Quest-Design-Research

Research on Quest Design for Project II.

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An Approach to Meaningful Quest Design

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Figure 1. Dragon Quest XI’s screenshot. Square Enix (2017)

About the author

I am Genís Bayó, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Video Games by UPC at CITM. This content is generated for the second year’s subject Project 2, under supervision of lecturer Ricard Pillosu.

Introduction

“Quests are about action that is meaningful to a player on the level of ideas, personal ambitions, benefit to society and/or spiritual authenticity.” Jeff Howard - Quests: Design, Theory, and History in Games and Narratives (2008).

“Quests are this place in a video game where game design, gaming and technology all come together.” Jeszek Szczepanski - Building Non-Linear Narratives in Horizon: Zero Dawn (GDC 2017).

Whether they are a minor feature of a game or a vital one, quests must be properly developed in order to keep -and, hopefully, reinforce- players’ feeling of immersion. An important amount of games tend to have a poor approach to Quest Design, due to a low amount of resources being put into it, which can make the whole product fall flat. Games that invest a high amount of resources in their questing aspect, on the other hand, normally have a noticable success because of it (e.g., The Witcher 3).

In this article, we will go through what quests are, what quests must be like and what they must transmit. Even though the information is mostly focused around the RPG genre, it can be useful to design quests for all kinds of games.

What is a quest?

Definition of Quest

First things first, we need to define what a quest is. According to Wikipedia, “A quest or mission is a task that a player-controlled character, “party”, or group of characters may complete in order to gain a reward.”

This means that we are able to turn any action our player can perform into a quest, as long as we reward them for it. This definition is not enough, though. In order to approach Quest Design properly, we need to be able to differenciate between Main Quests and Side Quests.

Main Quests vs Side Quests

Most people tend to think that a Main Quest is simply a quest you must complete in order to advance through the game, and a Side Quest an optional mission that you can decide whether or not to fulfill, without it representing any major effect in the core gameplay itself. The problem with this conception is that if, for example, the storyline of a game bifurcates into distinct quest chains, and you choose the “A” option, it implies not playing a set of quests that you would have had to complete in order to progress through the game if you had decided otherwise. Similarly, there are some Side Quests that players must complete in order to level up or grind, making them not that “skippable” anymore.

Definition of Main Quest

According to Dean Razavi, Game Designer for Razbury Games, Main Quests are plot points in our narrative arc, meaning that anything that is not related to the main story of the game can not be considered one.

To expand on the subject, Main Quests normally tell the story of a character -who tends to be the player’s-. They can be used to reach points in the narrative arc (Points of Interest) determined by the protagonist’s transformation; often following the Hero’s Journey in RPG’s. Main Quests start at the early stages of the game, introducing the main story, and develop it as the player progresses, showcasing it from beginning to end.

Definition of Side Quest

Instead of narrating the main storyline, Side Quests help to explain, describe and discover the world that surrounds the main character, as well as its inhabitants, while existing out of the main narrative arc.

Quest Design Pillars

A quest must…

… be meaningful. The player needs to feel connected to it in some way or another, and be engaged with it. They will invest their time on playing it, whether if it’s for 5 minutes or 2 hours. We can’t let them down by forcing them into going through something they do not enjoy in order to get to the better content later on.

… convey a story. It has to transmit a series of feelings and sensations, to make the previously mentioned connection easier, while narrating the facts that made that one village be what it is today, or explain what happened between these two brothers for them to be fighting to death now.

… be immersive and interactive. The player is not listening to a story, nor reading one. They are intervening and taking part in it. They must feel as an important piece of the tale, that carries it on and changes the curse of it depending on their decisions. If the players think that they don’t take any part in the quest’s narration, they won’t relate to it nor its characters, and we’ll have failed on its design.

Basic Quest Categories

Quests can normally be casified in 4 different types:

Kill Quests: the classical “kill 10 rats” kind of quest.

Fetch/Gather Quests: “bring me 5 rat tails” kind of quest.

Delivery Quests: bring a package from a Non-Player Character (NPC) to another. Could be considered as a variant of fetch quests.

Escort Quests: Protect an NPC on their way to X place.

