Non-Linear Game Design

[@antijulius]

I can't believe you're still out here, spewing absolute gold on a daily basis for over two months without missing a day.

[@SilverionX]

Spewing is such a surprising and hilarious word to use in this context.

[@Jordizzan]

Guys a true creator

[@DanielScutt]

Nearly a year on. Still going strong.

[@cykeok3525]

There's probably at least a dozen game directors who could have benefited from this video over the last two decades! Let's hope that it benefits designers over the next few to come :D

[@ciboxcibox222]

Been really enjoying these as a hobbyist, it's like a little uni lecture but free!

[@sandwich2473]

Yiss!

[@BlackMasterRoshi]

@@sandwich2473 Yulch

[@gargamellenoir8460]

You could get to Monarch without a nav key in Outer Worlds, but you would end up in Cascadia and had to go through a major difficulty spike. And it was a very cool option.

[@SCARaw]

I did that

[@joshmapes4311]

The Outer Worlds was incredible. So many wonderful choices. I have 250 hours in it, and SO many characters. I adore it.

[@Malisman77]

I did that. It felt mixed. The challenge was great, but there was much reward for it, so...

[@Lakstoties]

"You make the story, I make the character. If you are going to make both, then maybe I'll just go watch a movie." Damn, that sums up my feelings about RPGs in general. I need to have some kind of hand in the mix with an RPG, otherwise, I might as well play a point and click adventure game instead. Listening to what things your writers need to be able to handle in designing plots and quests of RPGs, it seems like your ideal plot and quest designers might be people who are on-the-fly game masters that are also by-the-seat-their-pants writers: People you can present a situation and let them explore through options, writing out the possibilities.

[@StephenYuan]

What you are describing definitely means rpg to me although it seems like some people will slap that label on anything with a skill tree and a leveling system.

[@Elrog3]

Games that provide many pre-made characters to choose from can be okay too. There are in-betweens here. But yep, full character customization is the way it should be and he summed that up well.

[@shellymars9961]

This is exactly why I can't play The Witcher games. Even Commander Shepard in Mass Effect is a bit too much of a pre-made character for my tastes.

[@human-ft3wk]

I mean, the witcher 3 is one of the most beloved games of all time and they provide both the story and the character. You do have some choice in the story, but not much, and it does feel a bit like a movie, but people enjoy that

[@РамильГильманов-з5о]

​​@@StephenYuan, Devil May Cry is an RPG then😂😂😂. I mean damn those labels are the cancer of the game industry. There's skill tree it's an RPG. It's hard, then it's souls like RPG. 😂 If there's some similarities with System Shock, then it just Immersive sim😂😂😂 Same story with music, when you can slap a breakcore label on some jungle with it's own brakes and bpm. And some samples from anime or something.

[@splatterbooth]

The different ways you could resolve the conflict in Edgewater blew me away. During my second playthrough I did the opposite of everything I did the first time and was surprised to find out that picking options that I initially didn't like yielded a much more satisfying resolution than the first playthrough. One of the coolest storylines I've ever played in a game!

[@alexan2930]

I think it's smart to add restrictions as it provides incentive to fully explore the game world. Observing details urges players to further engage in the world alongside the skills needed to not only progress, but to reward players.

[@Gnurklesquimp2]

Even RPG freedom aside, wandering into areas in games like Dark Souls, Demon's Souls and Megaman etc. is something so awesome to me... Let's say you get a mace, now you can counter skeletons, let's go there. You find a strong hex spell that will help you counter clerics elsewhere, incentivizing a new path if you wanna go that route. Put some branches at every point, and it's so smooth. I think rogue-likes etc. can be exceptional with this, cause it keeps it improvisational and adaptive even if you know the game. At the same time, it's really satisfying to get to know a game that's more set in stone and plan ahead, I personally think when these two opposing aspects are balanced, that's a recipe for a game I might just replay a million times.

[@pervognsen_bitwise]

The area around Firelink Shrine deserves a place in gaming canon for all eternity. Getting owned by the sleeping dragon in Valley of the Drakes which appeared to be dead is an all-time gaming moment for me (a close second is the descent into The Great Hollow and discovering Ash Lake for the first time). Or getting in trouble against the incorporeal shades in New Londo Ruins. Or beating your head incessantly against the respawning skeletons in The Catacombs. I don't think that feeling can ever be recreated; part of the magic was that it came after a decade of mainstream game design had conditioned players that this kind of thing shouldn't happen right at the start of the game. It's interesting to reflect on how much its impact relied on countering (intentionally or not) player expectations.

[@lookalivebrett]

Your videos have been essential viewing for me for about a month and some change now. I'm really grateful you took to sharing your insight and perspective.

[@cmdr.jabozerstorer3968]

I agree about the end slides. In Dragon Age: Origins, if you romance Leliana and kill Marjolaine (I think you have to harden Leliana too), you end up travelling with Leliana at the end. If you don't kill Marjolaine, Leliana goes off and kills Marjolaine herself. It's a very subtle choice and consequence but it's enough for some players to change their mind on their next playthrough if they decided to keep Marjolaine alive and wanted their Hero of Ferelden to travel with Leliana post-Landsmeet instead.

[@plaidchuck]

Great points about the non linear parts in Outer Worlds! People took that game for granted I think and will start appreciated it more as time goes on.

