Examples of Dynamic Cities/Locations in Gaming

[happyninja42]

So, was just thinking about how various games have you running around an enclosed area (like New York in Spiderman), doing things, helping people, and "making a difference", but you never actually SEE any difference. You spend hours fighting bad guys to "clean up the streets", but the streets are just as messy if you hadn't been there at all.

So I was curious about examples of games that actually tried to reflect your actions, within the world you are playing. For me, the best example, and one I've mentioned many times, is inFamous 1/2 (I think the follow up games did this too, but I don't remember them very well). But when you did actions in the city, you could see the impact. From things as small as just reducing the amount of debris and detritus (as they literally clean up the streets after you make it safe), to providing power to the city blocks, thus lighting up the buildings, to posters of your deeds being put up, and the people cheering you and helping you fight the, now reduced criminal element in the sectors you liberated. Just so many little details that made it feel like I was actually helping the area.

Fallout 4 does it to a degree as well. As you add more settlements to the Minutemen, you see patrols of them wandering around, and, if you install artillery units, you can have yourself a massive defensive screen to help you clear out badguys, going forward. You can make supply lines to link your settlements together, which spawns a convoy person, who you could arm considerably, making the roads a bit safer as they move back and forth.

So, what other games, make an effort to actually have your choices, directly impact the game structure going forward? I'm curious to see other examples, because I'd like to try them out, assuming I haven't already done so.

 

[09philj]

Dishonored's world becomes more fucked up as you complete more missions with High Chaos, so there's more rats, more guards, more weepers, and more bloodflies.

 

[happyninja42]

Dishonored's world becomes more fucked up as you complete more missions with High Chaos, so there's more rats, more guards, more weepers, and more bloodflies.

Yeah I remembered that one after I posted it, sadly you don't see much on the other side of that spectrum, since that's basically in the aftermath, resolution part of the game.

 

[Xprimentyl]

The Crackdown series to some extent. You're basically dumped into a clusterfuck of corruption and violence, but as you take down bosses, each of whose control extends to limited parts of the city, those areas become less volatile.

 

[Chimpzy]

Xenoblades Chronicles has a major side quest dedicated to restoring a settlement from bombed out ruin to thriving community. Involves a whole bunch of subquests for materials to improve housing and facilities, and finding people willing to immigrate.

There's a lesser version of this in Xenoblade Chronicles X where completing certain side quest lines properly lets your establish friendly relations with other civilized species, eventually letting you invite them to New Los Angeles. You'll see them in the streets and some will open new shops and such.

 

[Dalisclock]

IIRC, Dark Cloud 2/Dark Chronicle, had a whole thing about building a series of settlements as you ventured further out into the world, using resources and plans you found in the dungeon next to each town. I believe there was also a puzzle element to this, to develop each town in just the right way to develop it to it's max potential.

 

[BrawlMan]

Prototype - As you get further into the game, Manhattan changes and gets a lot more red hot zones open up and more infected appear. Not only that, you'll see more powerful infected in early game areas that weren't there last time.

Ghost of Tsushima - The weather changes depending on the flute you play when not in combat. It rains and storms, whenever Jin kills enemies the ninja/assassin way and not the "honorable" samurai way.

Evil Within 2 - After killing the guardian for the first time, more will show up in the semi-open world. Two of them you can activate in different parts of Union. Doing side quest or saving Sykes unlocks weapon caches or rooms you wouldn't be able to enter before. After doing the first Sebastian side quest where Anima chases you, she will chase you in certain parts of the open world. You can tell when the screen gets dark blue and foggy. You'll also see some static on the screen and you'll hear her humming. she's usually easy to evade because you're in such a wide open space.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

I think Vampyr is supposed to react, but cause I always want to be a goody two-shoes support-worker Vampire doctor warrior (*gasp for breath*), the desire to test the "other path" is not part of the plan. Plus there is no confetti, fireworks or applause for helping people...they merely obtain the privilege of unknowingly producing tastier blood and a shiny spot on my "chart of happy edibles," so I guess they're doing fine? Apart from that one guy, but we don't talk about him...

