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Game Design Technology: The Holy Grail of FunBack matter
Needs at a Glance
The short version of Understanding Human Beings and Fun Is the Fulfillment of Needs, for keeping open next to your design notes. Every game, mechanic and menu fills some of these needs and drains others. Watch all of them, not only the one your game is about.
The needs, and what games do to them#
| Need | Fulfilled in a game by | Violated in a game by |
|---|---|---|
| Subsistence (food, water, air, warmth, health, rest, exercise, basic survival) | pausing and saving whenever life calls, reminders of the real-world time, sessions that fit a life (Respect for the human) | time gating, sessions that can't be stopped, play that clashes with sleep (Time gating) |
| Safety/ | rules that stay consistent, a stable regular world, progress that can be backed up (The regular world) | loot boxes, threats to erase progress, hidden odds (Punishments for leaving) |
| Freedom/ | abundance from the start, the robot that can boost to any speed, the player choosing where to go (Abundance from the start) | arbitrary unlocks, invisible walls, forced RNG failure, removed conveniences (Arbitrary unlocks) |
| Growth/ | multiplicative content, emergent systems, a world worth learning about (Content That Multiplies) | blatant recycling, filler, a thousand bowls of differently colored porridge (Recycling) |
| Enjoyment/ | momentum and flow, honest fantasy with no real-life strings attached, customization and room for the player to express themselves through their own playstyle (Game vs interactive tool) | hidden delays, unskippable cutscenes, gamified chores, play restricted to one rigid way of behaving (Hidden delays) |
| Meaning/ | mementos and a living history, an overarching goal, time that never rewinds: anything that makes the time spent feel worth it as a human being (Mementos) | "nothing things" that fill time and give nothing back, unlock systems that become the only reason to play, the zero-to-hero dead end (Jacque Fresco, Zero to hero) |
| Equality/ | never wasting the player's time, welcoming and supporting every kind of player, in the game and around it, and serving them instead of using them (Respect for the human) | wasted time, labels and a mean attitude, belittling players who are different, treating players as a resource to be mined (Six ways games fail) |
| Love/ | cooperation, gratitude, multiplayer and real-life activities the game makes possible or better, where people give and receive wholesome time with each other (The human need to give) | competitive structures, hollow praise, rewards that buy behavior (Why competitive games self-destruct) |
The words are lumped together on purpose, because English has no single accurate word for each need. Max-Neef's matrix, in Chapter 9, shows the same needs as qualities, things, actions and settings. William Glasser's Choice Theory names five (survival, love and belonging, power, freedom and fun) and ties fun directly to learning (Another angle: Glasser).
How needs work#
- Needs are universal. Strategies differ.
- Every human has the same needs. A game, a mechanic and a feature request are all strategies. "I need a sniper rifle" is a strategy; the need behind it might be power or variety (NVC for game design).
- Progress bars, not a pyramid.
- Each need rises and falls on its own, like the bars of a sim in The Sims. They don't wait in line (Not a pyramid).
- Feelings are the dashboard.
- Pleasant feelings mean a need is met, unpleasant feelings mean it isn't. Neither kind is "negative": anger at an unfair game points exactly at the need it violated (Feelings point to needs).
- Strategies are smart, dumb, useless or flawed.
- Smart meets needs with no drawbacks. Dumb makes things worse. Useless does nothing. Flawed meets one need and breaks another, and most bad design is flawed, which is why it's hard to spot.
- Rewards and punishments are one coin.
- Both move the player's reason for doing something away from the thing itself. Make the thing worth doing instead (Two sides of one coin).
- Power over, or power with.
- Timers, penalties, nagging and carrots on sticks are power over players. Giving them what they came for and trusting them to come back is power with them (Power over and power with).
Feelings to listen for#
When needs are met: relieved, joyful, calm, excited, grateful, amazed, empowered, energetic, lively, awed, strong, free.
When needs are unmet: frustrated, bored, anxious, lonely, angry, annoyed, disappointed, sad, exhausted, disgusted.
These are only a start. The Center for Nonviolent Communication has a full needs inventory and feelings inventory for free at cnvc.org. Print both. You'll use them on yourself, your partners and your players.