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Narrative, Plot And Aimlessness In Game Design
Logic Bomb writes: "Feed is running a very well-written essay by Steven Johnson on game design that includes an interview with the designer of Oni. Johnson has some thought-provoking comments on narrative, navigation, and cheat sheets. Lots of room for discussion here: what balance do you like best between plot and action (i.e. Metal Gear Solid versus Quake)? Are cheat sheets just part of the game, or does needing one show bad game design? Anyone have comments on the system used by Oni discussed in the article?"
Equally interesting to me is this other Feed interview with Warren Spector, designer of Deus Ex.
"Insert coin. Avoid missing ball for high score."
So, basically, as long as the game has something block-shaped, you're good to go? You must *love* crate levels in first-person shooters. ;)
FP
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
(sorry about the formatting...this got REALLY munged when I pasted it in from an email to myself.)
I don't know about anybody else on Earth, but my favourite video games are ones I get immersed in. When I BELIEVE I'm flying an F-16. When I
BELIEVE I'm crawling through a sewer pipe trying to solve a Big Mystery. When I BELIEVE I'm trying to escape from a top-secret military facility being taken over by otherworldly creatures. If you are trying to immerse the player, you will not be able to do it by just stringing together a bunch of game theory ideas that look good on paper. You've got to tell a story. You've got to grab the player's attention. You've got to present an engaging world to play in. And, with computer games, you do that with 3D graphics. Usually complicated ones. (MYST may be a conspicuous exeception, but I personally found that game boring as hell. Other people certainly disagree with me.)
I dunno, maybe I'm painting with a broad brush, but I also thought that the original filmmaker's credo was stupid. Why SHOULDN'T I be able to
make a film about a talking pig? What's wrong with having a story that takes place in outer space? Why can't I light the scene so that it
looks like it would really look if I happened upon it on the street, instead of looking like something that's been filmed with a flashlight
on top of the camera? If you reduce the thesis to its root, you should be able to tell any story with a simple series of black and white sketches, or with a spoken word story. Arguing that technology makes film bad is like arguing that protein makes food bad. Technology is an essential component of film (and game making) and eschewing it for the sake of some ascetic ideal is cutting off your nose to spite your face.
I think that technology and creativity are not opposites...I think they're orthogonal. You can tell a good or a bad story, with or without technology. Think about novels...you can tell a good or a bad story, and it may be short or long. You can't judge a book by its cover, and you can't judge a film by the fact that it's mastered in Super Hi-Fi Dolby THX Digital OmegaTURBO Sound Blasterrific. Perfect example...Forrest Gump. For me, that movie stopped being a movie, and started being REAL when I clearly heard an RPG round detonate in the seat right next to me. The soundtrack of that battle scene, in the theater I was in, was utterly convincing, and it made the experience That Much Better.
I for one don't want to go back to the days of Donkey Kong. I thought that the game sucked. Sorry...most of the 30's games that a lot of people hearken back to don't engage me at all. I'm not saying they're bad games or that you're stupid if you like them...I just don't happen to enjoy them, and I'm not likely to enjoy a game that pays them homage at the expense of the things I enjoy in a game.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
OK, games we remember. Earliest? Deathchase on a 48k Spectrum. Seriously. Excellent game (if limited by modern standards) and fantastic, fast, pseudo-3D graphics. Track it down on an emulator.
More recent? The Chaos Engine had me hooked for so long it was silly. Brilliant game, I only wish they'd do an FPS with that sort of atmosphere and speed.
PCs? I remember the first time I played Doom and thought a massive 'So what?'. Hated it, still no fan. Looking at PC games from then, compared to Amiga games, I have to say much of the reason it got the reception it did was that it was a tolerable game on the PC (still pretty unusual at that time IME) and was something the Amiga couldn't do. I remember the first time I played Quake, thinking it was better but not much. Got into it after a while, but I have to say I mostly like it for atmosphere rather than gameplay even now.
I remember the first gaming session I had on my own PC vividly. Back then (10/98) it was a powerhouse - 400 MHz, TNT, 128MB RAM. Oops, still that now... Anyway. I loaded SiN onto it first, and that helicopter scene, then running round the bank, absolutely blew my mind. The sound, the graphics, the atmosphere. The whole thing was just incredible. Then Battlezone - oh, I played that demo over and over, I liked it that much. Then I got the game, and I'm still playing it now. Fantastic - if you don't have a copy, track it down.
I'll probably play a lot more games over the years, but if any provokes a reaction as strong as SiN did when I first loaded it up, I'll know it's truly groundbreaking. The only thing that's come close since has been Half-Life...
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!
That game is wonderful! I usually donn't like this type of game, but dangit! I was hooked! I was a bit sad that the company had to go.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
this is not a troll comment, I'm serious. In life, there is plenty of activity, and depending on what you choose to do, there can be plenty of plot and storyline.
If game designers want to make games more realistic, then they won't give away the details to a murder quite so easily. Instead, they would create an environment where interacting with your randomly occuring bot-peers, (or other real-life people) would be the only way to get more goods/info/whatever to accomplish your goals. This is why Quake is so addictive, you don't always know about the troll hiding under the bridge. If I wanted a game that I could memorize and play blind-folded, I'd break out my NES again.
