The Future of Game Design

IGN has the beginnings of an interesting series up entitled The Future of Game Design. The first part of this series covers game design elements that we've seen in the past that the author would like to see show up more often in future games. From the article: "We need better art direction in our games. Not just more polygons or slicker textures, but games with a better sense of visual style. Off the top of my head, one of the first games that really showed a distinct sense of art direction and style in this generation of games was Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus. That game oozed with style, and even though it was simple and quick, it became one of my favorites because the main character, Sly, had real character." As we start to get into Uncanny Valley territory I hope more artists take the approach that Sly and WoW have.

Comments

Atmosphere

[Dachannien]

Art direction is good and all, but is anybody writing games to convey *atmosphere* these days? Take the first two Thief and System Shock games. These games had atmosphere. You felt the panic and dread in SS2 as a former human rounded the corner, lead pipe in hand, swinging at you while moaning, "Kiiilllll mmmeee!" Your heart pounded as you crept up behind that guard and clocked him over the head, picking up his corpse just in time to duck into the shadows before his friend saw you.

These were games you could play at night, with the lights off, and actually scare the crap out of yourself. And it wasn't because of toonish graphics or special effects - it was because of atmosphere.

Re:Atmosphere

[papadiablo]

I'd say that Doom 3 attempted to create an atmosphere similar to what you are describing. Unfortunately it was a bit too repepitive so you no longer got scared when the lights went out in a room and the monsters appeared around every corner. Half-Life 2 really startled me at times, when you'd round a corner and there would be some baddies right in your face. It also created a great claustrophobic atmosphere in the city levels for a more urban warlike feel.

I think one of the problems is that in order for something to really get your heart pounding there has to be some risk involved. If you can save your game at any point, this takes away risk as you can run in, attack the baddie and if you die just load your saved game.

Re:Atmosphere

[UWC]

Try to find a cheap copy of ICO for PS2 somewhere. Its atmosphere is one of the best I've experienced on a current console. It's fundamentally a puzzle/exploratory/adventure game. Combat is very simple but spaced out so as not to ever get particularly repetitive. The main draw of the game, thuough, is the interaction with and exploration of the environment. The complete integration of the puzzles into the environment is a very, very large part of the effectiveness of the atmosphere, I think. The art style is similarly effective in the immersion, though. While none of the graphics are particularly detailed, the entire environment is cohesive and nothing at all sticks out as just there for the gameplay. Portions of the game remind me of the atmosphere established in the original Myst. It was apparently initially intended for the PS1, though judging from the final game, I think it was probably moved to PS2 reasonably early in development. It unquestionably benefits from the PS2's more powerful hardware. Nevertheless, it's the only PS2 game I've seen on a CD instead of DVD.

Also, Half-Life 2 does a great job at establishing immersion and atmosphere despite complaints about the story and lack of gameplay innovation.

Re:Atmosphere

[obeythefist]

I've played through HL2 and DooM3 now. I think the gameplay in HL2 is better, but not as good as it was in HL. DooM3 did get repetitive but the atmosphere, while different, was conveyed better than HL2. In HL2, so many things were just... not right. For starters, there were many areas, like security towers with guards, that had no ladders! How did the guards get up there? Also, HL2 had the same problem that the HL2 advocates were laughing at DooM3 for... monsters "appearing" out of nowhere behind you all the time. Not as often in HL2, but it did happen. At least in DooM3, there was a flimsy excuse for it, they were teleported in from Hell. HL2 just had monsters stuck in places for no real reason than to "make you fight". Everything in the original Half Life was there for a good reason, it all made sense! In HL2, they lost that message.

While we're talking atmosphere, HL2 just didn't cut it. I've played Devastation and similar games, and HL2 doesn't come up with anything more novel than that, we've all seen trashed up old city environments before. DooM3... well the parts in Hell made my skin crawl. Genuinely creepy.

