Thirith on 28/6/2010 at 13:06
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
There is no doubt they generally make for weak gameplay experiences though.
I think there's little disagreement on that. For marketing purposes, though, as long as they look cool and make people buy the game, it wouldn't seem to matter all that much that they're mainly annoying in the actual game. Once people have paid to play the game that looked so cool to begin with, the marketing department considers its work done.
Sulphur on 28/6/2010 at 15:07
Quote Posted by Koki
Hahaha, oh wow. Okay, keep talking, just not to me.
A master class in predictable. Cut a little too close to home, did I? It's not that difficult to fathom, so try harder: someone who tries to learn an AD&D game first by playing it after merely skimming through the manual is, in effect, screwed. What's that you say? 'So read the fucking manual completely'? Well, guess what, most people probably would look at the thickness of it and say 'oh, fuck it'. I hope that works as a metaphor without me bolding or highlighting anything to make it too obvious.
I didn't abandon the manual in the end, so I did get better at it. But my first games were quite screwed, to say the least.
Quote Posted by Papy
SS2 total budget was 1.7 million. Do you think I can assume most of that amount went into graphics, animation and sound? Could I then infer that creating, testing and balancing a "deep" gameplay doesn't cost that much? I agree that fully creating another SS2 is not commercially reasonable. But that's not what I'm advocating, What I'm saying is it would be great to use the same assets as BioShock and then create a deeper gameplay with it. Same engine, same graphics, same animations, same sounds even same story. Just add an inventory screen, make a few modification here and there to levels and balance and test another gameplay.
This works if the game we're talking about was designed with having those options in mind. If we're talking something like the 'no plasmid switch' when parts of the game have been designed with having access to all plasmids in mind, reprogramming and modifying level assets and layouts to enable this stuff wouldn't just involve QA, it'd involve the level designers, programmers, as well as the QA team. Which involves man-hours.
There's no hard numbers I can quote, but it's not so simple as 'farm this off to 5 QA guys to re-test the game with all these options and combinations of them thereof'.
An inventory screen on the other hand? Yeah, that'd be a lot easier to do.
Quote:
With SS2 numbers in mind, do you think this can be done professionally for less than a million? So the question is : do you think 50,000 people would be interested with that? Because that's all it would take to make the project profitable.
This is pure speculation. Game budgets in 2001 are not the same as game budgets for the last few years. I can't give you a straightforward answer here because there are no straightforward figures.
Quote:
Personally, I have nothing against company making games with the lowest common denominator in mind. But if they want to sell games to people like me, they have to change their way of making games. Marketing crap won't be enough. I used to buy a lot of video games. Now, it's only a few. I didn't buy BioShock 2 and there's very little chance I will buy Human Revolution. The truth is I'm losing interest because everything is now mostly crap to me. Do you think there is at least 50,000 people on this planet who think like me?
But that doesn't really constitute a lot of people given the 4 million who swallowed up the original, does it?
Paps, I see what you mean, and I'd like for the sort of thing you're talking about to happen. Fact is, a lot of devs don't see much reason in adding something like that sans guarantee of it being a 'value-add' or guaranteed sell for people like you and, to an extent, me. How else do you explain the 'dumbing down' as people like to call it that's so apparent in games these days, console and non-console?
The only developer who's actually doing something like what you propose right now is Obsidian with Fallout: New Vegas. I like their proposed 'Hardcore' difficulty mode for it, which should make the game a little more realistic; it's not quite 'there' yet in terms of wide-ranging options, at least not from the details we have so far, but it's definitely a start in the right direction.
Dresden on 28/6/2010 at 23:54
Quote Posted by Sulphur
It's not that difficult to fathom, so try harder: someone who tries to learn an AD&D game first by playing it after merely skimming through the manual is, in effect, screwed.
I can vouch for this. I think after making my third character because the other two weren't working, I was about ready to toss the whole 5 CD binder in the garbage. I shelved it for 5 years before I beat it with a walkthrough out of sheer boredom.
It probably won't add too much but I think New Vegas really has the right idea when it comes to difficulty by adding a rule set over top of the existing one for people who want it, not just adding health/damage to enemies.