Quite liked the delapidated castle home you get in Dragon Age: Inquisition that you get to blossom into a majestic hub of commerce, safety and mortal judgement. Might have to go back to that game at some point to finish the narrative and carrot garden.

Ooh, can I sneak in Okami? There is something deeply primal about the joy felt from seeing actual life bloom from your very paws and actions.

 

[Asita]

Kinda interestingly done in Undertale. Go pacifist? Eventually the random combat encounters become static NPCs you can talk to, their hostility all gone. Go genocide? Eventually you run out of enemies to fight. The major characters also react very differently based on how you've been playing. Notably, after a certain point the simple puzzles that would be blocking your way in the other routes are pre-completed, as the NPCs are busy trying to get the hell away from you.

On a more environmental note, the Legend of Zelda games - particularly the 3D ones - tend to be reasonably good at this. In Twilight Princess you're literally pushing back the darkness and more or less making the realms habitable for the Hylians again. Majora's Mask is probably my favorite example, however, because everything has a visible impact and so much of it is personal. Beating the Forest Temple turns the swamp back into water rather than poison, and you run the Deku Princess back to her family to save her monkey friend from being boiled alive (after which the place is much more mellow and the monkey is treated as a proper guest). Beat Snowhead temple and spring finally comes to the mountain. Great Bay Temple dispells the storm. Spirit Temple makes the canyon relatively safe (I think...it's been a while since I played). Don't help fend off the alien invasion of Romani Ranch on the first night? Romani is missing the next day and Cremia just sits outside what's left of the barn crying the entire time, and the day after that Romani is back...nearly catatonic and twitching. Fend off the invasion? Business continues with Cremia none the wiser...and then comes the afternoon of the final day...

And on that note, the best part of the game is that most of the characters recognize the Sword of Damocles hanging over their heads. The characters are not static. They've got their schedules, and they've got their variations as the days go by. They know that barring some kind of miracle, they are going to die. The postman has been doing his best to ignore it by losing himself in his work. But come the third night, he's got only a few hours left to live and nothing to distract him, and you find him terrified in his home, not even feeling he has the right to the slim hope offered by evacuation. Anju and Kafei are under no delusions about their fate, but insist on getting married before they die. The construction foreman is in full denial and by the end he's pissed that his co-workers ran away and defiantly shouting at the moon about to crash down on his head that nothing is going to happen. The beleaguered mayor ends up spending his time in debates with the guards and citizens about whether or not to evacuate...unless you show up wearing the Couple's Mask, which gives him the kick in the pants to adjourn the meeting saying that the citizens should do what they feel is best but their [possibly last] days should be spent with their families rather than tied up in bureaucracy. Anju's family evacuates to Romani Ranch, but (provided the aforementioned invasion was fended off) the discussions with Cremia and Romani strongly imply the former knows they won't live another day and can't really explain it to her little sister. It's absolutely heartwrenching, and I love it. It makes the world feel so much more alive and beating the final boss feel more meaningful.

Yeah I remembered that one after I posted it, sadly you don't see much on the other side of that spectrum, since that's basically in the aftermath, resolution part of the game.

I mean really, that's Dishonored in a nutshell: lot of effort into the high-chaos stuff, token effort on the low-chaos stuff. It's arguably to the point that it's less accurate to say that there are tools/powers that enable low-chaos runs than it is to say that the principle mechanics of low-chaos runs are self-limitation and save-scumming. It's supposed to be a 'play your way' game, but its design doesn't meaningfully support it.

 

[happyninja42]

I mean really, that's Dishonored in a nutshell: lot of effort into the high-chaos stuff, token effort on the low-chaos stuff. It's arguably to the point that it's less accurate to say that there are tools/powers that enable low-chaos runs than it is to say that the principle mechanics of low-chaos runs are self-limitation and save-scumming. It's supposed to be a 'play your way' game, but its design doesn't meaningfully support it.

