Category Archives: Game Design

On Rejection and Competition

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This blog post is going to cover two topics. First, how to deal with the emotional feeling of being rejected for a role. Second, a re-framing and discussion of how to feel about the person who did get the role.

I want to start by saying, everything about getting a job in the game industry from before 2025 is outdated information *at best* and potentially harmful at worst. The landscape of looking for a job in the game industry has completely changed in the last four years into a very different beast than it once was. Before 2022, if I applied to a role, it didn’t matter how many of the requirements I met, I was probably getting a phone screen.

In 2024 I was in the unfortunate position of being employed, but knowing the layoffs were coming. Our contract had been canceled (*shakes fist at Netease*) and no one was being funded. So I started applying around. I actually got quite a few phone screeners during this time.

The context of my resume matters here though. Even ignoring my earlier shipped titles, I have 4 Skylanders games on my resume. A series that earned 4 Billion dollars. During my time at TfB I shipped 4 games in 7 years, a feat that VERY FEW other AAA developers can claim. (And not many indie devs either.) I also worked on World of Warcraft for 4 years, the 800lb Gorilla Game that everyone has heard of, most people have played, and is known for being difficult to work on. And I shipped two expansions there. These two bullet points ALONE put me in a different category from most other experienced game devs. Then I have multiple years of Unreal 5 experience. You know, that editor half the industry uses. Further, I am fairly competent and skilled at using Blueprints to do scripting. I understand state machines. All of this makes me a “top candidate” for most game design or level design roles.

I am not saying this to brag, I am saying this so that you continue reading with the FULL CONTEXT of what I am talking about when I talk about my experiences in interviewing in 2024-2026.

I have had people flat out say directly to me that if I apply for a job, they won’t bother.

I have had people say to my face “Well, you’re a unicorn.”

Okay? So trust me when I say this next sentence okay?

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE FOR FAILING TO LAND A GAME JOB IN 2026.

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE FOR FAILING TO LAND A GAME JOB IN 2025.

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE FOR FAILING TO LAND A GAME JOB IN 2024.

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE FOR FAILING TO LAND A GAME JOB IN 2023.

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE FOR FAILING TO LAND A GAME JOB IN 2022.

I can’t really speak too much from before then, because I didn’t have the same experience before 2022 that I have had since 2022. There were also like 100k more game developer jobs back then. The old understanding doesn’t apply anymore.

In 2024 I was interviewed by 5 companies. One turned me down because I did not have Unity experience. Which is silly, because that’s clearly evident from my resume, but also – like, no offense Unity – but all game editors are pretty much the same. In my career I’ve worked in over 20 editors, everything from 2d ones like Game Maker to proprietary editors that were in the middle of being built while using them. If I can learn the WoWEdit tool, I can learn anything.

Another two companies during this time rejected me and went with other developers. I actually knew both devs who were hired instead of me. (I saw their posts on LinkedIn when they were hired.) Both were less experienced, had fewer shipped titles, about half my time in the industry, and both were cis white men. I can’t say why they were picked, and there were probably reasons unrelated to their gender and race, but at the same time, it cannot be discounted. In a pure numbers game, I should have won both roles, but I didn’t. I have no insight into the logic behind the choice. Was it just they had a better interview? Had they previously worked with the hiring manager? Were they cheaper?

In the end, I interviewed with Noodle Cat, and despite there being SEVERAL weird moments during the interviews that I was sure disqualified me, they made me an offer. So in 2024, I managed to dodge the layoff and land at Noodle Cat.

I was the unicorn. I was the overlap of skill sets and gave off the right energy to make them think I was a good hire.

Like many other game devs, I hold a lot of personal pride in being good at my job. Being offered a job in one of the worst layoff periods in the industry was very validating and affirming.

Sometime fairly early after starting, I heard a factoid that made me have to literally lay down.

Ready?

1500 people had applied for the role. They had 1500+ applicants. Even after sorting out the unqualified, who didn’t even meet the base requirements, there were over 500 remaining candidates. Once they cut everyone who didn’t meet all of the bullet points, they had over 300, fully qualified candidates.

THAT’S FUCKED UP. THAT IS NOT NORMAL. THAT’S AN INSANE NUMBER.

We’re not talking about a junior position. We’re talking about one that asked for a minimum of 5 years and 2 shipped titles. I know people with a DECADE in games who haven’t gotten to two shipped titles.

That’s the level of “Extinction Event” the industry is currently in. It’s not YOU, it’s the industry.

When I entered the in industry in 2007, getting 100 applicants for a role was OVERWHELMING. Blizzard was only getting a few hundred for a ENTRY LEVEL role.

Now, a senior to principal role will have HUNDREDS of QUALIFIED applicants. I am not exaggerating here. I need you to internalize this information because otherwise, you will continue to feel like not being able to get a job in the industry in your fault. It’s not your fault. I know indie studios that post a role then TAKE IT DOWN a week later because they are already overwhelmed with applicants.

THERE ARE NO JOBS.

Right now, the total number of game design and level design roles I could apply to is less than 20. I also know for a fact gents like Steve Powers and ladies like Beth Beinke are also currently unemployed. Even with Skylanders and WoW on my resume, it’s kind of hard to compete with “This guy was an LD on Deus Ex.” and “She was an LD on Bioshock Infinite.”

I am currently writing this while waiting to hear back from a small indie company. I interviewed, did well with each interview, and they even asked for my references and salary requirements. I have been doing the <exact> match of the role they are trying to fill for the last FOUR YEARS. I am telling you this because I am also fairly sure I am NOT going to get the offer at this point.

So how does that feel?

Honestly it sucks. I know I could do the job. I know I am kind and personable. I know I am good at working remotely. I know I can communicate well with my co-workers and I can prioritize tasks without needing a producer or director.

But the truth is, there’s a million reasons that it could have been that it wasn’t me. I hadn’t played their second game. I am a designer, so I don’t have the engineering foundation the rest of the team has. Maybe my references are too far out of date. Maybe my willingness to accept a lower salary than normal made it look like I didn’t know my own value. I mentioned the Activision Blizzard lawsuits and they aren’t sure they want someone who has sued their employer before. I am a woman, but even worse, I’m outspokenly feminist. I am anti-AI. I got distracted mid-interview because I have ADHD and I am currently unmedicated.

Or, the more likely one, I was a great candidate that they considered hiring, but there was someone else who was just SLIGHTLY better. A little more experience. A little more technical. A little more of a culture fit.

Despite knowing, intellectually, that I was better than a majority of the applicants and I did GREAT at my interviews, there’s still a tiny voice that says “Maybe I messed up.” and lists all those things two paragraphs ago. Here’s my advice – strangle that voice until it shuts the fuck up.

Once again, it’s not you. The industry is in a free fall. The companies that were hiring a year ago are closing. There’s ZERO funding if you don’t already have a large community for your indie game, and sometimes not even then.

Now. Even knowing these truths, even seeing how hard it is for someone with my level of resume, it’s completely valid and reasonable to feel bad/upset for not getting a role you managed to get the interview for. It sucks!

So how do I deal with it?

First off, remind yourself of the context of the world, industry, and economy. This wouldn’t be happening in 2019. This didn’t even happen in 2008 and that was another trash fire year for the industry. It’s NOT YOU.

Second, allow yourself to mourn the possibility. When I thought I might get this job, I started planning a possible to move to a larger house. Maybe even a trip to Japan. All of that won’t happen now, but it’s useful to remind myself – I am in the same position I was before I applied and that’s STILL a better position than many others. But it’s still sad to realize that I am probably not going to be replacing my couch or mattress this year, despite needing to. So I allow myself that sadness. (Ideally with a time limit. I try not to let it drag on for more than 2-3 days, then it’s just sparkling depression.)

Third, don’t dwell on it. I know this is hard, but letting go of the hurt is the only way to recover from it. Take a moment to post mortem the interview process. I like to write down questions I was asked, and noodle over perfect answers I could have given. How to phrase a story to make it funny and interesting. How to cut a story down that went on too long. But after that, just remind yourself you can’t change the past. Someone has been hired. You can iterate for the next one.