Chade on 29/6/2010 at 01:23
Quote Posted by Muzman
Well, no I guess not. Here's somewhere that we can again look back on
System Shock as being decades (probably at this rate) ahead of the curve. Their system didn't really undermine the game in quite the same way modern methods do. I don't know how hard it could be. Someone might say that with modern damage and AI and so on it could add a lot of labour allowing things to be that flexible. But could it really be much worse than those convaluted dynamic difficulty systems they try and employ (which don't really work all that well from what I gather). Seems like they're just outsmarting themselves trying to 'smooth' the experience.
I'm not sure if the target audience of System Shock can really be compared to modern gamers.
I know that I've read a study before that found gamers tend to pick inappropriate settings (usually too middle-of-the-road iirc) and then blame the game for any subsequent difficulties. That was around 5-6 years ago now, though, so my memory is fuzzy.
Also, are you sure that dynamic difficulty systems don't work? Gamers won't notice good systems, only bad ones. So the "word of mouth" about dynamic difficulty is likely to suffer from sampling bias.
Nihilism on 29/6/2010 at 03:21
Quote Posted by negativeliberty
I can't believe I'm "defending" Fallout 3 here, but this is a pretty weird example of meaningless choice.
It's way more far-reaching than you make it out to be. For one, if you choose, it destroys Megaton, which, besides confirming you're role-playing a murdering psychopathic closes off a number of quests (as in, narrative), encounters etc., but opens up a couple of other ones (as in, narrative). In a recent Bethesda sandbox RPG that's about as close to multi-path as you'll come.
I'm
not saying it's compelling storytelling, but at least they didn't shy away from closing off a whole branch of narrative in favour of a different branch, and vice versa, unlike pretty much 95% of all developers which preach "choice" but end up too scared to "waste" resources on bits of game only a portion of people play, and so end up having pretty much every player experience the exact same thing, even if it's not in the same order.
I'd be surprised if DXHR gave more freedom than Invisible War (heh) because actually that is the
*one* game you should've used in your example of
meaningless choice.
My problem is, either you're an angel, or you're a demon. There's no in between; it's black and white -- no grey area. Yes, it opens and closes quests; that's exactly what we expect if we've played previous Bethesda games. I think quests should be introduced and removed based on unrealized actions. That way, we won't know why things turn out the way they do. With the current system, a simple choice between detonating the nuke or not results in only two obvious outcomes. All the player has to do in their second playthrough is continually do the opposite of what they did in their first, and then they'll have experienced the entire game. If the actions culminating to the game's conclusion are unbeknownst to the player, the game will continue to be fresh and replayable.
Papy on 29/6/2010 at 06:43
Quote Posted by Chade
Also, are you sure that dynamic difficulty systems don't work? Gamers won't notice good systems, only bad ones.
When I play a game, two things may happen. The first one is I will put the least amount of effort in order to succeed, which implies I will make mistakes if I can afford them. If the dynamic difficulty system try to ease the gameplay when it sees I'm almost dying, then, instead of waking up and actually playing the game more carefully, the only result will be that I will put even less effort and find the game boring.
The second possibility is I'll play like an ant and do everything I can to maximize everything. If the dynamic difficulty system sees this and try to make things harder, there's a lot of chance I will feel frustrated.
Basically, my point is I will always adapt to the difficulty of the game. If the game at the same time tries to adapt to me, There is no way to predict what will happen.
Muzman on 29/6/2010 at 06:47
Heh. Well I guess it helps given the general view of it, one defender proving the rule. But I generally have nothing against any given gameplay mechanic in principle. If that's the game, it's the game and I think the anti QTE voicings on Heavy Rain are misplaced. That game is clearly trying to be Point and Click Adventure 2.0 for want iof a better description. It's the insertion of every new gimmick into every game that's the problem.
Quote Posted by Chade
I'm not sure if the target audience of System Shock can really be compared to modern gamers.
I know that I've read a study before that found gamers tend to pick inappropriate settings (usually too middle-of-the-road iirc) and then blame the game for any subsequent difficulties. That was around 5-6 years ago now, though, so my memory is fuzzy.
