The Trick is to Stay Behind?: Defining and Exploring the Design, Space of Player Balancing Mechanics

The Trick is to Stay Behind?: Defining and Exploring the Design, Space of Player Balancing Mechanics

The Trick is to Stay Behind?: Defining and Exploring the Design, Space of Player Balancing Mechanics

David Gonçalves, Daniel Barros, Pedro Pais, João Guerreiro, Tiago Guerreiro, André Rodrigues

Abstract

"In multiplayer gaming, skill disparity can lead to frustrating and ex-cluding experiences. Balancing approaches exist to level the playing field (e.g., providing aim assistance to low-performing players), but it is unclear how different design choices affect individual player ex-perience. We first introduce a design space for balancing mechanics encompassing six categories: Determination, Timing, Targeting, Ef-fect, Feedback, and Information. We then present a mixed-methods study, focused on the effect of two subcategories: Targeting Direc-tion and Effect Dependency on skill. In this study, eight pairs of participants played a game prototype and experienced seven balanc-ing mechanics. We collected data from questionnaires and group interviews, revealing implications for future designs, including the importance of 1) merited victory that does not ignore individual achievements, 2) sense of agency when determining the balancing before and during gameplay, and 3) balancing as an intrinsic part of the game that does not disrupt the core gameplay."

Reference

Gonçalves, D., Barros, D., Pais, P., Guerreiro, J., Guerreiro, T., & Rodrigues, A. (2024). The Trick is to Stay Behind?: Defining and Exploring the Design Space of Player Balancing Mechanics. ACM. https://dl.acm.org/doi/full/10.1145/3613904.3642441

Keywords

Gaming, Multiplayer, Balancing