Dev.log Red

A genre of games that is no longer popular and has little to no notable entries nowadays is the battle arena type of games. I'm somewhat sad because I became a fan of DOOM and Halo recently and have yet to see a recent game that wowed the industry recently. One game that caught my eye that fits this mold was Diabotical, a battle arena shooter with robots. This game caught my eye because of the genre and it was a free download; after I download it, a few things caught my eye.

First of all, it was incredibly fast, way to fast for me to even register what the map layout was like. In most shooting games, you would either have a set moderate pace or a a sprint option; but here, it's the speed of running a marathon. Next the weapon load out is your standard bunch: rockets, machine guns, shotguns, snipers, etc., but in order to use and master these, your aim must be perfect, down to the slightest millimeter. Anything less will you killed in under a few seconds. Everything else about the game is pretty standard: team modes, some customization, and fine tuned combat.

My takeaway from this game would be the hectic, chaotic and skillful gameplay that pumps your adrenaline. Fast movement, fast and fun weapons, and big meticulously crafted maps. Other than that, it's more of a love letter to the genre than anything else. In its own version of capture the flag, the mode is called "MacGuffin", where you have to bring it from the middle of the map to your team's base for points. This is a nod to the fact that the flag is just a thing to strive for in the game and is only there for the sake of being. If I were to make my own take on this game, I'd put in more game modes that can take inspiration from other genres. For example, DOOM 2016 had a multiplayer mode called freeze tag, where players who were killed were frozen and can only be unfrozen if a live team mate stands next to them for several seconds. Whichever team gets frozen first loses the round. Or a mode from Fall Guys where you have an item to hold until the end of the round; Diabotical can take this mode, have the item passively give points up until a certain threshold, and make killing players less a priority and moreso on teamwork. The game hasn't been out for a month, so I'll give it some leeway; but there's so much potential this game can experiment with.

Exercise 2.1: Think of a Game

1. Think of a game, any game. Now write down a description of the game. Be detailed. Describe it as if to someone who has never played a game like it before.

2. Now think of another game—a completely different type of game. The more different this game is from the first one, the better. Describe it.

3. Compare your descriptions. Which elements were different and which were similar? Dig deep and really think about the underlying mechanics of each game.

In this exercise, I decided to pick two games that released on the same day, are completely different in almost every way, and somehow had both fanbases cheering each other on and supporting one another: DOOM ETERNAL and Animal Crossing New Horizons. Considering one is a bloody and violent linear first person shooter and the other one is a happy go lucky open world multiplayer adventure game, the unison between the fandoms amazes me. Despite that, there are many things that heavily appeal to other markets.

I wrote about how everything from aesthetics, world structure, gameplay, story, goals, tools, quests, viewpoints, etc. are all different. I summarized about how DOOM ETERNAL is for a more demanding and hardcore audience that loves violence and fast paced combat as a main factor to these games, which means everything must be fine tuned, brutal and rewarding. Meanwhile, I mentioned that Animal Crossing is for a very casual audience that anyone can be a part of and doesn't mind a bubbly environment and a plethora of relaxing quests to do and people to meet. At the end of it all, I mentioned that what both have in common are the general points from the book: players, objectives, procedures, resources, conflict, boundaries, and outcome. All these factors are tackled differently between the two games and cater to both their audiences respectively with grace and style unmatched before in their respective franchises.

Having played DOOM myself and have friends and family members who've played Animal Crossing, I had to ask about their perspective about the game instead of just relying on reviews. I needed to see what other people felt and how its gameplay loop worked to get a deeper understanding of what makes it so widely respected and enjoyable. Had I played Animal Crossing, I felt I would be more qualified to compare and distinguish them.