Enough with the red screen.

[DustyDrB]

I was thinking about this yesterday. Health regeneration used to be a special kind of power-up you'd work your butt off to get in a game. Now it's a basic starting element in most first-person shooters. It takes the specialness out of it.

...and it makes it seem like American and British forces have Deadpool clones fighting for them. Minus the fun banter.

 

[Korolev]

Neither Health Bars or "Red Screens" are realistic. I don't like health bars, but some "red screens" are horribly bad - MW2 (great game, by the way) had an exceptionally awful "red screen" which looked as if someone had thrown raspberry jelly into your face EVERY TIME YOU GOT SHOT. Even if you were near full health, your vision would look terrible as a result. inFAMOUS (also a great game) had a similar flaw - the red screen was too imposing, blurring your vision and hiding the borders of the screen, which sucked if you wanted to get away in a crowded area.

I think Red-Screens are better than health-bars, but ONLY when they are done right. The FIRST Modern Warfare's red-screen was okay, and the red/grey screen in Uncharted 2 was fine. It's only an issue when it's done badly.

 

[mParadox]

Ladies and gentleman, today we announce a new innovation in gaming. In order to tell the players of the characters health we have replaced the red screen mechanic with a new one. Behold, the blue screen of death!

Spoiler

 

[Space Spoons]

I like a pulsating red screen, maybe with heartbeats that get steadily quicker as health gets lower. It's not particularly realistic, no, but I always thought it was a neat visual effect.

And for the record, I don't mean the mysterious blood splatters. I'm talking about just tinting the screen red or something. Splattering the screen with blood just reeks of "LOOK HOW EXTREME I AM YOU GUYS, TAKE ME SERIOUSLY".

 

[Arcticflame]

I like the black and white effect from left 4 dead, and the heartbeats. It impairs slightly but damn it makes you nervous.

I like how Left 4 Dead implements the health bar, as well as slight screen effects.

On a side note, is your avatar the thing from that game "Ski Freak"?

It sure is. You cannot escape.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

But licking jam off your face to heal is so realistic!

 

[theSovietConnection]

Of course, I didn't play Resistance 1 very much, so I may be talking out of my ass here.

Nope, you got it right. That was my only problem with that system.

 

[captaincabbage]

I miss health meters, those guys had style.

True 'dat.

OT: That's exactly why I love games like Left 4 Dead and the old Spyro games. Whilst L4D has a great traditional health bar that's easy to keep track of in the middle of a zombie rush, Spyro has a dragonfly that changed colours as you got hurt.

 

[Squilookle]

While health bars do lean closer to what I would like, I concede that they aren't perfect either. As Lazarus Long pointed out, they can be missed on the screen by merit of being so unobtrusive.

As long as they blink or beep or have heartbeat sounds then you can't really use that as an excuse. Besides if you just took massive damage and took cover without glancing at your health, you're doing it wrong.

I'm going to take it one step further and say even health bars are too modern. Say what you like about them, but my ideal health gauge is still the health percentage. That way you always know exactly how close you are to death, and in multiplayer when you just scrape through a fierce fight and come out barely alive, when a friend or foe asks you what your health is, tell me what's more fun to be able to say:

a) "I'm down to about a quarterish of the last health box."
b) "My bar's down to... ooh, maybe say.. a millimetre or two? hard to say on the TV screen.."
c) "My whole screen is red except for a pea sized bit in the centre"
or d) "I'm on TWO PERCENT HEALTH!"

 

[Miles Tormani]

Of course, I didn't play Resistance 1 very much, so I may be talking out of my ass here.

Nope, you got it right. That was my only problem with that system.

The obvious solution is for the health kits to heal you fully. I brought up Reach in my last post, though on reflection, I have to wonder why the health kit restores your shields as well. Kind of weird.

I'm going to take it one step further and say even health bars are too modern. Say what you like about them, but my ideal health gauge is still the health percentage. That way you always know exactly how close you are to death, and in multiplayer when you just scrape through a fierce fight and come out barely alive, when a friend or foe asks you what your health is, tell me what's more fun to be able to say:

a) "I'm down to about a quarterish of the last health box."
b) "My bar's down to... ooh, maybe say.. a millimetre or two? hard to say on the TV screen.."
c) "My whole screen is red except for a pea sized bit in the centre"
or d) "I'm on TWO PERCENT HEALTH!"

When playing Reach, health regenerates by a third, so based on those statements, I tend to use D&D-ish terms when referring to what my health is.

Full health is, of course, "full health."
2/3 health is "injured."
1/3 health is "near death."

Of course, you could always swap those out for "damn it, I need a health pack!"

 

[Danny Ocean]

Yeah, you're getting shot at and you need to grab cover, but that's a lot harder when you can't see where you're going. So it basically means that if you are hit, you're pretty much dead, with no saving throw.

Except you're grossly exaggerating. It doesn't get to the point where you can't see where you're going until there's legitimate grounds for it to be so. Plus, when you look over someone's shoulder when they're playing a game with that effect, you'll see that they leave the centre of the screen around the cross-hair clear.

