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24 hour exclusive - Should Roguelikes Have Persistent Upgrades? | Game Maker's Toolkit (Patreon)

Published:
2019-01-17 14:29:24
Edited:
2019-06-28 04:36:07
Imported:
2020-03

Content

Hello!

So, here's my video about roguelikes and progression. Hope you find it interesting - looking forward to the debates in the comments under the video!

I'm off to Canada for a bit to do a talk for a major game studio. Then I'll be back - and I'll either do the last episode of designing for disability, or crack on with a secret video - the first GMTK ep that that will feature a developer interview!

Mark

Files

(Retired) Should Roguelikes Have Persistent Upgrades? | Game Maker's Toolkit

Roguelikes are defined by randomly generated levels and permadeath. But that permadeath can be a point of contention for players who like making tangible progress. So maybe there’s a way to add a sense of advancement to roguelikes? Support Game Maker's Toolkit on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/GameMakersToolkit Have Mark talk at your studio, university, or event - https://gamemakerstoolkit.tumblr.com Games shown in this episode (in order of appearance) Enter the Gungeon (Dodge Roll, 2016) Crypt of the NecroDancer (Brace Yourself Games, 2015) The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (Nicalis / Edmund McMillen, 2014) Monolith (Team D-13, 2017) Below (Capybara Games, 2018) Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare (Infinity Ward, 2016) Invisible, Inc. (Klei Entertainment, 2015) Dead Cells (Motion Twin, 2017) Rogue Legacy (Cellar Door Games, 2013) Spelunky (Derek Yu, 2012) Flinthook (Tribute Games, 2017) Nuclear Throne (Vlambeer, 2015) NetHack: Legacy (FrozenCrate, 2018) Downwell (Moppin, 2015) Hades (Supergiant Games, Unreleased) Pyre (Supergiant Games, 2017) Into the Breach (Subset Games, 2018) Music used in this episode Curiosity - Blue Wednesday (https://soundcloud.com/bluewednesday) Spelunky soundtrack - Eric Suhrke (https://phlogiston.bandcamp.com/album/spelunky) Donut County soundtrack - Daniel Koestner (https://open.spotify.com/album/6SFBSlMnqv8xd2aQcagqaq) Other credits Zero Deaths Victory! World First! World Record! [Rogue Legacy] | ZorsYT https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVpx3QpC6NM

Comments

Anonymous

To me, persistent upgrades aren't really the issue. I dislike most roguelikes, but usually it's because of the level design, or lack thereof. The Binding of Isaac is good because the rooms get jumbled around but you still essentially play one room at a time. Many roguelike platformers, on the other hand, just offer generic areas that aren't actually fun to revisit time and time again, and some end up being a mess. Just my 2 cents.

Anonymous

I was hoping that you of all people could finally explain to me why people like roguelikes, but I'm afraid it just isn't for me. I don't mind a game forcing me to get better. Many games with permanent progression do this and I like becoming more able to play a game instead of just my character becoming more powerful. The thing I really dislike about roguelikes is that I have to do the same segment of the game over and over and over again. Randomly generated or not, this just seems like a chore. And if I slip late in the game I will have to do all the same actions again. The same general layout and level assets, the same enemies. Ugh. I really do not see the appeal of that. Everything the genre has going for it can also be found in other genres. I agree with your thesis that permanent upgrades make it a grind and undermine the general concept and I like your graphs, but my main complaint with the genre is not addressed by this video. And maybe it just can not, because in fact... do suck :)

Filip Lange

This reminds me a lot of the debate that goes approximately "Souls being fun is predicated on a combination of players being slow, healing being limited, etc"--except that in that case, not even From is sure where that correct balance lies, as we have four modern Souls games that all do it quite differently. In that spirit, should roguelikes feature progress? Yes, absolutely. Some of them. Experiment more. I'm personally a huge fan of the way Necrodancer does it. It uses unlocks (including chunky permanent health upgrades!) and level-by-level progression to give you a way to learn the game, and when you feel ready you can play "All Zones", the true meat of the game--that starts with everything unlocked and a set (low) starting maximum health. (Incidentally an important point that is worthy of consideration: Progression systems can serve as prolonged tutorials.) Furthermore, taking inspiration from, say, the board game Risk Legacy: I can envision a game where successes or failures on runs can permanently change the entire nature of a run. Maybe you permanently "corrupted" a zone by failing to kill a particular boss on a particular run, changing the way it plays? I don't think we should insist that "statelessness" is an essential part of roguelikes. Unlike a Wild Western town, this genre is big enough for both of us. ;)

Anonymous

Love this video! Have you thought about doing a video how to properly do a twist ending? Like how to properly lay the breadcrumbs so that the twist is surprising, but you go "how did I miss that?!"

