Andrew Rambles Incoherently About Games and Game Design

[AndrewRogue]

I'm bored and a little annoyed, so let's ramble for a little bit.

I've spent a chunk of time lately rambling and grumbling about the gaming industry and gaming lately, because I myself have been having issues lately with it. While it would be fun to simply write it off as the market being terrible (with jRPGs heading the pack here), that's a little unfair. It isn't like there aren't perfectly acceptable titles coming out. So I've been kind of at a loss as to why I'm having this annoyance.

As I sort of mulled over this idea (and then threw up my hands and went back to playing Mass Effect 2 for a bit), a little bit of enlightenment came to mind. At least so far as jRPGs are concerned.

I suppose a large chunk of what's been driving me crazy is the massive disconnect that comes up throughout a lot of games. I mean, at the basic level, you've really got a big issue in that the game is divided into, well, game and cinematic. Which is annoying.

I mean, yes, awesome dialogue is awesome and stylish scenes are stylish. At that point, though, you start to get into the old fashioned question of “Well, if I'm gonna watch shit, why don't I just pop in a movie?”

Fundamentally, when I plop down to play a game, I'm plopping down to do something instead of act passively. If I wanted to just watch something, I'd toss in my Burn Notice DVDs or something. I'm looking to be engaged when I pick up a video game. I'm looking to spend my time being proactive!

“But wait, Andrew!” You cry, “Aren't some of your favorite games games with a ton of dialogue? And I see some RPGs at the top of your lists! Mass Effect has a tone of dialogue, doesn't it?”

“Shut up, jerkface,” I respond.

Seriously though, there really are some noteworthy differences in the way these games are designed and executed, compared to what I'm ceaselessly bitching about. They are small, but they make a very big difference. So let's talk about them through a couple games I like.

Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter has a lot of elements of your classic jRPG. Random battles (admittedly  via on-screen enemies). You have your standard division of gameplay (dungeon crawling and beating up monsters) and cutscenes. What works here though is the general ratio (which is definitely in favor of gameplay quantity) as well as the very nature of the cutscenes: short and to the point. I could be totally insane here, but I don't think any single scene in BoFV really exceeds, like, the five minute mark if you can read at a decent clip.

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, certainly has longer scenes going for it (especially when you consider full voicing and what not). Of course, at the same time, the game both establishes a framework in which the conversation emerges naturally (you are seated behind Harry, thus you are being addressed when he is, further evidenced by a swap to first person for sequences like this). Secondly, ridiculously minor as this is, you have the ability to look around and adjust your view.

Mass Effect 2 is a Bioware game. You have, like, a quadbillion dialogue choices plus the ability to occasionally click a mouse button to do awesome things (Press X to shoot some bitches! Press Y to hug grieving teammate! Press X to deliver the taste of the back of your hand to some disrespecting punks! Etc). Otherwise, most of the dialogue that you don't control occurs in the background.

So, looking at my own rambly thoughts (or not, who knows if I actually wrote what I meant to), there are about two common threads that make the games work for me.

Length: Despite what all the girls say, size does matter. And, in this instance, shorter is better. The simple fact of the matter is that really long cutscenes, especially enmasse, are immensely disruptive. The difference between “me playing game” and “me watching game” is not really pronounced when the breaks aren't that long.

On the other hand, if I hit a 10 minute cutscene, play for a few minutes and then hit another 10 minute cutscene, I'm going to REALLY feel like the game exists in two separate modes and that's disruptive and unpleasant and doesn't contribute to a cohesive, interconnected and smooth experience.

Short cuts work well because you don't really have the time to register the difference between the modes, because, by the time you're starting to realize that you aren't playing, you're back to playing. There just isn't room for the scenes to drag.

Participation: The other noteworthy factor to all of these is that, if they are not short (or, in some cases, even if they are), that they provide you, the player, things to do. I mean, even in the Silent Hill example, where your control is limited to looking around the environment, it still helps you feel invested or involved in the scene. You are, literally and in the game, watching the events unfold. It maintains immersion.

Mass Effect 2 (and wRPGs in general) are honestly pretty good about this because they give you the ability to actively participate in the conversations, which creates a pretty firm connection between what's happening on the screen and what you're doing. Yes, it is just talking, but its talking that you are guiding along. You just never have the chance to disengage from the game.