Next, I “clear out the dust”. I know this sounds kind of “hippy dippy” but trust me on this. I go for a LONG walk. Like, walk so far that you consider getting an uber home. Ideally walk in nature. As far away from a screen as you can get. Then I come home, put on my favorite music (right now it’s K-Pop Demon Hunters), and then I clean. I start with daily chores, and just keep going until I physically can’t anymore. Even if I am still sad, I am too exhausted to be able to deal with it, and I sleep better.

I also try to make sure I change at least one thing about the space I interviewed in. Not sure why, but it feels like I am actively “breaking” the memory of the failure. I clean the space and optimize something. I hang new art. I change the lighting. Something. Big changes are even better. Reorganizing my desk or bedroom to change the feel of the room. By changing the space, I am changing the way it feels. So instead of sitting at my desk and having the memory of the interview come up, I sit at my desk and think “Man, I am glad I fixed that doom pile that was over there.” We’re replacing a sad emotion with a positive one.

Allow yourself a “break” from the application and interview treadmill. I know, most people can’t do this, but if you can, try to do something that is soothing or comforting for yourself. Plan a specific “I won’t look at job boards or linkedin day.” Find a project you’ve been meaning to do and focus on it for a day or three. Even better if the project is fixing your living space or results in a physical item being created. (I think I’m going to try to tackle my paper doom piles.)

Do the same kinds of things you would do if you were just laid off, or mourning a loss of any kind. Be kind to yourself. Not only do you deserve it, you’ve been trough a tough challenge that didn’t pan out, but also you deserve it regardless. If beating yourself up worked, it would have by now. This isn’t something YOU could have changed the outcome on.

I can’t make a company offer me a job.

I can’t make more jobs appear.

I can’t –

Sorry, I just got the rejection email.

*SIGH*

The best interview I’ve ever had and I didn’t get it. Yes, this literally happened while I was typing this post up.

Do you believe me now? It’s NOT YOU.

Okay, well, let’s move on to the next part, how to feel okay about the person who did get the role.

First off, let’s be very clear here – the other applicants are NOT the enemy. They are your peers. Your contemporaries. Your possible future co-workers! It’s NOT THEIR FAULT they got the job. Just like it wasn’t your fault you didn’t.

They just – fit a little better. They had a little more connection to the studio. They just managed to win that roll of the dice.

The game industry is REAL small. They might be the one interviewing you in a year when the company opens more roles. I’ve worked with several people MULTIPLE times at different companies.

I’ve been friends with people who were in direct competition for a role, and we both knew it. I’m not going to stop being someone’s friend because they managed to score a job over me. I even talked about one of my “competitors” in an interview one time KNOWING she was also interviewing! (Yes, Jackie Wiley IS amazing at her job and totally the right call if you want an exceptional quest designer.)

Heck, the job I was just rejected from I literally gave them a reference that included ANOTHER PERSON WHO WAS ALSO INTERVIEWING FOR THE SAME ROLE.

Because the truth is we’re all in this together. No one wants the industry to be this “rolling dumpster fire”, it just is.

I’m going to repeat this – we’re all in this together. Games are so often a collaborative effort between dozens (or hundreds) of people from all different disciplines working together towards a singular goal. Every other game dev you meet has something to teach you, no matter how many years you’ve been in the industry or how many games you’ve shipped. And if you allow yourself to be angry and bitter over the loss of this job, you’re actively making yourself a worse hire later.

Now, I’m going to finish this up with a story and a bit of “hippy” talk.

Back in 2010, I had been unemployed for 5 months after the closing of Sega Studios San Francisco. After a summer of barely being able to find jobs I was qualified for, I applied to two different companies. One, the one I wanted MORE, was at Nihilistic. My buddy Jeff Kung worked there. He had recommended me. There was a SUPER COOL lady designer in charge of design. I had never worked with a lady designer at that point* (note – since this event, a person I worked with transitioned and now this story is no longer completely accurate, but at the TIME, I didn’t know I was working with a lady designer, because she hadn’t transitioned yet.) I liked the game. I liked the studio. I learned Maya in a WEEK to do their design test, which I felt was awesome.

Then they told me no. I was CRUSHED. Heartbroken. They were working on a game for Playstation! UGH.

A week later I got the call back for an interview with the other job I had applied to. I went to my interview, but I didn’t have a recommendation there. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to work for *Activision*. I didn’t expect to get the job.

But as it turns out, they needed heavy scripters and the hiring manager also played WoW, so he understood that my WoW addon scripts made me totally qualified to do the job. And that’s how I got hired on to be a level designer for a game that would eventually be called Skylanders.

Sometimes things happen for a reason. Sometimes it’s the universe lining you up for a better spot.

Emotional Roller Coasters

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I’ve never been a fan of roller coasters. They tend to trigger anxiety attacks in me, which sometimes become panic attacks.

Losing a job is one of the more stressful events you can experience. It’s right up there with the death of a close family member and the birth of a child. Everything kind of changes all at once and you’re left feeling like something is missing. I could spend days talking about how garbage it is that our society places so much importance on being productive and having a job that we completely wrap our entire selves up in it, but I don’t feel like that today. TL:DW, it’s bad and you might need to repeat to yourself that your worth is not measured by your productivity.

I will add, it’s especially bad when you lose your job because of things entirely beyond your control. I can’t change how many people buy a game. I can’t change the cost of rent. I can’t change the fact that MBAs and VCs are actively looting our industry with their mad gambles to try to out Fortnite Fortnite. I can only change my own behavior.

Related, this is why I so often repost or talk about Indie Games from people I adore. Supporting small indies is literally the only way to take back our industry from the Money Men. But again, that’s a whole different blog post.

What I want to talk about is the emotional weight (and how to deal with it) of being laid off.

It doesn’t matter how often it happens, or how much you expect it, it always hits like a truck. I became worried about layoffs when we slipped past our first “potential release date”. We barreled towards our second, a mere 2 months later. Still anxious and stressed about it, we again were given more time to keep working. And we did. In the end, I had been preparing to be laid off for 10 MONTHS before it actually happened.

“I braced for impact for so long, it wasn’t relieving to finally impact.”

Fortunately, unlike some of my other layoffs, this one happened along a clear timeline. We were told it might happen 2 months in advance. Every week we were given information that made it fairly clear that the headcount cut was coming. We had shifted (without input, it just happened naturally) to a 2 week sprint cadence. We knew that time was running out and no one wanted to leave things undone.

When it finally happened, I breathed a deep sigh. They gave us a couple of days to gather materials, hand out contact info, etc. That’s always nice. It’s not the norm though.

I like to compare it to being in a thornbush. Along the way some decision was made and you ended up here, in a place that is only filled with sharp points that poke into you every time you try to move or even breathe. You freeze so that the thorns stop hurting you, but they’re still there. There’s no easy escape and often the only way out is through.

Fortunately, I had been bracing for impact for SO long, I knew exactly what my runway was. I knew what the backup plans were. I knew how long I could relax before I’d have to find another thornbush to jump into.

I am lucky enough to have a partner who is also in games, who also understands, and who is also an Android Developer. He had already updated his resume and was mid interviews with a small local company.

“Tag, you’re it.” I joked as I flopped down on the couch, exhausted.

I started thinking about all the times I’ve been laid off before. A couple of times I wasn’t laid off, but the layoffs were imminent. I managed to – multiple times – in my career sneak out just before they hit. I got really good at reading the signs.

Layoff Signs, for future reference:

  • They do an inventory of computers and equipment. (Always backup your work on a regular cadence, but if this happens, do it immediately.)
  • Normal spending that would usually happen very quickly, is drawn out. As if they aren’t sure it’s worth it to spend the money right now.
  • There’s little to no work and everyone is being encouraged to take time off. (They want you to burn your PTO so they don’t have to pay it out.)
  • Hiring Freezes are more overt. Sometimes they’re sneaky though and instead they’ll just not interview anyone for a position.
  • Delaying standard “business” activities. (Updating hardware, annual reviews, or training.)
  • Penny Pinching software licenses.
  • Multiple Leadership people leave in a short time.
  • Leadership checks out.

