When we’ve got done with a game, but still want to play more of the game, it’s not uncommon to go back and try and do it differently. Some games build this in in various forms, either because the game has a large random element (For example Civ IV) or thanks to a New Game Plus or the like, but in a lot of them you’ve got to find your own ways to spice things up.

The first thing you might try and do is to master the game, to 100% it, and that’s all well and good, but there’s so much more that can be tried. Interestingly it seems to go in two wildly divergent directions; either you try to find every loophole, glitch, and exploit in order to break the game completely over your knee, or conversely to impose strict conditions on yourself so you make the game more challenging. Of course we probably all try both these routes at times but it still struck me as a curious point.

Some forms of this have taken off and become more popular. There are all kinds of challenges for Final Fantasy for instance, such as No Materia runs in VII, or Nuzlocke runs in Pokemon. Me, I like to pick someone in Kaiserreich and take them to glory no matter the odds. I played a game last week where I was Britain and every other Syndicalist power in the world was gone except for the Bhartiya Commune and Mexico. It was a long, difficult fight that had to be planned carefully and executed well because the longer I took, the longer the gigantic German alliance would have to build themselves up – still, after 20 years of warfare the Red Flag flew not just over London and Calcutta but Madrid, Paris, Berlin, Moscow, Washington, Ottawa, and Rome, among many others.

What sorts of things do you do to keep games interesting? Do you look for complete mastery, or for a real challenge? Tell us in the comments below!