The objective of your game is to make a franchise.
- Poker has 100 hours of gameplay
- Tetris has 100 hours of gameplay
- Angry Birds has 100 hours of gameplay
- Sim City has 100 hours of gameplay
- Starcraft has 100 hours of gameplay
- Portal has 100 hours of gameplay
- Sensible Soccer has 100 hours of gameplay
- Left 4 Dead has 100 hours of gameplay
Who Actually Plays For 100 Hours?
The majority of your game’s players will never actually get to 100 hours of gameplay. They will top out at around 20-25 and move onto another game. So why think in terms of another 75 hours for a minority?
Because the objective of your game is not to make a game. It is to make a franchise. Single franchise publishing is about attracting and converting fans to your cause, not feeding consumer mouths, and by short changing the gameplay to only what the majority actually plays, you ensure that nobody becomes your fan. So nobody continues the conversation about your game, and you’ve fallen into the conversation gap.
100 hours of gameplay is what you need to build a real connection with your players and get them invested. Whether through content or game dynamics, what they need is to fall in love with your game world. They want to play within in, fail within it, and yet feel positive about it and themselves as a result of playing it. This only happens if your game gives them the hours to do so.
