Hi everyone ! 

The 0.2 version is live ! 4 celestial islands have been designed for a total of 117 cards, rules have been updated and bit of lore written. 

As the new version is out now, I wanted to make a new game design breakdown. 

3 - Ludo-narrative harmony

So I guess it is a pretty known notion among designers but which is quite hard to reach when designing. Ludo-narrative harmony refers to the coherence between the gameplay mechanics of a game and the narration (that includes the scenario, the storytelling, the lore etc...). When a player, in their experience, doesn't feel a coherence, we talk about "dissonance" and we actually want to avoid it (at least, when it's not intentionnal). 

The notion itself is not that important, however I really wanted to get to the point that players feel like everything was planned ahead, and that the whole feels consistent. For this post, I'll use for example the celestial island of the Entity of Conviction and Facts.

So this Entity is about how one can defend an opinion based on facts, what are the foundations of science or arguments, how you can be sure about your assertions. Firstly, I wanted the environment of this island to reflect these theme : enormous mountains with rope bridges between them. You're on those bridges and you have to steady yourself in order to advance and not fall. 

But what about gameplay mechanics? In this game, movement and placement is really important. And on this island, for example, exists the power of Anchor, the ability to steady yourself and cancel any push, grab or mouvement by force.

Another example is getting Stunned : in the game, you can't make any action. And that's the extreme of a conviction : being self-centered and close-minded in a way that you can't advance anymore. 

When designing the islands, the entities and all the cards, I tried to keep all of that in mind. Also, for now, cards have temporary names such as "cannon" but they will be changed soon enough, to fit the lore and narration. 

So what about you? Do you think about ludo narrative harmony when designing a game? Have you already played a game with it, or with a particular dissonance?

Thanks for taking the time to read!