Fairness

Guide info#

Short: 3-5 minutes

TLDR - What this guide covers#

• Fairness in a level happens when it can teach the player about its mechanics, since players perceive fairness differently, it is a complex topic to approach. Using different techniques can help with making the gameplay fair.
• Keeping players in the flow state for as long as possible and progressing the level further encourages them to keep playing.
• While fairness is a good concept to use when building, it can become a hindrance: the difficulty of the level will decrease and the player will have less opportunities to click.

1: What is Fairness?

In general, a level can be considered fair if it can clearly train the player about its rules and mechanics. If a player dies in a level, do they blame themselves or the level? Fairness is a complex topic to approach as others can have a different opinion on what is considered fair. Things such as keeping the gameplay fair for everyone is difficult to do, as your skillset and creating bias can affect this greatly.

The way the level progresses heavily influences how well players feel about it; gameplay that is too sudden or buggy can lead to frustration. The factor of the “unknown” leads to the feeling of unfairness as well, even if the gameplay is perfectly balanced. The main goal should be to eliminate any of these issues as much as possible. If you punish the player for something that isn’t their fault, or expect perfection at all times, that’s not fair. The player should feel in control as much as possible, this makes them believe they have more of a ”fair” shot at completing the level.

Ways of Introducing Fairness#

• Coyote Time: A principle seen in most platformer games where you can still jump a couple frames after you leave a platform. This can be applied in Geometry Dash by increasing the size of platforms slightly. This mechanic already exists in platformer mode as of 2.206, so in most cases you won’t need to do this for platformer levels.

• Lenient Hitboxes: Scaling orbs or portals to increase the size of their hitbox can help with consistency and predictability. The opposite can be done to hazards by turning on “No Touch” and placing smaller hitboxes within them.

• Predictability: Use structuring to make the path more straightforward, ensuring that movements or events such as randomness occur in a reasonable timeframe. Avoid gameplay that goes against the player’s intuition as much as possible such as having yellow orbs acting like blue orbs for no reason.

• Helping the Player: Use visual hints to guide the player. Nerfing or using invisible objects can work, if used correctly. Balancing the level can get rid of any possible “choke points” or “slow” parts in a level.

• Mechanic Easing: If there is a main gimmick or custom mechanic within the level, it’s best to ease the player into learning it first before challenging them with it. Having a level where there’s a double jump ability and having the player go through complex uses of said ability at the start will cause frustration and confusion.

Flow State and Pacing#

Ideally, you want to keep the player in the Flow State for as long as possible. Once they’re in it, you should adjust the level to help them along and encourage them. You should also consider Micro Pacing, which is giving the player more leniency once they’re actually in the zone. You can determine where this occurs through playtesting, but before doing that you can still do things to improve how fair your gameplay is.

Balancing the Use of Fairness#

Though fairness might make levels more enjoyable, there can be drawbacks. Giving the player too much help can decrease the difficulty as well as the player’s input on the level. Rather than feeling a sense of control, players can feel the level is “hand-holding” them, making the experience less enjoyable. The handicaps you give them may be too obvious. Plus, what you do might even hinder the player’s performance if done wrong. For example, SLAM by rafer is a 7 star rated level. However, most people can say that they’ve beat it on their first attempt. The level helps you so much that it feels unnatural playing through it.

Overall, fairness is difficult to keep at a balance. You want to make an enjoyable level most people will have a good time with. However, you don’t want to lose sight of what your level should be.

Credits#

Created by @NotAModerator and @TDP9