Episode 83 What is Game Balance?
What is Game Balance?
Hi and welcome to Experience Points by University XP. On Experience Points we explore different ways we can learn from games. I’m your host Dave Eng from games-based learning by University XP. Find out more at www.universityxp.com
On today’s episode we’ll answer the question “What is Game Balance?”
Many gamers often don’t think about “balance” when playing a game. But they should. That’s because balance creates and shapes what should be a positive player experience.
But what exactly is “game balance?” How is it created and designed in games; games-based learning; and gamification?
This episode will define game balance for the purposes of this discussion. Game balance will be addressed as a factor in game design. Game balance strategies will also be covered from a development standpoint.
Game balance also plays a critical role in defining and shaping the player experience. Therefore, game balance will be addressed as a factor that is both experienced and interpreted by players.
Finally, game balance principles will be covered as it relates to the design process and its relationship to player agency and competency
The tricky thing with talking about game balance is that there is no universally applied and accepted definition for it. Game balance for a AAA video game developer could be radically different from someone designing a simulation; and a big departure from someone creating a serious game.
Game balance as a whole is highly dependent on the focus; application; and most importantly; the intended audience of the game. Therefore, when considering and thinking about game balance, you should have a specific game in mind and how its application – and specifically the player experience – appears in the eyes of the player.
However, for the purposes of this episode, we’ll focus on games as closed systems and economies and that represent a mathematical model for players to engage with.
This often means a collaboration and whole utilization of a game’s mechanics and dynamics within the realm of the magic circle that constitutes the player experience.
In this context, we examine players’ actions and abilities that are offset by the game’s formal structures and decision space. Game balance here defines players’ actions as having agency with a reasonable expectation that such abilities will be able to achieve a desired outcome.
Again, dependent on the game, this could be wildly different from one another. A spin at the roulette wheel with the player intention of hitting 00 doesn’t make it more likely after one spin or after a hundred.
However; for a first person shooter a player expects to be able to fire their weapon when pulling a controller’s trigger. Game balance is about supporting and curating the player’s expectations for an event to occur. In this context, these results will occur dependent on the overall decision structure; randomness; and player agency within the game.
We see this from a more macro perspective when it addressing overall game dynamics and strategies that players implement and follow throughout the game. If several strategies are possible – which is possible in many games – then those strategies should have a balanced expectation of success for players.
One of the central issues to working with game balance during initial game design and game development is the concept of symmetry.
Some of the oldest and continuously played games such as chess; checkers; go; and backgammon all rely on symmetry for players and starting positions. These games are all also exclusively two player abstract games where all participants begin the game in the same position.
What makes modern games more complicated is not just the issue of thematic connections and other additions, but also the advent of additional players and other resources considered for a closed economy within the game.
This means that the idea of starting symmetry for games has fallen out of favor and has often been replaced with asymmetrical player powers; abilities; and setups.
This change has in turn made issues such as creating mechanics; point systems; and other forms of player feedback and in-game rewards more challenging to “balance” symmetrically when taking into consideration the other resources that a game creates as well as the actions and motivations of other players in the game.
Therefore, a goal for game designers is stop pursuing the outcome of a “perfectly balanced” game and instead focus on the idea of balance and the player experience.
Game balance doesn’t equate to the players’ perception of “balance” in the game. The latter of which is much more important for player engagement and overall player outcome such as in applied gaming like games-based learning.
This doesn’t mean that achieving this perception of balance in games is easy. Make no mistake: curating a game experience for this balance is exceptionally hard for game designers.
Achieving such an outcome consists of hours and hours of building hypothetical scenarios for which to balance game mechanics and dynamics. Scenarios which may never come to pass for the players themselves.
Despite this, the creation of perceptual game balance for players need to be addressed separately and exclusively for each designer during each stage of their process. With that also comes the priority of this balance as it aligns with the purpose and outcome of the game.
Commercial games catering to more hobbyist gamers may require a more rigorous balancing rubric. Whereas serious games created for teaching, learning, and development may not require such dedication towards achieving this “perfection.”