In 2022, while working at Zynga, I started noticing several of these behaviors at our company, despite being well funded and near shipping. So I started poking around at other jobs. The industry was already a trash fire of layoffs, and I didn’t want to be caught without a job. Ryan’s work was already seeing contract cancellations, and I didn’t want to risk it. I interviewed with a couple of companies and I got two offers. (One was good, the other was HOT garbage.) I decided to stick around because the offer wasn’t quite good enough, and I wanted my annual bonus from Zynga. 3 months later, the first “round” of layoffs hit. Some companies do a big layoff all at once. Some try to “fly under the radar” and instead lay people off slowly, over time. Zynga liked to do it slow. Just a couple of people, and always a few short of having to notify WARN.

I felt the target on my back and reached out to the “good” offer I had turned down three months earlier. This is how, in 2023, as the layoffs in the industry were REALLY ramping up, I managed to land a new job in 2 business days. (Kim, why do you say it like that? Because I realized on Friday when my lead was laid off that I was going to be next. Monday was a holiday. Tuesday I reached out and by Tuesday evening I had a signed offer letter with a shiny new start date. That’s INSANE. That would have been BLAZINGLY fast BEFORE the industry began collapsing.)

I swapped over to my new studio, and things started off swimmingly. As I mentioned in my return post though, that didn’t last long. We had a round of layoffs (more than 100 people) and while I survived, the writing on the wall was very grim. I held out until the project I was on lost it’s funding. And once more, this time in 2024, I was looking for a job hoping to beat the “rush” as it were. I was successful, and in 31 days, secured a new role. As it turns out, I slipped out a mere 3 weeks before the layoffs hit. It probably would have been better for me to have waited, snagging that sweet severance, but I had a job so I wasn’t too upset about it.

In my early career I was at a company that closed (effectively, if not in name), a company that did a mass layoff two weeks after I left, and then again had a company close on me.

Sega Studios SF made Iron Man 2. We did a decent job given the timeline and the technical challenges of the game. It sold as expected. And despite this, despite the plan being to cut only 40% of the studio, the morning came where instead of laying off 40% of the company, they just shut the whole thing down. I was totally unprepared.

What happened next would be the foundation for this post, the advice I will give, and my current activities. I was unemployed for 5 months. Due to my (now ex) partner’s job at the time, we were not open to relocating. And even being in the Bay Area, there’s only SO many level designer jobs out there. 2010 was still in the period recovering from the recession. Things were still “coming back”. What do you do when you are unemployed for 5 MONTHS? What do you do during the long haul of anxiety and uncertainty?

Week 1:

The first week after a layoff is a MIND fuck, make no mistake. You will cycle between emotions with stunning speed and frequency. Sometimes even good emotions!

I always choose to post immediately about it. I want people to know when talking to me where the wounds are so they don’t poke them.

There’s a couple of different Tasks I would recommend this first week.

  • Go ahead and file for unemployment. It’s your money, and it will take a week or three to get functional.
  • If you’re feeling up to it, update your resume and portfolio while it’s still fresh.
  • Cut all non-critical spending. (Cancel subs, services, etc.) (More on this later.)
  • Clean your habitat.

And that’s it. You can apply to jobs or start networking, but in the current situation, it’s fairly unlikely you will be snapped up immediately. We’re prepping for a marathon, not a sprint. Don’t make ANY large decisions this week. They can wait a week. What you actually NEED this week is to rest and reset.

I highly recommend taking a day, and ANGER CLEANING. I usually put on old clothes, tie my hair back, and just start with the intent of getting as gross and sore as possible. The goal here is to be sore enough that you feel like actually sitting on the couch and watching something silly. The goal is to be gross enough to take a shower where you wash your whole body twice. The goal is to throw away every single piece of trash in your house. Think of it like, Spring Cleaning, but more about cleaning away the negative emotions.

This time I decided to clean bathrooms. Both of ours were very gross and with all the extra work I hadn’t had time to do it for weeks and weeks. Both toilets were fuzzy. The floors were covered in hair. Both showers were covered in mold and needed a deep clean. I got to it. 4 hours later, I had two sparkling bathrooms, two bags of trash, and I was tired enough to nap.

Humans have all these super cool evolutionary adaptations, but our bodies often react as if we’re still living in tribes. “You can’t run away from your problems, except when you can.” was a quote from an article I read about running as a treatment for anxiety. Literally running away from your problems closes the loop in our brains to make us think the danger has passed, so we can let go of the anxiety and move forward. The trick with cleaning is to do ENOUGH of it to trigger that “I got away from the tiger.” reaction in your brain. Also, having that room/area clean will make you feel better. I promise.

Week 2:

This week you should feel your emotions stabilizing. You’re not being bombarded with well meaning platitudes from friends. You aren’t being asked awkward questions anymore. You’ve likely slept a whole bunch. (That’s totally normal! You’ve been through a traumatic event and your brain needs more rest than usual!)

  • Update Resume and Portfolio (recheck it if you did it last week.)
  • Check for open roles at places you WANT to work. I am being specific about the narrow category here, because you want to “stagger” applications.
  • Calculate your personal runway and make a backup plan.
  • Clean another room.
  • Come up with your Daily Schedule.

I always like recommending people review their resume and portfolio a week later. You’ve rested by now, time to double check you remembered all the cool shit you did. I also recommend starting slow for applying for jobs. Right now there are SO few game jobs, you want to focus on quality not quantity. Apply to jobs you KNOW you’d be in the top choices for. Especially if you have network connections there.

I am going to assume though, that like my 2010, 2017, and now 2026, you won’t find a job immediately. So here’s where “Organization Renders Any Goal Achievable.” okay, maybe not, but producers sure love when I say that. So we’re settling in for a long haul. Unemployment usually only last for 3-6 months, based on where you are, and often does not cover rent. Before I go forward, here’s a reminder – YOU ARE NOT YOUR PRODUCTIVITY.

There’s no shame in being laid off (at least, not for you, the laid off one.) There’s no shame in moving back in with parents, downsizing, or even taking a job outside of the industry. Repeat after me: Make Art, Make Rent, and Help Others Do The Same. Anyone who will judge you for these things is not a person you should be listening to.

So at this point, (last week), we knew we had enough savings to get us to the end of our lease. Additionally, we could swing a U-Haul and are fortunate enough to have not one, but two parents homes where we would be welcome, if not comfortable, staying. So that’s our Runway and Backup Plan sorted. It’s not a great backup plan, but it means not being homeless, so it’s valid.

Now that the initial shock is worn off, it’s still challenging, but important, to review all your expenditures and go into “poverty mode”. It’s always a bummer to cancel stuff like Patreon or subs to small creators, but they will understand. They’ve been there too. I always like to slightly gamify this step, as it makes it easier for me. I try to see how much I can cut. Can I just drink tap water for a month? Let’s find out! Making it a challenge or giving myself a score for it makes me more likely to stick with it and give it a real chance.

This second week, I cleaned our kitchen. While doing so, I made sure to take time to do all the small things – small projects – that would take 30 minutes or so, and I had been putting off for months.

In 2010, when I was unemployed for 5 months, I didn’t start off with a plan. I just kind of existed for a month or so, then settled into playing WoW all day. Not to knock playing WoW all day, but it doesn’t pay the bills. After a while, I realized if I didn’t apply SOME form of structure to my life, I would continue to feel depressed and horrible about my job situation. I came up with a daily, weekly, and monthly schedule.

My daily schedule is very much focused on “meat suit upkeep”. If you’ve ever done “Time Boxing” exercises, this helps quite a bit. I have set times for things like – eating, showering, walks, and waking/sleeping. But then I will have a “one hour learning” block. I keep these very vague and loose, to allow for emotional and mental adjustments. Some days are emotionally hard, so I make sure I can do emotionally neutral activities those days. Some are more mentally taxing, so I plan for “easy brain” stuff as well.

My weekly schedule included things like “On Monday check all the job boards.” “On Wednesday, do all the laundry.” “On Friday, make a better than normal meal.” All of the goals I set were things that made me feel better or made me feel like I was at the very least, pushing slightly forward.

