The Survival of Survival Horror

Rich writes with this excerpt from GameTopius: "When it comes to pacing and combat, Resident Evil 5 is being compared to Dead Space, as opposed to its previous peers, Silent Hill, Clocktower, and Siren. This is understandable: Resident Evil 5 is joining Dead Space in a new quadrant of the survival horror genre. These games are akin to survival horror in their look and style, and sometimes in the trappings of their stories, but when it comes to gameplay, they are faster paced, and emphasize tighter controls and tactical decision-making, not the ability to use as few bullets as possible on hard-to-hit monstrosities. The reasons for these gameplay changes have been carefully examined by designers and gamers alike."

Comments

really, no Left 4 Dead?

[DragonTHC]

Left 4 Dead is THE survival horror game.

I can't really call RE5 survival horror when the main characters are zombie hunters by trade.

Dead Space is definitely survival horror, but sci-fi flavored.

Re:really, no Left 4 Dead?

[ral8158]

...why don't you start playing expert mode, and we'll talk about unlimited ammo.

Re:really, no Left 4 Dead?

[Fallingcow]

Normal is super easy. I recommend that new players play one or two levels (not campaigns) on normal, then crank it up to advanced and never go back. Experienced FPS players who have someone to guide them around levels ought to just start on advanced.

These days, I only bother playing Expert when I do Coop. Versus is where the big replay value's at, but if you can get some friends together IRL, Expert campaign is wonderful.

It's like this:

- Easy is unplayable. Ugh. Serously, the zombies do like 1 damage per hit, and there's NO friendly fire. The tank dies if just one or two people empty their Uzis into it, and can't possibly get close if you're paying any attention whatsoever, let alone actually hit you. Why bother?
- Normal is easy enough that you can screw around and do dumb things intentionally and still win. Tank still goes down too fast, and even if you've already got one guy dead you should be able to take it with 3 before it hits you at all.
- Advanced will punish you severely for screwing around too much, but legitimate mistakes (and a limited amount of screwing around) can usually be recovered from. Tank is now a threat, especially if you have Tier 1 weapons.
- Expert allows for few or no mistakes, and absolutely zero screwing around. Mess up once and your team might well get wiped out and have to re-start the level. Tank is a monster and will haunt your nightmares.

Some bonus advice: if you haven't started playing Versus yet, I'd recommend waiting until you feel like you've gotten what you want out of Coop; playing Versus for any length of time will ruin the AI infected for you, with the exception of the tank, by making them a total joke and non-threat, even on expert.

Mind you, I'm not 'leet by any means, and I only rarely get sucked in to online games of any sort (the only other online FPS games I've gotten in to in a real way were RTCW:Enemy Territory, ST:Elite Force, and SW:DFII:Jedi Knight), so this isn't some godlike FPS player telling you to play on Expert because Normal is for wimps or anything. I think that a player of average ability should enjoy Advanced more than Normal, given the nature of the game, and after a while will be able to do OK in Expert, which is where the Coop play gets really good IMO.

Re:try Call of Cthulhu

[Steauengeglase]

The Devs imploded before it came out the door.

Re: The Survival of Survival Horror

[genw3st]

I've noticed the same trend - except it hasn't been only within the past couple of years.

Games have gotten ridiculously easy, yet I'm honestly not sure what they should do to help this. They could move all the difficulty settings up a notch - but then they might alienate an entire user base, possibly one primarily consisting of children. Perhaps the fact that controls and gameplay have become much more complex contributes to this. Playing Super Mario, with a total of 3 buttons, is nothing like playing the average Xbox 360 or PS3 game - lots of buttons, another dimension to control, more places to go, more things to do. But it does still stand to reason that games should at least OFFER a more difficult level of gameplay - games like FEAR 2.

Perhaps part of it has more to do with my "evolution" as a gamer; maybe I'm simply much better in my ability to play games and execute the necessary tactics than when I was younger. Games HAVE become much easier - but as I mentioned, things have become quite complex and perhaps that evens out for younger or less adept gamers.

Another thing that has become cumbersome is the fact that developers are starting to draw things out in order to make a little more money - which is a mixed bag. On one hand I like an entire sequel to play, but sometimes a storyline doesn't need to be stretched out over THREE titles (See: Halo). On the other hand I understand that they aren't making games for my enjoyment alone (or possibly at all), but rather it is simply their business. That still doesn't justify releasing the same thing several times on practically the same engine... even Half-Life 2 has become a huge cash cow. I would rather wait another 5-7 years for a new engine and new gameplay mechanics than pay $20-30 (making that a total of $60-90, plus the original cost of HL2) per EPISODE.