I used to agree with your sentiment, but now I find myself unaware of how badly I'm being hurt in some of the older games. I now greatly appreciate the visual cue.

 

[shadow skill]

I prefer the red screen method for first person games in particular. I think the traditional HUD really only serves to clutter up the screen with information that would serve me more if it was placed elsewhere like on the gun in the case of ammo indicators. I think it is distracting to be looking off into a corner every so often to monitor health and ammo. But I am the type of person that prefers to turn off reticles if I have the option to do so. I think health bars are fine in third person games though.

 

[ethaninja]

I know right? Lets not forget the regenerative abilities we somehow get with the redscreen. At least back in the days of healthbars you had to FIND health, and medpacks were a lot more sensible. What's next? The ability to shoot fireballs out of your arse at the taliban or something?

 

[Billska]

You know the red screen in MW2? It's actually a medical based red jelly which heals all wounds. When you get shot you throw it on your face and eat it all up. Nom nom nom nom nom.

 

[Bunnybeater]

Personally, I quite like the red screen. Not necessarily the red aspect (WHY DOES MY LEG KEEP SPLASHING BLOOD ON MY CORNEAS?), but because it gives you a form of tunnel vision. If you've ever had a massive adrenaline dump (basically an adrenaline rush squared - usually experienced when something is actually threatening your very life), you'll know that you completely lose your peripheral vision.

I find the way the edges of the screen become difficult to see is a good simulation of the panicked loss of perspective - adds some extra urgency as you try to get out of the way of fire, with little idea where is safe or how to act. YMMV.

 

[x EvilErmine x]

I think the arguments for regen health and first aid health packs are both valid depending on the type of game it is. Some work better with a health bar (Fallout 3 for example) and some work better with regen health (i.e. most FPS's)

Maybe a better method than the red screen for regen health could work thus:

When the payer is at say 50% health have the game desaturated the colors of the screen. so everything appears slightly duller.

When the payer is at say 25% health have the screen go into gray scale.

Then finally if the player gets to like 10% or lower health, then have the players screen go into a tunnel vision effect that blocks out about 50% of the players vision.


I dont know if this has been done exactly like this before but IMO it's a way better idea than the having what looks uncannily like strawberry jam splattered in my face every time i stub my toe in game (I'm lookin at YOU here MW2!)

Ohh and completely off topic, the first time i got 'jammed' in MW2 this little sceen popped into my head for some reason,

'Sir we've been jammed'
'what?'
'We've been jammed sir....i think it's raspberry'
'Raspberry? Hmm.....only one man would dare to give ME the raspberry!'

Cookie for the refrence.

 

[Irish Rover Baird]

A system I would like would be a diagram of your body, with injuries being properly mapped on it according to where you were shot. So, for example, you would not be killed by getting repeated gunshots to your hand, but it would impair your aiming skills.

Swat 4 has something like that. Only not as specific and you can die with shots to the arm, or at least lose the Level

OT: I actually really like the Regenerating Health Bar. It doesn't impair and you don't get those moments where you have 10 health and a room filled with baddies ahead.

Yeah, I'll have to agree with this.

I like the SWAT 4 method, as it was actually more realistic than most of the health indicators nowadays.
If you were shot in the foot, well, there goes your sprinting, you're just tied down to walking slowly.
If you were shot in both arms, your aiming quite sucked.
Which, to be honest, made it feel like a realistic SWAT operation.

And I also like the regenerating idea.
Let me explain by this small example:

I once played a game where you could save anywhere you wanted. It had no health regeneration.
I saved at a point where I thought it was safe to go, with only 25% of my health left.
I went into a next room, got overrun by a shitload of baddies, with no health packs whatsoever.
I died. The game loaded my last save...I tried to enter the room, find cover and kill the baddies as quickly as possible...I died again.
The game loaded my last save etc...

So yeah, I'll go with the body diagram thing and regeneration.

 

[Squilookle]

When playing Reach, health regenerates by a third

Yeah I dunno- only being able to guess my health after a vicious firefight down to the nearest third just isn't going to cut it.

 

[GundamSentinel]

I don't mind red screen, not even the MW2 can-see-a-thing one. At least you know when you're almost dead. Bad Company 2's red screen I hardly noticed which often led to: "Oh, I'm dead... Wasn't expecting that..."

Health meters aren't bad either, I love the HL2 meters. Easy to see, but not in the way. To me, health meters work better in singleplayer and red screen (in combination with a health meter/bar) in multiplayer.

As long as you can't actually feel pain in games, there's just no realistic health system. And it's fine that way.

 

[hurfdurp]

When I first encountered it, I thought it was neat. After regularly being implemented in games, you get used to it and its limitations. For instance, you have a general idea which shade of red indicates how many more times you can have damage inflicted on you (not as straightforward as health bars, but doable), and I like the panic it causes as my screen gets more and more distorted and I freak out and most likely run to my death. I think it teaches you to be even more cautious than a red, blinking health bar would.