features its own upgrades and goal loops connecting to and benefiting from the Blue Hole and Bancho Sushi HQ.?

FARM TO TABLE? MORE LIKE DIVE TO TABLE.

The true genius of Dave the Diver is in how the goal loops of the Blue Hole and Bancho Sushi feed one another. Your dives can yield over 150 different ingredients to be used in 260 sushi recipes. The gold you earn at the restaurant unlocks new abilities and upgrades to your suit and equipment. It’s a complementary relationship between above and below the waves that never gets old. These nestled short to long goal loops across both areas are balanced in a way that feels rewarding for dozens of hours. It’s simple enough to jump in for quick 15 to 30 minute bursts for a dive and/or serve. But it’s deep enough to get lost for hours on end as you build up your tools, acclaim and menu. You always feel like you’re progressing and discovering something new - above and below the waves.

Almost every loop in the game - above and below water - is accompanied by visuals and audio cues that give you a sense of accomplishment. A popup with an uplifting chime celebrates each catch. Hilarious cutscenes with fantastical pixel art animations accompany every story beat, weapon upgrade and dish enhancement.?

Through these cues, the player feels celebrated each step of the way. A few upbeat notes herald Dave catching a tuna. Bancho enhances a dish with its meat via a dramatic cooking prep cutscene. And, finally, you watch as one of your VIP guests literally flies off their seat into a state of psychedelic bliss from getting to taste the dish. It feels like the developers are cheering you on every step of the way as you journey from the deep to the kitchen. And it feels so rewarding.

THE ALMIGHTY SMARTPHONE

If you couldn’t tell by now, there is a WHOLE LOT to do in Dave the Diver. MINTROCKET expertly ties it all together with an in-game smartphone that features 19 apps. Most of these apps are meant to directly track your progress across all of these medium to long goal loops. The Weapon Shop allows you to build and enhance weapons. iDiver is the place to upgrade your suit and diving tools. Cooksta is your all-in-one social media app. To-Do tracks progress on story missions and side quests. There are email and phone apps to interact with characters and receive notices. There’s even weather, a calculator and music apps. Ecowatcher and Marinca track your exploration of the deep and all that you encounter. Management and farming apps include progress across Bancho Sushi and the Farm. On top of all of that, there is a section of minigames! Some of this stuff is just for-fun and adds to the immersion within Dave’s world. But most of it is necessary tracking for your progress within all the game’s interlocking systems.

A SIMPLE IDEA, EXPANDED AND REFINED

"The idea first came to me when I was on Jeju Island, which is kind of like the Hawaii of Korea," Jaeho Hwang, Director of Dave the Diver, recently told PCGamer . "There was this restaurant by the sea there, where the owner caught fish in the morning, and cooked them for dinner. When I saw this, I thought this would be something interesting to work with, so I started to design a game based on this concept."

Such a simple concept - catch fish in the morning and cook them for dinner - has been expanded and deepened beautifully by the team at MINTROCKET. Hundreds of design decisions had to be made in the game’s multi-year development to enrich this core interaction between diving and serving in such inventive ways. The way they got there was through a series of interconnected goal loops that balances challenge with mastery. These loops create a meaningful experience to the player that makes you want to hop into Dave’s flippers again and again. A quick 15 minute dive becomes hours of playtime as you strive for that perfect dish or?the next suit upgrade. It’s a master class in game design that makes Dave the Diver one of the best games of the year.