Quest Creation Process

Concept Creation/Sketching

First of all, you have to know what resources you dispose of. Depending on them (and your game), you can use a narrower quest system, which mostly uses, for example, kill and fetch quests, or a wider one, which can use puzzles, minigames or any other innovative method you can think of in order to solve missions. Having a narrow quest system allows you and your team to easily coordinate, and create a lot of quests in an agile way, but they will probably get repetitive and, therefore, boring. On the other hand, if your system is too wide and allows for basically anything, the quest creation process will be a lot slower and harder, but quests will be interesting and most likely fun to play. You normally want something in between, so that your quest system is dynamic enough to be fast and have all the team members on the same page (programmers and artists also take part when it comes to implementing quests, and even writers if your team disposes of them), and allow for design freedom and interesting quest concepts at the same time.

Once you and your team have clear what types of quests you will be creating, you can start making quest concepts. The best way to do so is by writing down a lot of them, and then filtering them carefully. Pay special attention to the first ones that come to mind, since they tend to be the most cliche ones.

Write, in a couple short sentences, what the concept of the quest would be, followed by what the player should do in order to complete it in a really general way. Here are two examples of initial quest concepts for The Withcer 3 done by CD Projekt RED game designers, shown in Australia’s PAX 2015:

“A tower appeared out of nowhere - Geralt must find out why it happened and get rid of it.”

“A fake witcher is giving witchers bad name - Geralt can find out who he is and deal with him.”

As you can see, even if the concept is simple, it should already be interesting and express a clear and concise idea. This indicates that the quest has potential, and that it will be easy to expand later on.

Hiding Quest types

Once the concept is clear, you can start thinking what quest/s you will build around it, and their types. Avoid repeating yourself. Kill quests should only serve to teach the basic combat mechanics, if used at all. If they are not used carefully, they get repetitive and tedious. Same thing applies to fetch and delivery quests. Make the best out of your brain and imagination, and think about the content you want your player to experience.

As an example, main quests can just direct the player from one place to another. We always need to keep in mind that they will stumble across our content just by walking through the world we created, if it’s wisely placed. There is no need to tell your player to kill 10 rats. Instead, hide it. Make them dive into the sewers, seeking for the villain’s den, and they will be forced to fight rats as a result.

Aspects to Keep in Mind in Main Quests

Story is king in main quests. Always keep it in mind when designing them. Main Quests have to properly express to the player how their character (and, therefore, the story that surrounds them) transforms during the transcurse of the game, and how that affects the entire scene.

If you have a villain, do not use it to create quests. Use your main character, or hero, instead. Evaluate what scenarios you need in order to produce certain changes in your hero, and then how to use the villain to create those scenarios and draw the story to those Points of Interest, in a way that feels natural. This is why the villain is a powerful tool, and its proper use will tend to result in a stronger narrative.

If you want to branch a quest, without it modifying the whole story development, make the different paths meet at the next Point of Interest in some way. To make the player percieve their decision as meaningful, you can use further references to their choice of path later in the story, and even modify the ending of your game based on their choices, which also negates the possibility of replaying a small segment of the story just because they didn’t like the repercussion of the action they took just after saving the game. With that, we can avoid making incredibly complex story developement options, with mutliple and completely different branches, which can take a lot of time and resources we may or may not dispose of. This can also apply to Side Quests, but smaller Side Quests can have two or more distinct approaches at the same time, without having any point in common, while not requiring that big of a cost.

Aspects to Keep in Mind in Side Quests

In most Side Quests, you should define well stated rewards. The player should know what they’re getting after finishing your quest, so that they can estimate what the effort-payoff difference might be. If you do not state the rewards, or don’t specify them a lot, you will be making an agreement with the player. If they enjoy your quest, and feel that the reward is fair, there won’t be any complains. However, if they do not enjoy it, or if they consider the reward not valuable enough to compensate for their actions, they will feel betrayed, since not only they won’t have been provided with proper content, but they won’t have recieved an adequate reward to “compensate” for it either. This can affect their immersion, their initial perception in future quests and, most importantly, their general experience, so we must be really careful with that.

Be open about quest givers. NPC’s are not the only ones who can provide missions. A note on the floor, a ring dropped by a skeleton or even your main character driven by curiosity upon encountering a mysterious scenario can be perfect quest starters.

