Free running and parkour in newer titles

[Schmeiser]

First of all i know nothing of video game design or the process of making a video game but in my humble opinion i think i do know what makes a game feel great or gives it a nice flow.

To the point, loads of games have somekind of parkour or free running mechanic in their games and i've recently bought shadow of mordor for ps4. The game is decent it has its flaws but i enjoy playing it and its quite some fun. Now my biggest complaint about it and some other games is that the parkour mechanic feels so boring and uninteresting it's like im not even doing it. Its all down to holding X and just sliglthy nudging the analog stick where you want to go. Personally i find this dull, give me some options here, let me control how far i jump, make it so i can fail it (under jump it, over jump it etc).

The first prince of persia didn't have complicated mechanics but even 2 buttons made you actually feel like you were in control of the character. Right mouse button was used for wall riding anyway you wanted and space was used for jumping off walls and then you had parts where you had wall climb vertically and combine those 2 buttons in a really cool mechanical way which was hard at first but felt really good once you got the hang of it. And on top of that you could press the attack and off hand attack button for nice bounces off walls while riding with the right mouse button.

It's just a slight rant, hope you guys got a sense of what im trying to say since i do have the tendency to repeat my shit over and over, anyways i would like your opinions on this. Am i just being nitpicky? Is this even an issue? Do you guys prefer this way compared to what i like

Edit : Talking about the newer princes, the sands of time trilogy not the super old ones

 

[SoreWristed]

The freerunning in Mirror's edge was nice and well thought out, but it was the Entire premise of the game. I feel like developers simply shouldn't bother making it any more complicated, because it would make some games needlessly complicated. It would be extremely frustrating if I can't rely on making a certain jump in a combat-centered game in a consistent manner.

Prince of Persia basically revolved around two mechanics, which were wallclimbing and combat. So if one of those feels weak, then 50% of your game feels weak. I feel shadow of mordor has a much more complicated combat mechanic goign for it, to afford going for a complicated climbing system aswell. (haven't played ShoM, I'm just assuming)

I can see where you are coming from, but I wouldn't want any more complicated climbing mechanics in most games.

 

[Prime_Hunter_H01]

It has been done better and worse depending on the game. Overall I think it's a good thing, its like what jumping used to be in certain games, height was an aesthetic, so with generous fall and failed jump penalties, it was merely a way to interact with the scenery rather than part of the skill required to progress the game, at most it was an occasional puzzle mechanic. Simple Parkour like the old style of jumping, I see is a tool to add the occasional minor challenge, since even in games with one button parkour (Assassins Creed, Shadow of Mordor) do find ways to give a puzzle quality to certain sections adding some challenge to the parkour but making it more of a path finding than performance test, and feel free to like and dislike as you please since everyone looks for something different, but when its not posing an obstacle, its a scenery and character tool, it shows off that the character can do this effortlessly as part of their abilities and allows for imposing scenery to be made as just a visual tool, since not all games want a hard platforming section as part of their game (and in certain cases neither do we).

And then there are the ones that do it well like Prince of Persia as you mentioned, as well as Mirrors Edge, Dying Light from what I have seen, and maybe others. I guess makes sure you know what a game is meant to give when you pick it up, since my point boils down to, some games use mechanics as integrated tools not as focuses of game play, when something is used as a tool it is streamlined, and in the case of your problem, you played games with parkour tools, not games about or partially about parkour.

 

[Schmeiser]

Hmm, i'm not really asking for super hard jumping mechanics i just want it to feel like im actually doing it and with the thingy they do now i don't really feel it. I'm still enjoying the game, it's great i guess the freerunning mechanics aren't to my liking and that's fine. As you guys said the main spin of the game isn't really about that so it does make sense, it's basically just a traversal mechanic and i shouldn't look too deep into it but i am glad they added the wraith sprint after touching the surface makes it a bit more enjoyable. Interestingly my favourite games of all time kinda do the jump thingy so bad it just shows how going to the other extreme can suck, talking about dark souls ofcourse. Noone can deny the shitty jump mechanic there.

About mirrors edge, the game is basically just wall riding and parkour and jumping so it makes sense that the mechanics are a bit more complicated and my god did i suck at that game in the start, no flow no speed at all and failign on every connect jump haha but the game was still loads of fun.