Of course, ranked progression systems also have other, older influences. I contacted the team at Respawn Entertainment who are producing Apex Legends, for this article I hope you were able to understand how a similar game tried to balance its own progression system (and also faced unfair accusations). By email, David Duong, senior director of product management at Respawn, and Aaron Rutledge, senior manager of experience design, responded that “their influence comes from tested fundamentals. and testing, both in-game and out-of-game”.
“There are certainly some established languages that are popular for competing development systems,” says Rutledge and Duong. “For example, the concept of precious metals and gems representing prestige dates back to the early Olympic Games, and you can see that same Bronze, Silver, Gold, etc system across many games and genres .”
Of course, fairness is an important component of competition; It is often pointed out that video games, which guarantee a reward for our achievements, are fair in the way that life is often not. However, developers are still stuck with the fact that “fairness” means different things to different people. This cannot be reduced to a simple algorithm. For example, is it fair that one student can work eight hours a day, while another has to work and take care of their children? In what ways might fairness be at odds with pleasure? You can understand the philosophy of this: What is equality of opportunity, and how do we realize that condition? Or specifically: How much experience should you get for a kill? Equity, say Rutledge and Duong, is a never-ending negotiation between the developer and the community.
“In terms of how we measure it, ‘fairness’ is nearly impossible to measure precisely,” Duong and Rutledge said. “So we do our best by looking at the inputs that we have available to us with player and test player feedback, a dose of qualitative and quantitative research data. healthy amount and a little bit of inner intuition to try and come up with the right system for us players.”
However, over time, developers have been able to distinguish certain principles. Loot boxes, virtual random items, have been criticized for their resemblance to gambling, and players hate the system they define as “pay-to-win”: the idea that in any game where players pay money and no pay, players pay more than at a competitive advantage. Bycer says: “The days of being 100% clear, like in ‘this is the best weapon in the game, give us your credit card number, and you’ll get it,’ those days are gone. again”. “Consumers have gotten wise to that, and so have developers: it’s become a lot more refined.”
Respawn’s Rutledge and Duong say that one of the ways they create a system that is fair to players is to understand that players play at different odds. Players can log in daily, weekly or monthly; Therefore, players need short, medium and long term goals to work towards. Play must be paced, divided into daily challenges and missions, with weekly challenges that limit after they have passed the daily challenges. And after completing weekly challenges, they can still earn XP for their overall account level. “Weekly challenges drive the majority of your progress in the Battle Pass. The weekly challenges in this Battle Pass stack on top of each other and reset weekly to let less frequent players play,” said Rutledge and Duong. can still make meaningful and rewarding progress throughout the season.”
