Top 10 Tips on How To Balance Your Game
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- Опубликовано: 27 май 2024
- Balancing can make or break your game. Here are my top 10 tips for making sure you end up with well balanced product.
My games:
Will You Snail on Steam: store.steampowered.com/app/11...
ISLANDERS on Steam: store.steampowered.com/app/10...
Join our creative community on Discord: / discord
Hope you enjoy. :)
Wanted to note that I'm obviously still learning and everything I say in the video here is just based on my personal experience.
Is there anything you disagree with? What else would you add to the list?
Looking forward to some inspiring discussions. :)
Hey an english Tip from a fellow german:
1die many dice ;)
keep up the good work
@@Ausstein Oh, I thought I used that signular. I can even remember looking that up... lol. :D
Thank you. :)
@@JonasTyroller You did use that correctly ^^
@@Ausstein Well actually, you're right, but most people use dice as both singular and plural. I don't know anyone who uses die as the singular and dice only as the plural. But you gave me an idea, I have some english friends, maybe they use or at least know the word die :D
from my experience it differs for many english speaking people. i heard a lot of them ONLY saying dice and a lot of them ONLY saying die, no matter if it was singular or plural
I recommend playing around with extreme values, to get a feeling for what they do, before settling for the realistic ones. Sometimes you find surprises and new inspirations by doing that as well!
6:40 On the other hand, if you're overwhelmed by 5HP enemies, then the top gun will be much better.
Or if it's not about DPS, or rather, how quickly you can deal a burst of 3-5 damage, then it will be better too.
Balancing truly depends on the surrounding factors :D
Yea if the clip size is 3 rounds and it takes 4 seconds to reload the first gun would be assloads better. I feel like that was a missed opportunity by trying to arbitrarily say one is better or worse.
@@matthewstahler6525you are adding another variable to the guns. Ofcourse it is possible to change the balance by adding new variables but without adding new variables bottom gun is better in every scenario that involves different number of enemies with different number of hps.
I mean you could have said "what if you automatically died when you miss with the bottom gun". But it is completely a new scenario.
Ps:
I agree with him that almost all scenarios will benefit the faster shooting gun. Think, for example, in the case which it is possible to miss a shot. If you add similar probabilities of getting the shot right, certainly the faster gun will be more efficient.
I don't know from where you came out but you, blackthorn and brakeys are the best and more informatic channels in all youtube. Your quality is awesome, your content is becoming better and better. Thank you for everything.
Thank YOU for watching and your kind words. Appreciate it.
Well sadly brackeys WAS one of the best unity gamedev channels
When I first saw the 3D text, I thought you want to spend all of your time to make videos instead of games. Then I realized that it was basically an interactive app you probably made in Unity. I guess it's one of those "It'll save time in the long run" things. But one thing: If your mouse moves over black text to create black particles, it makes the text difficult to read ;)
"Save your game under a different name so you have a copy" - Giiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit! (And when you struggle with understanding how Git works, just make a copy of the repository and give it a different name xD)
As for balancing early, it depends. I think you should have a rough sense of balancing rather early on, like "section A comes before B, there A should be easier", but personally I'd put balancing actual precise numbers towards the later part. At least that's what I'm doing for my current game. How much damage a particular attack does under which circumstances - that can be a huge time sink that you don't want to block your early creative sessions.
Onto the guns: If there are quick enemies, you might miss 1 or 2 shots of the slow gun but maybe hit 3 shots with the fast one. So I'd consider the second one to be better. And then you said I'm right :D #SoProud. I'm a bit scared about the balancing I will have to do eventually. I think I won't be able to get around large spreadsheets because a wide range of choices have to be playable and that will probably be quite the challenge. ...but that's years in the future so I don't need to care now.
Huh, your "Rock Paper Scissors Action RPG" looks funny. I actually had an idea to make a small action RPG that only uses one button. That is, no sticks or anything, not even the menus. The core idea was already done but then I was too lazy to implement anything.
1) Yes it's supposed to save me some time in the long run I hope. :P
2) True. Should have mentioned Git as a solution for that as well.