- passion
How's about Origin's BioForge in 1990 or so?
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Back in the days of Genesis, the game Ecco the Dophin was so damn hard, if not impossible, that a cheat was needed to make it to the end of the game. In fact, when it was ported to Japan, they made it easier to complete.
So, to answer the question if a cheat means that there is poor design, I'll say that it depends on the game, and the skill needed to complete the game.
Simple to learn, hard to master are the best rules for game design; which is why tetris still does well in this day and age, adn RGPs where the focus is on the story line does wonders. (Shenmue is simplely out of this world)
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
Difficulty is a very large part of this "intrigue" category. If a game is too easy, people will be done too quickly and not care for it. If it is too difficult and requires cheats, then people will likely complain about that. A game needs to be difficult, or somewhat puzzling, but not so much so that strategy guides or friendly tips are needed every few minutes.
A game like Perfect Dark is a good example. If played through the way Rare intended, one would start by going through on Agent [easy] mode. One would play the levels without much resistance and learn the controls and the settings. Then one would advance to the Special Agent [moderate] mode. The levels are slightly expanded and the difficulty is increased, but because of previous experience it is not too much to handle. Finally, one should give a go at Perfect Agent [expert] mode. Perfect Agent in Perfect Dark was incredibly difficult, but not so much that I needed any cheats, tips or tricks... I had just developed my skills, and through patience and determination, I was able to beat the game.
(On a side note, I would like to add that Perfect Dark is the only game that I have ever beaten all the way through without any cheats or tips or guides - all others I have had some form of outside help. Yes, even Mario, but that was years ago. *dips head in shame*)
So you see where I am coming from. There is an innumerable supply of factors that can make a game more or less enjoyable, but just the right blend is required to put the game on my must-play list.
And again, good visual and sound effects are great, but not necessarily required. Think of it in terms of the United States government - checks and balances. The legislative, judicial, and executive branches work together and check up on each other to provide the most efficient government possible (arguably). Graphics, sound, and gameplay/intriguing factors work together in much the same way to make a game what it is.
There are a lot of fairly standard devices that can lend a nice air of pacing and/or non-linearity to an otherwise blandly linear plot. A classic is what I think of as a "node" approach; the player moves from one chunk of the linear game to another but the actions necessary to move on are fairly free-form within each chunk. That is to say that you can get the key first or you can kill the monster guarding the door first, but you must kill the monster and have the key before you can move on. This lets the player feel that he's not completely on a rail without breaking the scripting advantage of a linear plot.
Another old chestnut to provide a semblance of pacing is to vary the difficulty and frequency of opponents vs. puzzles vs. open space. Sections without oppnents can release the built up excitement of a flurry of combat, but after a while they start to build up tension and wondering when the next attack is going to come. Areas without any puzzles or enemies can be particularly good for this, since the player is inevitably scrutinizing everything very carefully to find the next ambush. Similarly, an increased frequency and intensity of combats convinces players that they're closing in on something important, while an occasional wimpy attacker suggests that nothing big is going on. These kinds of things let a careful designer play with the gamer's emotions in much the same way that a good novelist can, and can be made to work even without a rigidly linear plotline.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
> i
You have:
No tea.
--
The levels in Oni are cavernous open spaces, full of nothing. Real-world architecture is large, spacious, and empty. No one lives in an empty house or works in an empty office. Imagine your office stripped of desks, tables, paper, clutter, xerox machines, computers, and chairs. That's what Oni looks like. The levels are immaculately designed from an architectural standpoint, but they need more furniture! Pictures on the wall. Potted plants. Something more. See Deus Ex as an example of real-world spaces which are more than buildings (working water coolers, water fountains, potted plants, pots, pans, sinks, trash cans, garbage bags, etc.) A world without things feels wrong.
For instance, imagine you have a game world that is completely interactive. I mean, 100% immersive. Say it's a Blade Runner game. Remember the part where Harrison Ford just "happens" to find the snake scale? What are the chances of that actually happening if the author doesn't make the character notice that. :)
Good point !
The problem here is that if the game becomes *that* realist, then you'll have to be *that* hero to survive through it
Anyway, the fact it is actually a problem just makes it more interesting to solve (or try to)
Have you ever played james bond rpg ?
While I didn't like james bond so much (well I just like better some other ones), Those who designed the game faced the same problem: "you've got to be a hero.. now how can you be a hero ?" and found an elegant solution (that could still be improved, especially for a video-game case):
The hero points...
You start your missions with some few hero points and their number increase according your performance in the game (game master decision)
The idea is, when you get stuck in a very hard situation, you can use a hero point to "magically" go through it
Which is a pretty funny and good way to model a "james bond" case, or the "find the snake scale"
For instance, you open a door, and damn ! three strongly armed guys are waiting for you ! you use your hero point (if you chose to do so) and oh well.. the 3 guys appear to be busy watching tv, anything...
Now it would be hard to introduce something like that in a video game, but not impossible if carefuly thought (and modified accordingly) (maybe for instance, if you run out of ammo, a hero point would spam some in the room you are (but behind you so that you don't lose too much realism and make the ammo 'shinny'.. things like that) and would perhaps help making the game-plot as hard as it should be. If you're not *that* hero it takes to get through the end, well you'll end with less hero points than somebody else, plus, you get a somewhat more interesting scoring system than counting all the dead bad guys
A lot of people would say that you need a good balance between technology and gameplay/plot, but it all depends on what the company's objective is.
