The Rules Change
Imagine playing a game where some rules are clearly define early. For example, falling into a pit means that the player loses the game and must start from the beginning. This is a form of punishment and through negative reinforcement, the player learns not to do that again. Now, imagine later in the game, it is necessary to jump into a pit to advance the game. The player will probably reach this point and not know what to do, unless by accident, they fell in the pit where the rules have changed. This happens in Super Pitfall (NES), where the player must jump into a flying bird enemy to active a warp zone to continue advancing the game. All other instances of the bird will kill the player and cause the player to lose progress, so the player has already learned to avoid birds. With the rules changed, most players are clueless on how to advance the game and will give up. Upon learning that the way forward was to jump into the bird, the player will feel even more frustrated, because now they realize they have to jump into every bird just to see if it kills them. This is brutal when punishment is also brutal.The rules change in other games as well, for example, in Bill and Ted's Excellent Video Game Adventure (NES), where jumping into grass typically causes the player to fall. But in some cases, jumping into grass has no effect. In Rocky and Bullwinkle (NES), the rules also change when stairs typically touch the top edge of the screen if they lead you to the next room above, but in one instance, the stairs don't touch the top edge of the screen and yet they still function like any other steps.
Imbalanced Punishment
Punishment is one way of teaching the player what not to do. When the punishment is too severe, it can cause the player to quit. Imagine playing through an arduous level, and just near the end of the stage, you have to try again from the beginning. This can make the game near impossible to win, although the excitation effect of finally winning can translate into immense euphoria. This fault to playability also fits in with the model of the Flow Zone, in which most players expect the game's difficulty to fall somewhere in between "too difficult" and "too easy". Harsh punishment can make the game too difficult, and a lack of punishment can make the game too easy, and in some cases, a very confusing and non-intuitive game.In Fester's Quest (NES), anytime the player dies, they must start from the very beginning - there are no "check points". This also happens in a lot of games, including Ninja Gaiden (NES) - if the player is defeated while facing the final boss in Act 6-4, they must, contrary to the norm up until that part, begin again from Act 6-1. Usually upon defeat, the player just begins at the previous checkpoint of the same stage, in which each stage typically has many checkpoints. Because Act 6 is one of the hardest in the game, this kind of punishment led to many players quitting before they ever beat the game.
Non-Intuitive
Intuitive games can be played with little to no direct guidance. These are games that "make sense" and lead the player where they need to be going. A game that isn't intuitive will cause the player to wonder what they need to do.In Super Pitfall (NES), there are items which are invisible. The player must visit everywhere, jump everywhere, touch every spot to determine where they are. Without any clear direction or sense of where to go, the player will start to lose their sense of intuition, which is a serious detriment to video games. If a player feels like they don't know how to play it, then they're going to stop playing. If the items were visible, this would give the player a sense of direction and a clear guidance system in what the player needs to do. This way, the player can feel a sense of accomplishment in knowing what to do, and experience in the mystery of discovering new items and finding out what they do.
Something similar happens in Castlevania 2 (NES) where the player must kneel down in a corner to summon or wait for a tornado to carry them off-screen. Since the wait time is more than just a second, this can become really confusing. The same thing happens in Earthbound (SNES) where the player has to wait behind a waterfall for 3 whole minutes to advance the game. At this point, some of these can feel more like interruptions to the game rather than actually playing and enjoying the game.
In many games, another common pitfall is when you can't see where gaps and death traps are. If the floor appears whole, but there are actually holes there, this can be real frustrating to the player. This might be fine for secret areas as long as they aren't necessary to advance the game, but when this becomes the norm for playing a game, it can seriously break the playability.