[@zerpblerd5966]

but you COULD incorporate side-quests into potential additional solutions to main quests IF you do the sidequest, then you get the map that has an alternate path to the place you need to get to, or it has a key, whereas if you don't, you have to do it the other available ways, opening up more coolness with the sidequests

[@miguelinop]

they are still side quests in the sense that you don't need them to finish the game, it just impacts the main quests.

[@joenofoa5223]

I'd love to see a video on design pillars! Especially if they were different for each of your projects or the same. Great video as always Tim.

[@AndreaCaviglia]

Wow, I just thought: "I wish Tim posted a video"... and a video was posted 1 minute ago. Happy days

[@DjxJt13]

I was impress that Fallout 1 let me make a low intel ultra lucky, character. The game totaly adjust to my 1 intel and 10 luck. Start of the game go west, pick's up the alien blaster and win! The replayability of that game is so High, not many games managed to do that. Thanks for all the games and specialy for the Fallout franchise.

[@Kamylospl]

I love when Tim talks about town and bandits example it's literally goodsprings

[@Dr.JanItor]

(Voice of R.Pearlman) The print... the print always changes. Since the first video on this chanel its host shows us his grand collection of T-shirts. New videoes show the variety of Tim's clothes. People would like to have all the resourses to make their own prints but resources were limited and people were of great amount. But the print...the print always changes. P.S. Sorry 4 my bad English.

[@calebszyszkiewicz719]

Hey Tim, just wanted to say thanks again for making these. It takes dedication to turn your camera on everyday and share your experience and experiences with us. This is truly a gift thanks a lot. ❤

[@HeinerGunnar]

Tim, I just want to say that shirt is absolutely amazing! Two of my favourite things combined

[@CaffeinatedKing]

This was wonderful. I would love to see a video doing a dive on Design Pillars and maybe even structuring in general. I really enjoyed the football analogy for story paths. I feel like a lot of modern RPGs don't really see the "Come back later" thing as Aspirational, but more of a limiting factor of player enjoyment (through playtesting or target audience response) and don't often like to give players those choices as a result, if ever.

[@kaisokusekkendou1498]

This is what is meant by "it was made with love, that's why it is better". The more care and attention you put into anything, and the less you "it's good enough" things, the better the results. Players really do notice and appreciate the little touches like dialogue updating after quests complete, or NPCs having different patterns and behavior based on the events changing around them. In a more clinical sense, it feeds into player engagement. Instead of losing immersion because of jarring lack of impact from options (or lavk of options at all), they instead notice it and seek to explore those further. For a developer that wanted to tell their story, it means more players wanting to fully experience it. For a company wanting money, it means good will for future purchases, and a desire to buy any further development down the line (hopefully in the form of expansions, not microtransactions). If big companies could see past the next two quarters profit and work on long term success, we'd see more of this. There almost needs to be a major game company consultant group that pushes this so it can get through instead of this current era of quick wins and sacrificing consumers good will on a pyre devoted to "next quarter's profit margin".

[@veqzor]

Just wanted to comment to show my appreciation for these videos tim, i hope you wont stop any time soon

[@arit8009]

Just wanted to say that I really enjoy watching your videos, learning about game development (and some of the history! at least from one perspective) is really pleasant, and you've also got a nice general way of speaking/demeanor

[@bruceschlickbernd8475]

Similar things we explored in Wasteland. Alternate ways of solving a problem. Let the player decide if they want to tackle something when they have been repeatedly warned, “Don’t go thar, Ranger, you’ll have your ass handed to you!” Because there’s always someone who will try just because they have been warned off - my brother decided he’d go to the tough town simply because he could satisfy some sibling rivalry and kill me (Master Bruce and Mistress Jennifer). And he kept trying it until he got enough high-powered loot that he could steam-roll a lot of stuff, but eventually it wasn’t enough (haha, you lost and got blown up in the final countdown, bwahaha). One problem with story critical plot lines was making sure the Magic Doohickey or the Proton Thingamabob you needed couldn’t be thrown away or sold or lost in some fashion. But not as much focus on always having an alternative - you’re a desert ranger! You better be able to fight, because sooner or later you’d have to. Then there was the *illusion* of being able to go anywhere. I like “aspirational”. But it was often a case of it’s a whole lot easier to create a few choke points that when you got past them, the options opened back up again. Whether that helps avoid frustration by keeping the inquisitive out of places they simply aren’t going to survive, or making it “semi-open” so far as it goes, is both a design choice and a rationalization of how you spin it. Also, players need feedback. There was one Wasteland skill that was used in exactly one space (stealth?): basically, you walked across a space and either an encounter was triggered (your skill was too low or non-existent), or it didn’t happen, and you had no idea that you just dodged a lot of bullets. There needed to be something that let the player know the skill had worked, that they got the feedback so they could triumphantly gloat (or save the game, learn the skill, and come back another time). Anyway, wannabe game designers should listen to this video and take it to heart. Well done.

[@EnneaIsInterested]

I really like it when you have differentiated combat strategies, and the game actually accommodates your playstyle with relevant factions and quests, the gold standard might actually be how the three big Imperial factions, and the big three Dunmeri factions, all underline warrior, mage, thief, as valid playstyles in Morrowind.

