BEAR on 3/12/2008 at 04:03
If you quit a game before it has the chance to get started, you deserve what you get.
If you quit Deus Ex after liberty island, you denied yourself a great game. Almost all games get better after the first level (well, Bioshock didn't really, but it didn't really get worse).
It is a fairly long game, but once you get midway, its fun just to play. When I installed oblivion lost, I had already beaten the game once. It was fun for me to just get on and run around for an hour or so, do shit I'd done already just because its never the same twice. Give it a chance and try and get farther in, you'll thank yourself later.
Muzman on 3/12/2008 at 05:01
Quote Posted by Chade
Muzman, I am not sure what you mean by accountancy of choice. Do you mean my choices have consequences? Are you talking about relationships with the various factions? I don't see how it applies to the shooter aspects of the game.
What I meant was that just your listing of the choice mechanics you've identified seemed really strange thing to do, to me. It could just be by way of conversation or such, but it seemed a bit too analytical. I only do that on reflection or when I can't stand something and I'm trying to work out why so I figure it's not a good sign for the game. You might be different, I dunno.
Anyway, I missed that you didn't patch. I only played the game after 1.0003 or whatever version and the main complaint there is that it's too damn hard. Your experience is that it's, paradoxically, too easy.
If nothing's wrong then the differences in patching are pretty huge, difficulty wise. From memory the AI improved quite a bit over the patchings as well as did the pacing of quests and...oi all sorts of stuff now that I think about it.
Yeah, patch it and try again maybe. I can't guarantee you'll like it more, but it'll be different.
I think I get what you want to hear about now anyway, so:
There's no really serious faction system (like in Clear Sky) but there are factions and how you work with them alters how you move through the game (It's possible to make them mad at you, for instance, and complicate travel and what gear you get etc).
Missions and side quests will require some consideration of allegiences.
There are staged 'incidents' where you can choose sides or generally make a mess. The outcomes of these can vary wildly and the game adjusts and continues accordingly. It's not Deus Ex but more like, 'failing' missions just alters things rather than ends or ruins the game (it is possible for things to become very difficult if you mess too many things up and dont make enough allowances in tactics and supplies though)
You haven't met any of the interesting monsters yet.
You haven't seen any of the underground sections, which are pretty 'spooky fps' but very good all the same.
In fact all of the really impressively designed cool looking stuff is ahead of you.
That's a few things that might help anyway. I do feel like people should start out with the AMK mod right from beginning sometimes. They basically turned on all the stuff that was cut for being too complicated. It's a very dense and lively experience (the A-life is much livelier and more dangerous for instance). I really don't know how I would feel about if I hadn't played the vanilla version first however.
Chade on 3/12/2008 at 06:04
Quote Posted by Muzman
I only do that on reflection or when I can't stand something and I'm trying to work out why ...
What do you think I posted here for ... :p
A couple of years ago I would have just played more to see what happened, but it's just that I don't spend the same sort of time playing games anymore, and I don't want to waste it.
Anyway, yeah: your post was pretty much what I wanted to find out. I will keep giving the game a shot, and patch it up too.
Koki on 3/12/2008 at 07:35
Quote Posted by Chade
I have oodles of ammo, money, health packs, and am leaving stacks lying around because I can't carry them all (and I don't feel like legging it back and forth from the store all the damn time) ... particularly after I decided to assualt the military camp in the south of the first map.
That's perfectly normal if you're playing at Stalker.
Quote:
I realize ... is there a faction system worth speaking of in this game?
No. Later in the game there are two factions which don't like each other and you can get a quests from both, including the obligatory "kill leader" quest. But that's all.
Military is always hostile to you, Stalkers are always neutral to you, well you can befriend Ecologists later on but it changes absolutely nothing.
By the way, slaughtering entire military outpost at Cordon with what, AK-74U? Not bad.
Quote:
Do you mean my choices have consequences?
Nothing to speak of.
Quote:
As far as A-Life goes, I haven't been too impressed so far. I haven't noticed anyone doing anything other then randomly wandering around and sometimes choosing to attack one another. Is there stuff I am not noticing? Will it get more impressive if I go further into the game?
No, that's pretty much the entire A-Life in action - random spawns moving along pre-defined paths reacting(Which means attacking each other in 99% of the cases) to other random spawns moving along pre-defined paths. But nothing ever happens without the player's presence.
Quote:
So far, my opinion is that they dropped the ball with that. It doesn't really add to the "survive in the wilderness" feel, or at least it hasn't yet.
And it won't, especially once you get better guns. There is no survival aspect to SoC to speak of other than firefights.
I dunno, try going through Agroprom at least, I genuinely hate Garbage myself.
Aja on 3/12/2008 at 09:09
I kinda feel like I'm trying survive... I spent all my good ammo (TRS301) killing the bandits outside the lab, and had to do the entire lab using only a handful of bullets from some shittier machine gun (at least I had a scope). Now I'm out and the place is crawling again and I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have to run (but my inventory is full of health and artifacts and I don't want to abandon either).
It's like little mini survival sessions in between each base. The going is still hard, but with the TRS it isn't nearly as frustrating, since I can actually hit stuff with it.
Koki on 3/12/2008 at 09:42
Correct me if I'm wrong, but every enemy you kill drops 20-30 bullets for his weapon. And from Garbage onwards that weapon is either MP5(Which is very good actually) or AK74U(which is less accurate but hits harder than MP5). And that's not counting pistols. So what you're telling me is that on average you spend more than 20 bullets on a single enemy?
