ZylonBane on 30/10/2008 at 19:26
Wasn't Alex Jacobson's job specifically to "handhold" agents through field missions? The first DX was smart enough to have a newbie-guiding mechanism built right into the game fiction!
Silkworm on 1/11/2008 at 20:00
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
Wasn't Alex Jacobson's job specifically to "handhold" agents through field missions? The first DX was smart enough to have a newbie-guiding mechanism built right into the game fiction!
Sadly, this has become a major cliche in practically all FPSes since. If I have to play one more shooter with talking heads in my ear ...
rachel on 1/11/2008 at 21:18
It's also very common in fiction, where you have field agents and HQ communicating in real-time (cf. 24, The Unit, etc.) with blueprints or whatever to help them find their way.
I'm with ZB. If the hand-holding is as well done as Jacobson's was, then it's ok for me. Immersion didn't suffer one bit because it made sense even in the game's context. It also cleverly poked fun at itself. ("Like leading a mouse to cheese")
ZylonBane on 1/11/2008 at 22:14
Anyone remember Max Headroom's take on this? Reporters had a controller who'd tell them exactly where to go and what to do... bringing up blueprints of buildings they were in, realtime satellite imagery of their current location, etc. And this was back in the mid-80's.
Chade on 3/11/2008 at 02:38
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
Wasn't Alex Jacobson's job specifically to "handhold" agents through field missions? The first DX was smart enough to have a newbie-guiding mechanism built right into the game fiction!
I'm not sure how to say this without sounding like self-important-internet-guy (oh crap, the shoe fits!) ... but I'm honestly unsure whether that was meant as an argument against anything I'd said, or was just an interesting observation.
Anyway, yeah: that was cool. But I wouldn't say it was especially effective. Hell, it's quite common for even hardcore gamers to "not get" DX untill after the first level. (Yeah, I'm blurring the line between understanding a game's systems and appreciating a game's systems, but I think that particular line should be blurred, and that's part of what I'm talking about.)
ZylonBane on 3/11/2008 at 22:56
Quote Posted by Chade
I'm not sure how to say this without sounding like self-important-internet-guy (oh crap, the shoe fits!) ... but I'm honestly unsure whether that was meant as an argument against anything I'd said, or was just an interesting observation.
I was pointing out that the early levels of DX do in fact handhold the player, but do so in a way that's so seamlessly in-fiction that you don't even perceive it as hand-holding.
Chade on 3/11/2008 at 23:19
It is well integrated into the fiction, although I wouldn't have thought it does a noticabely better job in that regard then a multitude of other games (e.g., half life 2 with the little bit of slippery ground just before some barrels just before the first "tentacle monster" - whatever they are called - that you see).
But it is also unobtrusive because they don't really hold your hand all that much, and where they do, it is typically fairly indirect and subtle. Which is nice in many ways, but I don't believe it was all that effective.
To be fair, some things were effective. They did an amazingly open first level, and AFAIK no-one had any problems knowing where they were supposed to end up, given that the final room was in the statue of liberty and visible from across the map.
van HellSing on 4/11/2008 at 00:01
Quote Posted by a supposedly "brainy gamer"
Once the hilarious dialog ends I have to pick my weapon of choice and am encouraged to try and find a back door, instead of charging ahead like a rampant gorilla with guns. I'm in a dock and there's a stairway that goes down into the water, so I figure that's the way to find a back door. [...] So now I start swimming in search for... something, anything really. The place is huge but luckily there are some invicible walls. Perfect, it's always great to not know where the limits are. Super.
(
http://www.websitetoolbox.com/tool/post/brainygamer/show_single_post?pid=28241254&postcount=1)
Chade on 4/11/2008 at 00:19
Ok, so maybe some people had problems ... :laff:
Although, I can also see how, at each stage, what he was doing made sense.
redrain85 on 4/11/2008 at 14:27
That Kimari fella doesn't seem like too much of a "brainy gamer" to me.
I mean, what's an interphase? ;) And invicible walls? Does he mean invincible? ;)
Seriously, though. Yeah, I can understand his frustration with the first level. It's a common complaint, and I happen to share it. When I first played DX1, I couldn't get past that level. It bored me to tears.
Fortunately, I gave it another shot. Mind you, I never did some of the silly things he tried to do. No wonder he got frustrated so fast.
