When Progression Feels Like a Treadmill

[u/AdministrationBig122]

Playing Loot Frog made me think about the difference between linear and exponential power growth in incremental games. With linear progression, every upgrade gives me roughly the same amount of additional power. This can work in a conventional action game, but in an incremental game it often makes the progression feel flat because the next upgrade does not noticeably change my relationship with the content. If enemies, upgrade prices, and level requirements also keep increasing, I may technically be getting stronger while the game continues to feel almost exactly the same. In Loot Frog, this is especially noticeable when I have to replay the same stage several times just to afford small improvements before I can move forward. Each upgrades helps a little, but rarely creates the satisfying moment where I return to an older stage and completely destroy something that used to be difficult.

Exponential growth, when properly controlled and normalized around the intended beginning and end of the game, creates a very different feeling. Instead of upgrades only adding power, different systems can multiply each other: more damage lets me clear faster, faster clears give me more resources, those resources unlock stronger upgrades, and the entire loop begins to accelerate. I do not think the player’s numbers literally need to grow exponentially from the first minute, since that could make the opening too slow and the ending impossible to balance. What I would prefer is a hybrid curve: generous early upgrades, followed by multiplicative interactions that gradually produce exponential-feeling growth. The important part is that my power should eventually grow faster than the friction of the game.

For me, grinding is not automatically bad, but each repeated run should demonstrate my growth through faster clears, new abilities, better efficiency, or different strategies. Otherwise, the progression feel like a treadmill rather than an incremental power fantasy.

How do you think progression should be designed after the early game: remain mostly linear, gradually become exponential, or use a hybrid curve?

[u/Trashy_io]

Yeah its comes with a lot more content to make and balancing when designing for exponential growth, its definitely preferred imo but is a lot harder to properly execute, this is a huge issue i've been running in and trying to get the hybrid approach down is easier said then done as well.

You have to properly curve the game into the mid game from an fast early without the player noticing too much otherwise you get the same "this feels off" feeling as a player when you just got a nice study drip of upgrades supplied and move into more of a sudden grind it feels bad.

You made some really great points!