What makes a video game fun? (How to make games better!)

Tutorials (Here's how to...)
1

Alright, so, there are lots of games made daily. This applies to everything on the internet and such. However, some games will get bad reviews and some will get good reviews. Why is that?

To answer that, let's use an example, like Minecraft. No one would disagree that Minecraft is the most popular game. I mean, face it: it has sold more than 100,000,000 copies in one decade. What makes Minecraft so fun is that it is just fun, can keep people entertained for a very long time, has replayability, and it basically has an entire community which grows and expands. It also executes its game idea very well.

So let's just pull out some of these terms here: When I say fun, I mean that it is entertaining and such, and when I say entertaining, I mean that it can keep you busy for a long time. And when I say it has replayability into it, I mean that people will want to play it again and again for hours at a time. When I say that a game executes an idea perfectly, I mean that it executes the game's idea very well and it executes that linear ratio between too difficult and very easy.

A good game would be like Minecraft. A bad game however wouldn't have any of that. It wouldn't be very fun, wouldn't keep you entertained to the point that you stay glued to your seat, no one would want to play the game again after beating it, and it would either be too easy to the point that someone would want to find a new game, or it would be too hard to the point that someone wouldn't want to finish the game or even do it again to get better at it.

Now granted, there may be more factors, like the game would have to have little to no bugs or would have to have some kind of story, but the things I said above apply to any type of game.

I mean, the game always has to have an objective, otherwise no replayability would be in your game. But that doesn't make it a good game nor would it make it a bad game.

2

Even Minecraft has a lot of bugs. Just look at quasi-connectivity, or sticky pistons pitting out their blocks, to give just two examples.

Would Minecraft be popular if it didn't have bosses? Yeah, it would.

3

It has the Ender Dragon and multiple Mobs, but you can turn it off if you want to.

4

Peaceful doesn't disable the Ender Dragon, but it does make it not kill you.

5

Minecraft does have a few set objectives like beating up bosses. However, Minecraft is a sandbox game; the players are supposed to make their own objectives. For example, you can make up a quest to find all the music discs, like I have. Or build something, like a mob farm or a giant meatball. Or get X amount of resources.

(Guys i used a semicolon probably correctly am i smart yet??)

6

It is correct usage of a semicolon; however I am not sure if that alone makes one smart.

offtopic

Apparently my phone's architecture is arm.

Or make a 3x3 piston door in a laggy Java on PojavLauncher, like I did.

7

yeah i was joking about using semicolons meaning i'm smart

offtopic

yeah apple uses arm64 processors for iphones. arm processors are a popular choice for phones.

8

Ha.

offtopic

Apple? My phone is Android. Specifically, Android 8.0.0.

9
third offtopic

my bad i started writing thinking that only apple made arm processor phones before searching up whether phones other than apple used arm processors. and i forgot to change that part of the sentence

10

Actually fourth.

fiveth

I wonder what bloct is writing...

11

When I say fun, I mean that it is entertaining and such, and when I say entertaining, I mean that it can keep you busy for a long time. And when I say it has replayability into it, I mean that people will want to play it again and again for hours at a time.

According to this, a lot of games can be considered "fun to play," even if they're actually not: MMORPGs can keep players busy for a long time, grinding a specific area or mob just for a few levels per hour, something that all of these players would agree is a tedious, boring, and unfun task (and this is usually only done in order to get to somewhere else, like another area or mob to grind).

A good game would be like Minecraft.

This is likely just your opinion, because I know of a few people who don't enjoy playing Minecraft. Sure, it's one of the best-selling video games of all time, but that doesn't make it objectively good. Not that my friends think Minecraft is bad, just that it isn't their cup of tea, and that kind of refutes every point of yours that follows: that it keeps you glued to their seat (they stop playing after 10 minutes), that they find replayability in it (for them, the game has nothing to do after beating all the bosses), and that the game is too hard for them to enjoy it (Minecraft is very easy for a survival game, even on Hardcore mode).

I mean, the game always has to have an objective, otherwise no replayability would be in your game.

Sandbox games have no objectives or stories apart from those which the player creates for themselves (thus creating replayability).

12

Yes, you are, but not because of the semicolon. :~P

I think that different people like different game types, and there's no ordering those. It's within a type that you can ask whether a particular game is a good example of its type. Minecraft is a creation game; people who want to create new things love it. Violent games (I know, Minecraft can be violent, but that's not what it's about) will have different fans, and they'll like, I dunno, G**** T**** A*** or something similarly R-rated. I, being an old person with neither great creativity nor great any hand-eye coordination, like puzzle games, such as Futoshiki, a great example of the type.

13

… is so popular it’s considered a feature. Even acknowledged by the devs!

This is correct. I know 5 people who are super into FNF and those people also play BeatSaber, really like music class, etc. It just depends what you’re into.

EDIT: AAA so sorry for necroposting- didn’t see the date on the topic and just thought it was an interesting discussion!

14

Yes, but it's still a bug.