tl;dr: Experience first design is player first design.
It is a common question among designers if they design theme or mechanic first. I understand why this is the case, as it really is two different ways to approach game design. But I believe the reality is that most people are a mix of these two. I know that personally I sometimes have a theme in mind, and I will find a way to make a game of it. At other times, a mechanic might come to mind first, around which a game is built. I really believe that we all freely move between these. That said, I think there is a third approach that has gotten some attention lately: the notion that we might design a game with an experience-first mindset. In dissecting my own approaches, I think this is what I do the majority of the time.
Let’s think about what each of these three approaches looks like.
Theme first design
Theme first simply means you have a thematic topic in mind. Say, for example, you want to make a game about the solar system. I use that as an example because it’s an idea I have had for ages, but I have failed to find the best mechanics to bring the idea to life. With this theme in mind, one can shop for mechanics that might fit it. Thinking of it like a math equation, the theme is fixed, while the variable of mechanics needs to be discovered. I know that for me, as a designer, I tend to struggle most when I start with only a theme.
When I think about Firefly the Game I can’t help but suspect that they started with theme. I imagine the conversation was something like “we need to make a game about the Firefly world, what mechanics would bring that theme to life?” I have no idea how this game was developed, but it’s not hard to imagine this is how it went. Theme-first designs are typically sold primarily based on their theme.
Theme-first design means you start with the topic the game will be about. Everything else has to be molded to fit the theme.
Mechanic first design
Mechanic first design is when you start with a mechanical idea about how a game will work. For me, this typically happens when playing other games. You see a mechanic, and you fall in love with it. Or some new mechanic inspires you to put a twist on an old mechanic. There are countless other approaches to landing on mechanic first, but it’s always the same; you identify a way you want a new game to “work,” and you build a game around it.
I don’t know if Dominion was a mechanic-first game, but I would venture to guess that it was. The game features a new mechanic that was the defining aspect of the game. Frankly, the theme was almost irrelevant and really was a repeat of so many games before it. Dominion’s success was all about the mechanic.
Mechanic first designs are started with a mechanical way the game will function. The theme is then found to match the mechanic and give it a context in which to exist.
Experience first design
Experience first designs seek to create a feeling in the player. Some examples will bring this to life:
- I want to make a game where you feel like your managing the energy on a space ship.
- I want to make a game where you feel like your exploring the new world via sail in the 1700’s.
- I want to make a game where you feel like a mob boss having to manage your limited resources.
Notice how all of these are a theme plus a “feeling.” The feeling is what makes this special. Because you not just saying you want to make a game about being a mob boss; you saying you want to be a mob boss managing your resources. I just made that up, and I already have ideas swirling on how to use mechanics that would create that feeling. This is my primary way of thinking about games I want to create.
A game I suspect that used this approach is Clank!. I imagine someone had the idea to make a game where it feels like you’re sneaking through a dungeon trying not to make noise while stealing all the loot you can. Experience-first designs often appear on the surface to be theme-first, but there is always a difference. In this example, the feeling is being sneaky. This feeling could have resulted in other themes (which they have done with things like Clank! In Space!). It could have also been manifested in a wide range of mechanics; though they chose to use a bag builder and push-your-luck element which play into the experience and build on it in a beautiful way.
Experience first design seeks to create a specific feeling in the players of the game. With this, both theme and mechanics are found to bring it to life.
For me personally, my most successful designs always came from an experience-first approach. My earliest design that used this approach is called Shields Up Engineering!. I wanted to make a game that felt like you were managing the energy on a star ship like you see happening in Star Trek. I always loved how they bent the ship to do what they needed. So I had both a theme and experience in mind when I set out to make the game. When I play tested the game I would ask players “did it feel like you were managing the energy on a star ship?” or I would ask “overall what did it feel like you were doing?” I did this until I consistently got what I was looking for. I wanted it to feel like an open sandbox of options, that you were adapting the ship, and that you were managing energy on it to do what you needed. Once all of these were in place I was happy.
