![]() Your hobo friend Levi records your triumphs with murals and statues, providing a conventional “trophy room”. If you beat a puzzle in every possible way, you can access a unique associated doll, often with a fun ability. ![]() The game provides many rewards for discovering new solutions. Unusually for an adventure game, you can try puzzles again the instant you beat them, and may do so as often as you want thereafter. This information is accessible from the pause menu as well, making it easy to check your progress anywhere. Whenever you approach an area with a puzzle, any solutions you’ve already found are listed by name, while others are shown by question marks this means you know exactly how many remain at any given time. Each of its puzzles has a number of quite specific solutions. A more punishing, less flexible system would undermine players’ confidence and discourage them from revisiting puzzles. If you’re determined to solve a puzzle within certain constraints, you’ll likely be able to manage it– eventually. This is because its system allows for a remarkable variety of solutions even if your high-level approach is poor, as mine often was, you can almost always make it work by pouring enough thought and effort into the details. While SpaceChem is one of the most intellectually taxing games I’ve ever played, it was ultimately never frustrating. You might then want to improve on an area where you did poorly, or further refine a point where you excelled. For example, your solution may have been inefficient in the elapsed cycles category, but if you used an unusually low number of reactors, you still have something to be proud of. As the designer himself has noted, “players who optimize for one criterion often do poorly in the others.” Because each is displayed separately, not as an aggregate score or grade, the odds of an encouraging result are higher. Three vectors are considered: cycles elapsed, reactors used, and symbols used. The game provides feedback histograms charting the player’s efficiency compared to everyone else who’s ever beaten the puzzle. Each game encourages players to revisit puzzles, even immediately after beating them. Zachtronics Industries’ SpaceChem and Double Fine’s Stacking both address this question. After figuring it out, why give a puzzle a second look? ![]() The designer has crafted a solution, and the player must simply work towards it. Once you beat a puzzle, you move on, right? Until you forget its solution, what else is there to do? Unlike problems of, say, strategy, diplomacy, or resource management, puzzles are not dynamic. Of Hobos and Histograms: Repeatable Puzzles in SpaceChem and Stacking
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |