How long should rounds be?

Help and Feedback Game Design Support
#1

My aim is to make a fast paced game, all the players have an increased walk speed, speed boosts, and powerups. There are two teams, the runner team runs around collecting points while the kill team tries to kill these runners. When a runner dies all their points are lost and when a killer gets a kill they gain a point. And at the ends of the round the killers become the runners and the runners become the killers. There are four rounds in total.

How long should I make a round in order to keep player engagement but also give them enough time to collect points? While also making sure players in the lobby don’t have a long boring wait. Should I change the times depending on what round it is?

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#2

I’d say just play around with it a bit until you find a good balance.
Most games settle for around 5-10 minutes, but you may want to increase/decrease depending on your specific case scenario.

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#3

This is the wrong category - move it to #help-and-feedback:game-design-support. DD is NOT for “How should I do this?” “How do you do this?”

Anyways - depending on the pacing of your game you will want longer rounds for slower paced games and shorter rounds for faster paced games.

How long “short” rounds are is up to you - but typically it is anywhere from 1 min to 5 mins

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#4

From reading the description you gave, I’d say they don’t need any longer than 5 minutes? Not sure. My advice for you is to play-test the game with some friends and experiment with different times. Set the bar high at first, see how long it takes to collect all the points and stuff and go from there.

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#5

I’d say something between 5 and 10 mins, so the runners have enough time to collect their points and the people in the lobby are not bored. I guess 7 mins are perfect

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