Companies like id software don't need an enthralling plot - they need technology. They deliver that fantastically. Of course, with the advent of this technology, companies with creative minds (in the gameplay/plot sense) are now open to focus on other aspects of the game.
Most companies that attempt to do this in one go fail because its just way too much. Those that don't fail are either really good, or really lucky (usually the latter, because most of the times the sequels suck).
I think the real key to making a game isn't making a hell of a plot, and expect people to ignore the gameplay, nor making an excellent gameplay, but no plot...
The first, and foremost key is making the game 'fun'. But I find this to be an opinionated and useless term.
The real key is putting in a 'balance'. Halflife (which is going to be overused in this whole discussion) made an EXCELLENT balance between plot and action. There was no real "You killed X number of monsters, found X number of secrets, etc...", because your goals were "get the hell outta that lab", which screamed plot (not to mention how every npc interacted with you). But the action part was balanced because there really wasn't 'levels', it was 'chapters', and it was very continuous.
Another example would be System Shock 2. It was a first person action game, just like any other. WRONG! It was breath-takingly scary. The well written plot, with the errie sounds, with the constant action (either stompin aliens or running for the hills) made such an excellent combination, it was a sleeper hit over Q3.
Now you don't need to have an intricate plot (like SS2, HL, Deus Ex, etc...) to balance the game, take 'theif' for example. It had a minor plot, but the action was also minor. It still was a great game (not to mention genre breaking). How could someone like a game that was only 'minor' in plot and action? Well, honestly, I think it was the 'breaking the genre' that did it, but it wouldn't be fun if it was all action and no plot or vice versa.
This is why Oni will be a breakthrough game. Combine action, 3rd person, and fighting games, and you got a new genre. But it has a story the works right alongside the action.
--
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
If you compare games like quake and UT to games like Halflife, Deus Ex, and System Shock 2, you'll discover that a carful mix of action and plot can make the game. I think it's the right combination that's the key here. Any game that is all action (like Quake), and any game that is all plot (like Metal Gear) doesn't quite compare with those that have both.
Another point to bring up is with online games. If its a team game, you kind of make the plot as you go along. When people assume specific roles (even if its just 'sniper' or 'offense' and 'defense') it kinda makes its own plot. These can be very exciting games (just look at how tribes grew).
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Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Perhaps he isn't old enough, but I remember the Zork games and other text games, and in a way they were as 3D as the latest crop of 3D shooters - the only difference was that they relied on the player's imagination (wow, imagine that) to construct the world and the only hinted at the history.
To me, those games were the best - you were fully immersed in your imagination, just like a good book, but with a freedom to affect the story line.
Many games nowadays I find hard to play - the offer nothing for the imagination (similiar to movies). Everything's cut and dry - nothing like a good Mamet movie with loose ends and hints at a character's history. Nothing for an imagination to grab hold of and nothing to make me wish for the end not to come.
half life was cool as hell, up until you play Deus Ex, and then go back and play Half-Life again and realize how LIMITED half-life is in terms of story development.
as an example, i played half-life, then deus ex, and then Half-Life: Opposing Forces. while Half-life was fun the first time around, deus ex blew it out of the water. when the time came to play Opposing forces, the total lack of interactivity with objects and the fact that mobs don't spawn until you walk over a triggerpoint was really irritating.
as an example, there was a certain point in opfor that you walk between some trailer-crates and a big nasty slug with legs thingy spawns to your left, while a huge grasshopper-lookin' guy spawns to your right. after being hugely surprised by this, and dying, i reloaded a quicksave game and decided to ambush them from on top of the crates. lo and behold, when i looked down at where he should be, he wasn't there -- i hadn't set off the trigger that loads them.
compare this to deus ex, where mobs all spawn when the level is loaded, and have set patrol points, warning responses, etc. they're there, doing their thing, whether you're there looking at them or not.
more importantly, you can take many different paths to reach your objective. in half-life, you're herded like a cow into a semi; you have two ways to go. the way you came from (everything's been raped and pillaged that way already), and the way they want you to go (preferably over all the nice trigger points they installed.) no other choice. bleh.
i can see the arguments rising in your head already: "but half-life was made years before deus ex!" true, and a fairly irrefutable point. video game progression hadn't gotten to this point of sophistication yet (with potential exceptions such as Thief; it may have come out at roughly the same time, i can't remember.)
anyway, Half-life, Thief, SYstem shock 2, Deus Ex... they were all great games, and you can see a certain progression of development among them. I just hope that developers look back at the things like triggerpoint loading vs mobs that are there doing their jobs all the time (like in real life) all the time, and learn from the lessons of the past in what makes a good game, so that they can make even better games in the future. I look forward to it.
eudas
p.s. oh, btw, even deus ex had its weaknesses. for example, eidos bought out Looking glass's implementation of certain things; i think that they took the Thief/Thief2/System Shock 2 type engine and modified/enhanced it for Deus Ex. However, the Thief/Thief2/SS2 all had a memory leak type bug in common; after a while, you would get one of two symptoms: 1) the program would crash, losing unsaved data (happened to a friend), or 2) the memory leak would eventually cause something to go awry with the sound, making everything fuck up that involved sound (usually creating some god-awful screeching) until you saved, exited, and rebooted the computer. deus ex inherited these bug(s) to some lesser extent... they didn't affect as drastically, but that could have been a symptom of 256mb ram instead of 64... i had more memory for it to eat up, so it took longer to run out. heh.