Anonymous

Personally I don't like roguelikes. I like having a world to explore more. But one game that did roguelike right for me is darkest dungeon. It took the randomness of roguelikes and permadeath and made them into a core theme of the game, in always fighting an uphill battle, slowly making progress in order to take the final challenge. So even the even the grinding part of it was fun. In a way I liked roguelike mechanics re-purposed for a truly difficult combat intensive and a highly stressful experience.

Anonymous

Guess most my issues with rougelikes without upgrades comes down to I'm skilled enough to play the first half of the game, but need to practice to improve my skill in the later stages. But these early stages never become trivial so I still might have to restart before I can get to the later stages to practice. This turns into a wall that I need to take a running start to get to before ramming my head against it, then having to go back to the start line before going again. Most rougelikes don't have a flat difficulty curve, they do get harder as you progress. Each new stage gives a difficulty spike and if it takes too long to get over that spike, a player's liable to give up.

Anonymous
>>18992783

I can offer my perspective on why I like the roguelike genre (though I define it. . . much much more openly than Mark). My primary reason for liking rogue-likes is their self containment. What you pointed at as a fault is actually not really for me: I can pick up, play a game from start to finish, and put the game back down. This is great for filling (relatively) short time periods, and fits in with my tendency to be trying a lot of new games. I need games in which replaying the same starting content is fun every time. That's hard for big expansive games, but for rogue-likes, it's expected, so I don't end up feeling totally out of my element when I pick one back up much later. Relearning to fight in Breath of the Wild after I put it down for months before the DLC came out and then picking it back up to do that content wasn't fun for me.

Anonymous
>>18996783

I tried to write an answer like this three times thank you for saying what I couldn't.

Anonymous
>>18992783

I see your point and it kind of relieves me, because it makes me understand better, why people like roguelikes and also why I do not. I also dislike picking up a game after a long break so I try to avoid those. And I generally do not replay games with few exceptions. So if a game forces me to, I dislike it.

Anonymous

Speaking of roguelike games, can you do an analysis on Dwarf Fortress? I love how different and emergent the gameplay can be in each playthrough you have. You breaking down the mechanics and system of the game is a longtime wish I have ever since playing the game and discovering your channel.

Anonymous

I agree with Mark - permadeath is core principle of roguelikes and progression contradicts it. At least for me, more important principle of roguelikes is that they are very systemic. To have high replayability, devs design systems, rather than content. Good roguelikes have very consistent systems - no exceptions, no scripted events. Level design for example is described almost algorithmically. Permadeath is still valuable. It pushes designers to work towards replayability and this in turn pushes towards systemic design. Progression contradicts permadeath but does not necessarily contradict systemic design. Sometimes a system is so good that I want to explore some difficult to see part of it. Then I deliberately disable permadeath by save scumming. And I still enjoy the game, as this gives me glimpses of interesting situations I could not get otherwise. My point is that progression is not so dangerous. It can even be beneficial if it enhances systemic design. In FTL for example you unlock new ships that give you fresh perspective on how it all works 10 years ago Jonathan Blow talked about conflicts in game design. I will link it below. Mark talks about a similar thing in this talk and others: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGTV8qLbBWE" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGTV8qLbBWE</a>

Anonymous

I have played Rogue Legacy and it really doesn't feel like a roguelike. It feels more like a Skinner box where the point of the game is to get all the castle upgrades. When you beat the final boss, you continue the progression in New Game +, where all of the basic enemies get stronger. Then New Game +2 etc. Myself I have finished the upgrades at New Game +4 or 5 and at that point the basic enemies were starting to become stronger than the bosses. How far in difficulty you manage to get after all that is essentially your final score.

Anonymous

I would say that Dead Cells is more of a roguelike, that a roguelite. Sure, you have permanent upgrades, but winning in this game is about skill and learning enemy attack patterns. I can pick up the game, boot a new save file and beat it on a first try, without spending any cells. And if it starts feeling easy because of the growing familiarity, you have 5 difficulty levels to spike up the challenge.