Eh, I disagree it doesn't support the "play your way" style, but I do agree that you don't see as much impact on your style of play, if you go low chaos. Which I do dislike, seeing as I like to see the "good" things I'm doing, have an impact. I guess, given the short time frame of the events of the game, and that everything is already super fucked, it's not feasible for your subtle actions to have an immediate effect, but you tossing more fire on the flames would dramatically make things worse.

But as far as style, I mean, I've played that one several times, and you can have incredibly varied runthroughs, depending on how you work your powers (or no powers).

 

[Asita]

Eh, I disagree it doesn't support the "play your way" style, but I do agree that you don't see as much impact on your style of play, if you go low chaos. Which I do dislike, seeing as I like to see the "good" things I'm doing, have an impact. I guess, given the short time frame of the events of the game, and that everything is already super fucked, it's not feasible for your subtle actions to have an immediate effect, but you tossing more fire on the flames would dramatically make things worse.

But as far as style, I mean, I've played that one several times, and you can have incredibly varied runthroughs, depending on how you work your powers (or no powers).

Allow me to rephrase: you can play your own way in that you can go guns blazing, stealthy archer, unholy dracula-wannabe mage, Jigsaw trapper, etc. However, in broader strokes there's a lack of mechanical support for low-chaos playstyles. As I invoked Undertale earlier, I might liken it to Undertale without the "Act" button, or perhaps a Deus Ex game without social or stealth upgrades. In Dishonored, your tools and abilities are overwhelmingly flashy and lethal, and being noticed and killing people both increase chaos. Heck, if you aren't careful even normally non-lethal tools like the sleep dart can end up killing your target (eg, shooting them in the head or leaving them for the rats to find). This is what I meant when I said it didn't support "play your way" - which admittedly was a poor choice of words; for all that the game guilted you for not being a ghost-like pacifist, the playstyle demanded by a low-chaos run wasn't especially well supported by the gameplay mechanics.

 

[Dreiko]

The game I'm playing right now , Ys VIII, does this really well, granted it has a small area that it works with, but it still feels really significant. The setting is a deserted island and you're a group of castaways so you have to build a village while searching for survivors and trying to come up with ways to escape as you map out the island and find the mystery behind its curse. So as you find more people and do their personal requests the village ends up being fleshed up more. You make a smithy, a boat to carry resources, better defenses to fend off against the raids of local monsters, bets, a kitchen, tons of stuff like that.

My last development is a mini-farm, I only have eggplans planted there and the only animal in the pen is a pet so we're likely not eating him, but hey, better than just starving or subsisting only on fish lol.

 

[Catfood220]

I would say the de Blob games. You start a level with all the colour missing from the world, drab sound track and rubbish all over the place and enslaved masses. And as you start colouring the level, the soundtrack becomes more lively, the sun starts shining, the little NPCs start dancing in the street and by the time you're done, the whole level looks like a party.

Seriously, you want feel good games where you feel like you've achieved something, have a look at these games. THQNordic re-released both games for PS4 and Switch and are probably pretty cheap now. Not sure about XBox, I'm too lazy to check.

Actually, this guy says it better.

 

[Dalisclock]

There's an older game from the 1990's called Terraenigma for the SNES. It was made by the same people who made ActRaiser and Illusion of Gaia(I think it was also called Illusion of TIme in other parts of the world). The idea is that earth has died and you have to ressurrect it. So the first chapter is going to a series of towers and activating them to bring back the continents. Once you do that you go out onto the surface and find a dead land, so you go about bringing back plants, various types of animals and eventually humanity(by completing verious dungeons).

Then once humanity is back you roam the world and can help humanity advance back to a 20th century level(with the problems that entails) and it's weird, because on one hand, it feels like perhaps thousands and millions of years are passing and you just aren't noticing it, but then you meet characters you met earlier in the game as you were doing all of tis and they pretty much haven't aged at all. Like at one point you save Columbus from a haunted castle in Spain so he can "discover" the Americas(which honestly feels kind of awkward in so many ways)...and then you get to the Americas and there are already cities settled and growing there. There's also things you can do to influence cities to develop more, such as be the deciding vote in an election between one candidate who is obviously good for the town and one who is obviously not good for the town, etc.

