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Kabduhl
City Guard
Joined: 01 Feb 2003
Posts: 127
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Letting someone customize the look of their character doesn't affect the story in the slightest unless you are referring to full motion video sequences which are not necessary anyways ... or you can do like diablo and not show the player in fmv's ... but letting the player choose the race, sex, and other physical traits is a good thing ... none of these things need change a good story from working ...
For instance ...
You can still hvae NPC's address the character according to detail ...
1. have the conversations address the NAME of the PC when appropriate (the NAME block could say Conan so when an NPC address 'Hail <NAME>' in the inner code the string the player will see is 'Hail Conan'.
2. Do the same stuff for sex, race etc ...
In this way you get NPC's addressing your specific PC no matter what race, class, sex, or name you choose.
I can't for the life of me figure oout how letting someone customize their appearance, name, sex, or race could possibly stop a developer from making a good story. If you can enlighten me as to how be bale to customize your character makes it impossible to have a good story I'd sure like to hear your thoughts ... |
Sat Feb 08, 2003 12:00 am |
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Maggot
Magister of the Light
Joined: 17 Jul 2001
Posts: 392
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland |
Hmm, good point. Impossible was perhaps a bit over the top. I however do think that good rpg games need to take atmosphere into account. If I create an elven character, for instance, and start running around everywhere, I'd expect NPC's to react slightly differently. A good looking female character would have a hard time walking into a rowdy pub unescorted, (much the same as a female sounding nickname gets when entering an IRC channel). An unassuming guy would get no attention, and therefore no 'be my saviour' quest, but would perhaps be approached for a shady deal. I think all these details are essential for a GREAT story.
_________________
Don't force it - use a larger hammer.
-= Non Flamer & Written Word Worshipper =- |
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Sat Feb 08, 2003 12:11 am |
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Kabduhl
City Guard
Joined: 01 Feb 2003
Posts: 127
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quote:
Originally posted by Maggot
I think those are very good points.
1. Do you want to done down the significance of the player? There are a few excellent examples of this. The ending of Monkey Island 2, for instance.
Or do you mean a specific goal having to do with the main character, something similar to Planescape: Torment? Revenge perhaps?
Or do you mean optional retirement, similar to Pirates! ?
Or do you just mean a game without end, similar to MMORPG's, except that you never really finish the game successfully?
Something that scales things down to a more believable level would be nice. Like saving a city, or rescuing a kidnapped king, or discovering an acient civilization.
quote:
3. This is a good point. However, AI is very difficult to do well, and the best AI tends to be repetitive and really stupid. It has to do with the number of options, I think, since most CRPGs tend to have more options than chess.
Better to have a little repitiion (ie NPC's do their job during the day and go home and sleep at night with very little variation on that except maybe certain story specific instances) than to just have the same NPC's standing around all day every day doing nothing but waiting to be spoken to by the PC.
quote:
4. I'm not sure whether this is a good point? It makes a strong story nearly impossible, unless the character comes in as an outsider to SAVE THE WORLD? 
I made an entire post to address this point of yours ...
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5. Non-linear gameplay really leads to hack and slash. Stories have to be linear. Baldurs Gate 2 seemed pretty non-linear in some chapters, but you were just advancing x story paths linearly. It is very hard for a computer program to come up with an interesting twist in the tale, if the player spends all his time killing vermin on his ranch.
I think non-linear gameplay leads to more player driven experience, rather than the game holding your hand and pushing you along through a pre-determined course.
Obviously there has to be some limit to this but creating multiple pathways through the game and multiple endings to account for various playstyles is not too difficult to accomplish if you plan your story well.
And I don't mean complete freeform gaming. I mean letting a player decide what they want to do. Fallout 2 is a great example. You know what you need to do but you aren't put on rails and forced to go from chapter to chapter by scripted pre-determined routes.
Non-linearity does not lead to hack n slash, game devs wanting to make hack n slash leads to hack n slash.
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6. Again, we come to story. It's hard to write a story that takes into account possible omnicide by the character. (Fallout's an example, though)
It isn't that hard. Just make sure you have taken consequence into account.
quote:
What you seem to be saying is that most games tend to be overly heroic, the main character seems to be the focus of everyone's attention, and what the player wants to do is not taken fully into account. I agree with you on some points - for single player games, at least. MMORPG's for instance really have to balance things better - there can not be 1000 overlords of the realm running around.
I look forward to Project Ego, I hope that'll look cool.
My real point is you start out as some lowly dude/chick and after about 40 hours of play you save the world. It's been done too much, how about limiting the scope to saving a city, or rescuing a person from danger. Saving the entire world is a bit much and hard to make believable. |
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Sat Feb 08, 2003 12:16 am |
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TheMadGamer
High Emperor
Joined: 03 May 2002
Posts: 487
Location: Southern California |
1. Highly customizable character in terms of skills, statistics, and appearance. The ability to change the focus of the characters skills during the game.
2. All objects in the game can be manipulated in some way.
3. Objects in the world can be used or combined with other objects to create new objects that serve some purpose.
4. The environment can be altered by the actions of the player.
5. All NPCs have some kind of daily routine. Some NPCs should have multiple routines that may change based on what the player has done.
6. Dialoge with NPCs should provide branching. The interface should somehow indicate to the player what dialoge options have already been discussed with the NPC in the past (i.e. change the color of the dialog option).
7. All quests should somehow reward the player. Either by providing an item or by providing other benefits to the character in terms of skills or attributes or rank.
8. Rank in guilds or whatnot needs to somehow have meaning beyond simply achieving the rank.
9. All CRPGs should have an 'armegeddon' spell so i can wipe out the entire game world and all its inhabitants when I get frustrated.
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The Poster Previously Known As NeptiOfPovar |
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Fri Feb 21, 2003 7:03 pm |
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Northchild
Fearless Paladin
Joined: 03 May 2002
Posts: 232
Location: New York, USA |
I'm probably "old school" with most of my opinions, but here goes:
- I like to see heavy linearity in games. The game doesn't always need to be rushing the player through areas or what not, and there should be times when the game leaves the player alone entirely, but many designers aren't very good with setting pace. Non-linear games feel empty to me - the more choices as to where to go and what to do next, the more generic the game feels.
- I like to see heavy time and weather influence in games. If the NPCs don't seem to sleep or eat and stand out in the freezing cold for long periods of time without jackets, I begin to think that there's some sort of demon-influence cast over the land.
- Cutscenes should be eliminated entirely from games. They have no business there. Give me the history of your game world via 30 minutes of monologue and I will RMA the game faster than you can say "Neverwinter Nights"
- An earlier message mentioned interactivity. This is extraordinarily important in my book. And please let me have more ways to interact with people, places, and things than just "talk" and "kill".
- Bring back skill. Allow me to have a feeling of accomplishment when I complete a difficult part of the game. Take away my unlimited ability to bookmark my place in the game everytime I lose a valued item because I'll only USE this ability. Find some way to keep me interested enough in the flow of the game, win or lose, that I don't reach for the "reload" key when Johnny Monster wipes out my character.
- Speaking of characters, give me a SINGLE character to play throughout the entire game. If there are NPCs that join up and are well-scripted enough for me to identify with, then they don't need my micro-management.
- Numbers should be heard but not seen. Mathematics and physics in games are ever-present. players generally aren't required to look at particle physics equations while they're playing a role, why do they need to know the character's exact strength and exact "percent chance open door"? What's the point of having a 100% open lock skill if every other door is un-assailable because the developers don't want you going in there just yet.
I'm sure there are other things that I can rant about, but others here have covered these things and more. |
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Fri Feb 21, 2003 7:42 pm |
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