Based on the focus and overall purpose of the game, the designer may discover - through their own development or through play tester feedback - that some elements or strategies in the game become “overpowered” or “underpowered.”
As such; changes take place which even out the experience for players for a more balanced perceptual approach.
Additionally, different modalities of games allow developers and designers to address balance issues as the game reaches a wider market. Digital games support this more easily than other mediums as patches can be issued that remediate issues of game balance.
Table top games are another matter as often a new print run must be issued that addresses these critical issues in the game’s design.
Often designers will approach the core loop of games and the finite or infinite resources that are offered to players during the game. One of the earliest things that designers can do at this stage is to determine the amount of resources that players can invest in order to get a return on that action.
For table top games this can be as simple as determining what and how many actions players can take on their turn. For digital games this could include the walking or movement pace of a character or NPC over a given distance over a specific amount of time.
If we consider time a resource; then examining what player choices are in addition to their associated effects is critical. This is because strategies can be drastically different by changing these underlying game elements.
Conversion of “one resource to another resource” is important first to consider when examining pure mathematical balances for games.
This is where designers will first attempt to augment design elements. One of the most popular is to “buff;” or power up a weak character; action; or activity in order to correct an imbalance for that particular element.
While this is an agreeable activity for most designers; an underlying theme may be to first determine why a particular element is “weak” to begin with. Of course, this can’t be answered without first knowing the context of how the formal element is included in the game.
However, by taking this action without first realizing what is compromising its underlying integrity often leads to imbalanced game dynamics or strategies that emerge from the game.
Perhaps a more applicable view of game balance comes from modern fighting games. Most rely on player vs. player format where there are two antagonists fighting against one other. Selecting a character that has only won 20% of the time against other characters could reveal a flaw or weakness in the balance of that character.
However, it is also useful to examine experience and skill level of other players playing that character. Such an investigation could reveal that inexperienced players may only have a 20% win rate against other characters. However, more experienced players might have a win rate closer to 50%.
These results may indicate that the character selection is more balanced than it seems and that the 20% win rate result is due to player skill rather than game design.
This speaks to the inherent aspect of the player experience in game play. More skilled players may be in a different position to experience something from a game that may not be true for less experienced players.
Therefore, some aspects that could make games perceived as more balanced could include tailoring player feedback based on those experiences.
Such changes could include a more rapid and positive feedback loop that provides new players the chance to progress faster than more experienced players. This change could be self selective with players indicating their own skill level or it could be dynamically generated based on the play style and experiences for players with digital games.
However, the greatest goal to achieve for all game designers is to create a game that is perceived as balanced for experienced and novice gamers alike. Such “universal appeal” is incredible valuable for games as it caters to a broad player base.
This appeal and balance at different player experience levels also supports engagement in the flow state of games where they are challenged enough to keep the game interesting for them, interspersed with a few moments of reprieve which in turn prepares them for the next engaging challenge. In all, the game never pushes them completely outside of their comfort zone.
Of course the balancing aspects of games are a critical point for game designers and developers. However, the main consideration for game balance should really be the player. For the player experience is the main outcome of game play for players.
For many, this means that a single strategy; selection; or decision space for games isn’t the dominant way to win. This indicates that there really is an absence of choice for orthogames in pursuing a strategy to win.
This indicates that game balancing means creating experiences for players where multiple aspects - whether they be strategic; tactical; or both - represent viable avenues towards victory.
As a result, an additional level of complexity is added that makes the game experience more pliable and therefore different from game to game.
However, game balancing doesn’t always have to take place from the position of the game designers and developer. For instance, a game master in role playing games can execute wide agency and decision making capacity to curate the experience for the players based on their actions and observations. Such choices are made at their discretion in these idiogames.
Furthermore, game hosts other participants in game play – particularly for table top games – can also exercise discretion when it comes to creating a balanced experience for the player.
In these instances; house rules and other augmentation can take place when teaching a game or playing it for the first time in order to balance any skill or knowledge differences between players. This perhaps represents one of the most nimble ways that players can balance game play according their own handicaps and discretion.
