Physicality in gamesv0

Note: This article is unfinished and in progress.

I’m picky with games

but not in more typical ways such as having genre preferences; I consider myself an omnivore there. I’m picky with how things move in games.

Let’s narrow the scope down to the bare basics for a second here. At a minimum, games include a character that moves (which is functionally just a fancy camera mount if we get technical) and a world it moves in. With even just those two elements, one can build a satisfying game. Many games unfortunately take movement for granted, that you move to get through the game, but that is a waste to me; movement itself should always be a game in and of itself.

Movement can be made interesting when:

• your character has momentum that needs to be managed to move around effectively
• poor movement results in negative outcomes (death, point loss, etc.)
• movement itself is a resource (commonly seen with sprint bars in a basic sense)
• you can complete a game more quickly if you can master how you move

Time to get physical

Personally, I consider physics in games to be one of the greatest sources of interesting decision making you can get.

To be continued…