Back in November I was privileged enough to get to attend AnimFX ’11 here in Wellington, NZ. While there I happened to listen to a presentation by Tracey Sellar, a Senior User Research Lead for Microsoft Games Studio, who was discussing Usability in the games industry. While her presentation kept me interested there was one particular slide that has eaten away at me for months now. The slide showed your typical bell curve and it was describing what type of people buy any one game. The middle section of the bell curve was made up of casual gamers with the smaller ends devoted to inexperienced gamers and hardcore gamers respectively.

What this slide was trying to portray was that even if you make a hardcore game catered to specific fans, the majority of your consumers will be below that of your hardcore gamer, and this is where we start seeing problems arise. Obviously, if a game is too hard or too complicated for the majority of your userbase you’re not too likely to sell a sequel or similar product to them, and thus your userbase for any future iterations will be lower.

The only logical step from there is to listen to the consumers that have bought your product and change things to make it more to their liking. The hardcore fans who loved the complexity and challenge of your product already have the “buy-in” to your next product. They’ll follow any news regarding it and they’ll pick it up on day 1. They’ll then find out it’s been watered down or tailored to a softer audience than they are, complain, finish the game defiantly and hope for a better sequel. In the end, what does their opinion REALLY matter when the majority of the people buying your game now have an experience more tailored to them?

We’ve seen this happen with numerous products over the past few years with Dragon Age 2 being the most notable (and most recent) example of this. Hard and fast action games are becoming the pop music of the gaming world with more games trying to emulate the major success of popular shooters like Call of Duty, Halo and Battlefield. Dead Space 2 dropped a chunk of its tension and horror in favour of running and gunning, as did Resident Evil 5 before it. It’s not a new thing and genres that were part of everyday gaming life 5 – 10 years ago are becoming niche genres.

But I’m here to say that it doesn’t need to be like this. Instead of pandering to one section of the market and annoying the gamers that helped make gaming the industry it is today there has to be a way of bringing the inexperienced and casual gamers the triple-A titles hardcore gamers want to play without alienating them. And with that I introduce a difficulty setting that actually works.

Instead of Easy, Medium, Hard and Insane (all of which are basically the same game with the same puzzles and same AI) I’m suggesting developers spend more time putting in a Novice, Intermediate and Hardcore setting. We’re currently in a gaming world where you get tutorials for everything, whether or not you’ve played the previous 5 instalments of the franchise.

Example 1 (Novice)

Player 1 loves movies but has never played a game before. He’s heard that the latest Uncharted title would be right up his alley and he sets out to hire it and a console to play it on. Upon loading the game he selects the novice setting and the game starts. After the opening cinematic – he loved it by the way – the game pauses and explains that the left analog stick will move Drake about while the right analog stick will move the camera. While still paused Player 1 is asked to make the camera look at the ceiling. Player 1 moves the stick forward and the game recognises him as a non-invert gamer. The game unpauses and Player 1 is able to move Drake around the room.

The novice setting would be a very pause/unpause experience to begin with, and can be switched to Intermediate at any stage once Player 1 feels comfortable. He may never feel comfortable and the game will assist him over every jump, firefight or puzzle he comes across. Hopefully this will encourage Player 1 to sit through the entire experience and feel like the interactive movie he had heard about, he might even get adventurous and switch to intermediate should he want to watch/play again.

Example 2 (Intermediate)

Player 2 has a smart phone and loves a bit of Angry Birds. She’s also partial to a bit of Game Dev Story and has heard there are other simulator type games out there. A new Harvest Moon game is just around the corner and decides to pick it up to play on her boyfriend’s console. Upon selecting the Intermediate setting the game starts how any current (non example) game would start. The tutorials are what she expected and goes into showing her the ins and outs of how to play the game without being too intrusive or condescending. This is how casual gamers currently play games, and it works. Player 2 is happy, and plays through the game intent on playing another in the future.

Example 3 (Hardcore)

Player 3 follows the game industry, has played every Call of Duty released and doesn’t need to hear how to crouch or aim a gun. He can do it blindfolded and has a K/D ratio that impresses the gaming community he’s a part of. Picks the latest shooter up at a midnight launch, heads home and selects the Hardcore setting. After a second or two of familiarising himself with this companies way of controlling he’s good to go. He beats the game in a night and complains that it wasn’t long enough, or that someone was cheating online or something. Either way, he’s had no handholding and was able to get into the action straight away.

The system isn’t really about removing a difficulty slider but allowing gamers from all walks of life to enjoy a single product without alienating anyone. While it may not be plausible in every situation, whether the genre doesn’t suit it or the developers don’t have the budget for it, I feel that it would work wonders to help gaming become even more mainstream without watering down the experience.

Let me know what you think, and any ideas you have for how the gaming industry can continue to grow without alienating the hardcore group.