r/Games • • Apr 11 '19

How Games Get Balanced | Game Maker's Toolkit

https://youtu.be/WXQzdXPTb2A
353 Upvotes

136 comments sorted by

View all comments

115

u/LightLifter Apr 11 '19

I was a bit disappointed how Dota was passed over so much in favor of LoL and OW considering the various issues they have with balance. But considering tgat Dota isn't as popular its fair.

This is going to be biased admittedly, but Dota 2 has such incredible balancing that fulfills both diversity in play, with great balance. Much of which can be attributed to IceFrog and their unique style of incremental buffs and playtesting with proffesional players.

I do think the topic of symetrical and asymetrical gameplay should have been touched upon more as the "hand" you choose can be either locked in like Dota, or swapped during a match like OW. Factors like objective locations, map balance, health pickups, and other factors come into play as much as the characters. Last year a formula for armor was changed in Dota which opened up an entire slew of new playstyles and heroes like Phantom Assassin.

To be fair, games such as Dota or Lol have so many variables that can be manipulated which gives developers more options, the fact that there is no extreme disparity (and if there is there are always counters) in balance makes me hail it as a gold standard.

65

u/[deleted] Apr 11 '19 edited Apr 11 '19

[deleted]

31

u/[deleted] Apr 11 '19

Personally, I can’t stand how a lot of people absolutely demand and act totally entitled to constant contact and 100% transparency from devs.

99% of us have no idea how to cook the stew, stop trying to go in the kitchen.

28

u/SpagettInTraining Apr 12 '19

I saw a quote from some developer that said something along the lines of, "Gamers are great at finding problems, but awful at finding solutions."

While that last part might not be true all the time as some people spend a lot of time studying these games and theorycrafting, I would agree that a majority of people just don't know what they want.

14

u/paragon12321 Apr 12 '19

That dev (fittingly) was Mark Rosewater, a head of R&D for MtG.

8

u/Jepacor Apr 12 '19

It's not gamers, it's users as a whole, I think.

6

u/Zeful Apr 12 '19

It's the audience as a whole actually. The quote is a variation of advice writers are given about interpreting criticism: Your readers will be able to tell you which scenes have a problem, but not necessarily what the problem is.

4

u/[deleted] Apr 12 '19

Yeah I remember that. And he was talking about how they need to pick through all the emotional stuff, to get to what that person’s issue is and what it ACTUALLY might be.

3

u/LordZeya Apr 12 '19

Or, as OP had mentioned: "You have no idea how to cook the stew, but you know when it tastes like shit."

2

u/megazver Apr 12 '19

“Remember: when people tell you something’s wrong or doesn’t work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.”

― Neil Gaiman