Enemies

Game elements that are actively hindering players to complete game goals.

Many games have game elements that portray people or monsters that try and hinder players' goals. These Enemies can actively resist players' intentions through actions or they can be an explanation for challenges or obstacles in the Game World.

Examples

All the infected in Left 4 Dead Series are enemies to the players, although some are possible to avoid by not disturbing them. The same applies to Assassin's Creed 2 although this game allows more options for avoiding confrontation, e.g. distracting guards with hired thieves or courtesans as well as bribing heralds to stop being wanted by the authorities.

In fighting games, e.g. the Soul Calibur or Tekken series, players choose one of the available character to then meet another as an Enemy controlled either by another player or the computer. Similar structures exist in death-match versions in first-person shooters, e.g. the Doom or Quake series, and those game in the genre specifically designed for team play, e.g. Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory and the Battlefield series.

Several games, e.g. Super Mario series, let players know who the main Enemy is but only makes it possible to actively fight him or her at the end. A version of this is to let players know that there is an enemy but only reveal its identity when one can act against it.

Space Alert shows how Enemies can exist in games as more abstract challenges that need to be overcome, in this case card representing threats that players need to work together against to beat.

Using the pattern

For game elements to be able to function as Enemies they need some way of negatively effecting players.

Agents in the form of Avatars or Units is a typically way of creating Enemies with diegetic presence in a Game World. By this their are natural ways of providing players with ways of interacting with them and understanding how the Enemies can effect the environment and the players.

Another aspect of Enemies

Alarms Time Limits Challenging Gameplay Avatars Stimulated Planning

The primary design choice when defining Enemies is how players can Overcome or Evade them. There may be many ways to do this, which may change during gameplay, and players may have to complete several subgoals before having the chance to challenge the Enemies at all. Typical ways of overcoming Enemies are by Elimination (most often in the form of Aim & Shoot), by permanently making Interferable Goals impossible or by converting through succeeding with Gain Ownership goals. Games that provide many Enemies can give them different abilities to support Orthogonal Unit Differentiation, and thereby Varied Gameplay, or vary the environment in which these Enemies are encountered.

Another design choice is where in a Level the Enemies are met. They may block paths to Traverse goal, which makes their appearance likely or guaranteed, they may be the objectives of Reconnaissance goals, or may be Surprises in Exploration goals. In games requiring Maneuvering they can provide additional hazards that have to be actively avoided.

Having the Enemies appear separated allows players to decide what Enemies to challenge first (which can be useful to counter Orthogonal Unit Differentiation), while having the Enemies appear together can modulate the Right Level of Difficulty between different areas of the Level.

The most challenging Enemies are other humans. Computer controlled Agents can be made very challenging by using information or ultra-powerful abilities impossible for players to have, in principle, using Ultra-Powerful Events, but this easily conflicts with players' Perceived Chance to Succeed. Game Masters can more precisely modulate players' Perceived Chance to Succeed not only on their actual chance to succeed but also what the players believe.

The cause for enmity between the player and the Enemies can usually be described through a Goal/Preventing Goal pair. By using high-level goal pairs, the Enemies can be used as the main driving force for the Narrative Structure of the game. Such an overarching goal can then be used to create numerous subgoals within a Hierarchy of Goals: a Collection of goals that consist of several duels, Gain Information goals to gain the identity of the Enemies or their Achilles' Heel, Overcome to defeat the henchmen of the Enemy, Supporting Goals to find the Tools for defeating the Enemy, and so on. However, causes compatible with the Consistent Reality Logic need to be found to explain why these Enemies cannot be encountered early in the game.

The difficulty of Enemies can be modulated by changing their Skills, giving them Privileged Movement, or changing their numbers. Alarms can be used to support Enemies and can motivate the introduction of move Enemies if the Alarms are tripped. If players can have Identification with the Enemies, it can create a form of Social Dilemma as can having to perform certain actions to Overcome the Enemies. A special type of an Enemy is the Boss Monster, who is used to signify the final goal that has to be fulfilled to complete a Level.

Narrative Aspects

Many games show Enemies to the players through Cut Scenes before they can interact as a way of presenting Narrative Structures, and this is especially common with Boss Monsters.

Consequences

Enemies are the Characters or Avatars of players that have Preventing Goals or Agents or Units controlled by Dedicated Game Facilitators or Game Masters. The presence of Enemies in Game Worlds causes Tension and gives players motivation for Overcome goals, often through Combat. As such, they naturally cause Conflict or Competition as they threaten to make the players lose Lives orResources (working as a form of Consumers), or otherwise block the players' progress in the game.

The appearance of Enemies are nearly always Disruption of Focused Attention events and can require Attention Swapping when several different groups of Enemies exist. Enemies are often used to give the motivation for the unfolding of Narrative Structures in games. When players can identify common Enemies, this is usually a motivation for creating Alliances.

Relations

Can Instantiate

Attention Swapping, Aim & Shoot, Conflict, Combat, Competition, Alliances, Overcome, Social Dilemmas, Reconnaissance, Preventing Goals, Tension, Disruption of Focused Attention

Can Modulate

Exploration, Game World, Traverse, Evade, Levels, Narrative Structures, Right Level of Difficulty, Perceived Chance to Succeed, Maneuvering

Can Be Instantiated By

Avatars, Units, Agents, Dedicated Game Facilitators, Game Masters, Characters, Eliminate

Can Be Modulated By

Consumers, Privileged Movement, Identification, Orthogonal Unit Differentiation, Gain Ownership, Skills, Alarms

History

An updated version of the pattern Enemies that was part of the original collection in the book Patterns in Game Design.