I’ve just created a new game rating category, the Brain Rating:
I loved the old school times when a player was smart enough to learn about the interface and controls without tutorials, tooltips, or extremely visual guidance. If your character died, you just tried again. No big deal. No rush away. People used to spend time trying to solve puzzles, or finding doors, or whatever, they didn’t abandon the game immediately looking for walk-through or blaming the game/level designer.
That’s why I created a new rating. Enter Brain Rating.
If you are tired of people unable to interact with your game, unable to solve that dead-simple puzzle you created or unable to figure out how to control the main character, among several others, that rating is for you!
Just place this warning sign in every game you have. Let’s stop this no-brain madness and go back to good old times, when spending hours to defeat a boss was a great achievement and lots of fun, not a huge headache.
Brain Rating Badges
We have all flavors! Pick the one that best fits your needs and be happy.
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Old school games
Check those games below and tell me if the player is instructed somehow. You just have to figure it out yourself, it is part of the fun.
with so many options with the user today to waste time, it is difficult to keep a users attention on one thing. to do that you will just have to make simple games that will explain itself, or at least keep the game objectives clear and only changing meaning fully.
Yeah, I am afraid that is the whole true. Back to Mario’s and Contra’s time, there wasn’t so many games available, so player would stick with a single game for a long time. Today things are really different. As you said, if the player does not figure out what to do in 10 seconds, he will just leave. It’s sad but true.