Let's talk graphics. Half Life 2 had some awful lighting effects... sometimes I'd shine a torch in a room and it would shed no light whatsoever, othertimes it would be blinding. It's pretty obvious the graphics are a bit cludged. DooM3 had incredibly realistic lighting, you could see shadows in all the right places, and some of the effects were very dramatic and inspiring. Sure, DooM3 needed more grunt for the superior graphics engine, but what price should we expect to pay for progress? I'm looking forward to Quake 4, Raven has made some brilliant games in the past and that coupled with the DooM3 engine will be unstoppable.

Re:Atmosphere

[obeythefist]

Storyline is really important! But it depends on the game. The FF series probably has a great storyline, but the gameplay has always bugged me as a serious PC RPG player. NFS2U has no story whatsoever, but it's a lot of fun to play because the graphics are okay and the racing is a lot of fun.

System Shock and SS2 had pretty average graphics and gameplay, even for their time... but the storyline and atmosphere is amazing.

Some games don't need a storyline. Some games don't need great graphics. Some games don't necessarily need great gameplay (if the story and graphics make up for that). Some games don't need graphics, storyline, gameplay or even taste to be fun! (For an hour or so)(Postal 2 anyone?)

But certainly, the point seems to be being missed more often than hit lately.

Re:Atmosphere

[joeljkp]

For me, MOHAA had atmosphere. Especially the snowy-woods mission, where you, sniper rifle in hand, crept through a winter forest trying not to get shot by the German turrets scattered here and there. There was no background music, just the crunch of the snow under your feet. I would jump clean out of my chair when I got a bullet to the head out of nowhere.

Re:Atmosphere

[wickedj]

You beat me to it. I love ICO. I'd wager it's one of the best games ever made. I've never had a game that got me so deeply involved in the story.

Sure, I've played things like Doom 3, Half-Life 2, Metal Gear Solid and the like. Sure they are impressive graphically and the action is sometimes intense. But I always felt I was on the outside looking in.

With ICO, I definitely felt as if I were there in person. Even though dragging that princess around was annoying sometimes, you actually began to feel an attachment to the character and even began to worry about her if you had to leave her by herself.

I can't wait for Wanda and the Colossus, the next game from the same team that made ICO.

What about classic games?

[jgclark123]

I don't think that the graphics are as important as the gameplay. That's why we download emulators! Why else would perfectly intelligent computer geeks knowingly navigate spyware-ridden web sites searching for games? They must be good games.

Of course I'm glad that graphics are becoming more realistic, but that's not good for every game. Who really wants to play a game starring an overweight plumber or an actual hedgehog.

Mmmm...criticism...

[flabbergast]

I can agree with the author on just about every criticism he makes, but some of the things he wishes were better are huge hurdles. For instance its trivial to say "We should have better AI in games!" but, in reality its damn hard to try to make AI better. Most current AI (the AI the author was talking about) is scripted and is therefore limited by the programmer's ability to think outside the box. Yeah, when you're in a game and the enemy does something weird we automatically think "Duh! Its obvious that this is stupid!" But when you're designing and writing the game, its not always obvious. The designer has to think ahead "Well, what would happen in this situation?" and then program that particular situation in.

Or take voice recognition AI. It would be great in KOTOR if I could simply tell a companion to go attack the guy on the left and then I attack the guy on the right. Again, this is not a trivial hack or by any means some hidden conspiracy to prevent ease of use. The AI would have to understand the idea of left, right, and attack along with actually understanding when I state into a microphone "Attack the guy on the left." Yeah, we could script this, but see previous problem.

I realize the author is critiquing games to make them better, which is good, but failing to understand how some problems are very difficult can sometimes aggravate more than motivate. Nothing aggravates me more than a fanboy who simply states "How hard could it be to do X?"

Re:Mmmm...criticism...

[bluGill]

Its worse than you say. Even if the designer considers something, how do you go from seeing it to code, and still be done in reasonable time.

I have some obvious ideas to improve the AI on some open source games. I looked into the AI and quickly realized that humans can instantly process something that computers take a long time to figure out. You look at the map and think "Oh, there was someone in place X, but he isn't there, he must have the invisible suit on, but I know he only moves so fast, so there is only one logical place for him to be. Computers can do that, but even on todays computers it requires a lot of RAM and CPU time.

