Unlocking the Base: My Favorite Game Mechanic?
Or is it game concept? Idk, I'm not a game designer. Yet.
Welcome to my blog, where sometimes I peel back the skin on my emotional-creative baggage to reveal insecurities rooted deep within my psyche, and other times I just talk about stuff I like, because I want to do that. This is one of those latter ones.
Since the age of 8-ish, there has been one game mechanic I’ve been absolutely enamored by. Every single time I’ve seen it implemented in a game, it has made that game better.
The joy of “unlocking” the different parts of a base.
I. It’s Not “Base-Building”
First, to clarify: I am not talking about “base-building” games. I’m using the term “unlocking,” because I cannot for the life of me find anything more specific to refer to this idea. In my research for this article, I tried looking for examples beyond the scope of my experience, and SEO was making my efforts feel like I was trying to chop my way through dense jungle overgrowth with half of a hotdog. All results, regardless of my keywords, directed me towards one base-building/town-building/city-building game or another.
Those are not what I’m talking about here. In those games (read: Sim City, Manor Lords, City: Skylines, Anno, Frostpunk), the central conceit of the game is building up and advancing a microcosm of civilization, in some form or another. The overwhelming majority of your playtime is spent constructing buildings, redirecting infrastructure, and economic or social community management. I like those games, but they are different, like an apple tree that grows coconuts, or the new Freaky Friday movie.
The most common form of what I’m talking about tends to manifest as a ‘hub’: that is, a central location that one returns to in-between levels, missions, or quests. It is where your allies gather, the victims you’ve saved can find sanctuary, you can organize for the journey ahead, and reset from whatever came before and will come after.
Which sounds good, doesn’t it? But the feeling? That’s even better.
II. Dopamine, My Mistress
In many of these games, there’s already one really important chemical reaction happening: when your character, or your party of characters, advances, they tend to level up, or gain new equipment, or unlock a new ability. This sense of explosive, incremental, and easily measurable progress helps our brain produce dopamine, a feel-good chemical that makes us feel accomplished. It even has an addictive quality, which can drive us towards wanting more.
Unlocking a hub or base accomplishes the same thing, but on another scale. It allows for another, separate drip-feed of dopamine in addition to the first one. Our base can also represent our progress through the game, functioning like a pylon for our efforts and money and good will, to make it grow and expand and improve. Sometimes there’s an added element, where we are not only expanding a physical domain, but occupying it with characters who inject each area with additional personality, gimmicks, or purposes.
The first game I ever remember seeing this in was Digimon World for the PS1, and the scrappy little village that calls itself File City.
And let me tell you, I’ve seen hundreds of games execute on this premise in different ways, and none of them hit quite like that one did.
III. Chasing The High
Five console generations and a custom-built PC later, and there’s still nothing quite like File City. Starting with a meager old man in a cardboard box and a couple of helpless, baby Digimon wandering around, 9-year-old me couldn’t possibly imagine what that place would become over the next 30 hours of gameplay.
A monster-taming battle adventure game, Digimon World’s driving mission was to revitalize File City by exploring the native regions of (the very cleverly named) File Island. As you explore, you uncover a mystery around a force that seems to be driving the various Digimon inhabitants mad with confusion, fury, or pain, causing them to forget who they are, or attack you in a blind panic. As you help each of them come to their senses, many of them will either return to File City, or support you in some other way.
Once back at File City, they will build a bank, upgrade your meat farm (don’t ask questions), open a restaurant, startup a clinic with recurring clientele (usually you), put together a battle arena, add a curling rink, create electric infrastructure so there’s actually lights at night, add a fountain in the town square, and more!
Every time you rescued a Digimon and sent them back to File City, you couldn’t help but wait with giddy anticipation about what their contribution to your burgeoning society would look like. How would they get along with the other Digimon? Would they go into business together? Would they help keep the place clean and sanitary for everyone? Maybe some of them wouldn’t quite get along, but that’s alright! Because there’s no violence in File City. Everyone is in this together.
Then there’s Mega Man Legends, from that same era of games. Mega Man Legends, on top of being one of my favorite games ever (jank and all), has another different, but equally formative game concept.
Early into Mega Man Legends, you are made to do back-to-back boss battles throughout the greater metropolitan area that resides at the center of the island where the game takes place. Even when you’re a master pro gamer superhuman elite like myself, it’s pretty much inevitable that some part of the city gets destroyed, if not many somethings.
Afterwards you meet the mayor, and help her bring the city back into shape. As you progress through the game, you are able to restore the ruins of homes, decimated in the conflict. You can bring life back to the bombed-out wreckage of the local library, and start filling it with books again. Building by building, you rejuvenate not only the landscape of the city, but the spirit of its people. You can empower the local hospital with the funding needed to save a young girl (which to be clear, is completely optional). It’s up to you to resurrect the scraps of the police force, sundered by constant battles with the invading pirate crew.
With this, the city returns to its former beauty and glory, and people start to recognize you, acknowledge your service and how helpful you’ve been. They give you gifts, open up new questlines, offer opportunities to obtain valuable treasure or information. Between the daring underground adventures, the harrowing battles, and the gratitude of the people who come to your defense, as you came to theirs, Mega Man Legends is the whole package, and in my opinion, was way ahead of its time.
All said, I am glad that the idea of unlocking/restoring a base has become as big as it has, and implemented in so many different ways. From Gloomhaven to Hollow Knight to Hades to Darkest Dungeon to Assassin’s Creed II (Venice was so good), the gaming landscape is learning to master this gameplay loop each in their own, uniquely identifiable ways.
May they continue ever onwards and beyond the magnificent standard set by their predecessors.