Balancing User Experience and Game Mechanics

Perfect game balance will ruin your game. Here's why: The "50% Trap." Most designers think perfect balance means every option should be equal, with two options having a 50% win rate each. But here's what I learned across 25+ years in AAA and indie studios: Players don't actually want perfect balance. What players actually enjoy is to experience a varied texture of situations where they have advantages and disadvantages over time. Rob Pardo, VP of Game Design for Blizzard Entertainment, used to tell our team: "Players will often say they've had the most fun not in situations where the battle was perfectly balanced, but instead in games where they had a very slight advantage the entire time. That way, they were always winning, but the enemy put up enough of a fight that they felt scared." Think about your favorite gaming moments. Were they the perfectly even matches? Or were they the nail-biters where you barely scraped by with clever plays and split-second decisions? The best games create meaningful decisions. Here's how I would design engaging balance: • Focus on player agency over statistical equality • Create distinct advantages for different strategies • Design for "very slight advantage" feelings • Build varied textures of challenge over time • End matches quickly once meaningful decisions disappear Next time you play your favorite game, notice how it makes you feel slightly advantaged while keeping you on edge. That's intentional design at work. PS. Join 6,000+ designers in the Funsmith Club Discord: https://lnkd.in/g7_2HSYA

From the long list of "things UX can learn from game design" is a concept called Time To Hadouken, or TTH. If you believe that good UX is about giving your users superpowers, read on. For those unfamiliar - the Hadouken is an iconic ability from the Street Fighter games. Normal character attacks are things like punches and kicks but "⬇↘➡🤜" made your character yell "HADOUKEN!" and shoot a big blue energy blast. This was immediately appealing to players - it wasn't just awesome, but also accessible. You could jump into your first fight and be shooting Hadoukens left and right. These "combos" became the selling point of the game series, and many other game franchises copied them - but often got one key thing very wrong. It's the same thing that UX often gets wrong. A lot of productivity software makes the same pitch to customers: we will give you superpowers, you will be able to cool stuff that you can't do in any other app. And then they put barriers in the way of doing that thing. Their "time to Hadouken" - the time that it takes for the app to fulfill its core promise - gets padded out. Just like the games that copied Street Fighter made their combos increasingly esoteric to please hardcore fans or added unnecessary cinematics and intro stages that delayed the action, apps throw things like welcome tours in the way of the user, or present them with a blank canvas that they must populate before they can experience the app's most important features. Often this happens because there's no clear sense on the team of what their product's Hadouken actually is. It's easy to pull out a list of features, but not very helpful. Street Fighter also has a list of features - there are 121 characters, and each has many combos - but only one Hadouken. It's the most basic selling point that makes the user go "whoa, that was awesome!" in the shortest period of time. If you don't know what your Hadouken is, you desperately need to do the work to figure it out - and then build your onboarding in such a way that minimizes the time to Hadouken.

Today lets talk a bit about Level Design Intent As level designers, our goal is to create more than just spaces to navigate – we craft experiences. But sometimes, a level can feel like it's "missing" something or that certain elements are "out of place." In many cases, this happens when the designer’s intent doesn’t align with the experience being delivered. Every level should be built with a clear purpose, ensuring that mechanics, pacing, and layout work together to serve the player's journey. Here’s how we can refine our design philosophy to make every space feel intentional and engaging: 1. Design Intent: Purpose Over Aesthetics Every design choice should reinforce the level’s core experience. If an area feels unnecessary or out of place, it may not be serving the player's journey effectively. Whether it's guiding the player forward, creating tension, or rewarding exploration, every element should have meaning beyond aesthetics. 2. Player-Centric Flow Good design is invisible. Levels should feel natural to move through, balancing challenges with rest, guiding players with subtle visual cues, and ensuring that obstacles make sense within the game world. When flow is disrupted without reason, players notice – and not in a good way. 3. Pacing and Emotional Investment A great level is like a well-told story: it knows when to build tension and when to let the player breathe. If the pacing is off, players might feel rushed or lost. Thoughtful pacing keeps them engaged, making every high-stakes moment feel earned. 4. Challenge vs. Frustration Difficulty should push players without discouraging them. If a level feels frustrating, it might not be communicating feedback effectively. Good challenge feels fair – it teaches, adapts, and rewards persistence instead of punishing mistakes without reason. 5. Consistency and Immersion A level should always reinforce the world it belongs to. If lighting, environment design, or mechanics feel disconnected from the game’s themes, the immersion breaks. Players notice inconsistencies, and when they do, the experience suffers. Intent is Everything Level design isn’t just about building spaces – it’s about shaping experiences. When a level feels "off," it’s often because the intent behind it is unclear. By keeping the player at the heart of our decisions and ensuring every element serves a purpose, we can create levels that feel seamless, engaging, and memorable.