A mega-thread on Twitter revealed the cool tricks and lies of game dev

Over the weekend game developers and researchers all contributed to an amazing Twitter thread, revealing the secrets and lies that deliberately hidden in games and game mechanics to make sure we have a good time. 

It was in response to a request from game dev Jennifer Scheurle, who was looking for examples for a talk she was giving at the New Zealand Game Developers Association. 

What followed was a landslide of tricks that developers use to make us feel awesome when we’re playing a game, and it is incredibly interesting. 

Mike Bithell of Bithell Games threw in ‘third person game thumbstick correction‘ as a favourite, where a game detects collision blocks and subtly moves the character around them regardless of your input.

Researcher Tommy Thompson contributed a storm of sneaky tactics, including that Far Cry 4 deliberately turns down NPC damage and accuracy the more of them there are near you, that the Xenomorph in Alien Isolation has two brains, and that the NPCs in Arkham Asylum will ‘avoid 180° turns at all costs’ so you can sneak up behind them.

In Surgeon Simulator you can you call yourself from the game; in Serious Sam the bullets are thicker when tested against enemies; In Hi Octane none of the vehicles actually had different stats, at all; in System Shock your last bullet does double damage and Ken Levine himself said that the first bullets from an enemy in BioShock always miss you; Sam Barlow broke down ways the enemy AI in Silent Hill: Shattered Memories would be hobbled to make chases more exciting.

You should go through the thread to have a look when you have time. It’s fascinating. 

Scheurle got responses from people disappointed that devs ‘cheat’ players this way, and broke down why developers do this kind of thing.

This thread would have been really useful a couple of weeks ago, everyone.