So yeah. I sort of lost track where I was going with this (consequence of doing it in two pieces), but I think I had some sort of fundamental message about my problem with RPGs stemming from a sensation of disconnect or bumpy gameplay or something.

Yeah, that sounds right. In fact, there's a lot more I have to ramble on about that, but I'll save that for a future post. For now, I'll keep this one contained to a simple idea.

Games are interactive. Watching things happen for long periods is not. Either keep it short or give the player some involvement.

PS: No, I know, longer cutscenes do work sometimes. In direct contradiction to what I was just saying earlier, the uninteractive Omega 4 relay sequence in Mass Effect 2 was pretty awesome, if a little long. But even that was STILL broken up by gameplay AND had the benefit of being about the only instance of that in the game.

Nyah.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I generally agree that gaming cutscenes shouldn't be too long, but some times it's necessary for part of the story. I think video game stories have enough problems constraining themselves into stories that have to have near-constant combat (or at least action) without worrying about scene length tooo much, granted. Although, funnily, here's where I disagree with your belief that segregating plot and gameplay is bad: keeping a healthy separation between the two allows the gameplay fact that the player is engaging in (and winning) hundreds of battles over the course of the story to be essentially non-canon, which for some stories can be quite helpful.

I think you're completely wrong about plot interactivity helping; it may make me feel more involved but it makes dialogue far more awkward in general. Also, either your choices are laughably irrelevant (but thou must!) or the game breaks down and is unable to maintain a strong cohesive narrative because it has to bow to the unpredictable wishes of its player (hi most wRPGs). I don't play console RPGs to RP (computer games are inherently not suited to it with their finite preprogrammed dialogue), I play tabletop games for that. But I think this is a pretty obvious case of us looking for different things in video games and RPGs in particular.

[Grefter]

WARNING:  DISJOINTED GREFTER RAMBLE.  I have tried to put this in a logical sequence and try to split paragraphs up into individual games.

You can have cutscenes be more interactive and still be fairly tightly scripted railroading the character, the certainly don't need to be "But thou must!" if you have to frame it like that then you have written yourself into a corner.

One of the best/worst examples I can think of for that kind thing is from Call of the Cthulhu Dark Corners of the Earth.  It has a scene ripped straight from Shadows over Innsmouth where you need to escape from the hotel you have stayed at from the creatures that run the town.  This is the kind of sequence that you could easilly make into a big long cutscene that would enthrall people.  This game however has it as a fairly long scripted sequence where you need to scurry around trying to latch doors shut and pushing shit in front of doors as you run through the hotel trying to get to somewhere you can escape.  It is a really frantic tightly scripted sequence that one slip up will kill you.  This all first perfectly and is honestly really amazing to play.  Only problem is the controls aren't nearly tight enough for it (lol looking at a latch straight on, can't interact with it.  Dead). 

Right there you have a highly effective important plot sequence chock full of action that the game isn't really designed for that is engaging and fits the story spot on.  Up until this point the game was pretty much just a straight up Adventure game.




Gameplay/plot segregation is something I have been ranting about for years now, you might remember that it was something I praised WA4 for.  You don't need to have it be canon that your characters win hundreds of battles though, that is the bad way of doing it.  What IS good though is ensuring that the things you see the characters doing constantly in battle (or out of battle!) apply to the "real" part of the narrative.  Crowning moments of awesome for this in WA4 are whenever Jude uses Accelerator in a cutscene, Arnaud using Jump and the obvious Raquel just straight up rocking face when she fights Hugo.

On the other end of the spectrum here you have FF13 where you get scenes where the characters say something about wishing they could fly when they have summons that turn into fucking planes and shit (which they use in cutscenes just before that).  It somehow manages to have Gameplay/Cuscene/plot segregation going on or something.  What you can take from this is if you can't integrate your character's battle powers into the plot, maybe you shouldn't be having them dropping fucking meteors from the heavens every 5 seconds, you could maybe cut back a bit on it a little.

Taking this back a step though, as bad as it was, the coolest thing in FF7:AC was seeing sequences in the plot where the crazy crazy shit you see in game constantly actually taking place.  It was nonsense eye candy all things considered, but it was amazingly vindicating to see the plot acknowledge the powers of characters that beat up Ancient Weapons with their bare hands.

