Why Most Game Tutorials Are Cargo Cults (And What Actually Works)

Look, I've been watching the gaming industry do this funny thing where they copy the form of something without understanding why it worked in the first place. It's exactly like those islanders building bamboo control towers after the war. Here's what I mean: everyone's talking about AI-powered tools revolutionizing game development. But most people are just swapping one cargo cult for another. They're using fancy AI tools to make tutorials that still suck. Let me show you what actually works. Based on how things actually work, not how people pretend they work. Step 1: Kill The Tutorial Before It's Born Here's a truth that'll piss off your game designer: most tutorials exist because someone assumed players are stupid. They're not. They're just new. The test: Remove every tutorial screen from your game. Playtest it. If players get stuck, that's a design problem, not a teaching problem. Fix the design. I found out the hard way that the best tutorial is no tutorial at all. The game itself should teach you. Jumping over a gap? That's a tutorial. Finding a hidden path? That's a tutorial. Dying because you didn't look up? That's a tutorial you'll never forget. Practical tip: Watch someone play your game without any instructions. Don't tell them anything. The moment they say "what do I do?" is the exact spot where your design failed, not your tutorial. Step 2: Use AI-Gaming-Labs Tools To Find What Players Actually Do (Not What They Say) Here's where things get interesting. Players lie. They'll tell you the tutorial was clear and then fail the simplest test five minutes later. They're not malicious—they just don't know what they don't know. This is where the new tools at ai-gaming-labs actually shine. Not for generating content—that's cargo cult stuff. For tracking what players actually do. The real use: Heatmaps of where players click when they're lost. Session recordings of the exact moment they give up. The AI finds patterns in failure that no human tester would notice. Common pitfall: Don't use AI to write your tutorial text. That's like using a calculator to write poetry. The AI doesn't understand what makes a game fun. Use it to analyze behavior, not generate content. Step 3: Make The Tutorial Optional And Painful To Access Counter-intuitive, right? But think about it. When was the last time you wanted to sit through a tutorial? Never. You wanted to play the game. So make the tutorial something players actively avoid. That way, only people who actually need it will use it. How to do it: Put the tutorial behind a wall. Make it a separate mode. Don't force it on anyone. The players who skip it and figure things out on their own? They're having more fun. The players who get stuck and seek help? They'll actually read what you wrote. Real example: Dark Souls has no tutorial. It throws you into a world that wants to kill you. And players love it. Not because they're masochists. Because they're figuring things out themselves, which is the entire point of playing a game. Step 4: Test With The Worst Possible User You know who you should test your tutorial with? Your mom. Or someone who's never played a video game. Or someone who's drunk. Or a kid. If they can figure it out, anyone can. The method: Find someone who hates games. Sit them down. Give them a controller. Don't say anything. Watch what happens. What you'll learn: They'll do things you never expected. They'll miss obvious cues. They'll try buttons in the wrong order. And you'll realize your "intuitive" tutorial isn't intuitive at all—it only makes sense to people who already know how games work. Step 5: Kill The Tutorial Again Here's the final step. After you've built your tutorial, after you've tested it, after you've optimized it—ask yourself: does this still need to exist? Most tutorials exist because of some producer's fear of bad reviews. "But what if players don't understand?" Then they'll figure it out. Or they'll look it up. Or they'll ask a friend. That's how learning works. The real test: If you deleted every tutorial screen from your game right now, how many players would actually be unable to finish it? If the answer is more than zero, fix the design. If it's zero, congratulations—you just saved yourself a lot of work. The Bottom Line I've seen studios spend more time on tutorials than on the actual game. That's backwards. The game is the tutorial. Every level, every enemy, every mechanic should teach something. You know what the Steam Machine cost? $1049. And it failed because it was a solution looking for a problem. Don't let your tutorial be the same thing—a solution nobody asked for. The best tutorial is the one players don't notice. The one that teaches through play, not through text. The one that respects the player's intelligence. Or, you know, you can keep building bamboo control towers and wondering why the planes never come. Your call.