My monthly schedule included things like “Add a new level to my portfolio.” “Make a Non-Game Resume.” “Rearrange all the furniture in the living room to fix the flow.”

Your schedule will entirely depend on you, but I highly recommend focusing on things you DO NOT get time to do while working. Read a ton of books. Write down your emotions in a journal (not on social media). Reorganize your closet. Sell all those random things you’ve been thinking about selling but just haven’t found the time. Complete projects. I like to (usually during week 2 actually!) walk around my house with a notepad just writing down all the “in progress” or “not started” projects and tasks. Then I rate them on “Emotion Weight” (1-5, 1 easy, 5 hard), “Physical Demands”, and “Length of Time”. I like to start long projects on Monday, with a soft goal of completing it “this week.” I like to save emotionally challenging tasks and do them all on the same day (think about Parks and Rec’s episode with the 97 meetings) and then give myself a break the next day. (If I apply for jobs on Monday, I can play Genshin for an extra hour on Tuesday.) I then take this list, put it into a more organized list, and start checking things off.

Week 3 and Beyond

As time goes by, you will feel the roller coaster less and less. Things become more routine, you get into the cycle of actually changing your sheets every week. You settle into applying for jobs, but hearing nothing back. If you’re working out, you’ll start to notice changes. You might even start working on your own game. (You should absolutely work on your own game.)

Really, the important thing here is to protect your mental health. Track the things you do over days, recording how each activity or thing made you feel, and then in subsequent days, repeat the actions that make you feel better. Lean into things that make you feel like you have control over the situation. I like to pack the days with activities I would LOVE to do normally, but cannot due to work. If you’re going to be spending your savings (or accruing debt) might as well make it worth it and live your best version of life.

  • Watch a TV show you’ve never seen but people constantly reference. (Highly recommend X-Files or Supernatural for this.)
  • Watch a movie you’ve always meant to.
  • Read those books on your nightstand.
  • Play literally any of your backlog.
  • Learn some basic yoga (yoga is the GOAT for staying active while also not risking injuries.)

Listen to your body and give yourself grace. I like to say, “Never say something to yourself that you wouldn’t say to your best friend.” And it’s good advice here. Instead of beating yourself up about something you cannot control, be the friend you need that gives you support. Also, reach out to friends for support. Ask them to review your resume or cover letter. Ask them to read over your portfolio. Ask them to hang out (but somewhere cheap because you’re broke.)

Now, real talk, the Industry is a dumpster fire. Even stable profitable games and companies have been laying people off and while some still parrot sayings like “survive to 25” or “make it stick to 26”, we’re all very aware of the state of the industry. I often say “Any port in the storm.” and this is the storm of the century. Don’t feel bad if this means finding a job only tangentially related to games. Don’t feel bad if it means working at Costco. You cannot control the industry and you certainly can’t control the economy. You are a leaf on the wind and just trying to not get speared.

Try to balance your days in such a way that you don’t run out of emotional bandwidth or end up bed rotting, BUT IF YOU DO THAT’S OKAY. It’s okay to have a day where you do nothing but exist. You have been working very hard for a very long time and your body knows when it needs a break. Let it have one, since the universe has been so kind as to give you the time. (Mild sarcasm there. But it’s also annoyingly true.)

My currently weekly goals include writing more here. If you’re on the Ghost Hunter Simulator Patreon, you’ll see me pop up there this week too.

But remember, your job is not who you are. Your employment status is not a measure of your worth. You are capable. This is not a normal market and not normal for the industry. You are living through unprecedented times (again) and thus need to remind yourself of these facts.

Edit Update:
https://www.thewritegame.com/post/the-layoff-talk-presentations-by-worth-dayley

Here’s a link to a super cool powerpoint that covers many of the same things I talk about. It’s good stuff!

Trial of Style

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When I first heard of the idea of Trial of Style, I brushed it off as just another micro holiday I wouldn’t need to participate in. About 30 minutes later, thinking about it again, I decided to add a note to my journal to remember to post all my transmog auctions at a discount that week.

When it finally rolled around, I looked at the rewards and shrugged it off. But then I had a slow night and decided to try it – just once – to see what it was like.

It was AMAZING. And terrible. But amazing.

Trial of Style works exceptionally well, if everyone plays along. When everyone tries to match the theme, and then votes for the outfits that best match or are the most creative. It doesn’t work when people go off left field or just go for the sexy plate mog.

More than just enjoying the event – I really enjoyed seeing all the crazy things people came up with. I saw a demon hunter in all white. I saw an AMAZING warlock in a purple corset I just HAD to look up and go farm.

Even funnier was the time a member of the group decided to call everyone idiots right off the bat, and I said “Hey now, there’s no need to be rude, it’s just transmog.” And I ended up winning despite not having the best outfit.

As always, I immediately started noodling over how I would improve the event. First off, I would have it happen more often than once a year. Have it happen over the two fashion weeks, then like the first week of school, etc. Times when people would be looking at fashion in their real life.

The second idea though, would require a great deal more work. I want players who refuse to play along and just wear their normal transmog that doesn’t fit the theme at all to be disqualified. It was a huge bummer when the worgen in an admiral outfit won the mismatched mayhem despite being in all blue and white. (Yes, his transmog was VERY good, but it didn’t fit the theme.) The only logical way I could see doing this would be to create a database and tag each and every item with what theme it could remotely apply to. And if a player chooses a transmog that has less than 3 items that have the correct tag, it disqualifies them.

But then, that might be too picky. The queue time is short and even if you lose, you get a consolation prize.

Lastly, I would up the rewards. Make it an alternate path for farming specific pieces. Still can’t get this BoP out of Blackwing to drop? Farm up 2k Trial of Style tokens and buy it outright. it gives players who WANT to participate a really good reason to, adds to the collection they are already clearly interested in, and it gives them an alternate path to earn things they want, without just hoping for RNGesus to bless them.

Dungeons and Dragons at TfB

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It all started with someone saying they had never played Dungeons and Dragons. It seems weird, working for a video game company that exists because of D&D, but many people didn’t get the opportunity to play growing up. I did. And I had even run games before, though for much less discerning players than a group of people who *make* games for a living.

4 years later, we have had two full campaigns and a short lived run through some Savage Worlds, but here we are, playing D&D again. I have played in some of it, but mostly I have been running games. Not just because it’s the easiest way to make sure we play and everyone is having fun, but more because this is what I find fun. Presenting a situation to players and watching them destroy it in the most beautiful ways.

I believe playing and running D&D games makes you a better game designer.

There are different kinds of DMs (dungeon masters) and different kinds of campaigns, but most of the players I have encountered agree that that whole point is to have fun. I have tried planning out everything meticulously and it rarely works. If I have a country road ambush, and I need the players to ride along a road at a specific time to have something specific happen, but I mention in passing while setting the scene that a monarch butterfly flits by – one of two things will happen – 1. The players will chase off after the butterfly certain that it is important because I mentioned it. Or 2. Turn around and ride the other direction because someone forgot to buy arrows or their cat is on fire back in town.

Over the years leading up to my career in video games I learned a great deal about D&D players. They might as well all be named Murphy. They will absolutely go the wrong way, do the wrong thing, at the absolute worst possible time. The job of the DM though, is to make sure they have fun doing so.

I learned to only vaguely plan what I wanted the session to be. It will always be shorter or longer than I imagine. They will have an easy time with extremely difficult monsters while dying to the fluffy bunnies of cuddles. They will bash down doors that weren’t locked, they will fall down shafts that have ladders, and they will drown in small ponds. They will also roll natural 20s (an automatic success) on unopenable chests, leap 40 foot crevasses, and drown bosses in pools of holy water without ever once touching him.

What makes D&D so much fun? What makes me enjoy running these games so much, despite it taking hours of my limited free time, excessive amounts of money for every book WotC prints, and so much mental preparation? Because I can always say YES to the player.