3) Yes, balancing the precise numbers should happen at the end. I personally am still convinced that doing no balancing at all and saving it all till the end sounds like a dumb move as balancing is such a crucial part of shaping the game experience.
4) Haha. Good job with that gun. :D
5) Spreadsheets are not completely useless either. I'd just try to see then as a tool instead of the full solution.
6) That rock paper scissors action rpg was more meant as a metaphor than a literal game.. :D
7) That game idea sounds like One Finger Death Punch - great game. :D
great video man
every week you get even better at making these videos
I can confirm that working on a competitive game is always a gamble with balancing updates
like you said - take gambles, just make sure they are smart gambles
And every week the pressure keeps rising to not make the quality drop off too much... :P
I feel very UNDER PRESSURE at times...
At the same time about weapon balance, bc first shot is instant that means that despite the fact that both guns do 10dps on paper, first one will deal 15dmg after one second and second will deal 12dmg. Also in case of burst weapons like the first one you can use cover between the shots to mitagate damage from someone using second weapon. This is very common in tf2 if you fight shotgun vs a heavy with mashine gun, so both are good depending on the scenario
I've started and stopped alot of habits including game dev but I'm doing it more consistently now and honestly even just hearing you talking about these things is really helpful and a bit comforting
That's good. I like listening to a guy who enjoys what he's doing. 👍
Oh yes, I do. Thank you. :D
I know it's not related to this video (great video btw) but I have two ideas for a final boss in Will you snail!:
• AI tries to destroy you, so you have to escape him and lead him to his own traps
• You take control of the AI and place traps to destroy him
Noted. Thanks for sharing your ideas. :)
@@JonasTyroller Cool :), I had it hovering around my head and I thought I should share it here to help you make the game as good as possible
Id like to add: Make everthing (for example all guns) overpowered rather than underpowered. Make the bad guns better, not the good guns bad.
Bad idea, because this leads to power creep. If something is too overpowered, try to nerf it somehow and not bring all the game up to it's level, I think
This is how they balance DOTA 2. Everyone has their niche and those niche offer to counter a problem or enhance an experience. However, that is for DOTA alone. I don't think you can do this to shooter game unless you have economic base system like in CSGO where the AWP is powerful but expensive and reward very little while shotgun is cheap, rewards a lot but is unreliable. Overall, to follow the "Everyone is OP" balance, you need each of those OP offer a solution to a strategy.
I think this design can work in a single player game very well. Look at the bonding of Isaac, there's an abundance of overpowered items and synergies and barely anything has ever been nerfed. In multiplayer contexts you need to be more careful.
Dota has been able to manage this design philosophy, but still does nerfs, but something like Hearthstone has had so much power creep that the game has centralized around 1-2 decks in standard, and 2-3 decks in wild.
I am a big fan of keeping things strong and fun, but the health of the game needs to be considered.
I just love your handmade programs you use/make to do your videos. So much back end work but the originality is 100% worth it!
Thank you. :)
0:59 Saw the mouse cursor 😁
Great video like always Jonas
Well spotted. I didn't necessarily try to hide it, though. :D
Thank you. :)
@@JonasTyroller did you make a program to just teach us how to balance our games?
@@unitysparticlesystem He used Unity's Particle System.
love the cool visaul effects and animation in the vid
Thanks. Glad the effort was worth it. :D
I've been watching your channel for a while and I just want to say that your content lately has really been valuable to me and i'm sure a ton of others. Thanks!
Happy to hear that. Thank you. :)
Again thanks for the quality information Jonas! I am currently a designer on a project for the first time and I can see myself going back to this video during the project.
Oh, sweet. Congrats! For that boat game? How is that game called by the way?
@@JonasTyroller We have only had 3 days to work on the project and we still haven't even decided on the concept yet so it's still quite hard to say :D But I'll make video about it once the project has started properly.
Excellent work, Jonas! You always do such a great job with these videos.