For this means that actions can be taken to remove or mitigate factors that are outside of the control of players that may negatively affect their experiences.
Giving players the ability to take game balancing actions through game play is critical. This is especially true for games that are “balanced” at a professional level but demonstrate balance issues at an intermediate or novice level.
This can come about through player knowledge or skill of the game or through other factors such as the high demand of learning particular asymmetrical factions such as in Root for players.
This is where “casual” games excel at engaging participating players with simple core loops; regular and active feedback; and symmetrical abilities and starting positions.
Such simple setups allow players to fully engage in the game’s mechanics in order to demonstrate competency through their own agency in game play.
In this realm, it’s up to designers to determine the primary market and player base for the game and how to balance aspects of physical and mental challenges that entice and challenge players.
This means that some game dynamics - such as those determined largely by random number generation or chance - can have dynamically outsized impacts on the game state. Some chance is fun for casual games. However, large degrees of chance and resolution for serious gamers can be frustrating to deal with.
This means that design for and mitigating aspects of chance is one of the hardest aspects of game design and development. This is because the relative value of choice outcomes can be wildly different based on the architecture of the game and how resource distribution affects and influences different players of different ability levels and experiences.
This is especially true for learning game design when creating feedback loops that have negative consequences for players. Withdrawing points or other forms of resources could be a very visceral form of feedback in the player experience.
However, if the main expectation is to achieve a specific learning outcome; then such forms of feedback may promote the game experience but may detract from the learning experience.
Therefore, educators using games-based learning could balance certain aspects of game play by getting learners of the same experience level to play other players of the same or similar experience level.
Such “meta-balancing” could positively affect the player experience and avoids issues of sandbagging when applying games-based learning.
Likewise, individuals using gamification would do well to target exactly why users take actions and how those actions are reinforced through common gamification elements such as points, badges, and lead boards. Understanding how and why players take these actions is key to successful applied gamification.
This means that it’s critical as a gamification designer to understand users by asking questions and/or tracking their actions to determine what players are actually doing instead of what you think they should be doing.
Doing so will help you determine what ultimately motivates your users and identifies what actions individuals can take in order to complete both individual and organizational objectives.
The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses by Jesse Schell provides an incredible overview of game balancing principles that designers as well as educators can use for their own work.
Schell reviews twelve different aspects of game design balancing and the overall player experience that should be taken into consideration for game development.
Those principles include: fairness; challenge vs. success; meaningful choices; skill vs. chance; head vs. hands; competition vs. cooperation; short vs. long; rewards; punishment; freedom vs. controlled experience; simple vs. complex; and detail vs. imagination.
When addressing fairness it’s important for players to discover and realize that they have adequate resources in order to overcome challenges that the game presents.
A simple approach to this would be a quest within a game that requires the player to return three apples to earn a special item such as a shield. The game must provide an opportunity for the player to acquire three apples within the game.
The ease of which this is accomplished is within the hands of the game designer as they can determine if this is something more easily acquired now for a beginner player or requires more legwork and experience in order to attain this later in the game.
Furthermore; symmetrical game design makes the opportunity for players to acquire these apples relatively equal between players. Whereas asymmetrical game design may make this task easier or harder for different players to accomplish based on their starting resources and setup.
When addressing challenge versus success; game designers must review how and when a challenge impacts the player experience.
Some of the earliest challenges we encounter in games are relatively easy in order to engage players. However; later challenges might prove more difficult for us to surmount or require more knowledge; items; or in-game abilities before we can surmount that challenge and attain a specific reward.
Scaffolding these challenges appropriately helps to balance the player experience in engaging players early and keeping them engaged later on.
The agency in which players impart their decisions in the game hinges on their ability to make meaningful choices. Such choices made by players must be meaningful in some way to them.
Sometimes these meaningful choices could be purely cosmetic or narrative driven such as when players design a costume or back story for a character in a role-playing game.