oh, and the mobs, even though they were there and had persistence, and were somewhat smarter in responses (warning each other, etc) they still had the Thief engine weakness; that is, that if they saw you and went into Active-Warning-Defense mode, they would swarm around a bit (like a hive of bees)... but if you hid, and waited for them to 'lose scent' of you, they would just go back to their previous patterns. if you did this several times, they would still do the same thing. they weren't programmed to figure out patterns and install additional guards in an area where you kept showing up, or even to do something like be more alert than usual after you've tripped the alarm once or twice. i certainly hope that if one trips an alarm on a military base in the real world, they don't just go back to normal sleepy routine after an alarm trips! i'd hope that place would be a beehive until they figured out EXACTLY where that intruder went.
anyway, blah blah blah... i sign off now.
cheers,
eudas
Blessed is he who expects the worst, for he shall not be disappointed.
I'm not kidding on this one. I swear.
I've been thinking about this over the past few weeks and I think using PHP & MySQL (and perhaps a little Java) you could hammer out an interesting (hopefully entertaining) structure for MUD/MUSH-like multiplayer text adventures.
The idea of bringing MUDs into the 20th century intrigues me - kinda like everquest.
If this doesn't sound dumber than rocks, let me know.
There are exits to the north, west and south.
The lack of a input config option in Oni is just as bad as the savegame problem in Project IGI
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Oni's GUI is designed to keep the user from getting lost. You always know in what general direction and altitude to head next. And its fairly easy to know what to do when you get there, assuming you have to do anything at all. Because EVERYTHING is done by using a computer console. Its basically just a door and key design. It feels like the designers thought Oni was too unidimensional, so they added some 'puzzles' to vary it from straight action. The problem with that is that the puzzles fail to rival the action. On a side note, Bungie bragged about the usage of real architects to build the levels. Personally, I thought the levels were pretty sucky and uninspired. Yes, theres no crates. After reading this though, it seems that maybe the architects' designs had to be simplified to meet the lowest common denominator. What it comes down to is that if every game had to be accessible to every person, then we'd have run out of tic tac toe software along time ago. Part of playing a game is exploring the new environment you're in. Oni does a poor job of rewarding this, and yet makes it required on occasion. Either make it rewardful, or drop it...
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
Maybe games based on good narrative can be developed eventually. But until someone figures out how, game designers should perhaps just focus on making good games. There is ample precedent for how to go about doing that. And it neither involves making characters more "life like" nor adding a lot of bogus story background to the game.
Cheats have grown to be an integral part of every game. Think of your favorite games, and I'll bet half of them have built-in cheats involved somehow. Most of the time these cheats aren't allowed in regulated gameplay, but can add to the experience. For example, in Worms2 you'll rarely if ever pull the Concrete Donkey out of a crate, but the cheat gives you a chance to play around with it. The noclip function on games like Q2 lets you fart around in places you'd never reach and allows insight into map design theory. So even on well-designed games, cheats are nice to have.
I'll spare you the flame, but most of the games you list were coded in an era when available memory wouldn't support "plot" games. As soon as MUDs came about, there were suddenly games that were nothing but plot. Shooters and plot games are both just extensions of meatspace games anyways. Your personal electronic games preference will probably mirror the game choices you made before computers were available - sports vs. chess, if you will. Both have been around in some form for centuries, each having its own crowd.
Great point there, some games don't need plots. Pong didn't have a lot of depth, though (not that it needed it, it was a great game nonetheless), so it didn't need much explaining. But if I'm going to be running around blowing heads off of aliens and rescuing hostages and whatnot, I'd like to have some idea of why I'm doing it.
ff7: best plot of all time
1) terrorists
2) Sephiroth
Problems: the better the plot in terms of literary valuation, the worse the gameplay because it restricts fredom.
FF7, however, rewards systematic and thorough gameplay and does have many periods where you can freely explore theworld map and get hidden stuff, chjaracters and plots.
Goat sex free since 2001
Moderation in all things
They should mandate the memorization of this phrase before anyone can publish a game. Plot is good, interactivity is good, action is good. All of these are wonderfull qualities for a game. None of them can stand alone as the basic premice for a game.
Quake 3 (In single player mode) -- Plot? What plot? Sure, there is this completely basic storyline that you don't even notice in the game until you get to the end level. Even Doom had more plot. Plot is an integral part of the game. It makes the player belive, even for just a second, that his actions matter in some wider scheme.
I should note that plot is almost totaly unecessary in multiplayer games. Interaction with real people is far more convincing than a computer can be... right Mr Turing?
Myst -- No action to speak of. Now, I'm going to get flamed by Myst fans for saying this, but Myst was really lacking in the "Fun" department at times. By relying so heavily on problem solving and plot, myst offered no outlet for the stress involved in not being able to solve the problem. I wanted to let loose with a rocket launcher on those seagulls more than once. By making the game so cinimatic and slow paced, Myst gave up a good portion of its potential audiance and apeal.
