I’ve thrown out “Easy to learn, but hard to master.” Goals like this are all over the industry, and they just aren’t useful. This is the kind of goal I use instead.

Here’s why this is so much better:

Let’s say you’ve thought of an interesting new mechanic for your Roguelike; such as letting players fuse items together into more powerful ones, while freeing up their other gear slots.

This new source of depth would make the game harder to master, but it’d also make the game harder to learn.

Should you do it?

The standard, “Easy to learn, but hard to master” goal is useless here – just like it is for so, so many design decisions, because its components are in direct conflict. While many great games are definitely easy to learn and hard to master, that nebulous goal doesn’t help you make any individual design decision on how to get there.

Design goals exist to help you make decisions. When goals come into conflict for a feature, you need to determine which is the Mission and which is the Boundary.

Missions are what you maximize. You push them as far as you can within the boundaries. Boundaries are the hard walls you can’t cross. These boundaries are what create this thing we talk about all the time, “Design space”.

Here’s two examples, which would lead to very different games:

𝗘𝘅𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝟭
Mission: As strategically deep as possible…

Boundary: … as long as players can still learn in under 15 minutes.

𝗘𝘅𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝟮
Mission: As easy to learn as possible…

Boundary: … as long as we can keep hardcore players engaged for 6 months, which is when our next expansion will release new content for them.

When I plan out a feature, I identify the primary mission first – then identify all the boundaries I need to respect. Some come from stakeholders, some come from creative, but all shape design space.

This comes from session 4 ofmy upcoming design bootcamp: Mastering Game Systems. If it sounds interesting, you can check out the full details here. Feel free to email me any questions about it at designerdanf@gmail.com