But it was kinda cool to watch the world change around you as you went along your quest and it was an interesting game, so much I have fond memories of it, even if the combat part is rather meh.

 

[SckizoBoy]

The Saboteur is the one that comes to mind. It's mostly in black & white (with red for dramatic effect) and the more you liberate the various regions, the more it switches to colour (though it's actually mostly plot progression based).

Assassin's Creed II is a minor example insomuch that the more you renovate Monteriggioni, the less run-down the place looks (obvs) but, more noticeably, the tidier the mansion exterior looks and the more there's background population.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

I would say the de Blob games. You start a level with all the colour missing from the world, drab sound track and rubbish all over the place and enslaved masses. And as you start colouring the level, the soundtrack becomes more lively, the sun starts shining, the little NPCs start dancing in the street and by the time you're done, the whole level looks like a party.

Seriously, you want feel good games where you feel like you've achieved something, have a look at these games. THQNordic re-released both games for PS4 and Switch and are probably pretty cheap now. Not sure about XBox, I'm too lazy to check.

Actually, this guy says it better.

That sounds cool, but wondering if you later start painting over the colors with greys and browns do the NPCs start taking cover while CoD/Gears soundtracks kick in?

 

[Thaluikhain]

Exile 3 (and I think the Avernum remakes) do the opposite of this. If you don't solve the problem of a monster plague fast enough, towns in the area being affected get worse, minor (but useful) NPCs like shopkeepers disappear, there's cracks in the walls and some smaller towns have their human populations replaced with monsters, turning them from somewhere to sell your loot into another dungeon.

 

[laggyteabag]

One good example would be in a lot of Bethesda RPGs, with how named NPCs dont respawn, so if you kill someone, they don't come back, and any quests chains/objectives go with them. So I guess if you were inclined to do so, you could basically purge each city/town of its inhabitants.

Its not perfect, mind you, as I do believe that guards respawn, and the town doesnt exactly react to having its populace murdered, but it is still cool on paper.

Otherwise, IIRC, in Fable, if you go around murdering everyone, and you become super evil, the towns become super misty, less and less people walk the streets, and guards attack you on sight. Could be wrong though - I haven't played Fable in about 10 years.

But I am a big fan of smaller dynamic locations, as opposed to much larger static ones. I'd rather become familiar with a few streets, and a few people, rather than a massive expanse of nameless NPCs, and miles of empty locations. Maybe I should give Yakuza a go, or something.

 

[sXeth]

One good example would be in a lot of Bethesda RPGs, with how named NPCs dont respawn, so if you kill someone, they don't come back, and any quests chains/objectives go with them. So I guess if you were inclined to do so, you could basically purge each city/town of its inhabitants.

Its not perfect, mind you, as I do believe that guards respawn, and the town doesnt exactly react to having its populace murdered, but it is still cool on paper.

i think at this point theres more Bethesda games where that isn't the case then it was. Anyone of any import to anything has been immortal since Oblivion.

 

[SilentPony]

Fallout 4 does it to a degree as well. As you add more settlements to the Minutemen, you see patrols of them wandering around, and, if you install artillery units, you can have yourself a massive defensive screen to help you clear out badguys, going forward. You can make supply lines to link your settlements together, which spawns a convoy person, who you could arm considerably, making the roads a bit safer as they move back and forth.

Funny thing to do in Fallout 4 is with that robot add-on pack you can build robots, kit them all as Sentry bots with double laser gatling guns and double shoulder missile launchers and assign them all as the supply lines between the settlements. By the time I had contacted all the settlements I had constant minutemen patrols and there was almost always a super powered murder bot nearby to just unload on anything smaller than an albino deathclaw and turn it to mulch.

Took the challenge out of exploring the wasteland sure, but damned if I didn't make the commonwealth safer.