[@oGrayFox]

Your point about at 18:40 is a great one. It really sums up why I prefer the ending of Fallout 1 compared to Fallout 2. I found the different ways of dealing with Frank Horrigan in the sequel to be disappointing compared to The Master. I understand why you can't talk Horrigan down since he's so fanatical to The Enclave. Sure you can hack the turrets and convince other Enclave soldiers to fight him but there is still this soft requirement for your character to be at least competent at combat. I make quest mods for Fallout: New Vegas so watching your content about quest design and what you were thinking at the time when creating Fallout and other classics is so helpful! I'm also a big fan of The Outer Worlds and I loved the concept of the landing authorization codes. It was a really imaginative way of locking content while narratively showing the complete level of control The Board had over the solar system

[@cykeok3525]

Being able to blow up the Cathedral through sabotage, or talk to the Master and realize his entire plan was wrong, was bloody amazing. And it was almost thirty years ago when Tim and his crew did this. Most games since then are still too orthodox to allow the player this much freedom! I guess getting the Enclave soldiers on your side and taking control of the automated defenses was still a nod in this direction, although not as direct as the choices the player had with the Master. I still respect that it allowed strong alternate approaches to the problem, and I suspect they didn't want to seem like a retread when they were an immediate sequel to FO1. Also, Horrigan was never really the big bad, he was just hired muscle; by the time you'd gotten to that point, you'd dealt with the real enemy leadership already. Though he came to become the frightening face of the enemy faction, he was really just a goon, even if he was a really tough goon.

[@oGrayFox]

@@cykeok3525 yeah, Horrigan absolutely obliterates me every time I replay it. I still enjoy Fallout 2 but not as much as the original

[@HeinerGunnar]

If you convince the Enclave soldiers and get the turrets, you don't really have to be competent at combat, just at surviving

[@jonaszIGD]

Thank You Tim for Your work. You create all mechanics for this and further games! awsome material thanks for your all information

[@MikeSmith-xl1hz]

Tim, If you ever need capitol for that next game, just auction off all these amazing shirts you have. Legendary.

[@LDiCesare]

Very nice explanation of your quest design philosophy. Thanks for sharing it.

[@beccangavin]

This is fantastic. So much good advice in this free video. I can only hope that developing developers are tuning in and hearing this because I want to play games made by people that understand these principles. And the shirt is awesome.

[@lucasbarcellos3319]

This was your best t-shirt yet, Tim.

[@Ruffster]

I completed Arcanum a few times, and I remember I felt a bit let down with the end slides consider all the quests, main and optional I went through. Some of the optional ones kinda felt like you did something of value.

[@dominiking69]

You have really fascinating insight. Idc to become a game designer but I am writing my own book and it's amazing how some of the things you say can be relevant. Plz don't stop doing these

[@toysoldiernerio7172]

The biggest tips i needed. I love non linear games (and non linear plots but those are hard to do)

[@leroygardner8529]

I have always felt that a game that shoe horns you into a role, isn't a role playing game simples, you are right my man

[@michaelgunn9883]

I am writing a GDD right now, and this stuff is going right in! Thank you for your wisdom!

[@PostapocMedia]

Non-linear is something I learned very early by playing your games, Mr. Tim. Well done!

[@miguelinop]

I love that you consider generalists like myself. Although last bits of my generalist playthroughs I always end up leaning to a specific playstyle, like smooth talker gunslinger in New Vegas.

[@_iao_]

awesome vid, very comprehensive yet concise.

[@pancakewizard1533]

The thing I find interesting about the multiple solutions and accounting for them, is that you rarely see a game that 'secretly' removes the options you DIDN'T use if it can get away with it. Eg. if the info you need is either known by a person or on a computer, and you get to the person first and get the info, the computer behaves differently, like it's busted or something. Or if you get to the computer first, the person is already dead or they just don't know what you're asking about. I realise that's probably a pain in the arse to set all the triggers, but it'd make players feel more rewarded IMO, like they got through everything on their own intuition ("Yes! I KNEW this guy had the info!) and people discussing the game after the fact who took different tactics would genuinely be surprised how they each solved it and it'd make replays interesting. It's always a little harder to suspend disbelief when I can tell the developers didn't trust that I'd mess up and the same thing is solved 5 different ways and I can see them all together. Maybe it's the DM in me!

[@Ivanselectsongs]

Gothic, Prey, System Shock 2, Deus Ex edit: Fallout 1 has the best speech solution I've ever seen in a game. I loved that it wasn't just a 1 click WIN speech check. If I recall, you had to navigate through a few speech checks to convince the master. It bores me when there's a clear cut win button/speech win. -also, I love your idea of the Farmville example. I love the idea of not squeezing all the juice out of the games I play the first time and I think seeing a hook like that in an end slide would be perfect for someone like me. keeps it organic, keeps it in game and away from online perusal

[@Fitser]

VtM Bloodlines also has some great speech checks. In particular, the absolute minefield of checks you have to get through if you want to find a peaceful solution for the Therese/ Jeanette conflict's finale and ensure the survival of both of them is probably my favorite of any game ever.

[@Wobbothe3rd]

Bloodlines was the best speech system I ever played. The Malkavian character alone justified another entire playthrough for the dialog alone.

[@machelul]

Yes, please. Make a video explaining how to set/use design pilars and what we should consider while setting them.

