PRAISE FROM PATAPON AND A PASSIONATE PLEA
The best thing Patapon creator Hiroyuki Kotani says in his new interview with Gamasutra is a simple lesson I wish more developers would learn:
In my previous career as a teacher, what I learned is that if my students are happy, they would learn more; so, we had to praise them rather than scolding them. So, that’s the biggest hint I got for the creation of games: I have to make the users happier, so they would feel like they are encouraged to go to the next stage.
It’s an obvious point (and one elaborated on very incisively at GDC 2008’s Treat Me Like A Lover session by Offworld columnist Margaret) but one that bears repeating.
As an example: one of the keys to Rock Band‘s success compared to Harmonix’s earlier rhythm games like Amplitude and Frequency wasn’t just the real-world fantasy of its plastic peripherals, but the subtle but constant reinforcement of just how brilliant you’re doing, what a fantastic rock star you actually are, when the in-game audience cheers your star-power successes and sings along to ‘your’ vocals when the full band’s maxing out their meters.
Developers: do more of this.
The Rhythm of Creation: Hiroyuki Kotani and Patapon [Gamasutra]
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