Ace Attorney's Systems

Ace Attorney

Ace Attorney is a series of adventure games. In the games players play as a lawyer arguing against a prosecutor in a court. Players objective is to find the truth of the case and save the defendant. The game is so well-designed that it makes players immersed into the game. Let's talk about the systems of the game for a little bit.

There are about 4 or 5 cases in a game. These cases are related in some way so that these cases form a large story. Every case is a homicide case in order to make players excited.

                                        

Homicide

In most cases, the defendant is innocent but he/she is framed by the real murderer. The story has to be so. Then after players find the truth, they can feel happy because they win the court argument and find the truth. If the defendant was not innocent, the player would feel unhappy because although they find the truth, they lose the fight. That's why every case looks similar.

The defendant is innocent

Every case can be divided into two parts: One part is outside the court and the other part is inside the court. Outside the court, players play as a detective going around different places and trying to find valuable information and evidences. Inside the court players play as a lawyer trying to prove that the defendant is innocent using different evidences.

Outside the court, players can interact with different characters and different places. They can investigate the places and try to find some evidence. They can also talk with different persons and try to find some useful information and evidences. This seems pretty free. However, in order to add to story elements, these investigations are made very linear in Ace Attorney. So the story is always progressing. 

In order to make players still feel some freedom, the game uses several indirect controls: Players can select different topics talking with persons, but one topic will appear only after the previous topic is done. Players can go by different places at any time, but the event will happen only after the previous event happened. So when I play this game, I don't feel much restriction in this part.

This is totally 'free'

Another unique system is 'Heart Locks'. Players have a special emerald which can see if people are hiding some secrets. These secrets are visualized as 'Heart Locks' in the game. Players have to find evidences and try to break these 'Heart locks'. In essence, this is an interrogation. But the visualization of the secrets makes it so exciting: we can see the moments when these locks are broken and we succeed in the interrogation.

The heart locks

Inside the court, the core gameplay element is the cross examine. The witness will talk about what they saw about the homicide. There are probably some contradictions between his testimony and the evidences. Our task is to find out the contradiction.

                                   

                                   

Cross Examination

In cross examinations, we can choose from different sentences. When we are not sure where the contradiction is, we can choose to 'press'. 'Press' means ask further about the certain sentences. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. When it works, we get some new testimonies.

When we are sure where the contradiction is, we can choose to 'present'. We can show the evidence which contradicts with the testimony. If we succeed, then the witness will be panic and change his/her testimony. Then we cross examine again.

After these processes, we are nearer and nearer to the truth. We can find who the real murderer is. It feels so good when we find the contradictions by ourselves and we will be immersed into the game.

There are other systems to make the game more variable. For example, in the emotion system, players have to find the contradiction between the witness' emotions and the testimonies. In the small action system, players can find small actions witnesses are doing when they are lying. They are very fun but they cannot be the core gameplay system: They are not as logical as cross examinations and can be boring if there are too many of them.

                                       

Emotion System

Small Action System

Of course, we cannot forget about the exciting stories, different characters, excellent music, etc. in the game. But the systems in the game make it distinctive from other detective stories, movies, etc. It makes us truly participate in the game.

Make it more addictive

Let's think about why some games are more addictive than others. I will take ARAM(All Random All Mid) mode in League of Legends and Flippy Bird as examples. I have to admit that although the ARAM mode is highly unbalanced and not so strategic, it is more addictive than other modes. I also have to admit that although Flippy Bird is not so rich in game content, it is more addictive than most of other games in Appstore.

Firstly, let's talk about our brains. Our brains are almost the same from the brains tens of thousands ago. So we think as the same way as our ancestors did.  Thousands of years ago, the environment is changing all the time and very dangerous. So the best way to survive is living for the current moment. So nowadays, we still don't like to fight for the faraway happiness subconsciously. We tend to get the happiness we can get instantly.

That's why I am always procrastinating. When the deadline of an assignment is a week later and there is a new attractive game, I tend to choose playing the game instead of doing homework. Why is the game more attractive? Because the happiness of finish the assignment will come to my brain next week. Meanwhile, the happiness of playing the game will come to my brain instantly. So I will probably procrastinate until there are two or three days left for the assignment. When there is not much time left, it is more attractive to do the homework instead of playing the game: The anxious will make playing game not so attractive and the happiness of finishing the homework is not so far away.

Blaming ourselves for the procrastination is of no use because it is one part of our brain. The effective way to lessen procrastinating is making the task more attractive and making procrastination less attractive. If the tasks are very interesting and give me happiness very quickly, I will like to do it and stop procrastination. I can split big tasks into tiny pieces and give ourselves a reward after finishing even a tiny piece; I can work with others to make tasks like competitions; I can work in an environment where procrastination is not so fun because I will be punished. However, procrastination still exists because it is still very attractive. I feel it is better not push ourselves too hard or I will put myself in anxiety.

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There are so much digressions. Let's come back to game design. Why some games are so attractive and addictive? Because they give us happiness instantly. Even when we push a button, the game will prize us and give us reward! When we beat a monster, look at the number telling us how much damage we dealt, and the money and the piece of meat the monster dropped. We got these rewards 1 second after we did something. 