Having the gameplay powers of the character line up with the plot powers really just improves the overall narrative of the game.  This is actually something Extra Credits touched on recently, the narrative of a game (as a piece of interactive fiction) is more than just the words coming out of the character's mouth, it is the entire game as a package.

I agree that the genre certainly doesn't need this in general, but hands down the best games I have been playing in the last decade or so have been the ones that embraced this.

Another alternative is the Mass Effect design choice in which you give the player -some- choice, but it is fairly restricted.  ME you don't have choices to do anything, it isn't trying to be a tabletop RPG.  It is presenting you a minimal number of choices which lets you follow along a series of carefully scripted flowing dialogue.  It works pretty damned well.  You keep a tight overarching plot but the player still has an effect over the narrative.  Your sequence of small choices on a fairly minimal dichotomy of Paragon/Renegade spirals out from hundreds of little in game choices.  The best part of this in spades though is the fact that they made it show.  All those little choices you made seemed to have a consequence in the sequel.  For example, if there was a point where you couldn't bring yourself to do the Renegade type action in ME1 where that was generally how you were playing, it really stood out as starkly different from your regular MO, it highlighted it and reminds you of that action.  There are times where it really worked and gave you great satisfaction as the player.

[metroid composite]

I'm going to go ahead and completely disagree with Andrew.  Well...let me first pause to note that popular thinking in the game industry agrees with him.  Go to the Game Developers Conference, and you'll find plenty of talks on "cutscenes are lame: stop using them."  But I don't agree with the majority.

What games do I feel have fantastic stories?

Koudelka jumps to mind, which has a nice lengthy scene of the characters getting drunk.

But ok, Koudelka could easily be a movie.  What games can I think of that push storytelling in games in an interesting direction?

Valkyrie Profile jumps to mind, but some of its cutscenes are like...an hour long.

Portal jumps to mind.  Killing the Weighted Companion Cube was a complete nonchoice, but the fact that you have to do it gives players strong emotional reactions.


One of the rules of writing books is "show, don't tell".  By extension, yes, a rule of game writing is "do, don't show".  And the Weighted Companion Cube scene is an excellent example of why: that scene just wouldn't work as a cutscene.  But I think people obsess a bit too much about this rule: it doesn't always make sense to "do", just like when writing a book, sometimes "tell" works better than "show".  In fact, I've rather enjoyed some books that were almost entirely "tell".  (Not my favourites per se, but above average).  Along the same lines, games that try too hard to make everything "do" end up just awful *glares at quicktime event button presses*.  If you can find a way to make a player really participate in a scene...great.  If not, don't try to force it.  Cutscenes/dialog will be fine.



On Grefter's notes with WA4 and matching cutscenes to gameplay...can't say I noticed that stuff or that it ever bothered me.  I can see why it would be important to others, though.  (Same way I can understand when someone tells me they just can't tolerate anime art style.  I don't feel it's a big deal, but I can understand their complaints).

[Grefter]

You can make games without any of them quite clearly, but plot/gameplay not being segregated entirely strengthens the narrative and player engagement, it lets the player know the things they have been doing in gameplay actually matter to the plot.  It is not essential but it goes a long way to engaging someone.  It is like how you can have a conversation with someone without looking at them, but if you meet their eyes then they are more directly engaged (culturally in the west anyway).

Cutscenes have their place most certainly.  I sure as shit don't want a bad mini game every escape sequence in a game or something like that.   It is a well that has been pretty thoroughly drawn from though and at this point it is more commonly abusively so.  Just to go back to something everyone hates for a change.  XS3 isn't much more than jumping through hoops to have cutscenes play and have other characters tell you how awesome they are and what horrible awesome evil thing they have just done.  It is a sequence of bad cutscenes and exposition. 

We have successfully completed a sequence where there was a majour plot point that happened entirely either off screen or no where near the main characters.  All plot regarding Yuriev happens light years away from the main characters and what you do see is pretty much just a bishi guy grinning evilly.  Do, don't show?  Mang I would have been happy with Show, Don't tell.

It is telling that the games Andy has highlighted there as enjoying a lot are series that are noted for their Cinematic qualities.  It isn't that you should never use these things, it is that they should be a tool you use, not the primary way of telling the story.