[@misterburns103]

THANK YOU! This is clarifying for me. I feel so much better about my pickiness with RPGs on PC/console.

[@J.B.1982]

Tim dropping the instruction guide on how to make a western RPG, one video at a time.

[@PullingTheBasement]

It just occurred to me that you might be a huge Larian fan. Is that true? I loved Original Sin 1 and 2 for the non-linearity/reactivity and the fact you could play them co-op. The amount of times my friend and I "accidentally" set each other on fire... 😏

[@PullingTheBasement]

...although they do have big bad boss fights at the end, I didn't mind as much because the other elements were so good. Especially the fun twist with co-op at the end of 2.

[@magicalmusictv919]

For the game i'm developing, I'm intentionally letting the player lock themselves out of the critical path. If they kill a main story character, that arc is no longer completable. Perhaps the critical path can adjust to a few key NPS'c being lost, though that means those pieces of story aren't considered "critical path" anymore. Which is why I don't mind leaning in to the idea of making the main story impossible to complete if the player makes certain actions.

[@lrinfi]

Probably beats the 'just make quest-givers immortal' approach from your perspective, but I wouldn't want to play a game that forced me to make specific, designer/developer-dictated choices to complete its main story. Can't speak for anyone else. Tim mentioned several workarounds for that. I'd consider them carefully were I in your shoes. A little planning goes a long way. Otoh, just as players aren't mind-readers, neither are designers/developers. There's no way to predict all the possible permutations of what a player might think to do; all the choices they'd like to see presented; or all the possible outcomes. I'm satisfied if the designer/developer covers as many as possible. I'll still run up on plenty of situations where I think to myself, "I'd prefer to do 'this.' Why can't I do 'this'?" The simple fact is that the designer, developer, QA, etc. didn't think themselves to do that during development. NoClip's game doc with CD Projekt's developers regarding the quest design of Witcher 3 is as entertaining as it is enlightening. "There's the problem of the lake again." What do we do? Well, the player wil drown because the water is cold or something because the player character can't swim. Obviously, they decided that wasn't satisfactory and Witcher 3's player swimming mechanics were born. (Lots of great stories like that in that particular documentary.)

[@DragonMrDarkness]

Hhmm, if the main story is impossible to complete, how about transforming it in a new quest where you get the really bad ending?

[@magicalmusictv919]

@@DragonMrDarkness Youre definitely getting what im getting at. Its like you can fail the main quest many ways, but the game keeps going and you get an alternative endgame with a different context.

[@asdfasdf-uu5ls]

Enjoying these frequent uploads :D

[@pawlogates]

Theres another way of creating meaningful nonlinearity based in level design, I tried my best at it with a custom level for a game with mechanics that seemed to have a lot of nonlinear gameplay potential but original game was extremely linear. Ive got a video on it "The Oddysee Continues" with a standalone mod download link in the description. I think theres something really special in this approach when done well but it took 8 months (half of it was playtesting all the possibilities...) so I get why theres little of that approach in actual brand new games

[@Theinvalidmusic]

Fantastic video. I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on branching storylines - it's something I'm working on in my own hobby project and the tabletop games I run, but I kind of feel like it's a lot to keep in my head, and training myself out of thinking about a critical path has been weirdly difficult to do! Anyway, all the best. Love your videos, Tim.

[@xxlCortez]

Listening to this I can't help remembering Fallout 3's shortcomings. You can skip a huge chunk of the main quest by knowing where to look for your father. And when you reach the game's ending, you either sacrifice yourself or the narration throws shades at you for being a coward, even if your solution is actually smart, just because you don't do what the writer wanted.

[@Valcuda]

I don't see being able to skip a large chunk just by knowing where to go as being a bad thing. You're looking for your father, if you already know where he is, what's wrong with being able to go there straight away? You could only do this on your first play through if you use outside sources, or get lucky while exploring.

[@bsherman8236]

like morrowind just lets you icarus flight to red mountain and stab the heart right away

[@Vladimyrful]

I believe the perfect example of what you're talking about was implemented in Gothic 1 and 2 - only if you were clever enough you could overcome almost all of them whenever you wanted (especially in 2).

[@mattcat83]

I'm also not opposed to pre-conceived characters, especially with pre-existing or adapted IP, like the Witcher, just as long as one can nudge that PC with their own flavoring or inclinations. This is partly why I think Witcher 3 was so successful, as one could play Geralt either as altruistic or quite cynical and mercenary, both themes of which appeared in the books.

[@kbelflower]

Something I was thinking about while watching this was that I often don't like those third "everyone wins" options - not the concept of them, but the sheer quantity of poor implementation of those alternatives. So many games that try for choices and consequences will place these two really unique sides to a situation with two clear solutions, then tease out a third option for the player who wants to work more that will result in everyone getting what they want. But to me, that isn't allowing players to gain more by doing more, that's undermining the nuanced choices that you spent so long developing. For stories that aren't essential to the game's main plot / required completion to achieve any sort of ending, or ones which don't directly require player involvement to resolve themselves, it isn't a problem for me. But I don't believe that required quests should provide this middle ground, especially ones designed to make players think and use their judgement to make meaningful choices. Let players choose right or left: once they've started walking the path, make them see it through. Because why else would they come back to see what's on the other side?

