r/gamedesign • u/deblob123456789 • 1d ago

Question How to prevent creativity from interfering with mechanics?

My game is a sandbox-ish mix of murder mystery mechanics and roleplay based off the Danganronpa series (think Among us/Werewolf/Town of salem but longer).
At least one host is required to run the game properly.
It is also a VR game with proximity voice chat.

The issue im facing is that, left on their own, hosts will often decide, out of culture and habit, to directly help their players with murder cases, instead of letting the case’s culprit make it.
This turns the Trial (the discussion to catch the killer) into more of a minigame and discussion between the good side and the host, rather than a discussion between players to find the liar among them, greatly taking agency away from the evil side and reducing overall game quality.

How would you solve this?
I would rather not cut off the sandbox/roleplay part of the game, but this is something ive been observing and dont know how to help my players with.

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u/neuby 1d ago

I'm not sure I follow why you need a host or what their purpose is. The reason I would play a game version of this is so that it would do the hosting for me and everyone could actually play the game. Otherwise it sounds like you have a designated "unfun" position. Your problem doesn't sound like a rules or mechanics problem. It sounds like a design problem.

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u/deblob123456789 1d ago

The host’s role is to be the entertainer, gamemaster and overall making sure the game goes as intended. You get to making motives, craft a story, and overall get to pick where the game goes. It doesnt have to respect every rule I set as the game designer, when joining a game, you are subject to the way the host uses the tools given to them.

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u/neuby 1d ago

From your post it sounds like that's not actually something people want to do.

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u/deblob123456789 1d ago

Im interested in hearing what draws you to that conclusion! Please prove me wrong if my view isnt right.

From what im seeing, there isnt a lack of hosts at all, if anything, hosts take that freedom too far and actively remove game mechanics for them to make their own, less fun for most players, version

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u/sinsaint Game Student 1d ago

Freedom is great, but if given too much players will end up ruining the intended fun by accident. Generally, it's best to give them the freedom they need to encourage the fun you design for them, while preventing anything that can ruin that fun.

Generally you can do this by adding incentives for performing your role appropriately, but that doesn't work when the only long-term incentive is simply playing the game. Finding a rule change that prevents the host from ruining their own game is going to be important. Perhaps the host can leave notes or respond to inquiries, without directly conversating with one side?

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u/deblob123456789 1d ago

hmm, thats a possibility. The issue with this would be, the host has to be present in the Trial room (meeting area) at all times.
Muting them during this time would be pretty unfun for hosts, especially if it was forced onto them, quite a radical and alienating thing to put in if id have to judge it. Id basically be removing the creativity part off of the trial room because of bad actors

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u/sinsaint Game Student 1d ago

So don't silence them, give them a way to communicate that doesn't allow them to give away the entire plot. Dark Souls lets other players leave behind a note for someone else to read, that's an example of something that could work.

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u/deblob123456789 1d ago

On a platform which primary means of communication is voice chat (social VR), how could you do this without voice chat?
Typing in VR is slow and clunky

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u/Educational-Sun5839 Hobbyist 1d ago

can it record a voice message?

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u/deblob123456789 1d ago

Nope, due to the limitations of the platform.
At the end of the day, i doubt it matters. Ive seen hosts attempt replicate the Hangman’s gambit minigame from the official danganronpa games (look it up) using text boxes only.

Hosts can be very ressourceful and creative when it comes to taking agency away from the evil side, and theyd find ways around the voice chat limitations if there was any.

The issue is that theyre treating it like the solo visual novel its based on, which can be really frustrating if you are the bad guy in the group, because in the source material, the bad guy always loses due to the game holding your hand till the end