Taking On "Detrimental" Isometric Game Design

[Yahtzee Croshaw]

Taking On "Detrimental" Isometric Game Design

Yahtzee takes on the isometric view of video games and finds he really isn't all that fond of that type of presentation.

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[Thunderous Cacophony]

It's a good thing he threw in that last line about strategy games, or there would be a bunch of 4X players in here plotting to get their revenge on Yahtzee within 20 turns.

 

[moggett88]

I think there's a time and a place for isometric viewpoints in games. The time is (as Yahtzee pointed out) when playing as someone overseeing the characters, such as XCOM or that old PC games Bedlam, and the place is when a 2D plane is fine, even preferable (such as for hiding secret characters behind a tree) such as in Digimon World 2003. It works better with games with less-demanding gameplay such as RPGs, and when you have heavily stylised graphics.

Unfortunately, what I'm seeing more of nowadays is developers using isometric since it's easier to develop a game that way (probably because you don't have to deal with a camera that can look at things), rather than because it suits the game you're making. As the creepy guy with the bowl job says in No Country for Old Men, you should always use the right tool for the right job

 

[Kenjitsuka]

I agree wholeheartedly.
It's doable in Diablo games, but you are aware that you are just staring at a game character walking on all kinds of marvelous looking different floors... I too can't get into the character like in proper 2D or 3D.

 

[Thanatos2k]

A big swing and a miss in this week's column.

Well sure, using an analog to control something isometrically sometimes won't be as good, but using a mouse it's a piece of cake - click where you want to go and there you go.

Saying isometric games don't have a third dimension because there's no depth is like saying a 3D game doesn't have a third dimension because the screen you're viewing it on is flat. In Final Fantasy Tactics for example there's X/Y coordinates and height. How can you say it lacks a third dimension? All games are simply using visual tricks to make your brain think there's a third dimension when there's not.

Isometric camera lets you see more, and without the usual camera problems that exist in over-the-shoulder games. It reminds you that you're playing a game? Uh, ok, I know I'm playing a game, that's why I turned it on. Not everything needs to be some deeply immersive experience.

Isometric has strengths and weaknesses. It's fortunate that not everyone is listening to Yahtzee that isometric cameras are "rubbish" and we're starting to get more and more games using it again.

 

[LostPause]

But... do you not feel like Bastion and Transistor did the whole Isometric thing rather effectively? Perhaps less so with Transistor since much of the novelty factor had gone but at least with Bastion I can't imagine the game being better presented as a 2D or even 3D platformer. The layout emphasized the exploration aspects of the game and highlighted the themes of construction and destruction of a city [as well as memories and ideas if we start to analyze a little too deeply]. Equally significant was how it allowed for the ARPG-like "3D" fighting mechanics where enemies can surround on all sides. After all, videogames have had a long and checkered history with trying that in "true 3D" and getting the camera angle and controls just right.

I agree that the perspective create a sense of detachment but in the particular case of Bastion weren't we supposed to be listening to this story that's being told about 'the kid' and all the things he interacts with rather than 'becoming' the protagonist like we do in more conventional videogame narratives. Anyway, I fail to see a real issue here given that we're hardly going to be swamped with legions of 'Bastion' clones [except maybe from SuperGiant games themselves] and so the perspective is likely to remain the hallmark only of X-Com style games and Super-Giant's offerings.

 

[Evonisia]

Well the whole subjectivity thing was highlighted rather than stating that this is fact. Even if I don't agree I at least see his point.

Except that Yahtzee doesn't know that Chess uses one of the best storytelling methods in gaming. It leaves it all to you with only a unique looking world to stare at.

 

[Something Amyss]

Unfortunately, what I'm seeing more of nowadays is developers using isometric since it's easier to develop a game that way (probably because you don't have to deal with a camera that can look at things), rather than because it suits the game you're making. As the creepy guy with the bowl job says in No Country for Old Men, you should always use the right tool for the right job

While I don't doubt there's some ease of use involved, I can't help but think a lot of this is "because nostalgia."

 

[Penguinplayer]

I can't personally relate to your points, but you articulated them well enough that I understand and respect your opinion.

