Universality of Rules - Systemic Gameplay and Emerging Narrative in Video Games.
In 2015 the players of Dwarf Fortress, a curious and unique text-based console construction and survival game, began to find cats inhabiting their cities dead and covered in vomit. There was no record of them being killed or of any disease, yet more and more cats perished in this mysterious way.
The answer to this plague came from the creator, Tarn Adams, some time later. Tarn, a cat lover, wanted them to have their own particular way of cleaning themselves by licking their legs and ingesting whatever was attached to them, hair mostly, producing to the usual hairballs that they regurgitate from time to time. The cats, programmed in the most realistic way possible, walked all over the city and many of these walks took place inside the taverns that the dwarves frequented. The dwarves, in turn, toasted and threw much of their beer to the ground in their bar fights, beer that the cats then stepped on... and ingested when they licked their legs. The amount of alcohol, programmed to satisfy a dwarf, was lethal to the poor kittens who died in their own vomit.
Surely Tarn did not conceive of stray cats dying from ethyl poisoning, and if he had wanted to, there were a thousand easier ways to do it. What happened at the Dwarf Fortress is an example of an emerging narrative. Emerging, because no one conceived or planned it, it simply happened because of the game systems. The convoluted chain of events that led to the cat plague was not programmed, but what was programmed was the series of systems that allowed events like this one to happen. The elements and actors in the huge game scenario react to each other being affected by their events as much as the player in what is called systemic gameplay.
In a lesson that covers much more than the systems of a game, the mechanics and rules must be universal - a dogma of video game design. Establishing a rule and then betraying it for the comfort of the game designer is a mistake you can't make. Why does my sword hurt basic enemies but not the final boss? Because that's how it suited the designer! The rules and mechanics must be universal within a game, but also outside. Especially outside, especially for the game designer.
Don't you want the sword to affect the final enemy? Put armor on it and make it bounce; remove the sword from the player before entering the dungeon; turn the final enemy into an ethereal mass of untouchable gas. Do as you like, but don't break your own rules. A solid system of rules generates systemic gameplay, because if it is really solid, the designer will have taken into account the relationships between the rules themselves to not break the sense. And a systemic gameplay generates, in turn, emergent narrative.
And it goes even further: a solid system of rules generates immersion, and immersion is the ultimate goal of the game designer. It's not the fun, it's not the amount of hours played or the creativity, because an immersive game brings all those things. Think: why do we put so much emphasis on creating such realistic games? A realistic world with realistic physics appeals to the player, but that's because the more defined a system of rules, the more immersion it produces. And there are no more defined rules than those that govern nature!
The purpose of a digital experience like a video game is to create as many positive sensations in the user (like fun!), and one of the most direct ways is to make the player feel intelligent. There are hundreds of times in real life where people stop feeling ready, useful or fulfilled, coming home and offering to get all those emotions back is one of the goals of these kinds of products. People love feeling smart! Solving puzzles or passing levels does this, but there's no more brutal and great way to make someone feel smart in a video game... than to make them feel smarter than the designer himself.
The gameplay and emerging narrative, being unique to each player, bring this target intelligence that we are so looking for. Has a player managed to get chased by all the tigers in the forest and then entered the enemy base unleashing the mayhem? We had not anticipated that! But it is interesting to see the herd of tigers dismember the enemies for him, very clever!
Is then systemic gameplay the goal of all video games? Absolutely not! The most important thing is to be very clear about the type of experience that is being created. A world with very defined rules is just as interesting as a puzzle where the player can only move his pieces. The really important thing is to maintain the consistency of the rules, and never want to have the best of each type of game without understanding how they work. There are many games that do not allow total freedom because they have preferred to control all the interactions by scripting the gameplay to the fullest, and avoiding the countless bugs or unforeseen situations that such a game can bring.
In The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion beta, many missions could not be completed because the emerging gameplay brought unforeseen situations. The guards were starving because their duty prevented them from leaving their post!
Therefore games based on interactions between many closely related systems have the inherent problem of unforeseen situations. Sometimes it can be interesting but in many others it can lead to major and critical bugs and block the progress of the game. Do you have to climb a tree at some point in the game to access the apples? Bad luck! The incredibly detailed game weather system made a lightning split it long ago. Try again, champ!
"The more defined a system of rules is, the more immersion it produces. And there are no more defined rules than those that govern nature!"
It is virtually impossible to predict all interactions between systems, so the best advice is to keep systems to a minimum. Few rules, lots of interconnection. As in most things in life, and especially in the world of video game development, less is more.
A controlled system of well-defined and solid standards creates a quality systemic gameplay, which generates a fun, unique and interesting emerging narrative. And the emerging narrative is quality narrative! It may seem strange that a narrative based on chance is not only acceptable, but even better than the predefined scripts, and it is very logical if we follow the chain of facts above and see that it correlates with the standards of the quality narrative: few elements, a lot of interconnection. Few characters, very related to each other. Few scenarios, very related to his characters and with much detail and background, simple structures, but very intense.
The game design is a wonderful discipline. The art of enriching and create positive experiences. The act of creating interactive worlds where a player feels unique and special, and that reaches all those sensations that everyday life and routine deny him. Game design is the art of empathy, and the only way to succeed is thorough work and detail. Few rules, a lot of definition. Few mechanics, a lot of quality, few systems, a lot of interconnection. People immediately detect when something has been worked with great care and the way to achieve it, in this industry, is with the utmost attention to detail.