Also, are you sure that dynamic difficulty systems don't work? Gamers won't notice good systems, only bad ones. So the "word of mouth" about dynamic difficulty is likely to suffer from sampling bias.
Absolutely. It is usually some reviewer who is experienced enough to spot the nerfing who points it out. If it worked it wouldn't get spotted by most and they might not care anyway. And it's probably studies like the one mentioned that caused the scramble to remove difficulty as we oldies know it altogether (if my brief glimpse of the bandwagon jumping marketing studies cause is anything to go by)
But who is the modern gamer? Are we so sure that even two or three separate difficultly settings would be too much for them? It's not like anyone's tried it recently have they? It's more likely an inference based on vague notions, further infered from other studies, that gamers like their interfaces simple immediate and unencumbered by options. So this works works nicely with it being easier to smooth difficulty away altogether than have to balance the offputting aspects of failure with the desire to continue playing. That's my inference on the way the thinking goes anyway.
(and then we get this ass backwards situation we see here, where they're trying to add complexity and options to a detailed game that is about these things and still keep inside the current design paradigm that is frequently against such things).
The box inside which they think has glowing lights a goes under the telly. We know this. But this is why I keep coming back to Demon's Souls. By current difficulty and interface logic it should fail, but there's clearly an audience for it. No design team should think they know the "modern gamer" because of insular industry impressions. Doing what worked last time or what the other guys are doing could still be missing a whole lot.
Chade on 29/6/2010 at 22:08
Quote Posted by Muzman
But who is the modern gamer? Are we so sure that even two or three separate difficultly settings would be too much for them? It's not like anyone's tried it recently have they? It's more likely an inference based on vague notions, further infered from other studies, that gamers like their interfaces simple immediate and unencumbered by options ... But this is why I keep coming back to Demon's Souls. By current difficulty and interface logic it should fail, but there's clearly an audience for it.
I think you're confusing three separate issues here: what sort of difficulty is fun, how well the player can choose an appropriate difficulty level, and the belief that streamlined interfaces are an inherently good thing.
Players choosing middle-of-the-road difficulty is not just a problem because newbies get shafted: experts get shafted too! They play a game that is too easy and come away thinking that it was boring.
It's true that the industry has tended to make easy games lately (I imagine it's seen as a safe choice), but this is a different issue. Something like Demon's Souls, I imagine, walks a very fine line between punishing the player in such a way that they look forward to bouncing back, and leaving them gasping for breath in the dirt.
And it's not just an interface issue either, although again it's true that people value streamlined interfaces. But even if you don't care about having the extra mouse click before the player starts a new game, you still have to worry about how the player is supposed to choose an appropriate difficulty when he hasn't even played the game yet.
Finally, there are many ways to provide adjustable difficulty settings, and many of them don't look like adjustable difficulty settings at all. For instance, thief can be played at the player's pace (as can most rpgs). The sims can be made as hard as as easy as the player likes depending on what sort of goals they set themselves. Many games, especially modern games, feature achievements (e.g., loot counts and knockout stats in thief).
And then you have hybrid systems, where the player can adjust the difficulty during the course of the game (e.g., Oblivion, or sharing the loot in Pirates!).
Also, even if people know about automatically adjusting difficulty (and I suspect that we usually don't), they might not care when actually playing the game. Take racing games, for instance. I imagine most players realise that the cars are cheating, but in the middle of play, is that actually the first thing on their minds? I suspect they're too busy trying to catch up with that car that
just stays ever so slightly in front ...
Papy on 29/6/2010 at 22:40
I remember when we were playing arcade games like Final Lap. We all noticed very fast that the car behind had enormous advantages over the other ones. This lead to the strategy of voluntarily not playing the best we could so we could get better speed in the end and pass everyone easily. That was not a good thing.
Chade on 29/6/2010 at 22:54
Final Lap may well have had an implementation that was over the top, Papy, but in general the mechanic has been very successful for racing games.
In response to your previous post, btw, where you basically claim that you actually do worse (statistically - from the game's point of view) in an easy game then in a hard game ... well, frankly I have a hard time believing that, although the baseline against which you judge your efforts may well have changed.
On the other hand, I know you like your iron man challenges, so maybe it is actually true, in which case I'd say that you're the exception to the rule!
