This video from Marblr about adding fall damage to Overwatch is really intense – 45 minutes of length and a lot of footage of frantic gameplay – but really informative, too.

It’s a great case study of how something seemingly really simple – deducting health from the player as they fall from height – can be a complicated thing to figure out in all the detail.

I never played Overwatch and rarely play videogames anymore, but many of the lessons here more universal for any sort of UI and system design:

• You will have to introduce tactical inconsistencies for the system to feel consistent, but be careful as there might be a point those inconsistencies start to outweigh the whole thing.
• Wanna learn how you and others feel about something? Overcrank it to make the feelings come out more easily. (And to find bugs.)
• There will always be tensions between what the data says and how you feel about something. (I was surprised how often the word “intuitive” entered the picture.)

Also, it’s just a really well-made video, filled with little presentation and storytelling details that elevate it. I wish more videos like this existed for UI mechanics.

But maybe the most important takeway? You don’t have to choose between rigor and fun. You can have both.