Interactivity -- Balders gate was listed as the example for this above. I agree, a universe that is to interactive, where the player "picks up anything that's not nailed down... just in case" is poorly designed.
So my conclusion is this. Moderation. There needs to be a basis for your game. That basis can be in action, plot, or interactivity. That depends entirely on what kind of game you're making. But your game also needs aspects of the other two. Further, no single element should be taken to far. Action taken to far (eg Action Quake) becomes painfully real. We don't want to see the hero die from a leg wound. That's not FUN. Plot, when to overarching, leaves the player feeling dwarfed and insignificant. Final Fantasy is guilty of this at times, it becomes very clear that your actions don't matter at all, all you have to do is survive and "destiny" will make sure you end up in the right place. Interactivity, at to great a scale, is also pointless. Sure, your character can play with everything, but what is he supposed to DO?
Diverging plot lines, maybe only three or four, but as many as 15, are an asset to a game. Building in the ability to change and manipulate the environement, even if it is without meaning, is always a plus and adds depth to the illusion of reality. Finaly, action is necessary in almost every game. We play games to escape from our world, to do things we can't do in real life, since most gamers are men and most men do have these irrational violent impulses (I know I do) action (and often violence) is a necessary asset for a game. Besides, blowing stuff up is fun.
This has been another useless post from....
Killfile(TGK)
No trees were killed in the creation of this post. However, many electrons were inconvenienced.
These are all good points, but I disagree about interactivity. There are very fun and successful games built around interactivity, such as the Sims. There is no goal in the Sims, it is just an "interactive sandbox" where the player can do whatever he or she pleases.
Given a reasonably level playing field, who would win a fight between a bear and a shark?
I think one gaming skill that is very important is patience. If you don't have it then chances are you may need to use codes or cheats. However, most of the time if you keep trying enough times you can usually solve the problem. This is very evident in some of the older nes games like Ninja Gaiden. Usually on your first time playing through you will die, but after playing it enough times you will eventually know where everything is and where enemies are going to come from. Whether this is good game design or not is a different matter though. In small modurations difficult challenges are ok, but when there is an overabundance of them its just annoying. I think one thing game companies need to do is make sure games stay fun and avoid trial and error type things. When you walk into a room, fall into a hole, and die without having anyway of knowing the hole was there. Thats just poor game design.
-I fear the easter bunny.
However, I think this could be a feature, not a bug. If you don't try pretending that you are constructing the narrative, but are simply unlocking it as you play, the narrative becomes the incentive, like bits of kibble that reward achievement. You want to keep to a minimum, I think, the number of plot elements you have in mind at any given time to navigate the game; then you want a pay-off of narrative (and nice cinematics and sounds and such) that make you feel that you have participated in a narrative without having to create it.
What was the first game to introduce on-line multiplayer play? What was the first game to use hardware acceleration? What was the first game to have a "sniper" view?
Ultima Undeworld came out a month before Wolf 3-d did, but you never hear people talk about it and how it had features that even DOOM didn't.
nettrek had been out for years allowing people to play online against multiple people.
Descent had true 3D long before Quake.
None of the game you list were TRULY innovative in and of themselves. They may have brought ideas to a new area but ultimately it was more than just the sum of their innovations that made them the names that you remember today.
BTW, the games I remember are C&C: Red Alert, Age of Empires 2, Duke Nukem 3D, Gabriel Knight. I don't remember them because they had innovations. I remember Duke Nukem 3D because I played that coop all the way through over a modem with my best friend one summer. I remember Red Alert because I spent a good chunk of my junior year playing it multi player with my friends. I remember Gabriel Knight because, even though it was extremely dated when I played it (1998) it had a great story and was a great adventure game.
Always remember that the solution comes from two directions -- what the player gets to do, and what the game does around him. A good example is the cliche of the dropped business card during a murder mystery. Sure, maybe you as the player forget to pick it up, and that's what cheat sheets are all about. But if you're in a truly interactive game where the plot hasn't been completely laid out in advance, then maybe the character in question doesn't drop it, and then what happens? How do you continue to direct the story? Make it mandatory that the character always drops it? Or have some sort of internal consistency checker that makes the game always solvable by shifting to some other story line and providing a different clue?
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
Choose the most likely explanation for this:
--- Hot Shot City is particularly good.
Just think of all the games that leave an impression in your mind and consider if it is memorable because it was well designed, or if it was the first to do something new. The ones I really remember are Wolfenstien (my first FPS), Doom (my first multiplayer game), Doom2 (my first multiplayer with more than 2 people, and it was the hack that made it extra fun), Quake (my first 3D FPS, but not really big until CTF came out), Warcraft (my first multiplayer realtime strategy game).
So basically it's not the overall game I base my appreciation on, it's the innovations they introduced that made them k-rad elite. This is why I've pretty much stopped playing them after Q2, everything's just more of the same but with insane hardware requirements. And when you think about it, it's not the stories that keep you interested (go play D&D if it is, or read a book) it's what's new and exciting. Now days all that's left is eye candy and complexity. But dammit, Doom on a 486 with no mouse was fun enough for me.
PS. if anyone knows a Q1 CTF league drop me a note. Once I get it to install under win2k I'm all over that...