[@lrinfi]

The third options many, if not most, games try to pull off is not really a third option at all. ME3's ending is a perfect example of this. [SPOILER] The supposedly "good" ending is Synthesis. An appropriate name for it for reasons I'll get into in a minute. There's nothing good about it. Rather than controlling or destoying the Reapers, we're supposed to feel good about every species in the galaxy essentially being merged with them with absolutely no say in the matter and against their will? My response to that is "*Ahem*. Excuse me, but your transhumanism is showing." 'Synthesis' is a good name for it because it reflects the deficiency of reason in the modern era to a 'T'. "Now I a fourfold vision see And a fourfold vision is given to me Tis fourfold in my supreme delight And three fold in soft Beulahs night And twofold Always. May God us keep From Single vision & Newtons sleep." ~ William Blake "A new storytelling paradigm must find a way to transcend and include the conflict resolution core of the old storytelling paradigm. One way would be to reframe conflicts as lessons, focusing on the healing, developmental & evolutionary gifts of the challenges we face." -- Mark Allan Kaplan I get the impression that perhaps especially younger writers are reaching for a new storytelling paradigm that's not yet fully articulate.

[@tamaro.skaljic]

Hi Tim, thanks a lot for your great videos! I'm very interested in the topic of Non-Linear Game Design. I'm trying to get into it as a programmer myself to build an editor for it and I'm unsure how to relate the different entities. It would be great if you could share a bit more on this. What I mean is: - There are dialogs, - that are made up of dialogue points, - there are also choices where you can choose between several answers, - you can write conditions that check some values and depend on them which dialog line will be played next, - there is text, - that is translated into different languages - and set to music, - the lip sync is different, - dialog lines are always assigned to a living being, - there are camera movements, - several dialogs can be embedded in a quest, - but also exist completely independent of quests, - there is always a certain dialog point that is processed when you address an NPC and this can also change over time, - mostly there is then a choice for the player, to which dynamically possibilities are added, - ... How do I bring all this together? Is there a glossary of terms for all these things, with which I can do better research?

[@GypsumGeneration]

Very cool talk, thanks for sharing Tim!

[@TheodoricFriede]

I'm not really sure what my point is, but I just wanted to share that I played Fallout 1 for the first time, and beat it just yesterday. I have to say.... it's not an easy game to go back to... But I am very glad I played it! It's really cool to see the origins of the setting.

[@somasatori9117]

There are some games out there that take the "everyone can complete the main quest" to a ridiculous degree. You can level way past the requirement doing side quests and easily breeze through the story with no problem (looking at you Skyrim). I like the idea of having to come back, I remember liking that a lot in the original Fallout and New Vegas.

[@assassindelasaucisse.4039]

As long as no level scaling is involved, non-linear games are the best.

[@cykeok3525]

Yeah, artificial levels make the world seem artificial, reminding you that this is just a game. Especially when the game has an enemy that is low level in the area you start in, but then they have an enemy that looks exactly the same but very high level in an area intended for endgame. It's lazy of me as a player to simply call the developers "lazy" when they do that, because I don't think it's lazy; it's a design choice they went with, and it's just one that I don't agree with... other players may like it. I prefer it if the hard areas have entirely different threats there, such as how the northwestern area of the Fallout 1 map had patrols from the Master's Army (Super Mutants), whereas the beginning areas had raiders and radscorpions. I'm oversimplifying, but you get my point: I wouldn't want to see a late game area with oddly 10x tougher/stronger radscorpions and bandits, or strangely squishy weak Super Mutants in the commonly traveled trade routes of the wasteland.

[@pervognsen_bitwise]

I appreciate the very constrained, hand-crafted scaling in BG2 where there are some extra spawns (e.g. a lich in Temple Ruins) at certain level thresholds. But notably, the same creatures always retain the same level and stats, and even with the extra spawns in some areas the scaling isn't so severe or so widespread that there aren't significant differences in relative difficulty depending on when you choose to tackle each area. The way they implemented it, it just introduces a little extra variety and challenge and encourages you to tackle areas in different orders on different playthroughs to see what might have changed.

[@worldstoodstill]

I like level scaling after a certain point. Making older areas of the game feel dangerous again after respawns, unless it's something that was permanently cleared of baddies for story telling. But generally I agree.

[@assassindelasaucisse.4039]

@@pervognsen_bitwise I personally prefer when a game gives us in-depth difficulty options to handle that sort of things. Or even better, an options to toggle on and off level scaling altogether (like in PoE II for example) .

[@assassindelasaucisse.4039]

@@cykeok3525 That, and the good old "I'll be back at a higher level" thing is a great feeling (when you indeed go back), and I really don't understand why so many modern designers are afraid to let players feel that way in their games. It's like, they're afraid that we'll quit a game immediatly if we get frustrated for two second...

[@babafrog1877]

I agree with a lot of what you say here but I also want to add the perspective that RPGs where you play as a written character with branching plot can be done well in theory. I think the problem comes from a lot of games doing half steps and muddling it, like Fallout 4 has the conflicting goals of wanting you to have total freedom in a sandbox world while also playing a character with a forced history and commitment to a stereo typical nuclear family. It doesnt please people who want a more cinematic and curated experience and it doesnt please the people who just want to mess around with the sandbox. Although whether or not you consider a game that wants a player to live alongside and within a characters head and influence their path true role playing or not is another thing.