In video games, we are often limited by our tech or our scope. If the player in a game wants to go off the beaten path and chase down bunnies – they can’t always do that. And if we do let them do that, that takes time and money that could be spent on “more important things”. But in D&D – not only can the player do so, but I can twist the story and plan to make it so it’s important and what was intended ALL ALONG. There’s always an answer. Everything’s always connected even if it wasn’t intended to be that way.

To give a very immediate example – last night I presented my players with a room in a magical dungeon. The dungeon is magical because it creates challenges that are specific to THESE characters. This room was targeting towards our resident sorcerer, who’s day job is creating gaming supplies like cards and dice. The room was a handsomely appointed tavern room (yes, in a magical dungeon, it works because magic) with a single table and two chairs. The player immediately sat in the chair, while his party members stood back and watched, and a ghost appeared in the opposite chair to play him at a card game. As he spoke to the ghost he learned the specifics of this challenge. He had to win three bets against the ghost, before he lost 3. Of course, he lost 3 first. Now, I as the DM, didn’t have a concrete plan beyond – the ghost will attack him if he loses. That was it.

The ghost turns aggressive and attacks my player. Of course, his party members join the fray, but as they are level 1, and the ghost is quite challenging, they didn’t kill it. It however reduced my player to 0 hit points (in D&D this doesn’t mean he is dead yet, just knocked out and dying.) At this point, I could have the ghost start attacking the other players, they did after all attack the ghost. But that’s so… normal. So instead, the ghost reverts to its previous non-aggressive form and vanishes. I didn’t plan that. I thought of it in the moment.

As they revive the player, he once more sits down to play the ghost, who returns and acts as if nothing has happened and is willing to play again. They know they hadn’t beaten the room’s challenge and earned the reward. Only this time, the players change their tactics. They all start cheating like mad. Slight of hands, distractions, perception and insight rolls are flying around as they try to help the player win 3 rounds of poker. Of course, he succeeds this time – it was easy as he had 3 extra cards in his hand.

They successfully overcome the challenge and the ghost leaves, giving them access to a door that rewards them with a magical staff specifically made for the player. I didn’t plan most of it. I had exactly two words written down for this puzzle – “gambling game” and then a second note made later that said “v ghost.”

On the surface it seems like a really weird thing to have in a game. It’s not combat (well, it had combat, but it was solvable without combat.) It allowed them to fail and retry without “reloading” or sacrifice. It was still challenging, but not mindless. And yet, it’s exactly the kind of thing we frequently did in Skylanders (there was just a card game, and at times the players inexplicably had to beat them to proceed.) And mostly, the interactions, rolls, and events were generated on the fly to adjust to the players, their actions, their health and stats, and the general feel of the room.

Video game development is a weird beast. Very rarely does the plan set down at the beginning actually lead to the game at the end. Much like the adage about war, the battle plan never survives the encounter with the enemy. On the 4 Skylanders games I built levels for, never once did the order of levels survive 5 months without being changed. That’s not the first 5 months. That’s every 5 months. 5 months from CRC (the first attempt at a final build) at least one level would be moved forward or back to fix some weird issue with a story point, a mechanic, or a toy production issue. Being able to quickly think on your feet and improvise solutions using nothing but what is already in the game is a very valuable skill.

D&D is a group storytelling experience, in that the DM is taking all the threads of story being told by the players, weaving them together, then weaving them into a larger epic narrative. Many video game designers want to achieve this same goal. I have found these are generally the better designers in the game industry and often make exceptional games. They let the player affect the game, story, and experience, even if that means things break in unexpected and horribly broken ways. D&D makes me a better designer because experience DMing has taught me that saying yes to the player and allowing them to do ridiculous game breaking things often leads to the most interesting stories that get retold for years afterwards. It’s not my epic tale where I force them along a prescribed set of actions (that’s a book) it’s the group of us, working together to create hilarious adventures.

Not to mention that having a regular group of people willing to stumble and bumble through mechanics and puzzles is a really great testing ground for level design. In addition, playing with people from work leads to really amazing friendships and the ability to work really well together even when not in dungeons.

Defenders of Hyrule

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Immediate Warning – This post WILL contain spoilers for the Defenders of the Triforce Escape Room event. Do NOT read this before doing it or if you ever plan on doing it. That would be cheating.

Escape rooms have always interested me, but I am not super great at getting off my couch and getting TO them. So when work set up a thing where we would go to Defends of the Triforce for free, I jumped on it knowing all my friends would go to.

Let me also be upfront about my love for Zelda. The Legend of Zelda was the first game I played obsessively as a kid. Ocarina of Time is one of my all time favorite games ever. I have a Switch and Breath of the Wild. I was READY for a Zelda event.

The first thing that struck me was – the production values were actually significantly lower than I expected for an event that costs $50+. The “room” was really 8 tiny tables crammed into a space, with small stools and 6 people per table. (Seriously, the tables were small. There was a binder as part of the game – and if it was open, it covered 80% of the table.) There were painted and crafted “areas” to match areas from the game. But these were like 1 day build sets. I might be critical – but as someone who did stage building in college, plus helped build temp structures in the desert – these were slapdash at best.

I should also admit, I’ve never DONE an escape room before. I don’t know if they are all like this – but if so, someone with some real stage experience should come along and do a better one. Just sayin.

So we sat down in our team (with silly green hats) and got our instructions. While I am here, let me mention the hats. That didn’t fit very well, but we were forced to wear… AND THEN HAD TO GIVE BACK. So I very much hope the rash I have on my scalp isn’t contagious or there it goes. (Seriously – don’t do this. People have very funky heads.)

The timer started and so did we. The first puzzle involved a series of small puzzles that lead to a word puzzle. I sat there looking at the puzzle and figured it out. We had only found 4 of the 6 words, but I knew what the next step was. But we couldn’t skip ahead? We had to have all the solutions. Ugh. Fine.

Remember how I said that there were 8 tables? Right – so 8 teams. And your WHOLE team has to go to the various areas set up around the room. So we all go rushing up to Zora’s Domain, and one of our party is lagging behind. Despite him being 4 feet away, the performer INSISTED that we wait until we were all huddled up to his satisfaction. I bring this up because – in a timed event – being nit picky about these kinds of things means wasting time. The PUZZLES are what should take the time, not needless subjective rules discussions about what constitutes the whole team “being there”. It wouldn’t be a big deal, if it hadn’t happened EVERY.SINGLE.TIME. Like literally, minutes lost because we weren’t all huddled up. No offense, but I don’t like people that much. On top of this, if you went to an area and there was already a team there, YOU HAD TO WAIT. Now – let’s be real, I am not a patient person to BEGIN with, but if you put me in a time crunch situation then STOP me from doing what I need to do, I am gonna be crabby. (And I was.)

So we get the next puzzle and proceed on. It seemed relatively simple – we needed the two stones, so we solved the two puzzles and went to see the Gorons. This performer was also needlessly particular. And not very good at being a Goron. He sent us away, saying we didn’t have what he wanted. After 5 wasted minutes re-checking our work, one of our member noticed a tiny point of a triangle wasn’t colored in fully. So we went back – sure enough, that was what had prevented it. After talking to others, ours was NOT the only group that had this happen. It’s a puzzle game – not a gotcha game. It was frustrating to see the “easier” puzzles designed in such a way as to trick the player and make them fail.

There were some exceptional moments (here comes the spoiler)

Like once, we needed a rupee. We had 49, but the price was 50. I was holding a pair of green scissors in my right hand, and a laminated instruction sheet in my left. I could FEEL the rupee sticker inside the instruction sheet. But it was laminated. The tag on the scissors said “Cut the grass!” The instruction sheet had grass printed along the bottom. It literally broke my brain, intentionally destroying this thing to get the rupee out. A truly amazing moment. I am actually SAD that not everyone on my team got to experience it.

Another when we had a bit of an arrow, an opened chest and instructions to Pierce the Spade. Jerry jammed the arrow into a sticker, which was covering a hole, and popped the false bottom of the chest out. I fucking LOST it. The call back to the earlier clue and puzzle. The hidden catch. So good.