For ones you do like, Koudelka is yeah, Koudelka.  Nothing else is really going to go the same places Koudelka does.  VP has long cutscenes and has like what 5 for the central plot in the whole game?  Otherwise it is pretty much pure gameplay and recruitment vignettes.  VP benefits from the fact that you set the pace yourself.  You choose when to do the recruitment and when to do the dungeons.  You can get away with an hour long recruitment vignette when the player could choose between it and doing one of three dungeons.

Portal is Portal.  Valve's design principles are exactly what we both want really.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Well, here's the thing that I've seen as the big draw for jRPGs: They are stories. Yes, more often than not, they are terrible stories, but I think the main fans of the genre like the cinematic aspect of these games more than anything else. So why not just watch a movie? Well, I imagine that's why this site exists in the first place: fans of JRPGs like to know the mechanics of how their favorite characters work.

I would liken it to kinds of people who care about how much a Gundam weighs, Goku's power level at various points in the series, or how many pounds of cubic force Spider-man can exert on a good day. All of these series are stories first (though they all have games devoted to them now), but people care about the mechanics of how their characters work. Sure, most fans don't care so much about the specific numbers, but I'd bet that most would care about knowing a general list of different abilities a character has and how it interacts with various other aspects of the world they inhabit.

A JRPG is just an interactive storybook that wears its mechanics on its sleeve. At least, that's why I've always loved the genre. Really, if it could just get a better narrative, I don't really need the gameplay staples to change all that much to enjoy it.

[Dhyerwolf]

It somehow manages to have Gameplay/Cuscene/plot segregation going on or something

FF13's problem wasn't a gameplay/plot split, but as noted a plot/plot split. The two scenes mentioned are about 2 minutes apart from each other. How the hell did they miss that?

I have little to add otherwise; Plot scenes are awesome when backed by non-fail writing; long plot scenes suck when the plot sucks. In theory, the non-fail writing should be engaging enough without needing gameplay integration.

[AndrewRogue]

To briefly state for a moment, I do want to say that I'm not against cutscenes in videogames. They have their place. They really do. Indulging overmuch in the uninteractive, though, is just missing out on the strength of the genre.

NEB: To the second point, I'm going to continue the disagreement. Honestly, games don't have to (and shouldn't!) try to kowtow to the player's every wishes. They can't be PnP games and they shouldn't try to. At the same time though, they aren't movies and shouldn't try to be either!

There's a happy median to be found and (to echo Grefter some), Mass Effect (and 2) are a nice example of this. You have a solid plot path to follow and you have the ability to influence the way you follow that path. It isn't particularly complicated or the like (usually a choice between being nicer/more heroic and more ruthless/pragmatic), but it does wonders for giving the player a feeling of power. It does a lot to have an option to say "Fuck it!" and shoot some asshole who was mouthing off about how he was going to kill all the hostages right in the face or to be able to offer a liked teammate a hug when they really need one. It isn't 100% your character, but it IS you guiding them along.

Mass Effect goes on to really step this up by giving a feeling of consequence to your actions. I mean, again, it doesn't all have to be huge stuff! Little things like that you provided helpful documents to one character, that you spared another's life and that you killed one all coming up again gives a real sense that YOU actually have something to do with the story, all without sacrificing a cohesive narrative.

~

The other thing that's come up is something that really bugs me and that I absolutely, positively, completely and utterly hate about jRPGs, and that is that plot and gameplay are often almost universally separated.

I DO understand some reasoning behind this, after our work on the IAQ project. It really isn't easy to create a solid semblance between plot and gameplay to a large degree (especially in regards to things like healing and the like, which even fantasy authors commonly fail hardcore at). I also don't think this is an excuse to not even fucking try, though.

I'll go ahead and say it. This REALLY takes me out of the story sometimes, and does have a tendency to make some sequences in games absolutely, positively unbearable. My poster child example is the P3 scene where your group gets held up by a couple thugs. It is, as presented, almost completely unfathomable. Here you are, being stopped by some punks only a couple years your senior, when you spend several hours a night punching goddamn demons in the face. Yes, yes, you can't summon Personas outside the dark hour (sort of, Strega kind of blurred lines there, didn't they?) but that doesn't justify the ability to take hits from them or fight them with conventional weaponry.

The perennial example, the death of Aeries, does a stronger job of detailing what the real problem is, though.

Let's say you're watching a TV show and, in one episode, a character uses an awesome move. The next fight they have (say three episodes down the line) he gets beat soundly and would have been able to win using the super move. He just didn't. This'd piss most people off. It certainly would annoy me! Why? Because its inconsistent, immature and thoughtless writing. It shows 0 regard for the writing and, honestly, 0 regard for the audience.