242 on 3/12/2008 at 10:59
Quote Posted by Koki
No, that's pretty much the entire A-Life in action - random spawns moving along pre-defined paths reacting(Which means attacking each other in 99% of the cases) to other random spawns moving along pre-defined paths. But nothing ever happens without the player's presence.
Man.
Firstly, they don't spawn randomly, they spawn when system considers it's needed based on
global population.
Secondly, AIs dwell in pre-definded so-called "smart-terrains". It's possible to remove the borders and make each of the populations totally free, but that would lead to total chaos (some mods do this). Random are occasional raids, when a group moves from its "smart-terrain" to some point on the map to occupy it. Yes, during raids it moves along pre-defined paths.
Thirdly,
A-Life functions when player is absent. There are two modes for AIs behaviour - "online" (when player is nearby) and "offline". In "offline" mode AIs groups are still doing random raids and fighting but simplified calculations are used for that. Notice how various outposts may change their owners in your absence. Also, AIs can move from one map to other during "raids".
This AI system is the most complicated system I ever seen in action/RPG games for unscripted "field" life simulation. It's light years ahead those used in Gothic, Elder Scrolls, Fallout3, Thief, etc.
Koki on 3/12/2008 at 12:01
That all sounds great and all, but who cares it the Zone feels as lifeless as it would be with random spawn system?
Global population is meaningless. It basically means that when you kill bandits, more bandits will spawn. When you kill Monolith, more Monolith will spawn. Great.
Smart Terrains are also to blame here - see if they were off, the bandits could spawn just about anywhere. But with them on, they always spawn where they only can spawn, which in all cases means where the player killed them since it's only "free" camp at the moment. That's why aliVe was so great, it actually introduced the much-needed random factor to the game.
Offline A-life is also meaningless. It doesn't matter to me, the player, if Stalkers fought Bandits at the Garbage warehouse or not. Why? Because effects of that struggle are nonexistant in the game. I am not going to arrive at the warehouse to find bandit bodies, and I am not going to find few Stalkers dead. As far as I'm concerned, the game might have just rolled a virtual dice, even for Stalkers occupying the warehouse, odds for Bandits, and then just erease previous occupant and spawn the new one. And the effect would be identical.
That's why the Zone feels eternally dead. It really is as if the game was just randomly spawning factions at pre-determined locations every time you enter the map. Furthermore, none of these factions will actually DO anything until the player is close. Let's say you're visiting Agroprom for the second time after a few in-game days(To make away with the scripted sequence). The game spawns both Stalkers and bandits at the central complex. Now if you don't actually GO to the central complex, they will do nothing - because they don't exist. It's only when you actually move within central complex's spawn distance both Stalkers and Bandits "appear" and start shooting at each other.
It doesn't matter if STALKER has A-Life and how good it is if the game is not using it. How empty it really is was best shown by AMK's "dynamic" news system. Unless YOU, the player, do something, all Stalkers will report is weather and what mutant they saw and where. It's only when YOU do something - i.e. kill bandits at the car park - that they start reporting dead bandits or shootings.
242 on 3/12/2008 at 12:12
Quote Posted by Koki
That all sounds great and all, but who cares it the Zone feels as lifeless as it would be with random spawn system?
Not for me.
TF on 3/12/2008 at 12:42
Quote Posted by Koki
That all sounds great and all, but who cares it the Zone feels as lifeless as it would be with random spawn system?
Global population is meaningless. It basically means that when you kill bandits, more bandits will spawn. When you kill Monolith, more Monolith will spawn. Great.
Smart Terrains are also to blame here - see if they were off, the bandits could spawn just about anywhere. But with them on, they always spawn where they only can spawn, which in all cases means where the player killed them since it's only "free" camp at the moment. That's why aliVe was so great, it actually introduced the much-needed random factor to the game.
Offline A-life is also meaningless. It doesn't matter to me, the player, if Stalkers fought Bandits at the Garbage warehouse or not. Why?
Because effects of that struggle are nonexistant in the game. I am not going to arrive at the warehouse to find bandit bodies, and I am not going to find few Stalkers dead. As far as I'm concerned, the game might have just rolled a virtual dice, even for Stalkers occupying the warehouse, odds for Bandits, and then just erease previous occupant and spawn the new one. And the effect would be
identical.
That's why the Zone feels eternally dead. It really is as if the game was just randomly spawning factions at pre-determined locations every time you enter the map. Furthermore, none of these factions will actually DO anything until the player is close. Let's say you're visiting Agroprom for the second time after a few in-game days(To make away with the scripted sequence). The game spawns both Stalkers and bandits at the central complex. Now if you don't actually GO to the central complex, they will do nothing -
because they don't exist. It's only when you actually move within central complex's spawn distance both Stalkers and Bandits "appear" and start shooting at each other.
It doesn't matter if STALKER has A-Life and how good it is if the game is
not using it. How empty it really is was best shown by AMK's "dynamic" news system. Unless YOU, the player, do something, all Stalkers will report is weather and what mutant they saw and where. It's only when YOU do something - i.e. kill bandits at the car park - that they start reporting dead bandits or shootings.
1. what's 'aliVe'
2. you can find corpses to loot sometimes
3. strange example with AMK since using AMK enhances off-line alife a lot, with stalkers looting corpses, getting new weapons and 'selling' some of the items to the trader. Nice way to make cash was to buy all the dog tails off the Duty guards who were often attacked by dog packs and sell them to the scientists.
It also allows levels to change more overtime, lategame try going back to various areas you feel like there's no need to revisit, like Agroprom, chances are they'll be completely dominated by a huge contingent of mutants or something.