Don’t assume players will only accept quests they are highly interested in. Due to a psychological aspect, named Endowment Effect, which is highly related with our Loss Aversion, humans give a considerably higher amount of value to things once they own them. After being presented with a mission, our brain will associate it with ownership, and we will be hesitant towards not accepting it. This might seem needless to say, but keeping this in mind, try to make every quest appealing and interesting for any player.

Consider creating confronting quests that create a conflict players must solve by themselves. For example, if a poor farmer is asking for the player to smuggle a chest full of medicines, in exchange for his last savings, in order to help his ill daughter, but the player encounters two emaciated and unhealthy orphenage kids begging for food, we’ll have forced a difficult decision that must be made. Try to keep the difference between rewards ambiguous. It can purely involve personal satisfaction, or it can encourage greed, by adding some juicy extra loot or gold to the mixture, so that the player has to think about who to help and who to “betray”, therefore stablishing a connection with the situation and the characters involved in it.

Use your world to simulate life and transmit its story towards the player. As an example, in the MMORPG NosTale, there is a quest chain in which you have to kill some non-human miners for certain reasons. While fighting against them, they start screaming and questioning your actions, and the players start asking themselves if what they are doing is entirely right. Later on, when the player’s character decides not to take part on the slaughter anymore, they will most likely be on the same page, because they have been questioned by the world’s characters. Stablishing this kind of bonds between our players and the main character is the main objective we should be aiming for, since it results in an extremely pleasent experience for them.

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Figure 2. NosTale’s screenshot. Entwell Co (2009)

Be conciouis about timing. You do not only need to be aware of where you are going to present your Side Quests, but also when. If the player is at one of the final in-game locations, and they have to go battle against the main boss in order to save the world from an inevitable destruction, you might not want to have an NPC asking for them to collect flowers. You also need to think about short termed quests. If, for instance, the player stumbles across a village that is being attacked by bandits, and one of the villagers asks them for help, the player will probably still be able to walk away and come back in-game weeks later, with the village conveniently still being attacked. To prevent this kind of nonsenses, you might want to consider making it a dungeon instead, or actually burning the village down if the player ignores it for too long, just so that they see that their decisions and actions truly matter.

Pacing & Tension

Now that we know what quests are and how they have to be, we can dig into how to make them transmit what we want them to. One of the best tools to ensure control over our player’s feelings and emotions, if used properly, is the pacing graph. Pacing is used not only in Quest/Narrative Design, but also in Cinematographic Narrative and videogame Level Design. Before explaining it, though, we need to know about tension.

Tension

If we can control tension, we can control our player’s perception and emotions. We want tension in our game to vary. It shouldn’t be always increasing, we need slopes between every peak, so that our player has time to breath, relax and assimilate what just happened before jumping back to action. Here’s an example from Star Wars:

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Figure 3. Star Wars’ Pacing Graph. Image source here

The reasoning behind letting your players “rest” between peaks is because we humans are more likely to remember the scenes where the tension is at its lowest, and the ones where it’s at its highest. Take Portal as an example. Just after pressing the “play” button, the tension is really low, since nothing has happened yet, and there’s a calm music that helps you stay relaxed. This is one of the reasons why everyone remembers Portal’s first room.

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Figure 4. Portal’s screenshot. Valve Corporation (2007)

After solving some rooms, the escape sequence comes in. In this part of the game, the music and scenario completely change, and almost every single element shown is new to the player, which increases the tension, driving them towards the climax, where they’ll fight GLaDOS, and finally ease all the tension.

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Figure 5. Portal’s screenshot. Valve Corporation (2007)

We can see with this simple example how, even if we don’t necessarily remember all the chambers and scenes from Portal, the developers made sure we kept in mind the most important elements of their story.

It’s important to note, however, that we are making games, not films. In a film, you can assume that the spectators will watch it in one sit 90% of the time. When it comes to games, it’s a different story. Some players will play 4 hours sessions, and some of them 15 minute ones. If we are basing our quest on the tension aspect, and our player saves the game and leaves at a high peak, the whole experience will have been ruined the next time they play, since all the built-up tension won’t be there anymore. There are two ways to solve this:

Making shorter quests: you can make quests that don’t take too long to play, so that you can almost guarantee the player will play them in one sit.