Interruptions
Interruptions are moments when the game stops the player from playing or slows their reactivity because the game needs a few moments to do something or display something. This can be related to network latency or perhaps poor system performance. But it can also be caused by poor game design or inefficient implementations. When the player is stopped, they can no longer respond and are forced to watch. In some games, this may be appropriate, such as with cut-scenes that show the reader how the story advances. However, such interruptions need to be kept to a minimum, and as always, different players have different tolerances to these kinds of things.In Kid Kool (NES), the game appears to be a common side-scroller that slides left and right as the player advances forward and backward. However, there is also another screen to the top, and if the player visits that screen, the game has to scroll the window all-at-once resulting in a full second delay. This could be fine if the stages were well-designed. However, many of the stages result in the player visiting and leaving the top screen quickly, such as when they're on a high platform on the lower screen and have to jump across a pit - the jump transfers the player to the upper screen and as they player character falls, they are immediately transferred back to the lower screen. A jump should be a fluid action, and certainly and distractions along the jump are serious detriments to playability that make the game that much harder to complete.
In Castlevania 2 (NES), the game cycles from day to night. When this happens, the game freezes to display a message with very slow text that tells you just that. This provides about a 5-second delay to the player, and it can happen at anytime - including right in the middle of a jump or while combating an enemy. At least in some games, like Dragon Warrior (NES), the player is given the option to change the speed at which text is displayed.
In Eartbound (SNES), the same thing happens as the player's dad can sometimes call to "check-in". This results in a dialog pop-up and the text is long and arduous. As it happens repeatedly, it can be very frustrating.
In many games, the player moves too slow which can result in a disconnect of fluidity between the player and the game, essentially creating an interruption of sorts because the human mind can think faster than the game takes to actually execute the requested action. This ties into our next category.
Lack of Fluidity
Fluidity is important in games, because as the player immerses into the game, there is an expected fluid interface between the player and the game. If this interface is lacking, the fluidity isn't optimal and it can be difficult to remain immersed.Take driving a car for example - you never have to look down to see the pedals and as a result, you can keep your eyes focused on the road. The pedals provide a fluid interface between you and the car, meaning that you aren't too distracted while behind the wheel.
Sometimes, a game can be lacking in providing a fluid interface. These are distractions and they can seriously decrease the game's playability. In many games, there is a common complaint that the player can't kneel while they shoot, or that they can only shoot in so many directions. This lack of "full control" is a detriment to fluidity, as it can remind you that you are playing a game with limitations and must adhere to the decreased control.
Another comment is that which was mentioned in the previous category - that the controls are too slipper or that the character is too slow. Both of these again remind the player that they are inside the game and can break immersion.
In Fester's Quest (NES), sometimes the shots are curved, as in many other games. The shots become difficult to "aim" so that the curved shots impact enemy targets. These are also limitations that become distractions.
Why do games fail playability?
After categorizing some of the common pitfalls to playability, one has to ask themselves, how did the game developers ever produce a game with these kinds of detriments? Some research suggests that the project leads or product owners don't actually play any games, so they don't really know what makes a game great or not. At the same time, they insist on owning the direction of the game and don't listen to any suggestions.
Sometimes, quality assurance is to blame. While developers and testers might be reporting these issues and even glitches, the developers don't fix them either because the bugs get listed as "As Designed" or a lack of funding or responsibility.
Even more frightening, sometimes developers come together without any game idea or story. Totally unprepared, its hard to imagine what they were thinking of coming up with.
Without a playable demo, a game is essentially untested before it goes down a path it cannot return from. Unfortunately, many games lack proper demos.
Sometimes companies can feel like they have experience and mastery over fun, such as with toy developers. But when it comes to games, that experience has no carry-over. Unfortunately, sometimes the the managers don't feel the same way.
Other times, games fail because of infrastructure and internal employee issues. If there is any kind of block on communicating suggestions or what some may feel are bad game decisions, perhaps because there is a risk in being reprimanded by the frightening bosses, then these suggestions are never effectively communicated and a bad game is produced.
In any case, it seems clear that the way forward to better games is to learn from the mistakes the past. If these summarize very briefly those mistakes at all, then perhaps newer developers can learn without these kinds of failure.
