Thinking Aloud About Game Design #3: What Do YOU Want From a Game?

Does anyone else remember the hype surrounding Bethesda Softworks RPG The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim back in 2010?

I took my kids to see a movie in the summer of 2011, and they played the Skyrim  Trailer before the movie. The audience (or a significant portion of them) burst into spontaneous applause at the end.

That ain’t something you see every day!

It’s insane that Bethesda has totally dropped the ball on Elder Scrolls VI, instead focusing on unrelated and underwhelming projects. Fifteen years later, and there’s STILL no sign of it! But don’t get me started on that…🤯

On November 11th, 2011 (11.11.11… geddit?) I trudged down to the game store in town to buy my copy, took it home to install from the disks (remember all that?) and started playing.

Within two days, you had people on online forums talking about how they had “beaten the game” and moaning that there was no news about DLC yet!

I don’t play Computer RPGs to “beat” them; I play to experiment with different builds and approaches. I think it was almost a year before I finished the main quest in Skyrim, because I kept starting over with builds, skills and tactics. Even then, I certainly didn’t think I’d “beaten” the game, because there was still so much to do.

I felt (and feel) the same way with every game I’ve played since: Fallout 4, The Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077, Starfield, Baldur’s Gate 3 and my current muse, Elder Scrolls Online.

Nonetheless, however we choose to squeeze every drop of juice from a game, there is still an undeniable “finishing point” in most games—a point where you can honestly say that you have…ummm… “beaten the game.” 😛

It’s the same in most board games. I’ve not played every board game (who has?), but those I’ve played tend to have a distinct “win condition”—whether it is defeating a final boss, completing an objective in a number of turns or reaching some arbitrary number of “victory” points.

I can’t think of a board game that you just keep playing ad infinitum, hoping to survive a bit longer, with no stated end goal to aim for…

But when it comes to Solo RPGs, it’s common—perhaps even ubiquitous—that we start playing a game with no endpoint, no “win condition,” and no way to “beat” it.

Take Ker Nethalas as an example (only because I just started playing; there are many other examples). There’s no win condition in the core rules. You keep exploring until you either die, go mad, or get fed up and stop playing!

Alex later added an ending of sorts in one of the follow-up Vaelorian Codex zines, giving players the option of triggering a “final” domain.

But there isn’t anything comparable in Across a Thousand Dead Worlds or Choir of Flesh or (more pertinently) Under Ashen Skies.

When the novelty of the setting wears off, if there isn't enough mechanical or narrative fuel, the game quickly devolves into what players call a "grind" or a "treadmill"—rolling on the same random tables, fighting the same stat blocks, and writing variations of the same journal entry until a bad roll finally kills you…

My question today, dear reader, is this: Do you prefer games that are never-ending, or do you like to have a final goal to work towards

I chose my words quite carefully there. I don’t want a game where you follow a pre-determined quest chain, leading to a final “boss” where you effectively finish the game and then put it back on the shelf, knowing that you’ve seen everything and done everything you can do.

My question, as it applies to my revamp of Under Ashen Skies, is whether there should be a way to “resolve” the underlying questions thrust upon us during the game…

• Why am I here?

• What is the meaning of this place?

• (and, ultimately) Who am I?

Now, the interesting thing about Under Ashen Skies is that the game (broken as it is) does contain quests and tasks that uncover some of the mystery behind the town of Riverside, where the game is set. This happens through a number of more fleshed-out NPCs (called Dramatis Personae) who can be encountered in specific locations in the town. Unlike most of the denizens of the town, they don’t immediately try to rip your face off, but are more than willing to talk, offer quests and muse on the mythology of the setting.

You can completely ignore them if you want to; they aren’t mandatory, but they are there to be discovered and interacted with if you want. So it’s a cool option to have, even though it feels like something that’s later in the game.

So it wouldn’t be beyond the realms of possibility to start with the existing Dramatis Personae, add to their interactions, perhaps add more NPCs and side quests—and create something akin to “a main quest” in the revamped game that, ultimately, leads to the resolution of the questions we are confronted with.

The other interesting feature baked into Under Ashen Skies is the video game-like “respawn” mechanic. In most solo RPGs, when your character dies, the campaign is simply over, and you start from scratch. Under Ashen Skies borrows a direct video game mechanic to break up that finality. When you die out in the terrifying town, you don’t stay dead. You (mostly) wake up right back in your safety-hub apartment, “a little worse for wear” but retaining your core progression.

By making death a mechanical setback rather than a hard campaign stop, the game encourages you to take massive tactical risks. You aren’t just hovering in a safe loop; you are pushing deep into terrifying locales like the Riverside University Hospital, learning from your experience, and going back out with a better strategy.

That way, the game loop isn't just about surviving for the sake of surviving; it's a mystery box. The literal reward for pushing through the repetitive danger of the town is discovering who you were. The game pushes toward a built-in narrative conclusion: coming to terms with your character's dark secrets.

Some Final Thoughts

Once again, my thanks for letting me “think out aloud” with one of these posts. It helps get the creative juices flowing to write out my befuddled thoughts!

In terms of the project to revamp the game, I’m still very much in the whiteboard phase of throwing ideas at the wall to see what sticks.

That said, I feel like things have coalesced in my head to the point where I need to sit down this week and really work hard on pulling some of the threads together to move the project forward—otherwise I’m just going to be throwing things around forever!

Wish me luck… 🍀

So what do you think? Are you happy with a game that offers a loop where you keep exploring and improving your character as you fight for survival? Or would you like the option (and it would be optional) where you could progress a story, through quests, missions and discoveries, through to a satisfying conclusion?

Let me know in the comments…