The visuals running in Unity were a very nice touch :)
Glad you enjoyed. Thanks. :)
Damn dude i think this is one of your best videos. Good work
That's very kind. Thank you. :)
also listen to player feedback. A lot of triple A games nerf their most fun mechanics to the ground which in the end only makes their whole playerbase not enjoy the game as much as before. Most of the time it is always better to buff less viable options then to nerf the good options. Or at least have interesting decisions attached to the good options rather then getting rid of them completely.
in a lot of cases i feel like the developer did not intent something to behave in a certain way, but it became such a fun mechanic for the whole playerbase which was then removed by the developers since they just soley focus around their vision.
sure a developer should always have the vision for all things in their game in check but also be able to adapt to the players.
Good point. I agree.
This was incredibly informative, thanks for the great video as always!
You're welcome. Glad you found it interesting. :)
the rock paper scissors situation is effing amazing
TL;DW:
10. Balance is connected with other game development disciplines.
9. There's more to balance than number parameters.
8. Be ready to change many, _many_ things at one. Don't fear to experiment!
7. Balance throughout development. Start early.
6. Take a look at the mathematics. (But don't obsess about it...)
5. Obtain analytics for objective truths. Try to get as big of a sample size as you can.
4. Be wary of mental pitfalls. (placebo effect, confirmation bias, misleading data, anecdotal evidence)
3. Use rock-paper-scissors advantages and disadvantages.
2. Make changes with positive expected payoffs.
1. Know. Your! Design! _Goals!!!_ For ALL OBJECTS!!!
Thank you for all your videos. I know I'll need them in the future. ♥
Sure. I hope they'll come in handy for you. :)
Awesome video. Love your Unity Powerpoint :D
:P
you are a very powerful dude, what you do is incredible
a lot of games have test servers like overwatch and pubg to test these things but i doubt that kind of thing would be too good for an indie dev (i wouldnt really know i just assume it wouldnt)
First gun is clearly superior if enemy has armor that reduces damage by 1 point, for example. This way, first one has 8 dps while the second one only 5 dps.
That's the first thing I thought of when I saw them compared.
But it can also be better against enemy with exactly 5 hp, it would take 0.5 second to kill them with this gun and 0.6 second to kill them with the other gun.
So the answer would be: it depends on a lot of factors.
Very good info. Thanks for sharing
You're welcome. Thanks for watching. :)
Wow, with 3d text/titles this time - awesome! :)
Yaas. I'm leveling up. :P
Yeah I can see that. Made good sense in this video. How was it made “just” something you created in Unity and recorded?
.. if so I know it’s not “just” and easy task :)
Even total placebos can alter balance. Even with identical stats and similarly-sized view models, the noise a gun makes in an FPS can alter how players perceive it enough to change their confidence and intimidation about the thing. There have been cases where both player complaints and actual statistics confirm that mechanically identical weapons are unequal in performance due purely to sound design.
I love this video, and I love how he presents topics
This guy is a genius
Love your videos they're insightful keep it up! At 6:11 (Lets call gun A = 5 dmg/shot; 2 shots/sec. gun B = 2 dmg/shot; 5 shot/sec) I disagree about the conclusion, imo I think it depends the scenario. What if your character holds a limited amount of ammo? lets say 10 bullets? gun A would deal 50 dmg and gun B would deal 20 dmg in total. What about if the enemy has a shield that blocks attacks lesser than 4 dmg? gun B wouldn't have any effect!
It depends on the design of the game really. Generally speaking, the second one would be better.
Think of this:
You have a bunch of enemies with predetermined HP, what would be the best gun?
2hp / enemy means
1: 1 shot per enemy = 2 enemies / sec
2: 1 shot per enemy = 5 enemies / sec
Drawing a conclusion from this:
To figure out how many enemies, you take the ceil(HP/DAM) × SPS
HP = Enemy HP
DAM = Gun Damage
SPS = Shots Per Second
Comparing:
ceil(HP/5) × 2 ?= ceil(HP/2) × 5
ceil(HP/5)/ceil(HP/2) ?= 5/2
Let's say f(x) = ceil(x/5)/ceil(x/2)
To find when gun 1 is better than gun 2, find when f(x)>5/2
To find when gun 2 is better than gun 1, find when f(x)
Math is not just multiplying and adding numbers, that's like saying that medicine is just fist aid. Everything in game design is math, even buffs and debuffs.
