Stealth as a Genre

Stealth as a Genre

The Stealth game genre is a bit hard to narrow down, because it is often incorporated into other elements, rather than being the full game experience itself. One could argue that the definition of a Stealth game is to avoid being caught by enemies, however that does not do the genre justice.

By all that counts, Pacman could be seen as a Stealth game because the player spends the entirety of each level avoiding ghosts while collecting items. This merely skims the surface. While some games do stick to almost the entirety of its gameplay being stealth, like Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed, many games choose to employ stealth as an alternative to combat, such as in FromSoftware’s Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice.

Player Agency

Some of the most important elements to a Stealth game is how much player agency there is; the decisions the player makes feel valuable. If the only way to beat a stealth game is to stick to a linear path that the designer has provided for them, the game starts to become less about stealth and more about memorization or timing. What truly makes a stealth game special is that it feels like the player has outsmarted their adversary. Generally, the player’s objective is to reach someone or something without being caught. Much like an action game making the player act out feats of heroism and bravery, stealth games allow the player to feel cunning and sneaky.

Without player agency, the very goal of the genre is lost. They are no longer getting a sense of satisfaction from mastering the game and outsmarting a foe. Instead, the game can feel like a very specific puzzle that needed to be solved. While this can be fun in its own right, some of the best stealth games offer many different ways to achieve victory. This will increase replay-ability while also making the player believe they came up with a very clever solution on their own.

Stakes

Likewise, just because you’ve given the player choices on solving a puzzle doesn’t complete what it means to be a stealth game. If Assassin's Creed was about packing a lunch in multiple different ways, the player will still have agency, but hardly a sense of stealth. This is where the broad definition of Stealth gameplay does count. Overall, the idea is to be avoiding enemies while attaining a goal. Simple enough. However, to make it truly thrilling for the player, it needs to feel like there are high stakes.

A common trope in video games is just to have the player die. That can get the point across in a basic sense, yet a great way to do that is to permanently have the game adapt to the player’s mistake. Instead of immediately making the player lose the moment they are caught, increasing the difficulty of the level or adding a permanent penalty to them, such as Sekiro’s lost XP and sen. Now, when the guard creeps ever closer to the player’s position, their adrenaline will be just as high as their character’s. This is what gives stealth games their feeling. The player wants to sneak past intimidating guards because they fear the consequences, not just that it will be game over.

Great Examples

A great example of using the stealth genre properly is Sekiro. As previously stated, one of the best ways to incorporate stealth is to marry it to another genre. Sekiro would not be half the game it is if all the player could do was slash their way through enemies with no different ways of handling a scenario. This would make it strictly an action game. Instead, with the flavoring of a stealth game, Sekiro offers the player different ways of beating the level. They can stick to stealth, choosing to focus their skills and abilities on ways to take out guards before anyone notices, or they can go in guns blazing.

Better yet, the punishment for being caught only raises the stakes rather than resulting in immediate failure. Often, the guards will alert other guards, making the room even more challenging than if the player successfully stealthed through the entire level. This means that when they do manage to empty a room of enemies before being caught, it feels like a real accomplishment rather than what they were expected to do.

Not So Great Examples

On the other hand, some of the earlier titles of Assassin’s Creed had many levels that felt restrictive with its stealth. Not only was the first installment of the franchise condemned for the repetition of its objectives, but the way the player achieved them was very punishing without being very thrilling. Plenty of missions entailed slowly walking behind a conversation at exactly the perfect distance for long periods of time, with the punishment for not perfectly walking just the right way resulting in starting over. Hardly the stuff of adrenaline-pumping action.

The series does improve with each new title, and many of the original gripes that players had have been addressed, but it shows what can happen if stealth is not treated properly. There is a very real difference between sneaking up on an unsuspecting foe and just following the designer’s orders in a specific order to get past a level. There should never be a part of your game that players reflect on and think “I’d play it again if it weren’t for that part.”

Overall

Stealth games offer a very unique take on games that are often not addressed. Rather than the focus being on as much damage as the player can cause with the angriest weapons at their disposal, stealth games offer the intensity of an action game with the intricacy of a puzzle game. While the average action game requires the end result is that the player has beaten up everybody in the room, many prominent stealth games require quite the opposite.

Regardless of if designers choose to focus only on stealth or add it to another genre, the most important part is to keep the mechanics consistent and clear. Given the heavy toll of failure that comes with stealth games and the huge amount of choices a player comes to expect, if the choices that were meant to make them feel clever end up having a strange interaction with the gameplay, that will immediately break the immersion. They will remember they are playing a buggy video game, rather than truly sneaking through impossible challenges, and nobody wants that.