Thats just one example where a human can quickly see the solution, but can't write it into a good program.

Interactive Cut Scenes

[Zen Punk]

The author mentions the desire for cutscenes to be less static and more interactive, citing Metal Gear Solid 3's zoom feature. Looking at Eva's boobs was the only thing I saw anyone ever use it for. Does anyone remember Shenmue's interactive cutscenes? You would sometimes run into situations that would require you to push buttons at the right time a la Parappa the Rapper. Say you were being hassled by some punks, get the sequence right and you lay the smack down, mess up and you get layed out. A lot more interactive than MGS cutscenes. What do you think about a system based on this for cutscenes? Too simplistic? Not appropriate for most types of games?

Re:Interactive Cut Scenes

[Babbster]

For most games, I would expect such interactivity during cutscenes to be pointless and potentially destructive. Using KOTOR as an example, if I had the opportunity to screw around with the camera in cutscenes it could only ruin the cinematic effect the designers are attempting to convey. In Shenmue, I would argue that the interactive scenes weren't cutscenes at all - they were minigames with a cinematic feel, which is an entirely different gameplay tool.

Bottom line: Cutscenes are supposed to be just that - cuts away from the action. They're also usually meant to have the feel of a movie and I, unlike most actors, have no desire to direct. Just give me a button to allow me to skip them on my second playthrough and I'll be happy.

Alien Hominid

[JimTheta]

How about Alien Hominid? That game oozes style, though it's rather short. I've beaten it on Hard and I'm still playing it. Armies of ridiculous FBI and KGB agent enemies, crazy guns, hilarious huge bosses, cartoony gore and a smiling alien that my girlfriend thinks is cute.

It's hand-drawn graphics, but not cell-shaded. It doesn't push any technical limits. It doesn't need to.

You can't go wrong.

Rose-colored glasses

[Osty]

There were just as many bad games Back in the Day (tm) as there are now. You've simply forgotten about them. In 5-10 years, you'll forget about the bad games taking up shelf space today and only remember the stand-out titles, and make the same complaint.

This doesn't just apply to games, either. It applies to almost everything. The "Good Old Days" were not necessarily any better than today, but the effects of time have made you forget the bad and remember the good. That's why people want a return to the "values" from the 1950s, or complain that Hollywood is just churning out mindless blockbuster action flick after mindless blockbuster action flick, or complain that the airwaves are overrun by Britney Spears wannabes. Do you really think that there wasn't divorce, death, rape, abortion, violent crime, or any of the other ills of today's society back in the 50s? Do you really believe that back in the day Hollywood only released one or two films a year, or even went years without releasing antyhing because nothing was good enough? Do you really think that there were entire stretches of years where no artist released any music at all? Of course not. The collective consciousness has just swept all of the bad behavior, bad movies, bad music, etc under the rug and idolized what came before.

Tuck this thought away in the back of your mind, and drag it out in 10 years when you find yourself lamenting that the current crop of video games pale in comparison to the gameplay found in the "classic" Half-Life 2.

Re:Rose-colored glasses

[jgclark123]

You make an excellent point. Perhaps it was more of the innovation that impressed us years ago. Today's video games, while constantly (arguably) increasing in quality, are not very different. Maybe it was because video games were uncharted territory that we liked them so much back in the "Good Old Days".

I suppose the way to revolutionize gaming would be to make games more innovative (like the Nintendo DS, the Sony EyeToy, or DDR). If only the companies tried more stupid stuff, then they might hit something worthwhile.

The best I've seen for plot or style

[0x4a6f6e43]

Grim Fandango - Dang that was a clever plot, voice acting over the top excellent, and artwork that was spot on. If you trimmed a few scenes it would be a great Tim Burton movie. The final scene about killed me...

Don't RTFA.

[stonecypher]

This article is actually worse than most of IGN's bilge.