Awesome video, very informative. I see you are improving on the graphics design. It may be nitpicking, but watching fullscreen my eyes were exploding because your cam view has a dark background and every 10 seconds you switch to a completely white screen, if you move your mouse over the video playtime bar you can see on the preview a lot of black/white flashing
Excellent point. Didn't think about that. Will try to remember that for the next one. Thank you. :)
Hey, I just wanted to say that I respect your work and you’re doing well, keep it up!
I’m also working on my own lil game! Sometimes you might wonder if it’s even worth all that hard work, or spend hours trying to figure something out like you said, but in the end the solution was so simple! If you keep going and get a little progress done regularly, you’ll get there eventually though and you might even create something you can be proud of.
Oh, if you manage to finish ANY game that is already something to be proud of as most games don't make it to the finish line. Keep it up and good luck with your project! :)
Love the idea for this video! :)
Thanks. ;)
When I was looking how to start with unity I was browsing your channel for how to start and watched this, I remember being so scared of rolling dices with every decision I make. Now I'm working on my first release and looking back it is quite funny seeing younger me stressing thinking game dev is mega stressful (I mean it can be but it isn't non stop pressure usually)
What happened?
@thimblebirb well actually I'm still a game dev to this day! I think what I was trying to say with this comment was that I was too scared to start a project because I didn't this it would be balanced, that it wouldn't be good, etc. All of this to say, just start. Go figure out where this wild road we call game development takes you, best of luck
Thank you
Nice videos, very interesting. I would like to see a big game project with you, BlackThornProd, Brackeys and Sykoo it would be the game dev cinematic universe, so epic.. x)
Haha. Would be epic to do a 1 week project like that. Let's see if we can make it happen some day... :D
@@JonasTyroller YEAH ! so cool, maybe challenge the community in sort of a game dev battle, not a game jam, but a ... battle?.. i don't know how to explain x)
@@desmondmies3095 Ohhhh... exciting. :D
I kind of like it. :D
@@JonasTyroller Your welcome ;)
Jonas, you are really a great inspiration. Love from India.
Glad to hear that. Thanks. :)
@@JonasTyroller HEY JONAS IF YOU EVER GET TIME, GIVE ME FEEDBACK ABOUT MY GAME. assassinomanik.itch.io/ball-block-gravity-cubes-that-disappear
I like this kind of video very much! Getting closer to GMTK which is an amazing channel too:) since we’ll be having mining, trading and management, we’ll have a lot of parameters to balance.. did you ever consider using AI to balance a game?
13:42
Just a still image of this presents such a succinct depiction of exactly why interacting mechanics make games so much more interesting.
I came to this video looking for an answer to "how do you make sure everything is balanced against everything else?"
It turns out the answer is "they don't need to be, but everything needs a(t least one) counter."
I imagine balancing based purely on "different tools shouldn't be any better/worse than others" leads to limited mechanical depth as everything is just a matter of who has the bigger numbers/who goes first. But this rock-paper scissors design opens up doors to all sorts of encounters with combinations of mechanics that force the player to think about what they're doing.
This is probably nothing new to RPG fans huh? XD
With my game (an rpg) I had to scale down health a whole bunch because the starter stats were too low to deal much damage and you’d be sitting there attacking doing 5 damage a turn to an enemy with like 150 hp. This also has to do with my damage formula which could use some work on its own, but that’ll come later when I think of something better.
Yay, more video’s by Jonas :)
Every Friday. ;)
Jonas Tyroller we need more fridays
This video is so beneficial!
Always glad if I can help. Nice. :)
6:11 faster is usually better
unfortunately i'm a bit obsessive with balancing to the point where i don't even finish prototyping but have spreadsheets for the numbers
amazing video Jonas, can you tell me please how to edit your videos ? like what software do you use ? thank you :)
I use Adobe Premiere for editing. I cal also recommend Davinci Resolve for editing as an alternative.
The animations in this video were created with Unity. :)
@@JonasTyroller wow thanks a lot :D
I should have known that you were behind the tight ebb and flow of islander's scoring system.
