Returning back to the “Professor Layton” series, the games employ a micro parallel arcs game architecture. There is an overarching narrative arc that drives the core game mechanic loops (puzzles, navigating around the world). Within the overall story, there are “chapters” that break up the main arc into segments. These narrative chapters run in parallel to multiple puzzle loops – if I remember correctly, each chapter has about 15-20 puzzles you can access that employ various brain teaser skills. The game music is also a strong evocative element that changes with each chapter and/or location, again running parallel to the core gameplay mechanics. By having different music corresponding to different loops, players are able to associate different emotions with different mechanics. There is a specific song for when players play a puzzle, access the menu, and travel to different locations on the map. There are also distinct tracks for narrative cut scenes. Through the close interactions between the gameplay loops and emotional arcs, the game is able to continuously engage players and increase their emotional involvement; if you were to remove these fun, evocative elements, you would still be left with a brain-teaser game mechanics at the core that you could definitely repurpose for different contexts outside of the Professor Layton cannon!