Hooking the player up: if your quest is good enough, players will want to keep playing it, and won’t leave until they have finished it entirely, or until they reach a really low tension point, where the experience won’t be ruined next time they play.

Last but not least, we can add tension by making the player guess aspects from our story. If they try to deduce what our characters are going to do, or what they did in the past, they will feel much more involved and immersed in the story. Nevertheless, if our story developement is too obvious, and players can correctly guess what is going to happen every time, the story won’t be interesting to them anymore and immersion will be broken.

Pacing Graphs

We will now see how Pacing Graphs can be made step by step.

First of all, we need to choose a series of events that will represent the most important parts of our quest.

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Figure 6. Pacing Graph Example 1

We then make a graph that represents tension through time, and position our events accordingly

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Figure 7. Pacing Graph Example 2

Last but not least, we decide what gameplay mechanic will be mainly featured in each one of the events, and assing a color to each one. This helps us visualize the variety of actions, since if we make our player enter in combat way too often, for example, they won’t perceive the events as separated ones.

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Figure 8. Pacing Graph Example 3

For more information about Pacing Graphs in Quest Design, click here

Example of a Quest

Let’s make an example. We’ll follow the concept below:

“Our hero’s wife dies, but resurfaces as a ghost. - The hero has to fight against her while overcoming his wounds from an old friendship.”

Let’s make the following plot: Our hero just came back from a journey, and finds out his wife is terribly ill. They have a talk, and the tension, which started pretty high, eases. The wife then mentions that our hero’s old friend, the one who he sees as a betrayer, had paid her a visit. The tension increases. Shortly after, his wife dies, which gets us to our first peak. After that, a burial is celebrated, where the player gets relaxed… until the old friend appears, that is. The main character gets into a short fight with his friend, but it derivates into an apology, since his friend didn’t intend to betray him, but to protect his family from a curse. After reconciliating, we reach the highest peak. The hero’s wife was cursed, and she turns into a ghost he and his friend have to kill. Thanks to this tension roller coaster, our player will be emotionally tired at this point, and if we add in a sad overcome, we will catch them off guard, and they will probably react accordingly. The hero’s friend will sacrifice himself to release the wife from her curse, so that our hero doesn’t have to suffer the agony of murdering his already dead wife.

The Pace Graph would roughly look like this:

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Figure 9. Pacing Graph Example 4

Just to exemplify it, if we wanted to add choices to our quest, let’s say we let our player choose whether to reconciliate with the protagonist’s friend or not, but still get to an overcome where he sacrifices himself and shows his good intentions, it would look like this:

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Figure 10. Pacing Graph Example 5

MMORPGs

“Most MMO quests are used to direct the player through the experience rather than being engaging by themselves.” Daniel Floyd, from Extra Credits - Why Many MMOs Rely on Repetitive Grind Quests.

When approaching Quest Design for MMORPGs, we have to keep something in mind: a big part of the playerbase is not there for questing content.

What makes MMOs special is their huge variety of content; and quests are only one of their many features. Furthermore, when players level up character for the second time, they will already have experienced most of the available missions, so they won’t be as interested anymore. Here are two approaches to encourage questing in MMORPGs:

Limiting the amount of quests a player can carry (e.g., the main quest, 1 big side quest, and 3 minor side quests). By doing that, you are forcing players to take decisions, and therefore choose the quests they like the most, which allows them to start being involved in them. Moreover, when they level up another character, they will most likely try different quests, maybe resulting in a completely different experience.

Separating the world in multiple zones. World of Warcraft does that beautifully. Since we are talking about multiplayer games, we can’t modify the world that surrounds a level 6 character just because a level 110 one just defeated the final boss of the expansion; unless we make different zones, that is. There is only so much you can modify from the “base world”, but you can do whatever you want with dungeons, instances and other higher level continents or worlds. Since our intentions are not to make our player feel like a hero, but rather be one, big and relevant changes in the huge world that surrounds them are some of the best rewards we can provide them.

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Figure 11. World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor’s screenshot. Blizzard (2004)

“At the end of the day our goal is for the player to remain immersed in their world. Comprehensible motivations, people leading their own lives, decisions bearing consequences and of course gripping stories are the most important tools of a Quest Designer to reach that goal.” Philipp Weber - Making Games Classics: Quest Design in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (2014).