CMPM176 Assignment: Systemic Machines, Deadlock & Game Design Loops

This assignment solution delves into the core concepts of game loops and system design, focusing on the distinctions between engines, economies, and ecologies as systemic machines. It addresses the issue of deadlock in game design, providing an example outside the textbook, and emphasizes the importance of maintaining balance in in-game currencies. The solution also highlights key steps in defining a system's loops and goals, particularly emphasizing the significance of defining the looping structure, linking player experience with system design, utilizing appropriate design tools, and documenting system designs for effective game development and future decision-making. Desklib provides a platform for students to access similar solved assignments and past papers for academic support.

Running head: SUBJECT 1
Creating Game Loops
Student Name
Institution Affiliation

SUBJECT 2
Creating Game Loops
1. In your own words, describe three major types of systemic machine (gameplay loops) and
what makes them different from one another?
There are three main systemic machines (gameplay loops) categorized by considering their task
in the game system resources, namely: Engines, Economies, and Ecologies.
i. ENGINES
Engines are the first gameplay loops that make the development of a game much easier by
taking care of the number of hard underlying tasks. In a game design language, it can be
defined as either reinforcing, adding resources to the game, or balancing, removing resources
from the game.
BOOSTING ENGINES
Boosting engine is a system that reinforces resources to the game in a way that the game player
can choose between using the resources to act within the game at that moment or to invest
them for future and greater capabilities. Boosting engines enable the player to earn more
victory points or to invest in better fighting capabilities depending on the choice the player
makes.
Engine Problems
Since Boosting engines are mainly based on the reinforcing resources, it has flaws. For instance,
in an arcade game, one of the players can’t catch up with the other player since the other
player has more wins than the other. To keep playing, the player must have enough resources

SUBJECT 3
for reinforcing the system. Generally, boosting engines requires a careful balancing of
reinforcing and balancing loops for the game to operate effectively in the favor of both players.
Breaking Engines
Breaking loops have a predominant balancing loop as compared to Boosting loops. In a
breaking engine, the source in the loop generates a resource for the loop but works to reduce
the reinforcement of the resource in the near future. They normally slow down the
reinforcement process in the game. Slowing to stop the breaking engine must be used carefully
in a game. For instance, if the regulations are too much for the players' resources then the
player might soon have insufficient resources to play the game, and the game will finally slow to
a stop.
ii. Economies
In game design, Economies is a system that’s is dominated by a reinforcing loop where the
reinforcement of resources, time and power is from exchanging one resource for another for
nonlinear gain in value. For example, a player can trade a gun for a bigger gun, the player has
acquired a better tool of combat in an economical way.
Unfolding complexity
in the Economies gameplay loops, as more capabilities are being created in the game, they
open a way for better loops to accommodate them. As the game progresses the complexity
increases and hence the game needs to be economical to accommodate the new advanced
features of the game. For example, a player can purchase an ore, refine it and make their own

SUBJECT 4
weapon. The game will start at a simple level and it gets challenging as the player progresses
into new levels.
Currencies
In the games, currencies such as silver and gold are mainly exchanged for other things such as
weapons and food, and they are drained out of the economy when they are spent. Since
currencies are affected by inflation, the game should be able to accommodate an economic
system that gives value to the currencies and a dynamic one.
Economies with Engines
Economies often have engines that help the player to weigh decisions based on how
economical it is to the player. For example, a player might be having wood, the player can
either exchange that wood with food or invest that wood to build a bakery that can, in turn,
bake more bread.
iii. Ecologies
Ecology system has a balancing loop(loops) where resources are being exchanged as they are in
the economy in such a way that each part balances. It has reinforcing loops as subsystems but
not the primary drivers of the system structure. Every part of this system grows but the system
remains balanced. The primary problems associated with Balancing systems have to do with
either the balancing system is either static or a balance that can wreck the entire system.

SUBJECT 5
Creating a game loop
2. In your own words, describe what Sellers calls ‘deadlock.’ Explain using an example of a
game that’s not in the book.
Deadlock is a situation in which two programs in a computer which are sharing the same
resource are typically involved in opposing one another from accessing that resource leading
them not to function. For example, in a game where a hostage has been kept hostage by a
criminal and police has come to rescue the hostage with the exchange of the criminals’ friend.
The cop will tell the criminal to release the hostage and at the same time, the criminal will tell
the cop to release the criminals’ friend. In the end, none of them will act since they will wait for
each other to act first.
Creating game loops
3. Why is it important to keep in-game currencies in balance? What design approach does
Sellers suggest to retain the balance between the value of in-game currencies and other
resources?
The in-game currency balance is important in that all the currencies earned by the player
should be of value to the player. For example, if the game awards the player with soft
currency, it should enable the player to spend the soft currency in a manner and
frequency that will add value to the players' gameplay. This makes the game much more
enticing to the player.
User “collection hungry” and spend-savvy approach.

SUBJECT 6
It is an approach in which the player gets to "collect hungry". The player is supposed to
be started off with a little, and make them want to earn a lot. Spend savvy is an approach
in which the player is well informed of what they can buy via the currencies they have
earned and how much fun it is to earn and spend more while in the game
Creating game loops
4. What steps in "Defining a System's Loops—And Goals" do you find to be the most important for a
systems designer? Explain why.
i. Defining the Looping Structure
The looping structure such as reinforcing or balancing loop generally defines how the player’s
experience will be with the game. The iterations of the game will determine the overall objects of the
game as well as the response of the game to the player.
The loops should be such that they help the player in meaningful decision making while playing. The
importance of this step is, it will define the game to meet the player’ s needs.
ii. Linking the player experience and system design
The game should be designed in such that the player can interact with the system effectively. The player
should be the one defining the rules according to the players' comfort, as the player is trying to
accomplish the objective of the mission in the game.

SUBJECT 7
The game should be able to accommodate the players' modification in terms the controls, visual and
sound. for example, the player would like to play the game with the controls the player is comfortable
with for better handling of the missions. This step is important in that the players can modify the game
system in the way they will love to play it.
iii. Tools for designing game systems
A designer is supposed to first come up with a design of the game by drawing it on a whiteboard in order
to represent the gameplay before actually trying to develop it. They normally sketch looping structures
to obtain the accurate structure they want. When the design is getting perfect a prototype tool such as
loopy is used to easily draw reinforcing and balancing loops. The electronic spreadsheet is widely used
to analyze the game data that defines the systems looping functions.
iv. Documenting your system designs
Documentation of games is important as it explains the goals, how the games work and how the system
is to be implemented. It is most applicable in the programming side of the game in the implementation
of the system in the game. The documentation should be updated as the game is being updated so as to
help in decision making in future.

SUBJECT 8