If you added more spread or recoil to the faster shooting one then that would help make the guns similar in power, then for the user it would be more about preference
thanks for teh vid!
Thanks for watching! :)
No Donkey... not like a cake. Video Games are like onions! They have layers
Not sure my analogy would have worked with an onion... :D
Jonas Tyroller i definitely agree. That movie just came to mind when you said it
@@James-mu8rp Which movie is that from?
Jonas Tyroller The movie is shrek
@@James-mu8rp Ahhh. I found the scene. I see. Lol. :D
Do you have any advice on where to find play testers? I’m currently looking to balance my game so this video is perfect timing haha
In the past I just gave my games to friends for playtesting. That's the easiest way.
Asking people online e.g. in my Discord community is another easy (but less reliable way).
In case you're already growing a community for your game for the sake of marketing you can also leverage that community for playtesting. That's the third way.
Cheers. :D
The 5hp gun can still perform better against high-hp enemies, if weaving in and out of cover is involved
with number 5
i would see it as that time when you said to always keep your game finished
every time you add a new layer to the tower you balance the game
Daaang ten years making games?! I think I’ve been making games on and off for like ...3?
Definitely a bit of on and off for me as well. Full time for about 4 years. :P
Jonas Tyroller was islanders your first commercial game?
@@thehambone1454 Basically, yes. I made 2 "commercial" apps before that but those weren't really super serious attempts. :P
Jonas Tyroller are they on the App Store? I wouldn’t mind checking them out
@@thehambone1454 Not anymore unfortunately.
So my problem right now is deciding what the *initial* values should be in the board game I'm making. How much health should someone have? Armor? Movement speed (spaces per turn), how much of each resource should they start with, then how much of each resource should they lose or gain over time?
Once I get the basic values in I think I can start designing more of the game around that and deciding which skills and such need to be changed. But that's where I'm stuck right now. Any advice?
Nice
Thanks. :)
i think by salt you mean how hard it is and sugar how fun it is. you want just the right ammount of sugar. and just the right ammount of salt
and the most important point is most of the time real balance is boring, not needed, and sometimes even counterproductive.
Hello! I am NoTime. I am currently developing a game called His Journey! I have been working on this project for almost 2 years now. I have a steam page up and a demo coming on the 21st for the Steam Festival! make sure to wishlist His Journey On Steam!
This will help with my game CHA0S :D
Nice. I hope so. ;)
5:57 I would make this into an FPS shooter scenario and add a range to the two guns
The gun at the top would have more range than the gun at the bottom and give it semi auto fire, it makes it a DMR, has risk and rewards
I would give the gun at the bottom lower range but deal maximum possible damage close range and give it auto fire, that makes it an SMG
Morgen sind meine Ferien vorbei, dann komme ich auf den Discord
Gerne, während den Ferien würde ich das auch auf keinen Fall machen... :O
Hy Jonas!I work on my game art and all the people says its similar to HollowKnight!Its there a problem if my art style its like that?Or i keep doing that?
Thanks fir the video bdw!!
In my opinion that's fine if not even an advantage as long as there are some other things that differentiate your game from others. :)
Thank you Jonas:)))
I am still working on that
The enviroment art is kind of crazy hard for me to do!!
@@CosminAntrenoruL Haha. I understand. Doing an art style like that would take me an eternity... :D
I have trouble with art ...have you any tips to make 2d art ?:)))
If you want i can show you some pics on discord?:))
all you need to know is: Make a game that is hard to master, but easy to start
5:53 one of the guns deals less overkills tho
that editing is crazy
is that the same project that u was working on on unity
Yes. :)
@@JonasTyroller cool really good job
@@younlok1081 Thanks.
The rock paper scissors game is probably the most fun thing ever
I think it depends on the things you're shooting. If each enemy has 2hp, well I know which gun I'd pick. If your enemy has 5hp I know which gun will feel more satisfying. If they have buckets of hp then it won't matter as much.
3:21 sounded like a discord ad
Lol
If there is a giant complex game like SLG war game, giant spreadsheet is indeed, just make a clarification
2 damage per shot with 5 shots per second is better, because you get more chances to hit the target.
