WINX Club
One of the only computer game I've played and thoroughly enjoyed was called Winx. It was a very "pink" girly game with fairies who fought monsters with sparkling super powers. As silly as it sounds it was incredibly addicting to me because every challenge build up towards unlocking more levels that progressed the story. Beating a level advanced you to find out what happens next (with short cinematic sequences that told the story, describing the relationships between the characters). The design of the game is very controlled and offers a limited amount of options of what happens in the story, however, there were a few built in stages where I felt like I was the one making decisions. The freedom to choose and influence the game is satisfying and also being able to play the game again, choose a different option and play the game again with a different outcome is fun as well! And thought that is the only PC game I've played I played it at least 5 times.
Tetris
I don't know if this is a personal bias but it's incredibly boring for me. The design of the game from the visual perspective is simple. The UI is functional, the game can be played on a Tetris machine, on the computer, on the phone which is supposed to be a good thing... but it swings between "too easy" and "too frustrating" because the blocks start to fall so fast it's almost like I'm bound to lose every time. There is no way to compete with pieces that fall so quickly they start to look blurry and you just put down the game after having passed by some time but not really achieved anything . In the book the author talks about how the game is not the experience, it enables it, but it's not the experience in itself. Fairness and symetry plays an important role in the balance of the game " Players want to feel that the forces working against them do not have an advantage that will make them impossible to defeat". This game frustrates me, every time. I hate playing actually so I would say that not having an option of winning takes away from making the game enjoyable for me.
The Room
This is the only game I've actually purchased on the app store that was absolutely fantastic. Despite my dislike for Tetris, my love for puzzle games have been fulled from other places. This game was a mystery puzzle so a lot of the stages took exploring and observation of your surroundings, making connections to previous discoveries and examining the space. Though its not a murder mystery it has a very ominous feel and the music adds pressure. I used to sit for hours at a time trying ot figure out the game levels, dreaming about it and resisting to use any of the tips to be able to come to the solution myself. I did end up looking up the very last clue because it was the least obvious one but the look and feel of the game displayed a very interesting UI. There were instructions to the game that would need to be discovered as well (they'd be glowing) so it was easy to discover them. Your eye would be guided to the things that glow or look out of palce. Each piece fit somewhere else and the UI was very simple to use, and most importantly it didn't get in a way of the game and actually supporting all the necessary features.
Flappy Birth
This game has started my love for mazes and various fantastical obstacle courses that play with physics but don't necessarily make sense. I am using this as a bad UI example just because of how addicting it is. The only thing you have to do is go through a crash course and fly through corridors without any guidance. I don't know if this is the absolute worse UI that could have been there but I didn't like it. I tried it out for a few weeks but got mostly frustrated. A lot of people were playing the game however, to the point that I believe someone has died in the process of playing it and the game was taken down.
No comments:
Post a Comment