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Bioware and Molyneux at GDC 2005
Alice's Wonderland blog has more coverage of the Game Developer's Conference this week. "Storytelling Across Genres: Bioware's Perspective" covers the way in which Bioware concocts the RPG magic they're so well known for. Next Generation Game Design details a talk by Peter Molyneux about where Lionhead and he are going to be taking games in the future. From the post: "Possibly a right proper experiment this, and kudos to Peter and Ron for having the guts to try it: at this stage it looks like it could go either way, and creating a whole new genre (Real Time Strategic Gods and Morals Sim?) is always going to be risky. I very much look forward to the result. "
The first article has a "hub and pinch points" that the author notes "I have no idea what that means". Assuming that this wasn't sarcasm, a hub is a recurring place you return to often. In an RPG, you may get quest A, B, and C and need to return to the hub after completing each one for the reward. A pinch point is a place you need to go to in order to progress with the main quest. A recent and extreme "pinch point" I've experienced is in the last Guild Wars beta. You start in the city of Old Ascalon before the Charr attack. At some point, you enter the acadamy and the Charr attack, devastating the kingdom and moving you into the Ruins of Ascalon. It is a pinch point - it progresses the story but limits or removes the amount of backtracking you can do. Fallout 2 is probably the classic example of pinch points - you have several places you have to go (Navarre base, dock platform, ship), and ultimately, the game could probably be completed in a few hours (I've seen a walkthrough that shows how to complete the game in 4 hours or less by going to Navarre in the first 5 minutes of the game rather than about 20 hours in), but there's a lot of stuff you'll miss in-between and you'd miss out on many allies and chances to advance your character along the way.