Game inconsistency is the same thing. It just isn't THAT easy to compartmentalize what happens in gameplay being completely isolated from what happens in plot. And why should you have to? If they disconnect between game and disconnect between cinema is just that great, why are we forcing these two things together instead of putting things that work together. When entire facets of the gameplay have to be ignored as they have no bearing on the story or, in fact, act in complete contradiction to what is happening in cinematics, I start to wonder why I'm doing these things together! As is, I'm just fighting battles with characters who vaguely resemble the dudes in the cinemas I watch between every dozen fights. Let's cut out the middle man here.

The Aeries example is so strong because it is supposed to be an emotive, gripping and important scene that requires, nay, forces, you to completely disconnect the gameplay sequence from the storytelling sequence, which isn't always easy. And if you do have trouble, then the scene loses a significant amount of impact.

I'm sure some of you are saying that if its written grippingly enough/well enough that this won't be an issue and I'm just being nitpicky. I'll counter by calling you several less polite names and insinuating things about your mother. More seriously though, I'm being nitpicky because this just isn't good writing. The burden is really on both parties (the designers and the story people) to make a cohesive work. At least make a token effort! I mean, even BG vaguely handwaves why its game over if the main character dies. Just do something to gesture towards cohesiveness, please.

And yes, I know its fully possible to tell a perfectly fine story and have the gameplay have nothing to do with it. Fine, sure, whatever. You can do it. I'll give you that. But you know what? It really does improve the experience.

Maybe I'm alone this, but I was a little sad inside when after watching the first video in DMC3, wherein Dante mounts a mook, uses him to skate across the room and shoot some bitches while doing so, and started playing. Because, man, that was awesome and HOLY FUCKING SHIT I JUST JUMPED ON A DUDE AND USED HIM TO SKATE ACROSS THE ROOM WHILE SHOOTING SOME BITCHES. HOLY SHIT AWESOME. This was AWESOME. I mean, its not practical, its not that useful, etc, but it was something that was highlighted, that was cool and that I could do. The reverse should apply too. I don't want to see my amazing band of heroes get held up by town guard Joe Schmoe and be easily subdued.

This is lazy writing.

This is bad writing.

I'll go more in depth on why I think integration should occur more often (short answer: because what sets video games aside is that they are a freakin' interactive medium), but I'm tired now.

[Crystalgate]

I agree that long cutscenes are, as a rule, a bad thing. Sometimes it can be a necessary evil (although if that necessary evil happens to often the writer should rethink the story), but generally cutscenes should be kept short.

However, for me the problem isn't necessary the disconnect between gameplay and story.

One reason I like RPGs is because they tend to switch activity a lot. I'm not only talking about cutscenes vs gameplay, but there's also a big difference between running around in a town and running trough a dungeon. Sometimes I play more action oriented games and usually the result is that I initially find them more fun than RPGs, but I still grow tired of them much quicker.

For me the long cutscenes are more a problem of bad pacing, I get tired of them, but the game keeps showing me more of it. That and often the cutscenes aren't good enough to warrant them existing for to long, but that's another story.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Andy:

I'm not sure what you're getting at with the Aeris thing? Something about how the party's healing spells couldn't save her? I dunno, I always took that as due to the fact that she was -dead-, not just lying injured on the ground waiting for a Phoenix Down. I sorta took the same view on the world as Wheel of Time; magic can heal anything! Except death. In FF5 there's another scene which backs me up on this, in which the party actually tries to use Phoenix Downs and the like on a character, but it's all in vain because the character is too far gone. (You'd probably like the scene better than the FF7 equivalent because of this.)

This is mostly a quibble since I know what you're getting at, although I haven't seen too many examples where I can recall being actively bugged about it. Usually when PCs are being held up and you don't get a fight out of it (a la your P3 example, note that I can't comment on it specifically) it's because they're facing someone they wouldn't logically fight, or that plotwise they'd lose to anyway. I think there has been one that has bugged me at some point, certainly, but currently I'm struggling to remember it. I guess of all the flaws I think games can have, this type is just kinda minor.

