Quotes • Headscratchers • Playing With • Useful Notes • Analysis • Image Links • Haiku • Laconic |
---|
That said, you can’t create a focus item that helps you create other focus items. It’s... uh, it’s a magic thing. Just doesn’t work.
|
Games, of various types, are about rules. They may have intricate backstories, multi-layered plots and other such. But in the end, they're about rules. Rules define what are legal moves and what aren't (even Calvin Ball, which just doesn't have the same rules all the time). Rules create fun.
But sometimes, rules can interact in ways that developers didn't intend. Sometimes this makes the game more fun, but more often than not, it leads to Gameplay Derailment.
So, you're a game developer, and it's two weeks from shipping your next great game. Then one of your testers comes to you with a horrifically game-breaking scenario, a way for a player to game the rules so that their powers spiral out of control and automatically win without a fight. And the rule interaction is very complicated; you can't just tweak a few things to bring this back into balance. In order to truly fix the problem, you would need to rebuild a number of rules, test those rules and so forth... and miss your ship deadline. What do you do?
Or maybe your game is out there already. Thousands, maybe millions of people are playing and enjoying it. Then some Power Gamer figures out how to game the system and auto-win with some horrific combination of moves. You certainly can't "uncreate" the game once it's out there, nor can you radically modify the rules so that particular combo doesn't work, because that would fundamentally change the game and honk off millions of customers. What do you do?
Make an Obvious Rule Patch. That is, create a completely arbitrary rule that forcibly prevents the particular interaction from happening, while having as little effect on other rules as possible. Doesn't matter if it sticks out like a sore thumb even to someone who hasn't played the previous version.
Note that issuing an Obvious Rule Patch for a competitive multiplayer game too soon can damage the evolving Metagame, which can often bring potential Game Breakers back into balance. And just so we're clear, "Obvious Rule Patch" refers to the rule that obviously exists solely to patch up something rather than the something that "obviously" needs a rule patch. "Rule" here is a simple adjective- the Patch is the focus, and the Obviousness is what makes it this trope. For the obviously needed patches, see There Should Be a Law. Sort of.
This sometimes is a result of Executive Meddling - showing once more that despite the negative press it gets, the trope is not always a bad thing.
Compare and contrast Nerf. May, if the situation is enough of a corner case, result in That One Rule.
Non-Gaming Examples[]
Reality Television[]
- On The Amazing Race, limits on how many Roadblocks a racer could perform were instigated after Season 5, after the three women who made the Final 3 that year performed a total of three Roadblocks combined.
- In Season 1, teams were only allowed to buy one set of plane tickets, and weren't allowed to switch, even if they found a faster flight or their original flight was delayed. This was changed on the very next season, and multiple flight bookings has become an important part of the Metagame ever since.
- The first two seasons had no rules in place for when a team's car broke down. These were instigated in Season 3 after several time credits were issued in Season 2 (including one that saved Blake & Paige from an elimination, which they recieved after Paige threatened to sue).
- After Season 3, it became standard on selling tasks, where teams had to reach a certain amount of money made, for each individual item to have a minimum amount it could be sold for. This was after Ken & Gerard completed such a task by selling massive amounts of fruit for what would average out to be very low prices, and repeatedly going back to the stall to get more to sell.
- Ties were disallowed after Season 4, to prevent having to give out multiple prizes for 1st place ties, and, more importantly, to keep two teams from accidentally tying for last.
- After All-Stars, where two teams horribly exploited the ability to take locals along on the leg with you to help with navigation and other tasks, bringing locals along in your vehicle was made against the rules.
- After Nat & Kat on Season 17 were Genre Savvy enough to take detailed notes throughout the race in anticipation of the Final Exam Finale, Season 19's Final Exam Finale instructions specifically forbade the use of notes. (There was no Final Exam Finale in Season 18.)
- Other minor changes were made to keep teams from taking advantage of loopholes, such as buying cellphones from locals (which Rob & Brennan did in Season 1) or switching their damaged car for another team's car at the Pit Stop (Dustin & Kandice in Season 10).
- In Survivor:
- The hidden immunity idol mechanics were changed. First making it so that you could play it after the vote. Then, putting the limitation that you couldn't use it beyond the final six because it more or less gave Yul a free ride to the final three, since everyone was afraid to cast a vote against him for fear of the idol being played. Then, changing how the clues were hidden due to Russell's obsessive idol hunting. (Except they appeared to have forgotten it in Redemption Island and later; or later players were just that good to have found them in the first couple episodes.)
- After "Purple" Kelly and NaOnka quit in Nicaragua, the rules were amended so that quitters can be banned from sitting on the jury if production felt it was appropriate. And typically; you can guess that unless you're trying to pull a Thanatos Gambit or are having a severe physical or mental breakdown, that'll probably be...never.
- Reducing the eligible age to 18. (Although this hasn't really affected gameplay; you'll notice that several contestants have been below 21 in the game after Fans vs. Favorites.)
- Not using the "purple rock" tiebreaker (where, in the event of unresolved tie, elimination is by random chance with everyone but those voted for at risk) in the final four because the one time it was used in Marquesas, Paschal was eliminated without having a single vote cast for him in the entire game.
