On Luck and Randomness In Games

Gamasutra has an article analyzing random events in games, and how they can add or subtract to a player's experience. It looks at the different ways luck plays a part in games; from landing a critical strike instead of a miss to the scatter of a shotgun blast to waiting for that blasted straight piece in Tetris. "Game developers are sometimes faced with similarly challenging decisions when contemplating whether to include some kind of deliberate randomness. For example, in the video game Unreal Tournament, when a player shoots at a target with the 'enforcer' weapon, the projectile does not necessarily hit the point that is aimed at; a random deviation is added that scatters shots. This introduces a degree of realism from an observer's perspective and no doubt gives beginners a fair chance against more experienced players, but it can also potentially frustrate skilled players."

Comments

Always nice to know

[playerone]

Its always good to see that people who matter are actually thinking about ways to overcome obstacles.

It also annoys me greatly when a steady handed and well aimed sniper round misses by a algorithm calculated bees proverbial.

Re:Always nice to know

[sykes1024]

Even irl there's such a thing as wind, and even differences in air temperature along the path of travel can affect the path of the bullet. Not to mention irl you have to lead ahead of a moving target and account for the fact that the bullet will fall a bit on its way. :)

Re:Always nice to know

[Purity Of Essence]

There's no physics reason that bullet paths can't be plotted accurately to include gravity, wind, humidity, etc...computers are great at that sort of thing.

Sure there is. It's called limited computing resources. Collision tests involving parabolas and volumetric effects are far more costly than simple line-primitive collision tests.

FFXI

[Chlorus]

I used to play FFXI, but one of the things that eventually drove me away from the game was the randomness of nearly everything. It was irritating to go nearly 0/10+ (and I've heard horror stories of worse) on rare item drops while Billy teh n00b would get it on first drop. Oh, and there's nothing more fun than fighting a hard fight and getting nothing as a reward. I can understand the developer's desire to keep certain items rare, but such low drop rates aren't the way to do it. I would have preferred they made the fights harder, not more random.

No

[Psychotria]

For example, in the video game Unreal Tournament, when a player shoots at a target with the 'enforcer' weapon, the projectile does not necessarily hit the point that is aimed at

Personally I think it does the exact opposite. I think Far Cry 2 *may* have done this. But if I line up a head shot (sniper) and put a bullet in the AIs head and he doesn't die, then this makes it seem far less realistic to me--especially when I let loose two shots to be sure and then aim down for a direct body shot and the guy still somehow manages to stand.

Randomness is good, but I don't think making bullet paths random is great. Sure, in real life there is random wind and other influences (projectile shape/smoothness, the barrel, and all that), but at the distances (and speed of projectile) I am talking about it's negligible. Two direct head shots and a just-for-fun/'cause-I-can body shot in quick succession should not fail just to add 'randomness'.

Hunters

[Bananatree3]

A skilled hunter can still miss a shot, and will be frustrated when the game gets away. If realism is the goal, getting the perfect shot the first time is not the way to go.

Re:Hunters

[misof]

WTF? A hunter can miss a shot because the game catches his scent and gets away. A hunter can miss a shot because his hand slips a little before pulling the trigger. For _some_ weapons and _some_ distances things like gusts of wind may play a role, but most definitely not always. In a computer game, pointing/clicking two pixels to the left of your opponent is the equivalent to the hunter's hand slipping. And this is when you miss, even with a "perfect" weapon. Nobody guarantees you that in the heat of action your [the player's] every action will be perfect. Precise weapons do _not_ make _you_ precise, and this is why it does not break an action game if the weapons in it are precise.

Re:Incorporate Psychological Hacks

[antifoidulus]

In actual combat though, 30 vs. 20 tends to have a higher win rate than 3 vs 2(with good commanders anyway). 30 people gives you a lot more freedom to implement various tactics that would be impossible or impractical with just 3 people.

Random loot and levelled loot.

[SharpFang]

...the primary killers of motivation to explore.

Why should I climb the tallest tower in the furthest castle, if I get the same stuff as from the chest behind the entrance door?

Why should I conquer the strongest enemies and explore their castle if I'm better off killing millions of rats, then open a chest in the tavern cellar?

Re:Better physics is desirable?

[Chyeld]

You could have been thinking of NRA Gun Club or Country Varmit Hunter. Both of which, were in fact great bombs by all accounts.

On the other hand, one was a completely non-violent gun game and the other was hunting varmits, I don't think the level of accuracy in the modeling of the guns was the sole contributing factor to their lemon level. There are plenty of "OCD detail level oriented" games out there than have fan bases, but they 'make up' for it by having interesting games behind them.

Most people interesting in realistic target shooting are already going to have access to the real item.