Emotion Mapping

When I'm brought in early enough in the game design process, I like to see if I can include Emotion Mapping. This means taking the player through an emotional journey, or even a roller coaster. I like to know what emotion the player is likely to experience where, and to ensure that a spectrum of emotions come into play.

Part of Emotion Mapping involves creating powerful emotional moments.

There's a macro component arranging these powerful emotional moments in key places throughout the course of the story as well as a micro component creating these moments within a particular mission or segment of the game.

Powerful emotional moments include such things as:

  • The time when you see you have little option but to do something unbelievably brave, and you launch into it

  • A moment when all seems lost

  • The feeling that you've finally won only to suddenly learn that the real hell is just beginning

  • Moments of parting, or moments of reunion, with characters you care about

  • Times when you and possibly your squad are running like hell from a better armed enemy

  • Painful moments when you lose one or more characters you're close to

  • "A-ha" moments when a big mystery is suddenly resolved

  • Huge action sequences that aren't cliché

  • Unbelievable plot twists that leave you amazed or stunned

  • Other such powerful emotional moments

Also involved in Emotion Mapping is building into the game Emotionally Complex Moments and Situations, as discussed in Chapter 2.15.

Unfortunately, when I'm brought in too late in the game design process, often there isn't much I can do in the way of Emotion Mapping.



Creating Emotion in Games. The Craft and Art of Emotioneering
Creating Emotion in Games: The Craft and Art of Emotioneering
ISBN: 1592730078
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 394

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