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Character Advancement in the First-Person Shooter Genre
By: Hans Larsen
Supervisor: Jonathan Skinner
Masters of Interactive Technology degree conferred July 10, 2009
Thesis / Project completed: June 8, 2009
As the video game industry continues to mature, the demand for games with more depth increases. One way in which to meet this demand has been to use mechanics from other genres to add to the depth of the genre in which the developer is creating a game. Another method used is to create a hybrid genre for the game. In many cases, these two methods create games off the mark from the intended product. The best example of this is the initial game design for BioShock. While originally wishing to develop a game that was a hybrid between a First-Person Shooter and a Role-Playing Game, but the team changed their design mid-development. Their reason for this was that they had a product that was not a fun game in either genre. When BioShock shipped, the design was that of a First-Person Shooter that borrowed aspects of character advancement from the Role-Playing Game genre and tailored them to fit the game, creating a huge commercial success.
This thesis explores methods of character advancement that are most relevant to a First-Person Shooter, to test the effect on a player’s enjoyment of the level. The level created for this project is a custom standalone level for Half-Life 2: Episode 2 and a survey. The project had 21 people volunteer to play the level and fill out the survey.
While the results of the project did not fully support the original hypothesis, the data collected suggests some interesting trends. In support of the hypothesis, there was an upward trend of the number of advancement player’s perceived to get as the number of advancements the player actually received increased. Also supporting the hypothesis was the trend that player’s enjoyment increased the more advancements they received. Contrary to the hypothesis was the common response that player’s did not notice some advancements as being advancements. In the end, this project has gained results that suggests some interesting trends and gives some insight into areas of further research.
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