In ARAM mode of LoL, I played as Annie, when I pushed buttons at the right time in the right order, then I had a large bear and we heard 'You slain an enemy' and 'Double kill'. What's more, I see the number '+140G' twice; After 30 seconds, I won the team fight; After 1 minute we found I could buy new items; After 10 minutes, we won the game. There are bunches of rewards after I did right and they came so quickly (No more than 30 minutes). In the normal game, every reward comes slowlier because there are not so many chaotic team fights and the game lasts longer.

Another thing makes ARAM mode addictive is because you got random champions and they are highly unbalanced in ARAM. It makes the champion selection more interesting because we don't know what we will get and how we will be in the game.

Then let's talk about Flippy Bird. This game looks so simple and can take only one week to finish. But why the game is so addictive that many players cannot stop playing it? Firstly, it needs only one push to enter the game and restart the game. No cut-scenes, no dialog, just one push and game starts. Secondly, the game is so difficult that we have to be very concentrated or we will die instantly; What's more, the game has instant reward such as sound effects and online highscore board. Players can play a round of game in just 10 seconds and start over again and again. Every time I play, I can feel the rewards or happiness in some extent. After 20 minutes, although I think this game is too simple and not worthwhile to put efforts into it, I cannot stop playing it. I keep playing for 2 hours and remove it from my iPad. This game seems so stupid but it succeed to be addictive.

So let's generalize the reasons why a game is addictive:

1. Short. It doesn't mean the game should be short, but the time between the action and the feedback should be short. The addictive games give players rewards or feedback instantly.

2. Challenging. When something is very difficult, players tend to keep thinking about it.

3. Rewarding. The reward can be anything which makes players happy. The more straightforward, the better.

4. Randomness. If players cannot predict the result, they will keep thinking about it.

I hope to put these elements into my dice game and make it more addictive...

About this Global Game Jam

Friday 18:00:
I didn't have joined any team yet. I am a shy guy and was a little nervous about talking to strangers. However, we formed a team in no more than 10 minutes. In that environment, everyone could know each other very fast.

19:00:
We started brainstorming. The theme is very confusing: "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." We came up with different ideas, such as seeing the world in different lens, making dreams, etc. The guys who attended GGJ last year said that we should focus on replayability and make our game arcady (like a game on the arcade). It seemed our direction was right.

21:00: Someone came up with the "Tracks with different colors" idea. Everyone seemed to enjoy this idea. After that, we decided to make a game with this idea. The game didn't differ from the original idea very much. So a good idea is also important, because it is very straightforward and we just realize it without much confusion.

22:00: Our team have two programmers: David and me. I am a poor guy who has been a sound designer for a semester and hasn't programmed for a long time; David is a programmer who never touch Unity3D before. However, we started very fast. I began prototyping and came up with a small ball rolling on the track. David is a geek and a fast-learner from Google Pittsburgh. He learned these codes super fast and began coding instantly.

23:00: There are four artists in the team. They decided to come up with a prototype level the next day.

The physical system in Unity3d is works super fluently.

24:00: So tired. They went back and decided had a meeting on Google Hangout the next day.


Saturday
10:00: We had enough sleep and began to build the level.

11:00: We imported the level they built and struggled with the pipeline a little bit because the tracks' sizes were not right. We tried to communicate with artists to let them build the tracks in the right size.

12:00: We playtested it. Unfortunately, there seem too much going in the level: There are 15 levels stuck in one single level and players would be too overwhelmed when they first see the level. We decides to rebuild the level and add some tutorials.

21:00: We added more functions: Checkpoints, pausing the game, etc. No one was talking about adding a story to this game. So just let it go.

24:00: I was too lazy, so I went to my project room and fell asleep. Other teammates seemed work over night.


Sunday:
8:00: I looked up some sound effects. I also found a music piece called 'Crystal Cave'. It cannot be more suitable for the game.

12:00 We began sprinting. The tutorial was done: it can pause the game and tell players to press 'A', 'S', 'D' at the right time. The tutorial is successful in my point of view: it tells the right thing at the right time, so players understand the game controlling instantly. We also added a picture manual at the beginning and I think that is redundant: there is too much information in the picture which can be told in the game very effectively.
The reworked level is much better: The beginning part is clear, easy and fun. The rest part is still too difficult. We also need more checkpoints in the level. I told David to do so but he was too familiar with the game and he thought there were enough checkpoints. He is the best players of this game in the world: He played it for hundreds of times!
It turned out that when players failed in the game, they seemed very frustrated by the fact that they had to start from the checkpoint very before.

14:00 We put crystal shaders in the game, it looks gorgeous!

16:00 We uploaded the game at the last minute.

To my surprise, the game was popular when showed in the RPIS and we won an audience award. Maybe that's because we always keep it simple and we can finish it within the time and resource constraints. We stressed on replayability so that we put it in the game unintentionally. Maybe we used crystal shaders which make the game's appearance super attractive.
We may continue on the development of this game. Who knows.

Hello World!

I am here.