There is no such thing as a bad mechanic; only a thoughtless application.
If you think that level grinding will serve an expressive purpose, or illustrate an important concept, then by all means work it in. If you’re just including it to slow down or impede the player, or because you see everyone else doing it, then maybe you should think a little harder about what you’re trying to accomplish.
The worst thing a game can do is assume the player has nothing better to do than play a game.
If you’re not enriching the player’s life, you are stealing the player’s time and replacing it with emptiness. This is not only socially irresponsible; it has the side effect of burn-out. Eventually the player will notice how little he is getting from the medium, and will cease to participate.
Just assume that the player has a life that does not revolve around jumping through your hoops, and they won’t necessarily do everything you tell them to just because they’re holding a controller. If you’ve got something to say, figure out how brief and rich you can make it.
A valuable item doesn’t make things possible; it makes them easier.
Locks and keys are the clumsiest of obstacles, and they take many forms. If it is impossible to enter a dungeon without a wand that can burn the surrounding bushes, and the wand serves little purpose other than to permit the player access, then it is little but a key. A key holds no practical value; its value is symbolic of a current lack of hindrance — and in its subtext, it speaks to the player of helplessness in the face of an arbitrary and contrived world, built to impede the player rather than to provide opportunities to explore and learn.
The items that become treasures are those that expand the player’s horizons by allowing the player to transcend the routine and inhabit the world on a higher level. They don’t unlock basic functions so much as they provide a better way of doing things. Much as a good home appliance relieves a person from the burdens of daily maintenance, Link’s recorder relieves the player from having to continually walk familiar terrain. His magic key means no more worrying about keys. His wand means no more worrying about sword beams. Add the magic book, and no more fussing with candles either.
Perhaps the greatest treasure in a recent game, Gordon Freeman’s gravity gun makes everything in the world both tactile and potentially useful.
Unlike previous Gradius games, in Gradius V losing your power-ups is a setback rather than a death sentence. All it means is that you have to be more careful. Likewise gaining power-ups means that you can relax and better appreciate the game’s nuances, but beyond that insight the player misses nothing crucial by failing or refusing to upgrade.
There is a place for locked doors, both literal and functional — but think about why you’re using them.
Every piece of a game’s method must reflect the game’s object, unless that contrast is part of the game’s object.
A game’s method is defined as the manner in which a game conducts itself — the rules, actions, and objects that comprise play, and the way that they interact. A game’s object is the overall idea that the game serves to communicate. Whether or not the designer has considered the game’s message, by the act of playing the player will receive one.
Every action is a verb, and every object is a noun. The game tells a story by the manner in which every action happens to every object. Therefore everything that you ask the player to do, however minor, is a part of the message that you are communicating to the player. Taken as a whole, the most common behaviors over the course of play define the perspective that the game communicates to the player.
A videogame must communicate through game design alone, unless the information is incidental to the game’s object or method.
Avoid all exposition. If you can’t explain an idea through pure game design, then you need to rethink what you’re saying and why.
Every environmental cycle must introduce a new point of interest, unless the absence of that interest is part of the game’s object.
An environmental cycle is defined as a complete refresh of the player’s surroundings, be it one screen (in a 2D side-scroller) or the area between here and the middle distance (in a 3D game). The specific measurement differs from game to game according to its pacing, format, and spatial sense.
A point of interest is defined as a new concept, or a significant elaboration on a known concept. The concepts need not all be profound; they need only expand the player’s perspective on the game’s object or method.
A game must assume no prior knowledge, unless that act of knowing is part of the game’s object.
This principle extends to knowledge of prior game design, as well as to knowledge and experience beyond the medium. Of the two, the former is more of a fundamental problem.