DataSquid.net, a little about me.
what balance do you like best between plot and action
It is critical to recognize that the notion of "balancing" these issues is subtler than it may seem at first. Once can have a simulation, or one can have storytelling, but it is in fact virtually impossible to combine (balance) the two without just plain lying with the suggestion that you are doing either.
This is because both simulation and storytelling place an unreasonable constraint on how time is "delivered" to the player. A story requires some application of the Poetics, an approach to the delivery of characters, their relationships, the staging and timing of events, the building of conflicts between those elements, the lifting of tempo until a climax, AND THEN (you simply can't skimp on this), a solid and unsudden denoument to a close. Tempo --an issue that is far more important than sequencing-- is critical in this regard. To the extent that the storyteller cannot control how the "story time" gets allocated to the real time of the game experience, the storyteller cannot deliver the fiction.
On the other hand, a simulation requires that the user is able to dictate the tempo of matters. This ability to control the timing --even moreso than controlling the sequence-- of events is critical to the sense of interactivity felt by the user.
In short, these are issues that really can't be balanced in fact. You must always cheat storytelling significantly to do any simulating, and vice-versa.
This is not to say that virtually every game purporting to be "in genre" doesn't try to do this. What I am saying is that it can't be done actually, and that the true miracle of a great game is not the "balancing" of these issues, but rather the capacity to use theatrical devices, smoke and mirrors, to cloud the player into feeling or having the sense that a storytelling game is interactive, or that a simulation is storytelling. One of the devices used in this regard is precisely the notion mentioned above, giving the user more control of sequencing to make up for the lack of timing -- which is the real tradeoff that is typically made. The best, and most creative games, are not just those which provide non-linearity, but which combine nonlinearity with other, often subtle, devices that "fake out" the user into thinking she is playing one type of game when she is actually playing the others.
IMHO, although this is not always the rule, those games that attempted to "balance" storytelling and interactivity directly, by going back and forth between the two styles, seem to fail dismally on both counts. For example, cinematics, one of the classic game design "dodges," while utterly goregous in modern technology, seem to detract from, rather than enhance suspension of disbelief in the simulation portion of the game rather. I have seen it get better, but I think the reason we haven't seen it done "great" is that, perhaps, it can't be done at all directly. The "smoke and mirrors" theatrics, on the other hand, can make for truly great simulations or storytelling games, and seem to get far closer to the "ideal" of Interactive Fiction.
Play to your strengths, and not to your weaknesses. Just another view.
This was one of the things I really liked about Half Life: there was a story that you were a part of. Things unfolded, and you found things out by overhearing other people talking.
That is, right up to the teleporter level. Then the story evaporated like Helium-II on a hot stove.
I hope that HL2, when it finally does come out, will be able to have enough money to carry the story through the whole game. Of course, I'd like them to throw in a few different tracks for different styles of play (the "sneak&snipe" vs. the "Grond KILL"), and of course I want it under a REAL operating system, but I digress....
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Dug this up from my bookmarks because I think some may find it interesting. Essentially Valve focused on making a specific portion as cool as possible, then they moved on, went back and made it as cool as possible again. I think it's a shame this isn't tried out more.
Considering that this is one of the little gems that has done things RIGHT lately, I should hope more people take note of HOW it was done right.
I definitely agree. When I play a game, I want something exciting and interesting, where I'm in control. I don't want to recreate the experience of watching a soap opera.
Really, I feel the same way about tabletop RPGs. If your GM has a story he really wants to tell, you'll probably be railroaded and it very well may suck. If, on the other hand, the GM gives you the freedom to take it where you want to go, ahh, now that's more fun.
Also, I want to be able to turn on a game and enjoy it immediately. I don't want to have to turn on a game and say, "that's right, I'm still looking for the Princess's MacGuffin!" or have to try to remember exactly where I was. But maybe I just don't have the right gamer mindset needed to appreciate long linear plots in video games.
-- dR.fuZZo
"Oh my God, this guy is really the half-brother of that guy who is the sister of so-and-so,"
Game Design Tip #13 : Make sure your game heroes are somehow related to Boy George.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
I recently realized that, with the exception of Final Fantasy 9 (which is more of a story), I haven't played any games in a long time. "What am I doing?" I thought. I then realized that I was playing games, just other types of games: How can I help the Free Software movement, How can I maximize my contribution to society and self, how can I promote, learn about, and work on, groupware. Learning is also another type of game, that I play.
What's common to games? I liked the definition I read on the WorldForge project page: You've got a goal, you've got obstructions, and you try to meet the goal through the obstructions. And, that description matches the games that I play, video-game or otherwise (contributing, learning, etc.,.).
Now the question is: What seperates a game from Work? The description above seems to also describe work rather well. Almost by definition, I hate work, but I love games (Cosmic Encounters, for name-dropping). So what's the difference? For this, I draw on Taoism, that book "Flow" (John Carmak recently referenced it), and Miyamoto-sama, who emphatically repeated at GDC 1999 that the game-playing experience must be "comfortable". Perhaps the only difference between work and a game is that the game is comfortable, whereas the game is, well,... Work. I'm still working on this definition. (Mary Poppins said that with a spoonful of sugar, you just snap, and the job's a game. While I like this idea, I have trouble in the impementation; perhaps I'm just not snapping my fingers correctly. Maybe I need to meditate more.)