[@drcrowlee]

Yes please do a video about design pillars

[@Rockyzach88]

Restricting player autonomy in video games, while possibly just bad design in some cases, is also frequently a style. Sometimes the game design and the intended user experience relies on a game's restriction to linearity or quasi-linearity. In another video you talked about how you didn't like Dark Souls because it was too linear. That's fine, but the type of linearity it gives the player has nuance to it and fits it well IMO. Sometimes you don't want "all the choices". Sometimes you'd rather have a narrative vs. a sandbox. It's all about finding the right combination for the image you have of your game.

[@brochampe-se9fq]

Funny that the entire civil war in skyrim is a skippable sidequest

[@SvengelskaBlondie]

makes sense, it like many other things have piss all bearing on the story and game itself

[@lrinfi]

Classic example of ambition outstripping what is possible in the timeframe allotted for developing a game. Development cycles are limited; visions are growing bigger and bigger. Elden Ring suffered from the ever-growing pains as well, but that's an industry issue that all development studios have to wrestle with today. Studios might choose, as Obsidian did with Outer Worlds, to make a dense, rich world that's as deep as it is wide or a puddle-deep world that covers as much horizontal space as possible. Most seem to be going for the puddle-deep world.

[@beccangavin]

Funny that I forgot that there was a civil war in Skyrim for almost ten years.

[@All4Tanuki]

If they'd had any sense they would've thrown out the dragon stuff (lame "chosen one" power fantasy that clogs the world up with dogshit random encounters) and instead focused on the civil war aspects, letting you conquer/liberate Skyrim and having more depth in the two factions with lots of knock-on effects for the various locations, characters, etc

[@beemerss]

Hey Tim! You mentioned in your semi-retirement video about a non-paid design role you're a part of. After hearing more about Clockwork Revolution recently, I was wondering if you can confirm whether or not you've contributed on the game? I know Jason Anderson is working on it and it would be really cool to know you guys worked together on a game again!

[@pervognsen_bitwise]

One of your best videos so far!

[@louistrinh3608]

Ahh yes the human fertilizer in Outerworld. I love the multiple approach I have to the final solution. I just wish that I wouldn't miss out on the best solution. Feels bad to see people suffer. That mentality made me researched the quest online before doing them cause I don't wanna do the bad approach and miss out on something. Kinda wish the all bad solution could eventually become good, a chance for the player to redeem after the initial mistake.

[@xthebumpx]

Instantly thought of the Bear cave in PoE 1 😂

[@mattcat83]

I'm not against level-scaling but only if it elevates enemy levels up to yours (or just below), and then only if jump in power between levels isn't extravagant.

[@robertmoats1890]

Tim, you don't like RPGs with characters that have a starting identity? I agree with you about preferring player-defined characters, but I used to feel a lot stronger about it than I do now. I think the two provide for different experiences. Both can be amazing for different reasons. Characters with an existing identity can have very strong connections to the game world, whereas a character that was defined by the player is usually completely untied from it. They usually have no family, friends, relationships, job, or back story, which can be pretty hard on the story. In addition, characters with identities usually have a specific personality, and personal characteristics, which also help tell a story. Characters with an identity can also become very well known and/or popular among players, where custom characters can't exist outside of the game. Consider JC. Denton or Geralt of Rivia. From the games I've played, it seems like games with custom characters have deeper character development, where games that have pre-existing characters have a deeper story. I still prefer character development over story, but I think they both have their place, and enjoy both types of games.

[@pooter3034]

I fn love you Tim. Thanks for being you man.

[@nutherefurlong]

Elden Ring is mostly combat but manages to have a sort of adventure game feel sometimes in the way you can solve puzzles, in a sense. I feel like there's more there to be mined that could inform other designs, mainly that they sort of ride the obscure and mystical way more, subtle clues that aren't necessary but can change what happens. Their footballs have fewer threads, but they tend to allow for a few side quests that wind up becoming alternate main branches for different endings. So the exploration isn't just in the environment but it's also structural, I guess? And some of my best unstructured "RPG" moments have wound up being in strategy games that allow for enough alternative builds. When it gets complicated enough, unless they're sort of set up an obvious path to victory you wind up having a bunch of ways to achieve different stasis/stability points that are sort of self-imposed goals that feel like endgame quests. You do have the problem of the human element acknowledging what you've done like a writer could in a traditional RPG setup, the environment may properly reflect choices beyond units or buildings or whatever signs are there for strategy gamers, but sometimes the best thing is just getting a tip of the hat from designers saying "I see what you did, good work" My own experiments in narrative paths that try new things each time were illuminating when I realized that if I was going to path out all the branches it would have taken me years unless I started closing some of the loops. It's an interesting work/time problem: how much can you expect the human touch to be there when you want to have paths that feel different and for the game not to take decades to write?