As for the DMC3 thing, that indicates how great a gap we have here, because I never for once even begun to imagine we'd do any of that stuff in-game. I was -very- happy with that cutscene; I thought it was great stuff (best part of the game!). You're pretty much suggesting they should have taken it out if they weren't able to implement body surfing in-game (or if they felt they could but were unwilling to for reasons of game balance, etc.) which I 100% disagree with.

because what sets video games aside is that they are a freakin' interactive medium

No, no, no! What sets video games aside is their gameplay. The medium should -not- restrict what style of story can be told (we get enough of that already through the industry's desire to maintain status quo for guaranteed sales); it certainly should not demand the story be interactive. There's a place for interactive stories (e.g. Mass Effect), non-interactive stories (e.g. Xenogears), and little to no story at all (e.g. Mario). There have been great successes in all three. (Well, so I'm told with the former. I need to play one that isn't shit.)

[AndrewRogue]

The start of something is, to me, among the most critical sequences.

Perhaps its merely a result of being impatient, but I am fully willing to drop something if the beginning doesn't interest me. Cries of "but it gets better later on!" tend to fall on deaf ears with me. If the thing I'm screwing around doesn't grab me and engage me quickly, I'm not going to feel like pressing on and seeing the "better stuff" that comes out later. Happened with me Haruhi. Happened to me with FFX. Etc. Etc.

Is this unreasonable? Yeah, a bit. I mean, I SHOULD be willing to give things something of a chance. Especially lately though, I just don't have the patience. If you can't be bothered to make an experience that, at the very least, intrigues me enough that I really want to pick it up again after I shut it off/close it for the first time? Then I'm not really going to trust you to make the rest of it something I care about, and I'm certainly not going to invest time enough to test that theory when there are at least a half-dozen other titles I have sitting around that I could bother with instead.

Gaming, unfortunately, is in a slightly rougher spot here. The necessity of introducing play mechanics, expositing, introducing characters and setting, etc means that games have a whole hell of a lot to introduce you to in a relatively short time. I'm just gonna ramble about a few examples.

Final Fantasy X: Oh you. Oooooh you. The game I still haven't bothered to play because the beginning bored me stupid. I'm pretty sure this game lives in an ever exaggerated state to me (I'm reasonably convinced I didn't actually not need to touch the controller for three hours), but the fact that I have reached this horrible state of exaggeration is a little much. The game just took too long to get started for me. The cinema wasn't that interesting and I'm really pretty positive I had like, no combat system experience in the time I played. Its just... blargh.

Persona 3: Guilty of the same sin as Final Fantasy X, but lucked out and got a pass for the early cutscene failure for just being more interesting. Starts with something intriguing, the art design appealed to me more and the first combat you get felt more exciting. So yeah, despite taking too long to really get running, it at least manages to intrigue a little more by being different and introducing the interesting ideas/mystery a lot quicker than FFX seemed to.

Mana Khemia: Oh game. I like you so much, but why the hell did you waste so much time getting to the fun part of your combat system? Introducing unique concepts, be they plot or gameplay, should be pretty much the highest priorities. This game jumped immensely in fun once you could start using supports. I DO realize there is some difficulty with character introductions in that regard, but MK2 did avert those with a new cast, so clearly it wasn't insurmountable. This is the sort of thing that'll hook players. As is, the game was lucky I was charmed by it enough to get to that point!

Mass Effect 2: Runs a little bit long in the cutscene department (could probably have done just a little less of the Lazarus Project stuff), but once it hits gameplay it goes pitch perfect. Sticks you right in the middle of action and quickly and systematically introduces you to all the basic concepts in a brisk and entertaining sequence. Runs just long enough to let you get a feeling for the gameplay and what its going to be like (and introduces you to pretty much every major concept by having you use them), but doesn't overstay its welcome for experienced players. Does a very good job of what I consider my ideal structure which is: Introduce Concept, Action, Cooldown Exposition.

Baldur's Gate 2: Excellent newbie dungeon, horrific drag for experienced players. Strips down your options a fair amount while introducing you to what you're going to be doing for most of the game. Annoyingly basic for people who have played several times though, and very, very long. Again, though, is oriented in my ideal way: Introduce Concept, Action, Cooldown Exposition.

