RPG Design: Above All, Stand Out!
On a whim, I pulled out an old gaming mag the other night. It was Computer Games Strategy Plus, a great PC gaming magazine of yesteryear. Its the August 1994 issue, with an Earthsiege robot ("HERC") on the cover. I do this kind of thing from time to time. So I'm a little bit of a freak.

Anyway, I turned to the adventure / RPG section and reminded myself of what games were available at this point. Al Qadim - The Genie's Curse, a pre-Diablo click-style action / RPG gets a review. I actually played and enjoyed this one. Then there's a review for "Hexx: Heresy of the Wizard." I couldn't recall this one at all. Apparently it was a sequel to an Amiga game. I went to some online sites to see what they had to say about this one. Information was scant, but for the most part they echoed Steve Wartofsky's words from this review:

"What distinguishes Hexx: Heresy of the Wizard, then? Nothing significant. I can't really see anything in the way of story, implementation, puzzle design or character creation to single this out from the scads of designs that have been developed over the years... Hexx seems conservatively unimaginitive and overly derivative, but within those constraints, it plays well."

In his summary paragraph, he states, "All in all, Hexx looks to be the kind of game that might fill some hours up for truly dedicated CRPG players who've run through all the other major CRPGs out there, while they wait for the next major CRPG release. Its conservative design approach means little in the way of new surprises for such gamers, in both a good and bad sense: it's a game we've all seen before, but unlike some more innovative recent designs --- it runs. That last bit alone would be a recommendation to many PC gamers."

Some other comments include phrases like, "pleasant to play," "pretty evenly balanced," "pretty effectively..."

Not words of high praise, but nothing really damning, either. All-in-all, this sounded like a pretty okay game. I've heard far, far worse reviews for games like, oh, Daikatana and Trespasser.

But I don't know if I've ever heard this game mentioned ever since 1994. It's forgotten. And I'm willing to bet that both Daikatana and Trespasser enjoyed both greater sales AND a larger fanbase. Sure, this could be chalked up to larger marketing efforts and timing. But I believe that a crucial element is simply that Hexx just never stood out in any way. It was like a single Dorito in a bag of Doritos - it was crunched down and forgotten.

While it is true of any crowded game genre, the key is to be a "purple cow" - to stand out amongst other games in the genre. Quality alone isn't enough. And it is also important to make your stand-out qualities obvious in your marketing and your initial gameplay experience. Sure, having a twist ending at the end that turns your game into something other than a generic "Kill the Foozle" experience is great... but you don't want players to wait that long.

Graphics. Mechanics. Story. Characters. Setting. Style. Pacing. Interface. Mood. Sound. All of these are areas ripe for doing something different in RPGs (and most other game categories) to make a game stand out and get noticed. It's important to be good. But it's just as important to be different.

Labels: Game Design, retro, Roleplaying Games

- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 12:10 AM (Permalink)