But all too often – the puzzles were either instantly obvious or so blindingly opaque that no one in our group of 6 VERY intelligent people even knew where to START. And talking to the performers across the BOARD was an exercise in frustration. I understand they are likely college kids doing an evening job, but at least make SOME attempts. Only one of them remotely TRIED to be in character, and all of them were oddly anal about procedure. For example – as you completed steps you got stickers, and there were spots on the papers for the stickers, but they were IMPOSSIBLE to get off their backings! (Says the lady with NAILS.) But twice we were not allowed to continue until we had peeled every sticker and stuck it on the thing. This probably added up to about 3-5 minutes of WASTED time.

All of my issues go back to the waste of time. Putting people under pressure like that requires that everything goes smoothly and doesn’t waste their time. Doing so frustrates and angers the person who is trying to do a fun thing. It ends up feeling like bureaucracy and not fun. If it’s too short without all the annoying delays, then add another puzzle and cut down the time.

In the end, we got stuck on the final step. The clue I felt was WAY vague and when we asked for help, we were given another clue that lead us down an incorrect path. FURTHER, even when the correct answer was revealed, I tried it on MY thing and it didn’t work. There HAD to be a better way to do the final puzzle so it worked, made sense, and wasn’t able to be mistaken as a wrong answer.

Further, I found out AFTER the event, one of the other teams was literally IN LINE – waiting their turn, with the solution to the final puzzle, when the timer went off. They were deemed Non-Winners. What the shit? No.

It may sound like I didn’t have fun. That’s not true. It was great fun. Because of the themeing and the friends I was with. If I had done it on my own, with random people, and it wasn’t Zelda themed, (and having had to pay for it) I would be so turned off of the entire experience I would never do it again.

I feel like, much like Breath of the Wild but that’s another post, the Defenders of the Triforce is being carried by Zelda, when on it’s own would not command the price or critical acclaim it gets. I liked it, but it could have been (and probably SHOULD have been) significantly better with only minor tweaks.

Who matters most?

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So apparently it’s a thing right now, where because a Mythic World First Guild decided to stop being a Mythic World First Guild that people are clamoring that Blizzard do something, because won’t you think of the poor Mythic World First Guilds?

As usual, I have some strong feelings about Mythic Raiders, raiding in general, and Blizzard’s “catering” to players.

When things come up about Group X vs Group Y in WoW, it always boils down to one thing – Whoever is talking thinks they deserve something, and the other side thinks they don’t deserve that thing.

So. Who deserves a thing in WoW?

Who deserves the gold? Who deserves the gear? Who deserves the mounts? The pets? The Titles? The Legendaries?

Does anyone disagree the answer is – People who spend time and money?

Those are literally the two most important things in most people’s lives after all. Time and Money. They are a weird balance board. It fluctuates at high and low ends of the spectrum obviously, and has weird connections to seemingly unrelated things. But despite how much I hate goblins – they aren’t wrong. Time IS money.

We can’t say “Well anyone who pays for WoW deserves all the things.” (Though I do actually think that SHOULD be true.) Because… well, we all pay for WoW right. If I have to run Stratholme 166 times to get my Baron Rivendare’s Charger, I don’t want someone else getting it just for logging in. (Honestly, I really don’t care, as long as *I* have the mount.)

So for WoW, the real thing isn’t money. Because we can’t BUY a thing straight up. And it’s actually not “fair” to gate things behind money like that. See, WoW is based on the precursor to Mobile Games Monetization. (It really is, even if they don’t have a direct route to a la carte purchasing – which they should if they wanted to make bank, but again I digress – the ability to buy with Dollars things that can be traded or sold in game for everything means that it’s doable.) Mobile Games are based on two ideas – more players is always better, even if 90% of the players pay nothing. And two (this is the important one for this conversation) Players are either going to give us time or money. That’s why all the “currencies” in mobile games are used to speed things up.

Do you want to spend a month farming a thing – or pay $10? As someone who earns more than $10 an hour – it’s TOTALLY worth it for me to throw $10 at a game (especially if I like it, support your game devs) over waiting a month. (Also I am wildly impatient.) There are people like me who don’t mind the money. There are other people who are super proud of reaching the same achievement without spending a dime.

But in WoW, this transaction – money to thing I want in game – is not direct. It’s very roundabout. I have to buy tokens, wait for tokens to sell, then trade gold for carries. For the sake of this discussion though, let’s assume this is not REALLY doable (since it’s cost prohibitive, and limited by Blizz since you can only buy so many tokens.) (Also, it’s how it was BEFORE the tokens, and I feel it still holds true.)

So then, if we all pay the same amount of money into Blizzard, shouldn’t we all get the same amount of stuff? All the mounts? All the pets? All the gear?

Hurm. That’s not very fun though is it? We enjoy the seeking, the striving to get a thing we want. So the currency Blizzard is asking for isn’t money, it’s time. They want us to spend TIME getting an item. Here’s where the breakdown happens though: Elitism – and players who think they deserve something because they “worked harder” for it.

If we go back to the mount example. An Elitist would say “Because I ran the dungeon when it was current, because I got the mount when it was a 1 in 1000 drop, I deserve it more than someone who farmed it at level 80.”

But they didn’t earn it the same way I did. They were just LUCKY. At 15 minutes a run, times a 166, it took me 2490 minutes to get my mount. That’s 41.5 HOURS. At minimum wage (in California), that’s over $400! FOR PIXELS! Someone who ran it at level, could have gotten it on their first run (okay probably not but rng is rng).

So which one of us DESERVES it more? Hint – both of us – we both worked for it, just in different ways.

Ah. That’s the key right there. We got the same result – we just got it in different ways. Also he got his like 6 years earlier than I did.

People talk about Mythic Raiding like it’s the people Blizzard is making the game for. It’s not. They make the game for all of us. If it was just for Mythic Raiders, do you REALLY think Pet Battles would be a thing? At all?

People talk about Mythic Raiding and say “Well if you were willing to devote the time to it, you could do it too!” Actually, it’s not about time. It’s about skill, what we find fun, and willingness to be unhappy while working towards a goal. How much time does a Mythic Raider spend playing WoW? 40 hours a week? Like a job?

My slash played, since 2005 when I started playing, averages out to 5 hours a day. That means in a week – I spend 35 hours playing – on average. Obviously some weeks are more (Legion launch!). Some are less (Person 5 get here faster!). But in the end, I spend almost as much time playing WoW as I do working.

The real question is – why is their 40 hours of play being valued at a higher rate than mine? Why is my 40 hours leveling and capturing pets not a valid path to a best in slot piece of gear? (Since that is ARGUABLY the goal of a game like WoW, a loot treadmill.) Why isn’t it valid that someone who PVPs 40 hours a week earn gear on par with Mythic Raiding? It is just a loot treadmill right? Aren’t we on the treadmill? Why don’t we get the loot?

Less than 1% of players saw Naxx. So they remade it for Wrath. And nerfed it. People were pissed. Why? Blizz was “catering to casuals”. No – Blizzard was catering to PLAYERS. People who paid money for their game, paid the sub, and likely spent just as much time as everyone else in game – but maybe weren’t driven to focus on raiding as the end all be all of the game.

Do I think people running a raid 40 hours a week deserve mounts/pets/titles/legendaries? Oh yes. Do I think people running dungeons 40 hours a week deserve mounts/pets/titles/legendaries? Yep, them too. Do I think people leveling pets 40 hours a week and beating the Celestial Tournament deserve mounts/pets/titles/legendaries? Hell yes, that shit is hard.

“But Joyia, if you make it so that people can get the best gear from running dungeons – people won’t run raids!”

Ahhh, that’s where the Mobile Game Monetization comes back in.

Mythic Raiders == the Whales. They put up with all the “pain and suffering and omg why would you do this this isn’t fun at all” and get the loot fastest. Us “filthy casuals” who spend just as much time in game if not more – we get it too. Just slower. And over a greater length of time. The currency here is just pain and suffering.

That’s why the progressive buff in ICC was such a great thing. (The Mythic raiders don’t need it or care, my little casual guild can progress to the end!) That’s why Badges of Valor were such a great thing. (You got it in a drop, that’s cool, but if I keep killing bosses I will get it in 3 weeks!) That’s why NOT REMOVING CONTENT LIKE THE GROVE WARDEN AND ICC MOUNTS IS SUCH A GREAT THING. (Seriously Blizz, put that shit back.)