Silent Hill 2: A candidate for probably one of my favorite openings. The beginning is just a little slow, but it starts with some very memorable imagery and ideas. The game really doesn't fuck around and says a LOT with its introductory sequence. The atmospheric walk is a little on the long end (Silent Hill 1 did this a bit better), but the payoff is solid. On the whole, the game is just damn efficient. And, I will also say, little tthings like letting you walk out of the bathroom and the like (to bridge the opening there and the opening outside) are good, since they help involve the player.

So I guess rambling on about these has helped me arrive at a few thoughts.

Formula: I do feel there is something of an ideal formula to starting games (and, at least to me, most other forms of media, but this is particularly applicable to games). You start with the hook. The introduction cinema or whatever that sets the stage/setting/character. Then you hand control over to the player and let them participate in what's going on. You should here introduce the player to as many of the major gameplay points as possible, giving priority to anything unique or standout. By the end of this, the player should know whether or not they like the core gameplay. After this sequence, you can cooldown and have a longer uninteractive spot to start expanding on the introduced concepts.

There is, of course, room for variance in the formula here, but something along these lines really does seem like an actual ideal.

Concept: By the end of the first hour, I really feel I should be able to say what the game is, in general terms, about. While there can still be (and should be) concepts or gameplay nuances to be introduced, I shouldn't have any major conceptual overhauls at this point regarding gameplay. If I spend the first hour shooting bitches, I should not learn later that half the game is street racing. If combat involves swapping PCs in and out of combat strategicially, I should have experienced that by now.

Control: I should be playing the game within a few minutes of starting it. I'll give a bit of leeway here, but if I'm not even experiencing something as simple as bridge gameplay within the first 10 minutes, there is a serious issue. Snagging and holding player interest is what beginnings are for. Introducing to the game is what the beginning is for. Blasting my face off with cinemas for half an hour is not the best way to do this. Don't be afraid to use them, but, especially at the beginning, keep them tight and efficient.

[Grefter]

Short version.

Andrewrogue: I want another FF7.

[DjinnAndTonic]

While those are good ideas, I personally don't want all games to follow one formula no matter how 'solid' it seems in theory. Sure, I can definitely see being tired of the "long exposition cutscene -> long battle tutorial -> more cutscene -> game finally starts" trend we see a lot of. But I would personally attribute that to the fact that it's a fairly solid, straightforward formula itself, so it's easy to use (and therefore, gets overused).

[superaielman]

Short version.

Andrewrogue: I want another FF7.

Yep.


BG2's first dungeon is boring as shit, period. They tried to shove in a bunch of plot elements to connect BG1 and BG2, and even threw in a character death (Khalid) to try and make you care. Didn't really work.

Perhaps its merely a result of being impatient, but I am fully willing to drop something if the beginning doesn't interest me. Cries of "but it gets better later on!" tend to fall on deaf ears with me. If the thing I'm screwing around doesn't grab me and engage me quickly, I'm not going to feel like pressing on and seeing the "better stuff" that comes out later. Happened with me Haruhi. Happened to me with FFX. Etc. Etc.

This is a problem with starting anything new. You do have to have some patience with games, not every one can throw you straightaway into action. 

[Grefter]

BG2's first dungeon is boring as shit, period. They tried to shove in a bunch of plot elements to connect BG1 and BG2, and even threw in a character death (Khalid) to try and make you care. Didn't really work.

Fail.  Just raw pure unabated fail.

[AndrewRogue]

Horror really should be one of gaming's strongest genres.

There's probably a little bit of bias here, given that I consider Silent Hill 2 one of the better video games out there, and Shattered Memories as a similarly strong contender.

Functionally, I think part of it is that horror is actually pretty conceptually sound for intellectual grounding. The ability to easily go surreal and explore elements of the human psyche (quite a few of the dark ones) just inherently lends itself to being generally artistic. Plus, you can load down the entire thing with shit loads of symbolism and watch the idiot fanboys do things like read hundred page documents all about Silent Hill multiple times because they love mulling over it so much.

Shut up.

Anyhow, the reason I'm here is to say that horror works so well for gaming, in theory, because its a genre that is really enhanced by the interactivity that games provide, moreso than any others.

The logic behind it is really quite simple. By putting you in the pilot seat in horror, it really is severely amplifying the effect. I mean, its one thing to cringe as you watch the movie, dreading every second as you know something horrible is going to happen or that the main character is going to be brutalized by some horrific entity from the nth dimension. Its entirely another to have to be the one walking down that corridor. The effect is pretty much like night and day.