Given this description, what are the types of games that I'm interested in playing? Personally, I'm really interested in games that cross-over into the domain of my livelihood, and the livelihood of others around me. I'd like the principle of game-ness to shove out work-ness from my life. I wouldn't fret if work completely disappeared from my life. Computers fit the bill rather well. I've always considered the operation of computers to be something of a game, since I was a wee little one, and I've always had an intuition that it would pay the bills. (That intuition turned out to be right.) But still, there's a lot that's uncomfortable about it. It's just like when you're in the maze, and all the doors are locked, and there isn't a key in sight. You're absolutely stuck. You were slated to finish a programming task in 2 days, and it's taken you 2 WEEKS, and you still don't know how you're going to get out of it. This is an uncomfortable situation, and draws me out of the realm of the game, into the realm of work. Ugh. And I was trying so hard to get out of that realm. Where am I going with all of this? Well, I'm trying to establish the similarities and subtle differences between work and games, and then I'm trying to segue into how I think that we can structure things so that work can become more like a game. My ultimate goal is to get feedback from you, build interest in the subject, and have you send me links and other references to related lines of thought.
So, I've found this neat way of teaching that can make a game out of learning. It gives you immediate positive rewards, it helps out in the world (because you learn a valuable skill), and you don't get stuck with no keys and lots of locked doors, because it has a built in help line, that you can call on and get a quick piece of help.
The way I found I learned from Philip Greenspun. He uses problems and a community system as integral parts of the ArsDigita training program. It works like this: You have a number of problems, in gradually increasing difficulty, that the learner tackles. Lecture is rather secondary to the problem statements themselves. Lecture is useful, in so much as it helps with the problems. The problems are rather UNIX-like in that the goal is to teach the student one thing, and teach it well. Anyways, I've been working on installing the ACS, and it's been going well so far. Whenever I have a problem, I go to the web bulliten board, search for the problem. Most likely someone had it before, and I get the answer there. If not, I write an entry to the list, and within 5-15 minutes, get a reply. (Once I had to wait 6 hours, though...) The reply then goes on to the board, so that others can get the solution as well. In fact, it's like this with most of our online systems, except that the response time isn't as small, you have to sort through google entries, and usually you have to subscribe/unsubscribe to/from mailing lists, etc., etc.,.
Anyways, I've tried out the method of problem guides in the Fledging Unix Programmers class that I teach, and it's had excellent results. Problems show up when the difficulty between problems is too high, so I subdivide those intervals. It works great.
But what I'm really looking for is for other people to do the same thing.. There are a lot of times in my life where I have 2-3 hours spare, and I'd like to play a game in that time. I'd like a good set of 3-5 problems, workable within 2 hours total, that increase my knowledge about the Linux Kernel, PHP, How to use databases, link things up, make a small game, play with networking, etc., whatever. Do you know what I mean? (Please answer.) So what I'd like to have is, not so much HOW-TO's, but PROBLEM-GUIDE's. And support lines consisting of other people who are interested in the subject, and have completed the guides themselves. Well balanced problem guides. That way, I can play games on a daily basis that are comfortable, educational, and most importantly, fun.
1) Plot v. Action: Depends totally on the game. If it's a game where you need to "figure stuff out" (e.g. Myst) then plot is a necessity. If it's a shooter, plot is OK, but please, please let me skip the cinematics if I want to.
2) Cheats: If you have to have them to make the game worthwhile, it's a badly designed game. I view cheats primarily as a way to jump in and start really playing a game without investing the (often copious) time required to get good. Beating a game without cheating provides a sense of accomplishment; cheating trades that feeling for saved time.
...like Starcraft or Sim City. In Starcraft, the learning curve is pretty, steep, but once you have that mastered the gameplay is in the strategy. It's learning the best tactics to beat the computer and/or your neighbor. The narrative is there, but I've played 'Brood War' for hundreds of hours without ever touching the included campaigns. In Simcity, the learning curve is also pretty steep, and you continue to learn every time you play. That's the point of the game, learning how the game works. EQ players will recognize that they have a mix of tactics and 'cheatsheet' style games. The bulk of Everquest is played learning the best tactics and strategy, while the backstory is created with detailed maps and long quests, 99.9% of which are documented online.
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For example, some of my experiences playing UT or Tribes have rivaled action movies in excitement and drama. But since I'm taking part in it with other people, rather than following a predetermined path, the excitement is increased because I know that my next move determines what happens. If given a choice would you rather see through Superman's eyes or BE Superman. That's the difference in choice between these two game types.
Given a reasonably level playing field, who would win a fight between a bear and a shark?
One of the more intresting/frustrating parts of games without cheats is the lack of continually enjoyable game play.. A good example is Worms 2... Even though the game is enjoyable and addictive the lack of weapons (i.e. weapons only available with cheats) is somewhat disagreeable. The only way to obtain the cheats is through beating the actual 1 player game, which is extremly hard.... A counter example would be Civilization 2... Even though the cheats are readily available for use (on the game menu itself) it is not that enjoyable to use b/c it simple defeats the entire purpose of the game, regardless of the humor of multiple nuclear missles being launched into third world countries like Canada..... A good programing creed would be simply to use cheats as a method of continuing game play and allowing more intresting interaction... Not simple for functional purposes but to expand the gaming experience itself...
