You don’t need to have the gameplay figured out before you start. Pick the feeling you want the player to have, work out one interaction that could create it, and build a small prototype to see whether it does.
Work backward from the feelings you want to evoke
Entertainment is enjoyable because it makes us feel something. Games do that through the choices players make. As a game designer, you choose what the player can do, what they know when deciding, and what happens as a result. Those choices need to support the feeling you’re trying to evoke.
The MDA framework connects the mechanics you design to the experience players have:
- Mechanics: the rules, actions, and systems you define.
- Dynamics: the behavior that emerges as players use those mechanics and the systems interact during play.
- Aesthetics: the emotional responses and experiences you want players to have.
We can work backward from the feelings we want. We’re trying to reverse-engineer the starting conditions that might produce them. We choose mechanics based on how we expect players to use them, then play-test whether those interactions feel the way we intended.
From premise to playable interaction
1. Define your premise
Start with the premise for the game you want to make.
For example, you’re making an indie horror game where the player works the night shift at a convenience store.
2. Choose the feelings you want to evoke
Think about how you want the player to feel. For ideas, see Marcel Zons’s four pillars of fun and MDA’s eight kinds of fun.
The way you engage players doesn’t lock you into one emotional tone. A social experience could be meant to leave you frustrated. An experience built around mastery could evoke sadness.
For the convenience store example, let’s aim for dread: you’re doing an ordinary job, but you’re starting to suspect you’re in danger.
3. Identify the player verbs
Start with obvious verbs that follow from your premise. Write down what the player could do.
For our night-shift worker, those might be:
- Place items on shelves.
- Serve customers.
- Walk to work.
4. Define the choices, uncertainty, and consequences
Start with one verb. Work out the choices, uncertainty, and consequences around that action, guided by the feelings you want to evoke.
Let’s take serving customers. One possible interaction is a customer who calls you by name, even though you aren’t wearing a name tag.
- What are you doing? You’re serving that customer at the register.
- What choices can you make while you’re doing it? You could finish the sale, ask how they know your name, or retreat to the back room.
- What do you not know? You don’t know who they are, how they know you, or whether they’re a threat.
- For each choice, what are the consequences? Finishing the sale lets them leave without explaining themselves. Asking keeps you in the conversation, where they reveal that they also know where you live. Retreating puts distance between you, but you can no longer see what they’re doing in the store.
You can come back to this step later for more verbs.
5. Build and play-test the interaction
Build the smallest prototype that lets you play through that interaction. Play-test it to see whether the interaction evokes the feelings you’re aiming for. Use what you learn to revise the mechanics, then play-test again.
For this example, build a register, a back room, and one customer encounter with those three responses and their consequences. Stocking shelves and walking to work can wait. You have enough to play through the encounter and see how it feels.