07-27-2020: Designing Minigames

Hey, fitlings and healthdralisks!

Today we're discussing the challenges and behind-the-scenes thinking behind designing minigames for Crestpeak Bay!

First of all, we should define what a minigame is. It's a game that's within a larger game, and it can be integral to the primary gameplay loop or it can be separate and optional, or a hybrid of the two. An example would be Gwent, a minigame, inside of Witcher III, the main game. The gameplay loop of Gwent is point accumulation along with a long-term progression in deck strength, which fits nicely into the primary gameplay loop of the Witcher, which is a combination of open-world questing, exploration, and combat. Gwent is an additional layer that fits really nicely on top of what's already there. A different example is Warioware, whose primary gameplay loop is survival, but the minigames make up the entirety of the gameplay.

The primary gameplay loop of Crestpeak is similar to many other life and social sims: long-term progression through our three main metrics (muscle, money, and relationships). Philosophically, we want to give the player freedom in deciding how they want to tackle these things, while placing enough incentives and interdependencies between our progression areas to encourage players to explore a good portion of the game.

To the point of freedom with incentives to certain behaviors, we are putting several minigames into Crestpeak. These minigames are optional, but serve to improve the player's progression in a fun, engaging way. Our minigames have these design requirements:

1. They must be simple to understand with room for increasing difficulty.
2. They must be repeatable without fatiguing the player with tedium.
3. There must be good variety between minigames.
4. The gameplay challenge must in some way relate to the challenge of the real-life activity it is meant to represent.
5. They must be less than two minutes per play.
6. They must have a score component so players can compare.

Right now we have two minigames already: workout and barista. They tick all these boxes, and while by themselves they may not feel like much, in concert with the rest of the game, they'll supply a good amount of gameplay variance to keep players engaged, while never being tedious in their design. We'll have adding a puzzle-based construction minigame, a target-based modeling game, and a deck-based personal training game in the coming months. It'll be up to you guys to help us test, tweak, and balance these games!

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