Mortal Kombat could be considered an older example of this, as it was notable for one major thing. No, not blood. It was notable because it was instantly satisfying. Boon, Tobias, and team developed the game to be enjoyable right from the start. At a time when a good Street Fighter player would need to study for weeks to play solidly in an arcade, a Mortal Kombat player could have a blast getting into uppercut fights within a few minutes.

The default attacks were all visceral, brutal, and fun. By stripping out the complexity that was both the strength and the barrier to entry of Street Fighter, they made things far more available to a large number of players.

Similarly, re-solving old design problems in new ways helps foster creativity within a limited framework. Let’s say that using the above example we’ve got a competitive FPS, and we’ve decided to take out health packs. Well, how does the player heal? Let’s say, then, that healing is accomplished by getting close to some sort of centrally-located healing sticks. That sounds like it will draw competitors closer together, doesn’t it?

Now suddenly you’ve got a device that serves an essential game function and raises the intensity of competition. If it has shielding properties, two opposing players may wind up staring at each other from within the healing point in a form of Mexican standoff. If not, it may be a tempting ambush point. From this one change to the basic formula a major gameplay set piece has been introduced.

The best of these changes should affect all player skill levels. If the change is only evident after 10 hours of play, the audience might be lost before they get to the goodness.

Conversely, if the change only simplifies mouse commands for new players, more advanced players on keyboard shortcuts will never notice. When Rise of Nations developer Big Huge games decided to merge a real time strategy formula with a turn-based one, they managed to hit that sweet spot of effecting beginning, intermediate, and advanced play fundamentally. They made one fundamental change that made the game feel fresh to all types of players.

2. Add a signature to the design of your game

Now that your game is solidly on the road of change, how can you get players to remember it? Most developers try to populate their 3D worlds with fluffy normal content that’s regularly broken up by amazing set pieces… high quality assets or events that make everything feel more overwhelming and memorable, even if they don’t come around all that often. But have you thought about what the set piece for the design of the entire game (in your player’s minds) should be?

The equivalent of a set piece for an entire game is a signature element, and more than anything else this establishes your creative beachhead. This is the one memorable, intriguing element that both grips them emotionally and sets you apart from the rest. Think of this as the image for the early Spider Man movies of Spidey up alone on a pole flying the American flag.

This succinctly encompassed the solidarity and morality of the character, and set an indelible stamp in the minds of the viewers. Early on in development, most teams already have one or two ideas about what will grip their players.