We ALL pay to play the game. We ALL pay in time – casual and hardcore is NOT determined based on time spent – but rather the bullshit required to defeat a SINGLE aspect of an impossibly large game.

We ALL deserve the rewards and cool things that comes with it.

TO THE SKIES!

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In the tone of my last post about flying – here’s my response to the announcement about flying in Draenor today:

FUCK. YES.

Let’s break down why this is an EXCELLENT solution. In fact I would say it’s possible it’s a PERFECT solution.

How do we get flying? Getting the Loremaster of Draenor, Securing Draenor, 100 Treasures, Explore Draenor, and rep achievements.

It solves the exploration vs non-exploration issue.

Many people commented that they LIKED being forced to ride around while leveling. It gives them a better sense of the world. It helps them learn the zones. It makes it feel like they are exploring. The thing is – once we hit 100, our priorities change. We start wanting to go to specific spots. We try to bypass enemies. We WANT short cuts. But by requiring the Loremaster Achievement – it shows that the player who gets flying HAS done the story. They did the ground footwork to complete the zones.

It makes it so only level 100s can get it.

You have to be 100 to get the Securing Draenor achievement done. Bam. Locked out to level capped characters without it being just a “ding” bonus.

They aren’t charging gold for it.

It’s not a gold sink. (It could be though.) It doesn’t punish poor players or players who want to spend their gold elsewhere. More, it means that it’s not a thing that can be bought with real money.

It doesn’t allow players to cheat around the treasure hunting.

By requiring the 100 treasures achievement, players HAVE to get out there and find at least a large number of them. Maybe not all of them, maybe not all the annoying jumping puzzle ones, but a ton of them. Enough that you feel like you have done the work.

The rep grinds don’t seem to be THAT important, but hey, it means we have to put some work in. I don’t mind WORKING for a reward. Especially one as good as flying. It’s not easy. It’s not too hard. It focuses on getting the players through the content they want us to experience, the way they want us to experience it, but then opens the game up to how WE want to play afterward. And players are going to do it. I bet TONIGHT there will be a huge rush of people getting out into the world to get to work on these achievements.

I like this solution. I would go so far as to say I love it, it’s the correct way to do it, and they should do it this way in the future. Make us work for it. Not RNG or gold based, but achievement based. It’s a really great compromise between the two sides of players who want to fly and designers who want us to stop flying over their content.

I can’t wait to get back to the skies, archeology, and exploring the world.

 

Motion Sickness in Games

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Eternal Darkness. Morrowind. Drakon the Ancient Gates. Oblivion. Half Life 2. Quake 4. Portal. WoW. Minecraft. Borderlands. Legend of Grimmrock 2.

What do all these games have in common?

I have vomited at some point while or directly after playing them. It’s worth noting, I never once vomited while pregnant. But I play Half Life 2 for 10 minutes and I am seeing my lunch again.

This has come up yet again because of WoW’s newest raid, Blackrock Foundry, and one of the fights is pretty awful.

I am a bit surprised it’s just coming up now, because for me at least, Grimrail Depot was far worse. Both fights have moving things, generally at a high speed, while the player needs to move or stay stationary. The problem occurs in that the player’s brain is immersed to the point they FEEL like they should be moving, but they aren’t, so everything gets a bit wonky.

In Grimrail, the specific problem is that the players are on a moving train. The developers added a screen “jostle” to sell the realism of being on a train. Then they have a section where the boxcar walls are lowered and there are canyon walls rushing by. But those walls have stripes on them, so the sensation of movement is very strong.

In the Hans and Frans fight, the floor moves, and the player has to run around dodging things while fighting against the conveyors.

“How does something like this get through?”

In my experience – it gets through because no one notices it. I have worked at 4 game companies, and only ONCE have I worked with someone else who got motion sick playing games. Occasionally a game will pop up that makes a large number of people motion sick, but they just adjust the fov and move on. (This is how I fixed Minecraft.) But for those of us that are sensitive to it, this is not going to solve our problems.

Game devs are generally, by definition, Gamers. They play tons of games. They have been playing games forever. (And if they don’t, like some artists, they don’t even play the games they make! But that’s another post entirely.) Much like riding on a boat, you get “sea legs” that makes you less likely to notice or be bothered by the motion sickness. You can acclimate. So by the time devs get to the point of working on massive games like WoW, they generally don’t get sick from it anymore.

“Okay, but I still feel like ralphing, how do I get around this without just skipping this fight?”

In a perfect world, Game Devs would contract a QA team to test and find things like – color blind issues, motion sickness, epilepsy, deafness, etc. Pretty much everything Able Gamers fights to raise awareness and solutions for. But there isn’t always time or money. (However for Blizzard I call bullshit. They know better. They have the money. They should have their OWN internal team checking for it.) At the very least, each company should have avenues for employees to bring attention to and address these issues. (Just like they should also do with sexist and problematic things!) At every company I have worked at, I invariably end up as a “motion tester” because I complain VERY LOUDLY any time I get motion sick. I get called to desks to test stuff and help the designer tweak areas and gameplay sequences to make them less hurl inducing.

But this isn’t a perfect world. So how did I get over it? After all, some of those games I listed are my favorite games! And I have to keep doing Grimrail for alts for the legendary ring!

– Saltines. It’s an old standby for a reason.

– Ginger ale. Again, we give this to sick kids for a reason.

– Greasy food. I have a method for a game like Skyrim or Grimmrock. I play it until I am feeling VERY unwell, then I eat some McDonalds. It calms my stomach down, and I wait until the sickness has completely passed, then do it again. Skyrim took 4 attempts. Grimmrock took 3. Drakon was the WORST. It took 11. I was persistent.

– Preggo Pops. Seriously. I got these while pregnant and there is a reason I never got sick. Further, they are super safe, and many moms even give them to kids when they are ill.

– Lemon water. Especially if you are one of the people who has mouth watering right before vomiting. Lemon water knocks that right out. (Or just sucking on a lemon if you can stand it.)

Within the game solutions:

– Point your camera straight down. Or adjust it so you can’t see the movement. I am awful at Grimrail for this reason, I have to just stare at the plate and can’t look up at the walls.

– On Hans and Frans, get your warlocks to set up their portals ALONG the “stationary” bands. These are the thinner bands. Then STAY ON THESE BANDS. Do not spend any time if possible on the moving part. Doing this means your camera doesn’t move, so YOU feel stationary, even though everything else ever is moving. Use the portals to move for smashers and try to focus on only looking at the bands. (I also found it helped to keep my camera facing the same way – the door direction – and stay on the one band.)

– Turn down spell effects. The more graphical stuff you have going on, the more it fights with your ability to focus on anything. Turn it way down. This just clears out the noise.

– Request that your raid take a break after this fight. Maybe you can sit out the next trash clear. But step AWAY from the game, and eat something bready.

– Persist. You will get your sea legs.

– Last resort – Dramamine or Sickness bands. While in school, we had two semesters where we worked in Half Life 2. I took that crap twice a day for 6 months. It sucks, but it made me able to function in the tool to build levels for it.

I feel like Blizzard could do somethings to help this without destroying the fight. Clearly delineating the stationary parts. Tune it so you can lose 3-4 people without wiping (so the motion sickers can just die). But they do need to do something. This is definitely a stepping away point for some people.

Promoting Better Play

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“We’re not above bribing you to be nice to each other. And frankly, neither are you.”

They said this at the BlizzCon they announced Warlords of Draenor at. And I remember thinking… That will be a neat trick. In the words of our tank Xxiv, “You can grief someone at anything, says the guy who was griefed in Journey.” (Journey has no chat, matchmaking etc, you just move through the world with another player. But apparently his match didn’t move. They just stood still.)

As a game designer, I spend most of my time trying to figure out how to convince the player to do what I want them to do, without just flat out telling them. And sometimes with just flat out telling them. It’s funny, because it kind of crosses over into being a parent. How do you get the toddler to do what you want, without forcing them to do it.