[@WastedPot]

[Luck 7] Ice Cream! (Success)

[@zakatalmosen5984]

I think a problem with many non-linear games is that, at least to me, a lot of really good ones are basically solved games. What I mean by this is that, unless you're playing a themed character or a challenge run, every character build converges near the endgame, and this is more and more evident the more freedom the game gives you. A really bad example of this is Fallout 1, one of my favorite games, which gives you almost complete freedom, and yet some design choices that make the game better also cripple the variety. Here's how otherwise great design decisions create this issue: 1) Enemies drop the weapons they use. Nice, not doing this makes for frustrating looting. 2) Shops restock both merchandise and caps. Obvious choice for a game that has to support long playthroughs. This means you have infinite resources if you put the work in. Not a bad thing in any way. Next step: 1) Skill books exist. This is nice, since it's a great way to incentivize exploration without giving the player new gear thus raising their power level drastically with each area (and also supports chars who don't rely on combat). 2) Skill books are purchasable. This is the one decision that makes the whole thing crumble. You can now turn money into skill points and money is infinite. This is somehow remedied by: 3) Skill books can only raise a skill to 100% and have diminishing returns. This prevents the character progression from spiraling out of control. Also not every skill has a book. However: Guns, First Aid, Outdoorsman, Repair and Science are the only skills that get skill books. Of these, Guns is good, First Aid is pointless and the last three have almost no checks above 100% (I think ZAX has a higher science check but I might be wrong). Since skill gain from books is capped, and books are infinite, if I were to play a scientist type toon I would basically be wasting level up points into these skills while also turning cool exploration rewards into vendor junk. Also, the Turbo Plasma Rifles is the game's ultimate weapon (power fist can stand in for that and I guess the ripper too if you don't mind the knockback, but they can't truly compare to the Turbo). Reinforced Power Armor is also a thing. So every playthrough for most players goes along these lines: put points into guns, speech and lockpick. Use every skill book you find and get science and repair to 100% by buying the books you're missing. In the endgame put points in energy weapons and get the ultimate gear. Done. This isn't even powergaming, it's just that one type of character is orders of magnitude more powerful than the others: the gun toting merc that uses his money to get an education lol Vampire Bloodlines fixed this masterfully by putting in the game a limited amount of books with both upper and lower skill level requirements to be used. IMHO one of the best design decisions ever made. New Vegas, another masterpiece, has a similar problem: it's very easy to create a character that can ace every single skill check in the game without ever sequence breaking or exploiting the system consciously. Literally the only speech checks I avoid every time are the barter ones that make Dean Domino suspicious of you, and not for lack of skill. Since checks reward XP, this character will own every other type of toon. Very good for power fantasy, not so much for roleplaying. Very few GOOD games manage to avoid this problem. The best example, I think, is Underrail, one of the best games ever made in my opinion. The game achieves this by being incredibly stingy with skill points and by using attributes that multiply SP instead of adding to them. This way the builds have to be harmonious. It's a very hard game, with a huge number of solutions for every quest and a massive amount of meaningful choice. I think that game is a masterclass in design and I heartily recommend it to you and everyone reading this comment. It also has an optional alternative game progression system where they remove xp and instead grant Oddity Points for finding collectibles and solving situations, therefore solving the age old problem of "why should I sneak through a zone if I don't get any XP for it".

[@lennyghoul]

OMG I:00 yes, all of that. Games miss this so much.

[@ItsBigIan]

What's interesting about this in context, is that Fallout only has two main quests. Destroy the mutant source and destroy the mutant leader.

[@DirePulpGaming]

I loved that I could dump everything into charisma and speech in the original Fallout. I came out of character creation with 86 in speech. I couldn't do anything else but I could talk. Made it to Shady Sands and found out the Mayor's daughter was kidnapped by raiders. Went to the raider camp, walked right in and just asked for the daughter back politely. I don't remember the exact reason or a convincing argument the dialog option made but I passed the speech check and the Raider leader was like "Ok, here she is, you can take her home." (paraphrasing of course) and let me walk right back out. I thought I had found an exploit. Asking nicely worked? At level 1? Blew my mind. Sadly, I died to radscorps on my way back to Shady Sands for obvious reasons. 10/10

[@CainOnGames]

You should have marched right up to those rad scorpions and said “Don’t eat me!” Bonus points if you say it in the voice of Marge Simpson

[@SvengelskaBlondie]

2:52 This is one thing ive come to heavily dislike with Bethesda games, the complete lack of areas with weaker/stronger enemies. Sort of annoying to have the enemies become stronger as you gain lvls, both cause it removes the challenge of going to dangerous areas early and revisiting early areas later in the game. Oblivion made it even worse by the risk of permanently handicapping your character if you lvled them up badly (if you gained very few stat points per lvl up) since the enemies all had a set amount of points they increased per player lvl.

[@plaidchuck]

Oblivion shouldnt have shipped like that, dont know how that made it past QA. Skyrim and Morrowind handled it alright imo

[@SvengelskaBlondie]

@@plaidchuck I agree, Morrowind handled the whole skill thing much better. Oblivion felt at times like a school assignment more than it felt like a game, with how convoluted the whole system was.

[@alexanderabramov2719]

I got a question that I would be very interested to hear your opinion on. I'm making a roguelike, a top-down RPG, it's going slow but steady. I never played Fallout 1 and 2 but from what I researched about them, the ideas and principles I came up with are very, very similar. Do you think it would hinder or help me to play them? I'm concerned that because of the similarities, my own vision will get overwhelmed, basically I won't be able to help but plagiarize. What does making such a decision come down to? Just confidence in my own ability and experience?

