Rule #1: Use everything you can possibly conceive of to slaughter the player.

Making a game too easy is just asking for a customer to try and return your game, so be sure to work in plenty of deathtraps and dangerous objects careening around the stage to ensure incalculable odds of survival. If the licensed property's universe doesn't provide a suitable environment to torment your player, just improvise. Anything can be dangerous if it flies through the air at high enough speeds, after all.


Exception: Konami's TMNT4 (SNES) made it very clear what could hurt you (foot soldiers, robots) and what couldn't (pizza, sidewalks), making it an exceptionally enjoyable title that could be completed within a matter of hours. Shameful.



Rule #2: Pimping a difficult license? Think outside the box. Better yet, ignore the box entirely.

So you've just landed a big-name license, but it doesn't really fit with the platformer genre which is hip with the kids these days, what with their Nintendos and Marios and such. Creating some sort of direct lift of the original property won't work as a video game, especially if you've landed a license on An Inconvenient Truth or The Miracle Worker. What's a developer like Ocean, Titus Games, LJN or THQ to do? Easy: make shit up.

Exception: ICOM's Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective (SCD), which plays exactly the way Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's books read, and is therefore just as boring.

Rule #3: If all else fails, punish your customers. It's their fault if they can't enjoy your opus, anyway.