Its the difference between being passive and being active, really.

Silent Hill 2 is a pretty sexy example off this, honestly. It has a lot of them, honestly! Reaching into the toilet to retrieve the wallet is... unpleasant. Really, most things James chooses to do are actually kind of unpleasant to the player, which creates a wonderous contrast with exactly how fucked up James is in that he does these things with very little second thought. The best part is that the effect of the game is enhanced in that, by the end, when this shit is just as blase to you as it is to James? You have synced up fully with the character! Its honestly pretty genius.

Fatal Frame does a pretty awesome job with this in its core conceit as well. The combat system? Is uncool. It restricts your vision painfully. Its tense. Its actually fairly hectic. And it puts you face to face with terrible ghosts that want to rip out your soul.

Plus it makes you play as tiny asian schoolgirls, and there is pretty much nothing scarier than that.

So yeah.

[Carthrat]

Plus it makes you play as tiny asian schoolgirls, and there is pretty much nothing scarier than that.

The problem with this is that in horror games you're not meant to be the one playing the monster

[Dark Holy Elf]

While I don't typically care for the horror genre as a whole, in any medium, I'll agree that gaming feels -more- suited to it than most, just because it's easier to immerse yourself in a genre that's interactive, and immersion seems pretty essential for good horror. Not that you can't reasonably become immersed in the lives of non-interactive characters, but there's certainly an advantage to be explored there.

[DjinnAndTonic]

I find that horror games are more frustrating than movies because I'm given control, but railroaded into making the same dumb mistakes that horror movie characters make. Why yes, let's walk right into scaryhospital without any means of defending myself! Alternately, if you're given combat options, then the game mechanics just take over and it ceases to feel like an immersive experience and instead I'm running numbers or thinking about finding a good place to practice my combos.

I'm not saying it can't be done well as a game, but I honestly find good horror games less scary than comparable horror movies.

[Nephrite]

My only comment regarding horror games is that I think ones that offer you no realistic course of combat are ridiculous. Take the Silent Hill 1 remake where all you're supposed to do is run away from everything. I, personally, do not find that fun or engaging in the least. I understand that the game is supposed to invoke feelings of terror but that can be done easily through atmosphere (See: Silent Hill 3 Haunted House) and doesn't have to be done through ridiculously stupid enemies (See: Silent Hill 4).

[Grefter]

But then if you have super retarded enemies you can have an ending that relies on you having properly defended a completely mindless other character in the game making the best of both worlds.  A horror game with bad controls and combat that is a giant escort quest.  Why not make it so there is nowhere safe in the last half of the game?

Gods I hate SH4 as a piece of design.

[AndrewRogue]

DJ: Says the guy who likes playing RPGs. >_> More seriously though, I'm kind of curious about what game/s you feel do this, though. At least so far as all the games I've played are concerned, they've either presented rational behavior given the situation/character or been in situations where bringing conventional weaponry would be totally useless anyway.

Neph: I dunno. I disagree. The problem is a "realistic course of combat" often removes the menace from a lot of monsters. Fatal Frame has probably achieved the best sense of combat being the method while still remaining threatening? In general, most games I've played where I acquired a stable weapon, combat generally became a lot less scary. I mean, once I can shotty bastards in the face, I'm just not that scared of them. Helplessness is inherently more frightening than being able to defend yourself.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

DJ: Says the guy who likes playing RPGs. >_>

Shit, beat me to it.

[074]

My problem with the "make you a weaponless loser" approach to horror games is simply that.  The problem with this is that I tend to prefer games that let me be better than I am in real life--playing some defenseless yoik in a game would only serve to make me ask myself "Why am I playing this to begin with?"  It's not scary to me.  It's just frustrating at best.

Games are escapism for me.  It's about empowerment, not immersion, from my perspective.  You do not ruin that escapism by making the character completely helpless.  This doesn't mean you take away challenge--but taking away the basic idea that one can fight the extradimensional entities at all?  Just puts the game one step higher on the trade-in bin.  Perhaps I'm just not the sort of person that horror games are targeted to, but I'd say that I'm in Neph's camp here.  You want horror, go for the atmosphere.

[DjinnAndTonic]

DJ: Says the guy who likes playing RPGs. >_>

Shit, beat me to it.

At no point have I ever played an RPG to project onto a character in the game. Horror games are built around this. Two different beasts, so shut up.