Game Pacing Pitfalls Discussed

Thanks to GameSpot for their editorial discussing the problems in pacing a videogame correctly, as the author theorizes: "It's almost always the same sorts of things that make us get sick of them in a hurry", and goes on to pinpoint game facets that affect pacing adversely. He suggests: "Loading times are quite possibly the single worst thing about today's games", and also points out "...providing the player with easy access to often-used features" as a pacing-killer, referencing Vagrant Story's "unwieldy menu system." Finally, he argues that "the ideal game should never require pausing or fast-forwarding", mentioning that Star Wars: KOTOR had "...combat [that] was paced seemingly just right so that I'd be able to react to what was happening as it happened, not in between desperately toggling the pause button."

Comments

What the author forgets...

[KDan]

is that different people like the game to be paced differently. I have friends who like to play Starcraft on infinite resource maps where clicking speed is a major factor in who wins the battle. Others like to take their time. Different people not only have different abilities in terms of what pace they can keep up with, but also different preferences.

Pacing may be an issue, sure - but it's not an issue that can be fixed in any way, because whatever you do, you'll still only hit just right one small portion of the gaming audience.

Daniel

Re:What the author forgets...

[PainKilleR-CE]

The only complaint I usually have about pacing is when a game hits a sudden wall. I don't mind if games are hard, and don't complain about games being too easy, but if things are going along for a good amount of time at a certain level (gradually increasing in difficulty), and then all of a sudden I hit something that seems almost impossibly difficult or requires an extraordinary number of retries, I often put the game away for a very long time. I love a challenge, but a sudden change in difficulty is often unwarranted and just kills the game when there are so many others I could play instead.

Re:And about loading times

[Skier4Life]

The N64 was the first thing I thought about when I read the load time complaint. I loved and still love my N64, I remember either going to a friends house to play some new PS or PS2 game or borrowing their systems for the weekend. The thing that always annoyed me the most was the load times, I think that was the best feature of my N64. I could pop in a cartridge and play the game without watching the stupid loading screen.

I expect when I play games on a gaming console to not have to wait, it is a dedicated gaming system. The hardware and software should be designed so they work together in a way that load times cannot be noticed by the user. When playing PC games I can understand and forgive load times since my PC is not primarily designed or used for gaming (although I know people who think that is what PCs are for). What is the point of better graphics if it means I have to spend time looking at a load screen everytime I start a level, or enter into a different part of the game.

I think this article helps to show that some game developers focus too much on things like graphics and not enough on gameplay. I love great graphics as much as the next person but if I had to choose between a game that looked good to a game that was fun to play, I would obviously choose the game that was fun to play. For example, I still own my old NES and I often find myself playing Punchout, Excitebike or one of the SMB series. I know that some of the reason for this is nostalgia but those games are still a lot of fun to play, even after I have finished some of them several times.

Don't think I am making a blanket statement that games these days are all show with no substance, there are those games that have both killer graphics with excellent gameplay. I am always glad to see those games come out on market.

I know this is just a rant and contains no real substance but I felt like ranting, so I did.