--- My Karma is bigger than your...
------ This sentence no verb
I think that most action games tend to have terrible plots, that are totally unbelievable, but that does not matter for most people because they only play the game for the action anyway. A good example might be Quake III - plot is meaningless.
Personally, I would like to see more professionally done plots for games. Why not hire people who know about plot, and developing an interesting story, according to the timeless rules involved? An English graduate or a professional writer or someone could I think work well with the people who typically create games.
Already most games companies employ musicians, actors, and artists as well as programmers. Why not bring some literary experts in too, to cover the plot side, so that you have a good combination of the visual, aural, logical and literary arts?
I think it would help improve the depth of games that bit more.
--
Clarity does not require the absence of impurities,
/* And you'll never guess what the dog had */
/* in its mouth... */
--Larry Wall in stab.c from perl
Just my $0.02 as a game programmer....
;-)
... realism and plot are tricks we can use to make the game more interesting. After all, the key issues in game design are FUN, and BALANCE.
;-) or I could wait 5 months, for my body to heal naturally. *boooooooring*
;-)
Realism and Plot are independent of a fun game...
You can have games with 100% realism, and 0% plot -- that are fun (flight sims or shooters, ala Rogue Spear or Counter-strike come to mind) Basically anything with mindless destruction
You also can have games that have 100% plot, 0% realism, and are fun -- Myst (as easy as it was) or adventure games, like Grim Fandago, Monkey Island (awesome memories plaything those with a friend)
And then we get odd ball games, that rock. Like "SOUL CALIBER" No blood, no cutting off of limbs or apendages, or guts. Just a nice background story, and a blast to play. Realism? Sort-of. Plot? Sort-of. Fun? Hell, yeah!
BUT
Game designers abstract the "tedious" stuff out, so as not to make the game boring.
e.g. I just use this health pack, from 20% health right back up to 100% health, *riiiiiiiight*
Lots of people complain about the "linearity" of single player games, but I treat it like a movie. I play it once, have a fun time, and enjoy the next game. Thief 1 & 2 were definately something I had a blast playing -- late at night, lights out, 3d sound on -- the physical environment set the perfect mood!
What some people find fun, may be boring to others.
e.g. some find chess/go to be be "lacking."
Others live for card games. Others want to frag their buddies 24x. Other's love the strategy of RTS's. I loved teamplay for ages. Some find virtual craftsman and selling to be fun.
Games are starting to do a good job on "representing realism" via 3D graphics, 3D sound, and force feedback.
But plot on a LARGE scale, is still a VERY hard problem to solve.
We see that stories and books have been around for thousands of years. The "general plot" is nothing new. So we see singler player action/adventure games, are like an "interactive" book. Drakken , Tomb Raider, Thief were cool - because the story didn't advance until I did.
There is a reason we haven't seen massive multiplayer games with a good plot. Because it's dam hard to have *everyone* be able to effect the outcome. It's WAY easier to "guide" someone thru a linear story.
Fun in games: Games have been fun from the start.
Realism in games: We arrived there when Mortal Combat had the "bloody" FINISH HIM.
Plot in games: We're only 25% way there...
Putting a "ban" on "familiar" game design elements, like orcs, character classes, etc, won't really "solve" the problem of having a game with more plot.
Ok, I'm going to get flamed here, But I don't care about plots in games. PONG had no plot, But i loved the game.
Pong: Don't let the ball go past you
Breakout: Hit the blocks, don't let the ball go past you
Pole Position: Don't drive your block (a.k.a car) out of the lines.
I had a great time with those games. Getting the magic diamond to kick the galactagoid's ass isn't entertaining to me. All that gets in the way of "hit the bad guy with your weapon"
One thing I've certainly noticed is that there is a lot more aimlessness in games nowadays. It goes under a lot of other names: interactivity or perhaps realistic action. However, what it really shows is one of the fundamental weaknesses of telling a story interactively. Anyone who have ever Game Mastered an RPG is aware of this problem. Most story telling is done in media like books, movie, or theater where the author has complete control over everything. Every thought of every character. Every action of every person. Once you distribute that control it becomes significantly harder to weave an interesting plot.
For instance, imagine you have a game world that is completely interactive. I mean, 100% immersive. Say it's a Blade Runner game. Remember the part where Harrison Ford just "happens" to find the snake scale? What are the chances of that actually happening if the author doesn't make the character notice that.
It's similar to the problem that a lot of sports and driving/flight simulators are having nowadays. They have become so realistic that they often become devoid any actual fun.
Now you have games like Baldur's Gate where you move your cursor over every square inch of the game screen hoping to find that elusive treasure hidden somewhere. Imagine a character in a book taking time from his quest to avenge his step-father's murder to comb every square inch of land for 40 miles looking for a magic ring that may or may not be there. Talk about tedium.
I dunno about most people but I find "open ended games" over-hyped. People often complain about "linear" plots but I think linearity has gotten a bad rap. The problem isn't linearity or non-linearity of plot. It's bad game design and weak story lines.
When was the last time you read a book and the main character picked up everything that wasn't nailed down "just in case" he needs it 60 days later to vanquish the evil demon hordes?