Also the floor in Transistor is damn gorgeous. I could look at it all day long. A bit funny we end up looking at them all the time when the game keeps talking about how people can change the sky with a pool and one of the side characters is a "sky-painter". I wonder if Supergiant noticed the irony?

 

[RedmistSM]

The problem I have with it is the lack of expression you get when all characters are tiny and far away. Portraits help a little. Anyway, it's much more annoying in those old beat 'em ups where you move up and down on the screen but it's all 2D so it's annoying to miss stuff.

 

[LoneWolf83]

Looking back at the top down 2d games I've players, I don't remember isometric games looking all that good except for a few (like Bastion). The more Zelda like top down style looked better to me.

 

[Kinitawowi]

Yeah, you're basically dissing my formative first eight years as a gamer, and my favourite game of all time in the process.

It's arguably lazy (or possibly deliberately retreaux) to do it now, but there was a time when it was all we could manage.

 

[william12123]

Not a bad article. Some good points about how it limits genuine "3d"-ness and stuff

I will admit I prefer isometric. I've spent so much of my time in 3d games dealing with crappy cameras that I prefer a fixed perspective, since the designer can adapt for it, making sure that you can see all that's relevant.

 

[Zombie Badger]

Well sure, using an analog to control something isometrically sometimes won't be as good, but using a mouse it's a piece of cake - click where you want to go and there you go.

Click-to-move has an inherently distancing effect in games for me, as it removes the player from the active process of moving. I'm not moving my avatar, I'm telling them where to go and like Yahtzee said I feel like a separate entity in the sky.

 

[Xman490]

"When I say that an isometric view makes a game look the most like a game, I mean THE game, that is to say, chess. It turns a room into a board, and its residents into playing pieces."

It's funny that Yahtzee mentions chess being brought to mind by isometric games. When this article was about isometric games being distasteful, it made me think of Don't Starve (or helped me think of it, since its strings of strategies about mitigating monsters, nightmares, and - of course - starvation have captivated me for several days), which is partially an isometric metaphor for chess. Or it at least references chess with the exits of worlds being giant chess boards like the one in Harry Potter, and the antagonist is akin to a chess opponent who you must outsmart and thus aggravate until either you or he feels the pain of defeat. It still suffers from the bugbears isometric games suffer from here, but it doesn't need verticality and has a camera angle that can be turned around.

Maybe it could be next week's review?

 

[Branindain]

Yeah, you're basically dissing my formative first eight years as a gamer, and my favourite game of all time in the process.

It's arguably lazy (or possibly deliberately retreaux) to do it now, but there was a time when it was all we could manage.

That's amazing because I was actually thinking of Head Over Heels while I read the article! That, and The Last Ninja. What everyone here calls the NES era was the C64 era to me, and I'm sure those games are terrible now but I loved them.

 

[DrOswald]

I actually agree with Yahtzee almost without reservation this time around. I really liked Bastion, but isometric is a big problem. I especially liked the point about how it makes the game world feel like a board game. Good insight.

 

[Cerebrawl]

I can't really relate. Many of my favorite games of all time have been isometric. Turn-based strategy and RPGs. We're talking XCOM(original and remake), we're talking Fallout 1&2, we're talking Jagged Alliance 1&2, we're talking Baldurs Gate 1&2, and so on, and so on.

It just might not be the best for single-character action gameplay, well, melee it's still good for melee games like Batman: Arkham City, ok so I guess it's bad for single-character ranged action gameplay... well, unless you consider over-the-shoulder like Borderlands to be isometric...

The perspective I've loathed for a long time(but recently started to relent a little, I liked Terraria, and been trying some others, with mixed results), is side-on 2D, especially platformers. Probably because I hated platforming, and I feel more restricted in side-on than isometric.

You can have isometric games that let you get verticality, jumping, ladders, etc. You can't really go around stuff in a 2D side perspective, all you have is forward, backward, up and down, so usually just forward and backward really. Which for example made me hate Zelda 2 way back when, despite liking the first one, and loving the third one.

Are 2D side-view games "background, the game"?