[@CainOnGames]

If you have a strong vision, then playing other games may give you ideas that you can adapt into your game. Every developer does this. We see what our colleagues are doing, appreciate it, and adjust our own work if we think it makes our game better, within the context of our vision for the game. But if you think you’d just lift content whole cloth from a game into yours, then maybe you shouldn’t play it.

[@alexanderabramov2719]

@@CainOnGames I just don't know how anybody could get into the mindset of "well I can obviously do it better than Interplay" :D I'll give it more thought, thank you.

[@koalabrownie]

The End slides aren't always rewarding or aspirational. I remember playing FO: New Vegas being very disappointed by the end slides to the point where I didn't think the outcome reflected my interpretation of the experience. Basically I went for an independent vegas and the end slides said Vegas went to hell. Possibly because I blew up the Brotherhood base. I had a similar reaction to Bioshock, where I drained one or two of the little sisters because I was legitimately confused of what do and that led to end slides saying my character was greedy and relentless sought power. There was no middle ground, it was just black or white. Dishonored- the same experience. In the second game I got a high chaos result because as Emily, I saw all these traitors had murdered my loyal guards and so I fought my way out of the first level and the chaos never went down. But if I eventually regained power, all these traitors would be imprisoned or executed anyway so- these morality and end slides don't always align with player expectation I think.

[@drithius4801]

I LOVE THAT SHIRT!

[@stevensavage9491]

TIS BUT A SCRATCH

[@drewdaniels4138]

Awesome shirt tim!

[@galacticx738]

Thank you for those stories, best YT discovery in loooong time! Also I’m such an ignorant... no wonder I loved Outerworlds should have known... :-)

[@justjunk3803]

I'm glad someone else realizes being able to masterkey through so many quests with simple direct speech checks is kinda unsatisfying.

[@jtaco4101]

Some of the best stuff on the internet.

[@KeiNovak]

I know this is an older video, but I had wanted to ask your opinion one something (hopefully) related to this: What are your thoughts on a world that is evolving, even without player interactions? Using your example, if you skip the town that is targeted by the bandits or visit it but decide to come back to it later, then after a period of time something happens in the background while you're off exploring some other part of the world. Maybe the town survives the bandit attacks, but is badly scarred by the event, or the town is decimated by the bandits. So when you come back to the town, its changed without your involvement. However, it does mean that if you take too long in one part of the world, you may miss a lot of things happening. As you've mentioned before, you didn't like the timer in Fallout -- I didn't like it either. But this would be a sort of timer too. I'm torn about wanting to see this evolving world happen in a game but also concerned about how it can make things feel like there is a timer. So I'm asking for your thoughts and insight (maybe solution?) to this based on your vast experience.

[@kurthellis]

Dude just listening to this making me want to play fallout again

[@dropkoo]

This is the same shirt used in the 2012 Q&A video on Project Eternity :D

[@perkinsdearborn4693]

Great content. Thank you. Do you have a video covering the flow of information to the player? Have you already covered this info topic? Such as overt disclosure (read this before proceeding), triggered disclosure (now that you did this action, you know this bit of lore), exploration rewards discovery, and generally the flow of information for game progression, player engagement, and other bits and pieces to keep the game fresh, exciting, and worth playing multiple times. I recently found your channel. I appreciate your thoughts.

[@vlander1992able]

I love the football concept, that makes alot of sense.

[@exessqd100]

If you can miss main story quest like side quest it makes it more valuable by giving player discovery dopamine reward.

[@cycleboy8028]

I like when "pathway" is semi-defined. You can't be great in all skills, but the differences are tiered. Low combat, high stealth/speech, you convince 3 factions to send 15 men each to help fight end boss, and you stay hidden until you coup de gras the boss. Or, mid everything, 2 factions send 5 men each and you have to help in battle. Or full Rambo, you can't talk straight, but you bash the boss all on your own and the factions see it and are grateful at the end.

[@gilgamecha]

11:00 maybe the biggest narrative failure of Fallout 4 is that the only option to resolve Act 1 is to kill Kellogg. Even though it's a really stupid option that ought to have failed the main quest right there.

[@DragonMrDarkness]

If it were only that... Most of that game choices are: Yes? Yes (Sarcastically) Yes No (but Yes)

[@andreaholcock8992]

The biggest narrative failure is that you have a son at all.

[@0logichere]

thank you tim i love you 😭😭😭

[@FluffySylveonBoi]

The stealth way to do Fallout is pretend you are a Children Of The Cathedral follower, go down, sneak a lot, unlock the nuke door and activate the nuke then make your way back.

[@nick-qb5wu]

You know a videos good when you finish it and immediately open a notepad and restart it

[@Sgt_Pepper13]

Amazing shirt Tim

[@dinohead2]

That T-Shirt is funny as hell

[@GabrielMatusevich]

What do you think about a game without a main quest. But simply with stories that lead the player towards a "custom" end. I remember for example in Temple Of Elemental Evil had several ways in which the game could end without you actually "completing the temple quest"

[@Jak132619]

Have you watched Mrbtongue's video on the shandification of fallout? An excellent breakdown on non-linear stories and game design

[@Fishlord136]

Lol 1:30 reminds me of dark souls and the graveyard off to the left and then that whole area down below it that a lot of people go to first during their first playthrough

[@GhassanPL]

Have you thought about doing a MasterClass on RPG design? I think that would be amazing to watch.