Affordance

An affordance is an action the environment makes possible for a particular player, such as climbing a ledge, taking cover behind a wall or opening a door. In everyday game-design talk, the word also covers the visual cues that tell the player those actions exist. Don Norman, who brought the term into design, later argued those cues should be called signifiers (jnd.org ): Signifiers, not affordances).

#Norman's sense versus game-design usage

The term comes from the perceptual psychologist J. J. Gibson, who used it for a relationship: "the actions possible by a specific agent on a specific environment" (jnd.org ): Signifiers, not affordances). Norman introduced it to design in 1988, meaning perceivable affordances. Twenty years later he wrote that "the term has been widely used and misused" and drew a line: "The perceivable part of an affordance is a signifier" (jnd.org ): Signifiers, not affordances). His advice: "Forget affordances: what people need, and what design must provide, are signifiers" (jnd.org ): Signifiers, not affordances).

Games mostly use "affordance" in the loose sense: a ledge affords climbing if the game allows it and the player can tell. Emilia Schatz of Naughty Dog quotes Gibson and then sorts game affordances into four kinds (80 Level: Defining Environment Language for Video Games):

• Explicit — "pointed out to the player in a break from realism", such as a glowing ammo pickup or a UI prompt.
• Defined — "when the game goes to length to associate arbitrary visuals with in-game mechanics", such as painting all climbable handholds yellow.
• Cultural — "those we recognize from our real world or other game experience", such as a ladder or a padlock.
• Inferred — "those players can deduct based on their knowledge of the game's rules and systems."

Schatz treats explicit and defined cues as a fallback, because they "break immersion"; cultural and inferred cues matter most to environment designers (80 Level: Defining Environment Language for Video Games). In Norman's vocabulary, all four are kinds of signifier.

#Making affordances readable

Schatz's method combines shape language with strict metrics. Rectangular shapes signal "usable"; pointed and diagonal ones signal "nothing to do here" (80 Level: Defining Environment Language for Video Games). Then the numbers remove ambiguity: "There cannot be any middle ground" (80 Level: Defining Environment Language for Video Games).

#The yellow paint debate

"Yellow paint" is shorthand for bright markings on climbable ledges, ladders and breakable objects: a classic defined affordance. Coverage cites the Uncharted series as an early example (Wikipedia: Yellow paint debate). The Resident Evil 4 remake drew criticism in 2023 for yellow-marked traversal points and breakable crates and barrels, and the argument returned in February 2024 with the Final Fantasy VII Rebirth demo, which marked climbing handholds yellow (TechRadar: The infamous yellow paint discourse is back…). Dave Oshry, CEO of New Blood Interactive, posted that "the yellow paint virus has infected FF7" (TechRadar: The infamous yellow paint discourse is back…).

#Related terms

shape language · silhouette · grids and metrics · wayfinding · landmarks · blockout · layout and flow · environmental storytelling

#Further reading and watching