Design Corner #2: GDS Bootcamp, the Unleash System, and More!
Design Corner #2: GDS Bootcamp, the Unleash System, and More!
Hello everyone! I'm Andy Mangal, and thank you for taking the time to read our second "Design Corner" blog post! It has been 117 days since the last design post, and much has happened in that time!
Most notably, I had the privilege of attending the "Master Game Mechanics" course and learning from the fine people who run the "Game Design Skills" program! If any of you would like to turn your creative musings and game design impulses into a professional discipline, I can't recommend this course enough. "Mastering Game Mechanics" is full of deeply thought-out definitions and frameworks that bring much clarity and light to the otherwise abstract and shadowy domain of game design.
In a world where game design information (in the rare occasions it is actually discussed) usually comes in the form of amateur YouTube essayists recognizing patterns, it was so refreshing to have the authority of industry veterans telling us very clearly what does and doesn't work. As opposed to other classes I've taken that have a very abstract and academic approach to game design, MGM's has a clear vision that is based in history and experience. Explanations of principles were often illustrated with stories from Alex's experiences of creating content in World of Warcraft or Kuo-Yen's experiences balancing League of Legends, or of course, illustrated with yet another fighting game example by Celia!
The in-class exercises were particularly valuable; whether it was roleplaying creative disagreements or practicing different approaches to content design, I felt that every element of the course was intended to make me a better designer in all aspects. And I believe it worked!
After my time in the class, I can confidently say that my understanding of game design has been fundamentally shifted.
Depth can be a goal, not something simply happened upon, and it can be achieved through planning and the effective use of tools, not exclusively by intuition and trial/error. And with these newly developed tools, the first thing I did was apply them to this very game—Two Robots: Unleashed!
The Birth of the "Unleash" System
One of the biggest things this course inspired me to do was to create the new "Unleash" system! In one of the earliest classes, we were learning that "gameplay depth" is the number of meaningfully different decisions available to players at a given moment. A series of options that all ended in the same way were ultimately the same option with a different coat of paint. It seemed so obvious at first! But as we started using this term to analyze the options in existing games, I thought to myself: what would happen if you applied this to TRU? What makes each scrap type different from the other? Playing a leg should be a different decision than playing a torso, shouldn't it?
And that's when it hit me—what if each scrap type had its own innate ability that you could trigger, or "unleash," at any time? For instance, what if Arm cards let you draw cards, and Torso cards let you gain mana? All of a sudden, at the cost of the added complexity of a few rules, the player was able to make much richer decisions and engage with the game’s systems much more deeply.
Early concept art of the Unleash system.
Extending Depth with Colors
I then applied this to the color—what's the difference between a Yellow bot and a Green bot? The solution was even simpler: every color bot should receive an ability that's inherent to its class. Now every bot has unique abilities and the player can strategize around what sort of ability they want to have out on the field, thus guiding the types of colors they put out on the board.
Anecdote from Playtesting
During an internal playtest, one of our long-time players commented:
“The Unleash system finally made me feel like Two Robots had esports-level depth. I wasn’t just dropping scrap anymore—I was constantly debating whether to unleash an ability or hold it for later. That tension is what competitive games live on.”
Hearing this confirmed that the system not only worked in theory but was delivering the kind of strategic choices we’ve been aiming for.
If you'd like to hear more about the details of the Unleash system and Faction Abilities, please stay tuned for the next blog post!
Once again, shoutout to Alexander Brazie, Kuo-Yen Lo, Michelle Olson, Celia Wagar, and Keba Etzioni for all their hard work in running such a great class!
And thank you for you for reading!
Yours truly,
Andy Mangal, on behalf of the TRU Team