Game-Pillar

In this github you will find information about what Game Pillars are, good and bad examples and how to implement them in your projects!

What is a Game Pillar?

When you start developing a game, the first thing you need is an idea. Here’s where game pillars play an important role, as they are the basis, as it name suggests, for a game. Not only do they focus on game features, but more focused on the design of the game itself. They are one of the most important foundations in Game Design, and should be followed during the whole process.

Benefits of Game Pillars

  1. They help the team see how the project will be going.
  2. Give a clear vision about how it should be done.
  3. Make more easy the understanding of the whole design.

Game pillars are the first step in order to cohesive the team in the first game design decisions.

Differences between game pillar and Unique Selling Point (USP)

In this point I wanna make clear the difference between a USP and a Game Pillar. If you do the process well, the USP should be a Game Pillar. However, a Game Pillar is not necessarily a USP. A USP isn’t necessarily a game mechanic. It can also be a specific visual style, an original location or story, or even a tremendous amount of content. A few examples:

Jet Set Radio: Manga-like visual style

Fight Night: When the game was launched, innovative punch controls

Dead Space: Monster dismemberment

Example: in Gears of War 2, they used Accessibility as a game pillar. Players will take it as “less difficult”, so it would be an error to put that word as a USP (and they did not).

Examples of good Game Pillars

1. The Last of Us

  1. Crafting: ammo is scarce, so to cause higher amount of damage it is better to use items populating the world.
  2. Story: the game is heavily narrative, focuses on the story of the two main characters.
  3. AI partners: the game is all about building relationships between characters with the AI.
  4. Stealth: combat is used in this game, but if you were to run and gun, the game would be extremely difficult.

2. Team Fight Tactics

  1. Mastery: the game should always feedback a feeling of improvement and growth, whether the 1st or 100th game.
  2. Playful Competition: beyond a rewarding game, TFT is also a shared experience, one that is competitive and challenging.
  3. Discovery: the gradual addition of champions, change in items and champions should refresh the game and avoid getting stuck in the same meta.

3. Clash of Clans

  1. Offensive Capabilities: In different town halls, you get more troops and abilities, so the pattern grows in offensive capabilities throughout the different levels.
  2. Attacking skills: what the player can do with his offensive capabilities, strategies, etc.
  3. Defensive Capabilities: In different town halls, you get more defenses with different skills, in order to defend your resources.
  4. Base Design: what the player can do with his defense.

Examples of bad Game Pillars

Now that we’ve seen some good examples, we have to focus on the bad ones to avoid it:

  • Tasks: putting a task as a game pillar like “make the inventory look clean” or “combat is dynamic” are not good game pillars.
  • No meaning: this game pillars like “make the game funny” or “make the combat enjoyable” are also bad game pillars.

How to implement them

  • First of all, comes the brainstorming. Write down every idea, then you can start filtering.
  • When you have all your ideas, think if you will have enough means to implement it. If the answer is no, decline it. If not, go ahead.
  • Then, is this idea gonna look attractive to the player? Will it help the game not to be boring? You have to make sure the idea helps the game, that’s a basic of game design; if it works, keep it, if not, remove it or rework it.
  • Finally, when you have all your game pillars, you have to ask this question. Was there a game before that worked with all your game pillars? If so, you have to start again.

Things to take into account during the development

Once the project is started, game pillars keep being pretty useful. The game pillars are the basis of the game, but a project like a game changes a lot through the development. To keep coherence, you always need to keep in mind if the
changes are working with the pillars. If that’s not the case, you should discard the idea (as much we like it).

Summary

Game Pillars are concepts and ideas decided at the beginning of a game. They give the team a clear vision of the game and help us to make good decisions and avoid fails. We have to keep them in mind through the development because the design is not static.

Biography