How did you do the animations in the VideO?
With Unity. :)
Also what a happy coincidence that I did a Unity animation tutorial last week. ;)
@@JonasTyroller I know, I already watched :) Have you already done one about Sounds, sound effects etc?
Jonas : The best way to imagine a game is like a cake
Me: Wtf
I like to make enemies glow, (not much, but still visible) on some of my games cause you may not be able to see them
finally
Experiment by playing with my knob. Got it
The upper gun is better!
Maybe the lower gun doesn't make you lose any damage, byt when attacking a single enemy (you know, like every single shooter) before going for the first one, the upper gun:
Has more ACCURACY: Same damage, less shots.
Is ECONOMICAL: Same damage, less ammunition.
:-)
Good point. I guess it really depends on the situation. It definitely has more burst damage.
quick note:
Don't ignore tons of negative feedback. If one person doesn't like it, that's fine... but make sure other people don't dislike the same thing.
"Make a backup of your project, maybe under a new name"... Just use source control everyone please it makes your life so easy.
At the moment I am making a top down shooter where guns have almost 30 parameters to tweak. I'm a bit afraid.
Sounds like you should first focus on which parameters are really necessary and actually add to the experience. Maybe you can experiment by taking some values out altogether and see if it actually plays any different. And if it still feels pretty similar, maybe ditch that value. That would definitely save a lot of time in the long run.
Thanks @@Lugmillord. I will try.
Ah, good timing for this video then I guess. :D
No need to be worried. I think the most important thing is definitely to define some general design goals and then also to know the design goals for every specific weapon. :)
I think the gamble part was too long compared to the amount of information it delivered.
Super helpful video though!
i felt the same way
Yes, I agree. Let's hope I get better at judging how much explanation something needs in the future. Sometimes I'm a bit scared people won't get my point if I edit out too much. This time it was too much, though. True.
At the time of watching this, Jonas has 99.9k subs
YES! I'm early :D
Pretty early, yes. :D
What is the game at 17:56?
yay Yay.
Indeed. :D
Machst du auch Videos auf deutsch? Fände ich leichter
Hey, just wanted to say hi.
Hiiii. :)
7:43
15:09
Anecdote is spelled with a c in English.
should i start eating my games then?
You add salt to your cake??!
Oof its called dice not die
This is the most German accent I have ever heard.
parameters
Developers of fortnite should watch this video.
idk why i get unreasonable angry when coding is boiled down to "changing some values"
I believe he is super wrong woth the 2 damage per shot 5 shows a second etc thing. Take it to an express and you have fundamentalny different feel and gameplay with one gun shooting one super powerfull shot once in a really long time vs a gun that shoots Teeny Tiny damage all the time. Im thinking pvp cuz thats my world and of course it will gemerate totally different play patterns, as the big shot guy will be modtly trying to hit the oponent and will not shoot much, will conserve his ammo but not his hp and only once reloading wił ltry not to get hit why his oponent will be mostly concerned with not getting hit, himself spraying damage all the time but not caring if that much of it hits cuz some will anyways. I means Yes as long as its as cloae as in the example it will not mąkę much dofference except for some EDGE cases where a skilled and knowledgable player may get some slim edges 9ver the enemy by using correct gun in correct situation. Which by the way is also fun, nut less important for less skill heavy situations (aka if you design for noobs and not for hardcore pvp, idk im only interested in the latter). Overall tho, its much easier to finetune your number than the non njmeric factors, easy to make a firewall weeker or stronger than for example a flying spell, provider its some abstrakt enuff game where there are no the to be made on flying (like height speed etc). If you habe a non numeric gimmick, it can eother exist or not and if its too strong you may need to remove it or teak everything else around it.... But uts much easier to mąkę a non numeric thong NOT be pbciously better or worse than other options. If two heroes can hit you with their magica abilities one will just do more damage most of the time, but if one can heal and the other can teleport its much more likely they will borh be viable some of the Times and bad some of the time. I guess i mąkę some sense xd
*too much salt* dsp is interested.