by David Whyld » Mon May 20, 2019 8:25 pm
After I posted that earlier, I went and had a good long look at some of the locations I’d added recently and was quite depressed to see how much pointless cr*p I’d included. One good example was an office which included a single important item – a computer – but countless other items which served no real purpose. There was a desk, complete with drawers that could be opened and closed and contained other items – a stapler, a pen, an eraser – which didn’t do anything and were instead there simply because they're the kind of things you expect to find in a desk drawer. There was a window, just because an office has to have a window, right? And through the window you could see a garden. With trees. And bushes. And a pool.
So much pointless, time-wasting nonsense.
In a fit of annoyance at myself, I went and re-wrote the room description and left it with the computer and nothing else. No desk. Maybe the computer’s floating in the air or maybe there's a desk there but it’s invisible. Either way, it can’t be referred to so it’s one less thing to worry about. The window’s also gone. And the garden with its trees and bushes and pool. Players may wonder about the lack of a window but I'm sure they’ll get over it.
And you know that? The room’s much better for it. I've put in a lot more descriptive text and added a few memories of previous times the player visited the office to give it some depth. It’s the same basic room as before, but now instead of being filled with lots of meaningless stuff for the player to waste time on, it’s been cut down to the basics. I like it a lot more. Players probably will, too. Instead of not knowing what's relevant and what isn't, and likely wasting a good deal of time opening and closing drawers, playing with staplers and pens and erasers, staring out of the window and pondering over purpose the pool has (i.e. none), their attention is now drawn to the only important item in the room: the computer.
Much better. And a whole lot less work, too, which is much better +1.
At some point I'm going to go through the other locations and pare them down to the essentials. I guess if this was the kind of game where important items are being hidden behind paintings or under creaky floorboards, it would be fine to have so much detail in the location descriptions, but it isn't, so it’s not. Another added bonus is that now I've come to this conclusion – and kicked myself for not coming to it sooner – I can concentrate on the game itself and stop fussing over every little tedious detail.