2 out of 3
Thinking about my own game creations and which ones have had the greatest success I have come to realize that the best ones started with at least 2 out of these 3. That is to say I have two aspects in mind from theme, mechanic, and experience.
One design that my son and I have been working on demonstrates this notion. Way back in 2020 the Game Crafter hosted the Solo Duo Challenge. The challenge was to make a solo or 2 player game. This in a way was a lower level mechanic in that it dictated player count. We had also just purchased a Humble Bundle or art that came with many thousands of pieces of art, all which were dungeon or fantasy themed. So we had a theme in mind, to make a Dungeons and Dragons type of fantasy game. Finally, we decided to borrow the rough structure of an 18 card game I had previously made called Shields Up!.
So here is what we had:
- Theme: Fantasy
- Mechanic: 18 card decks
This left us the ability to decide what the experience should be like. We decided it should be a one-on-one dueling game. We also decided early on that we wanted each character to be an 18-card deck, and that each of those decks should be asymmetrical in nature. That is to say that the mechanics of each should reflect the character. And I think this is where the real magic happened; we started to ask, “What would it feel like to be a gelatinous cube?” or “What would it be like to play a bard?” These experience-first approaches brought the whole thing together. We actually won that contest, which blew us away. I believe we owe the success to the combination of theme, mechanic, and experience-based approaches happening in unison.
So, reflecting on all this, I have come to think about these three approaches, and I try to find a way to have at least 2 of them in mind. But most often I start with an experience I want to create.
Experience first design is player first design
So how does this fit into a blog about the intersection of UX and game design? User-Experience design is all about how a human feels about using an interface. It is those feelings a UX person seeks to manipulate. We want long complicated things like taxes to feel simple and intuitive. We want it to be easy to find the content you seek on a website. These are all “feelings”: did it feel “easy,” did it feel “simple,” did it feel “satisfying”? The way the user feels is at the heart of UX design. And this is the exact same way to think of Player Experience (PX). Good PX is when a complicated game feels easy to play, or when the mechanics of a game feel satisfying. When thinking about and designing for PX, it’s about how the player feels. And this is why experience-first design seems so important to consider.
Bringing it all together
I want to consider a few finished games that I had no part in, but when looked at through this lens, I believe we can see one aspect of why they succeeded.
First I want to consider Star Wars: The Deckbuilding Game. We have:
- Theme: Star Wars
- Mechanic: Deck Building
- Experience: Classic good vs. evil
It has all 3 clearly defined. This still leaves a tremendous amount of room to design in, and yet it closes things down to a manageble core. And every single element that gets added can be checked against these. Does XYZ fit the theme? mechanic? experience?
Another great example is War of the Ring. We have:
- Theme: Lord of the Rings
- Mechanic: Troops on a map
- Experience: You should feel like the fellowship saving the world or the shadow trying to conquer the world.
War of the Rings hits on all of those fronts. It is for good reason ranked as the #3 thematic game and the #1 war game on Board Game Geek. For as much trouble as I give this game for its usability problems, it hits a grand slam on the aspects being talked about here. Think how much easier the designers roles would have been once they identified these three aspects of the game!
Finally I want to consider a game not based on a very successful IP. What about the game Blood Rage.
- Theme: Norse Mythology
- Mechanic: Area control, action points and drafting
- Experience: You should feel like a Norse god trying to achieve the most glory during Ragnarock.
It is interesting to consider that those three aspects combined could have resulted in a terribly boring game just as much as it could have resulted in an amazing one. So don’t think of this as a magic formula. Think of it as a way to view your designs and to create boundaries for you to operate in. It’s always easier and more effective when you give yourself boundaries to work with.
Be self aware
My main point that I hope you get from this is that there is not only a 3rd way to design games (experience first), but that we should not limit ourselves to one of these. I believe the best designs come to life when all 3 have been considered. For me, this has become one of the ways I decide if I am ready to work on a game. Do I have at least 2 of the 3 covered? And if I have 3 covered, I know that I have a far greater chance of seeing the game through to a successful finish.
