1. Make-A-Mode
Lastly, an idea to get more mileage out of games by simply letting us create our own "modes" before we start, almost like a user-friendly "debug" mode. Debug modes are used by developers to quickly jump around to specific locations, try specific things, tweak some numbers, and see what happens. Plenty of old PC games featured a commands such as "godmode," which made the player invincible, or "noclip," which let them pass through walls. Debug isn't usually meant for players to use because it breaks the illusion of a seamless world with unquestionable rules, but there are a few great reasons why it's time to let us under the hood. For one, we no longer have cheat codes. Chris DeLeon from HobbyGameDev.com discussed the merits of cheat codes and game tinkering in a
recent video, and he's right: game designers don't always know best. The games we loved as children often had secret codes which let us bypass what the designer intended. Before the Internet revolution, these codes were so precious that they sold gaming magazines by the thousands. Today, the "modding community" has done something even better, by creating and sharing their own versions of existing games. But too few games support this, and nobody makes it very easy, despite Steam's Workshop functionality. You're basically re-engineering a game the hard way. What we really need is an easy, no-brainer method of just customizing our playthrough. And what's the downside of letting us have it? Those who don't want it can ignore it, while most people would be delighted to play with the gravity settings, projectile speed, health and damage amounts, or the starting items and abilities. It mulitplies the entertainment value of the game and it takes practically zero work. Just include a little disclaimer that it may cause unintended effects and break the game, and we'd laugh when it happens. Realistically, it would also relieve a lot of pressure from game designers to make things "perfect", saving work balancing every aspect when players are guaranteed to think could be improved with a few tweaks anyway. It takes an old idea and evolves it for the next generation. What do you think? How should the real new generation really be heralded in? Share your own thoughts in the comments section.