Developing an idea into an experience

The main reason for creating a new game mechanic can be described as the need to give the player a novel experience. We learned how the game vision gives us designers a clear direction to follow in order to develop our games. By visualizing the experience we want our players to have, we are taking the first step into the conceptualization of a new game mechanic.

Let's see a practical example.

Modern First Person Shooter (FPS) games are very different from what we used to play in the 80s and the 90s. When we immersed ourselves in a frenetic shooting game all we needed were some interesting enemies, a few different weapons, and just a bunch of basic controls, such as move and shoot.

In a quest for better immersion, game designers started to ask questions like: "How can we make an FPS more realistic?", "How can we make shooting more tactical?", and "How can we give players the impression that they are in the middle of a real shooting scenario?"

A real gunfight...