- Tiebreakers in general; although the spectre of the Purple Rock (as well as confirmations/sepculations by Cirie that they still do use it outside the final four) causing people to betray their alliances to avoid it. You'll notice that for some reason, people are quite afraid of forcing a tie outside of the final four that can't be solved by a simple revote (such as John changing his vote for Laura in Samoa, Russell being voted out first from his tribe in Redemption Island, and Cochran turning on his tribe in South Pacific).
- Supposedly, someone smuggled something into the game in their luxury item (or used their luxury item in a rather creative way) to have fire.
- In Season 2, Australia, contestants could bring a personal item. Colby brought a Texas flag that doubled as a tarp... It, along with all the other shelter items, got snatched mid-season.
- Making tribal switches more common to shake the game up a bit.
- The Final Two became the Final Three. While not all fans like this, Probst says that this was so people would have to face a competitor and not just drag The Load into the finals. Chances are, everyone's thoughts towards Courtney in Exile Island (intending to bring her to the finals because everyone hated her) made the producers think. Probst has pointed out there have been plenty of seasons where everyone complained the final two was a wash anyways, one of them conveniently being Exile Island. Again, this didn't stop Earl from claiming the first uanimous victory against two disliked players and Rob from pulling the two dumbest and laziest players to the finals.
- This was also done as a result of Fan Dumb complaining about "Blowout" final twos because people had on many different seasons said that the winner was pretty obvious, nobody would've voted for [insert second place winner here], and the final tribal council was essentially just Padding because it was obvious that [insert winner here] had it. Or people just pulling What Measure Is a Non-Badass? when the fan favourite or most likely winner finished fifth-third place and a person deemed "undeserving" won.
- In the American Big Brother:
- After Season 3 where the jury voted 9-1 in favour of Lisa, the Jury was reduced to 7 and sequestered away from the game and unable to watch the show. The reason the jury voted in such a way was that they saw what Danielle was saying about them in the diary room and was angered.
- The Power of Veto was made into the Golden Power of Veto permanently after Season 3.
- Another veto example - Backdooring. In season 5, the houseguests realized that you had to pick the veto players yourself so you had full control over the players in the competition. So in order to get rid of Jase, the houseguests made up a plan and nominated two people who would have used the veto on themselves, or their other alliance members who'd have used the veto anyways. They then proceeded to pick players for the veto who would use the veto on their friends or were in on the plan and would use it anyways and evicted Jase without even letting him have a chance. The rule change was that Houseguests actually had to draw names out of a bag and only if they picked a "Houseguests Choice" Token could they choose themselves.
- A very subtle example, but notice that the houseguests are cutting with plastic knives. This was because of a Season 2 incident where Justin held a knife to another houseguest's throat and said "Would you mind if I killed you?"
- If someone is expelled or leaves when evicted players go to the jury, their vote at the end is given to the viewers and is used as a tiebreaker.
Web Comics[]
- In Chasing the Sunset, the rules are automatically patched.
- This xkcd panel.
- Penny Arcade parodies this with Scribblenauts. Tycho explains how the goal of the game is to get Starites, and you do so by writing the names of useful items (over 22,000 are available), which then appear. Gabe picks up the game and immediately writes "Starite". One appears and he wins. Note that in the actual game, doing this produces a fake Starite that's worthless. Except for the very last level.
Literature[]
- In Ender's Game, Ender's final battle as commander pits his Dragon Army against two armies combined. Ender discards all combat strategy and has his boys move as quickly as possible to perform the victory ritual. Since nobody had considered doing this without defeating the opposing army first, the other team is confused enough for him to win. He is promptly told that starting in the next battle fought at Battle School, it would not be possible for an army to perform the victory ritual without first defeating or disabling everyone in the opposing army.
- The Discworld's Assassin's Guild Diary has School Rule 16: "No boy is to keep a crocodile in his room." Followed by rules 16a to 16j to counter various forms of Loophole Abuse, from the obvious ("16a. No boy is to keep an alligator or any large amphibious reptile in his room"; "16c. Nor in the cellar.") to the outlandish ("16h. No boy is to convert to Offlerism without permission in writing from the Head Master." [Offler is the Discworld's Crocodile God])
- According to Night Watch, the Assassins' Guild School is now co-ed, so that rule would have to have been rewritten to avoid girls keeping crocodiles in their room and pointing to Rule 16's use of the word "boy".
- Which, when they added "Read boys for girls" as a note to the list, led to this:
- According to Night Watch, the Assassins' Guild School is now co-ed, so that rule would have to have been rewritten to avoid girls keeping crocodiles in their room and pointing to Rule 16's use of the word "boy".
School Rule No.145 : No boy is to enter the room of any girl. |
- This is surely a Historical In-Joke referring to Lord Byron. He wanted to keep a dog when he was at Cambridge, but school rules forbid it. He inspected the rules carefully and found there was nothing prohibiting pet bears, so he got one. It's unknown when Cambridge applied the highly-necessary patch.