I (and at least half a million other people in the world) had the opportunity to play the Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Event this last weekend. Having Played Guild Wars 1 since before its first birthday and logging more hours than I really care to admit to, I was looking forward to this quite a bit and thoroughly enjoyed it. And I think it's important to clarify that first and foremost: I liked the game, I am looking forward to the next weekend event, and I do not regret preordering the Collector's Edition in all its costly glory. Giving my wife a spin on it made her start shopping for a new computer so that she could play it with me when it comes out.
This isn't a review of GW2 or an analysis or anything. I expressed many of my thoughts and concerns already on their forum, so I won't get too specific about that. I'll give my detailed thoughts once it's not a beta anymore and I have an opportunity to get to an area that isn't effectively right outside the city gates. Nonetheless, It has caused me to think rather extensively about the actual value of a game mechanic that features so heavily in it and its ilk: Leveling.
I don't think that leveling is bad, really. I've been a fan of RPGs for a very long time, and it is generally the main commonality between eastern and western RPGs that actually allows them to even be identified together. It also gives a nice quick look at the relative power of your characters or your enemies without having to get into a whole lot of nitty gritty. I just think that it is a mechanic that can be vastly misused. But that's getting ahead of myself. After all, it's important to understand the purpose of a leveling mechanic, which is to Power Up the respective player avatar(s) in a game.
The earliest example of a power up that I can think of is the power pellets in Pac-Man. I think this is also a very good example of a power up, because while it was in effect it actually changed the gameplay mechanics. There are two very simple goals in Pac-Man, collect all the pellets and avoid the ghosts. The power pellet actually turns that goal on its head, and all the sudden you're the one chasing the ghosts down. By either eating them or merely putting distance between yourself and them you are also improving your odds of success, which is possibly the more important effect as a player, if not the only one that they are truly conscious of. So you could say that a power up is anything in a game, whether it be an on screen item that you collect or something you select from a menu at some point in the game or whatever, that allows a player to progress further in the game and optionally changes the way the game is played in some way. I posit that the power ups that accomplish the first goal THROUGH the second one are the ones that will be more memorable and fun for the player.
Another fairly early example would be the original Mario Bros. In this game, you had the capability of running around and jumping on enemies and platforms, and hitting blocks from below to attack enemies and gain power ups. The Super Mushroom is probably the most iconic power up in all of gamedom. Certainly, this item was valued for the extra hit it granted you, but it also changed the gameplay significantly in ways that actually were both good and bad. Being now 2 tiles tall, you could no longer fit through paths 1 tile high, forcing you to take certain paths. You could also now destroy many blocks by jumping underneath them (allowing access to new paths), which could actually become a liability if you needed those to traverse the level. It also allowed you to find the Fire Flower, which did not actually grant you an extra hit, but the ability to attack enemies from long range, which is a far less subtle change to the gameplay style. This ability improves the player's chance of success far more than the super mushroom, and it did it solely through the change in gameplay mechanics.
Less linear the design gets, the more important power ups become, as the power ups generally act as the means to which further exploration is enabled (and therefore improving the player's chances of winning). And these usually vary greatly. In the Metroid series, they ranged from jumping higher to being able to walk safely through lava, to allowing you to run through obstacles at a high enough speed. Each one of these changed the gameplay (jumping to new paths, running into lava instead of avoiding it, searching for open stretches of land to run through) as the game continued. Compare this to something like Doom, where the key cards merely allowed you to go through the matching colored door. Of course, Doom's weapons are also powerups, and the different way each one behaved changed the gameplay when using that weapon, as well as the overarching weapon choice for a given situation.
These are important to multiplayer games as well, as they can change player tactics quite a bit. One player having Invisibility in a First Person Shooter (assuming the other players know about it) will cause opposing players to be less conservative with ammo, while the one with the ability will be less likely to give away their position by firing. Having a damage multiplier will generally cause the player to fire continuously in the hopes to maximize its effect, while other players will usually run directly away from them. Something like the Jump Boots from Unreal Tournament will make players choose their location differently to either use it as an evasion or to reach a tactically superior position that is otherwise unaccessible.
So powerups in general are pretty great. Players like them because it helps them beat the game, and also because it makes for a more varied and interesting experience. If you took the power pellets out of Pac-Man, it would probably still be playable, but more difficult and much more repetitive. But there are many ways to implement them, and some are more well suited to certain things than others. More on that next time.
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