However; other choices could be more impactful such as pursuing a strategy of game play that is successful a majority of the time. Designers can address this through “triangularity” as addressed by Schell that includes choices for players to pursue decisions that are “low-risk-low-reward” versus other decisions that are “high-risk-high-reward.”
Balancing those kinds of decisions often go hand in hand with determining the right mix of skill and chance in game design. For focusing too much on skill could make the game predictable and unapproachable for beginner or novice players.
Likewise, making the game too luck oriented makes it less fun for players and removes some of the agency of player decisions in the game.
One common game design strategy for new designers is focusing on the introduction of randomness. However; randomness can be broken down into input vs. output randomness.
Output randomness if often seen in roll-and-move games where a player rolls a pair of dice and must move their pawn that exact number of spaces on a single track. We see this most often games like Monopoly.
However, input randomness instead gives players some agency in how and when they can use a randomly generated set of choices. Using Monopoly as an example, a player could roll a pair of dice and have a choice of moving their pawn the value of one die; the value of the other; or the combined total of both.
This simple change in decision structure gives the player much more agency and opportunity to make meaningful choices in the games such as backgammon.
Video and digital games often provide opportunities for players to pursue different challenges in the “head vs. hands” game balancing scenarios.
Here, players should have an adequate balance that challenges their mental faculties - such as puzzle solving - versus other physical challenging activities such as dexterity activities that we see in games like Jenga or through various fighting games.
Another application of game balance is formulating activities where players play against one another versus when they must cooperate.
Often games fall into an orthogame or idiogame format. However; some digital games and table top games also incorporate elements of semi-cooperation where players must work with - or ally - with one another in order to accomplish their own objectives – such as in Rising Sun.
This balance of play between working with and against one another can also affect other game balancing aspects such as the length of the game. Addressing length of play can be a complex feature to design for.
However providing players the ability to create other game sessions that are tailored to their own wants and needs or the ability to “save” the game state to return to it at future time is meaningful and a positive aspect of the player experience.
The curation of this player expedience largely speaks to the core loop of the game and how certain actions taken by players are reinforced with feedback.
Rewards play an important role here in providing players with necessary in-game elements or resources which help them surmount different and varied challenges down the line.
Likewise, punishments make it so that players are negatively impacted for choices - or absence of choices - they’ve made in the game.
While negative feedback implementation can be incredibly derisive for the player; its application can have positive impact on directing the player to specific actions and tasks throughout the game.
Such choices made by players inform their freedom of the game versus a controlled experience from game play. Structuring and scaffolding agency within the game makes it so that players have a balance between what they can do and what they should do to get the most of the game play experience.
Additionally, that freedom versus controlled experience should also include aspects for simple versus complex activities which make it so that deeper game play becomes a more emergent practice the longer that players engage with the game.
Lastly, players should be provided with the opportunity to experience details of the game versus using their own imagination to “fill in the gaps.”
While much time, effort, and resources, and can be spent creating an incredibly detailed experience for players; often the individual imagination is unparalleled in what it can render.
Therefore, creating games that provide the right amount of details while also giving players the agency to imagine the rest is paramount.
This episode defined game balance and what it means for game designers; developers; and players. Game balance in game development was discussed in addition to what steps designers can take to balance their game designs.
Game balance at its heart is part of the player experience. Therefore, it’s important to consider how game balancing changes will affect how players play and interact with the game.
Lastly, game balancing principles from The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses by Jesse Schell were reviewed and discussed.
I hope you found this episode useful. If you’d like to learn more, then a great place to start is with my free course on gamification. You can sign up for it at www.universityxp.com/gamificationYou can also get a full transcript of this episode including links to references in the description or show notes. Thanks for joining me!
Again, I’m your host Dave Eng from games-based learning by University XP. On Experience Points we explore different ways we can learn from games. If you liked this episode please consider commenting, sharing, and subscribing.
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Cite this Episode
Eng, D. (2022, March 29). What is Game Balance?. Retrieved MONTH DATE, YEAR, from www.universityxp.com/blog/2022/3/29/what-is-game-balance
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