As all parents and pet owners know, there is positive and negative reinforcement. Positive is rewarding them for doing what you want. Bonuses, treats, special treatment. Negative is punishing them for doing things you don’t want them to do. Spanking, time outs, etc. Blizzard is pretty good at getting a majority of people to “play” the way they want us to play. They want you to quest instead of grind just killing mobs? Make the quests have better rewards, take less time, and give more experience.

Torgo answered the question “Does WoD promote better play?” and he answered the question from his pov. But the game designer reads that question very differently.

This question is asking a lot of things. And play is a very loaded word for a designer. So I wanted to answer it, with my designer cap on. Play is not just about with other people, but everything you do within the game. other people are going to come into it more because it’s a multiplayer game.

Yes. And oh god no.

I am sure you are all surprised at my dichotomy.

Promoters!

– Garrisons do an AMAZING job of promoting play. People logging in at weird hours and staying up late to check missions, discussing buildings endlessly trying to figure out the best ones, helping with invasions, even working together to get achievements to get the guild banners! Further, they provide a very REAL reward in the form of bonuses, extra gear, extra materials. Very much a positive reinforcement to get us to play and play with all the parts.

– Flexible raid size. Our team of raiders is 15, just within our guild and real life social group. Now 2-3 of those might drop or wander away, but that would still leave us with 12. 12 is an awful number of raiders in the old system. In WoD – no worries. Even so, if you add our partners in crime, we are at potentially 32 raiders. THIRTY.TWO. That’s a ton of players and far beyond what I ever expected us to be at. So many people to play and have fun with. No man or woman left behind!

Non-Promoters!

– Items in dungeons not dropping from the final boss. Oh man… do you know how many times I have gotten into a Shadowmoon Burial Grounds run, the tank has been just terrible… we get to the first quest item and bam – he’s gone? Only to realize he was a dps, who had a tank offspec and used it just to rush to the item? It’s in the double digits already. Even worse – I had to run Grimrail Depot TWICE because I forgot to pick up the quest item off the ground, and even though I had a lockout where I had killed all the bosses, it wouldn’t let me back to that spot. So far actually none of the rumored “incentives” to keep playing together have been clearly communicated. And furthermore I have actually found it MORE difficult to succeed in a group of friends because we don’t get the luck of the draw buff.

– Proving Grounds. These were flawed to begin with. Players don’t really learn about their class in them. They don’t learn how to raid. They don’t learn how to move out of the stupid. All it does it gate the content. And what if my friend I want to drag along on heroics can’t do it? That doesn’t promote play, it promotes frustrated and upset people. This is a heavily negative reinforcer. It’s not good at all in that it makes players feel like crap and like they shouldn’t even be trying to play.

– No Flying. I haven’t done one bit of archeology or farming because oy is it HARD to get around Draenor. It’s very clear they wanted to gate and limit the player’s movement, but did they have to make it SO MUCH in every zone? It’s a very strong reason for why I don’t want to do these parts of the game. I don’t want to use a glider, I want to fly. Fiddly one off mechanics over a system wide ability I paid a great deal of gold for… yeah.

– Melee unfriendly fights. I already know one casualty to the melee unfriendly encounters of Slag Mines and Shadowmoon Burial Grounds. It is only a matter of time before we get into raids and find them there. Too often Blizzard seems to think the answer to making a fight “difficult” or complex is to make it insanely busy. There are a dozen different things to keep track of. And poor melee have to worry about huge swaths of downtime as they move. They have done this to a lesser extent to ranged, by taking away our ability to have some spells cast while moving. This is so negative. Especially for my guild groups, which are melee heavy. We would queue for a dungeon, get halfway through and be unable to complete it, despite having all done it singularly with pugs. The luck of the draw seems to be the deciding factor here, and we all miss it by playing with our friends. Bad choice.

In the end, I think WoD is just as good and just as bad as most expansions at promoting play both alone and in groups.

Waiting to be a Hero

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I didn’t get the chance to raid in Vanilla WoW. I wish I had. 40 man raids seemed like an insane and exciting thing to participate in. Pandemonium. That’s what I would expect. I did raid in a 25 man guild in Burning Crusade though, so I can imagine the headache of trying to get 25 people logged in, geared, and ready to go, scaled up to 40. OW.

In the 25 man guild I was in, we had about 30 raiders. (Or up to 35 at various other times.) There were 3 guild ranks, just for raiders. They were ranked, the highest being called Thunderfury. If you successfully posted above a certain amount of DPS or HPS you would earn that rank. When forming the raid, Thunderfuries were accepted first, then the middle rank (Sulfuras something) and Warglaive as the bottom rank. Anyone who had all blue/purple gear of the appropriate level could be a Warglaive. The problem was, once you were a Warglaive, the only way to advance your character was through raiding… so you had to wait for a night when not too many Thunderfuries showed up to raid to hopefully get in. If there were 6 spots, and 7 raiders waiting, then you had to roll against each other and hope you weren’t the lowest roll. The system mostly worked, except it was very hard to ensure you were always getting to raid unless you were very lucky or very dedicated.

When I left that guild and converted to Alliance, it was a bit different. I joined a guild as a tank, and eventually switched to healing. But we were a 10 man guild. This changed everything in that we had a fairly solid core of 9 raiders who were always present. Generally we could fill that final slot with any pug and do fairly well. However, over time we gained a few lost a few raiders, as always happens and started having issues with having 11-12 people showing up. When you can only take 10 raiders, this leads to the guildleader having to make very painful choices.

Do you take your friend? Do you take the high powered, but also very annoying person? Do you take the sweet, but oblivious person? Do you take the undergeared so they have a chance to get loot and improve or the overgeared so the raid has the easiest time of it? And oh goodness don’t take them, we already have four people fighting over cloth and no one to take the leather drops…

When I left that guild, I ended up in OLN, a 25 man guild that had about 35 raiders. So each night they would draw lots and split into 25/10 raid teams. That worked for Wrath, but Cataclysm was a different story. We lost some big players, had other players drift away, but couldn’t find *anyone* to recruit. I even talked about our insane solution to this event before. It was absurd. 16 raiders squished into a 10 man hole. By the time we hit Dragon Soul we were firmly down to 10 raiders. It was the end of that guild. We couldn’t recruit, we couldn’t bulk back up, we couldn’t get people who were willing to be on a waitlist just in case.

And that’s the problem with tightly tuned raids. When you can’t just carry one or two people, you have to have a finely tuned team to consistently show up to raid. When life happens, you lose a raider and it could be the beginning of the end for your team.

When I formed a guild with Misstorgo, recruiting was our first and main issue. We had to recruit people who wanted a casual experience, were willing to raid only 2 nights a week, and not cause drama. Through a series of lucky events, we ended up with several of my co-workers forming a core raid team. However, as we progressed through MoP we had several events that lead to losing a FEW raiders and not being able to replace them.

I think over the course of the expansion we changed more than half our raid team three times. More often than not, we would find interested people – but oh they couldn’t play without their two friends… Do you have any idea how awful it is being the 11th member of a 10 man raid team? You feel selfish if you say “No, I want to raid.” knowing it means someone else will have to sit out. You feel terrible not showing up because of course, that’s the one night that someone else can’t be there and then no one gets to raid.

But then, the Third Great Change came from Blizzard. Flex – the ability for the raid to scale based on the number of players – was implemented to all difficulty levels (except Mythic, which is fine because we aren’t hardcore like that) of raiding. 11 raiders? You’re good to go with all 11. 14? Yep. 19? YEP.

This literally changes the most painful and difficult part of running a guild into a non-issue. If we get down to around 12 players, easy, we just recruit a few more. No one has to sit, so there is no danger of them getting bored and finding another guild. The fights seem to actually be a bit easier with a few extra bodies. Missing a person? It’s fine, we have more. Your buddy who only plays a month or two then takes a 3 month break? We can bring him, when he decides to show up, and not worry about having to replace him.

WoW is most fun when playing with friends and now it doesn’t ask you to rank your friends and boot the ones who don’t fit into a 10 man hole.