On RPG Elements

[Jandau]

Horrible weapons becoming more effective over time is kind of the exact reverse of a difficulty curve.

Nope, it's just a poorly designed learning cure that assumes all players suck.

RPG games in general have been struggling with this for ages. How hard do you make the game? Considering that players can range from power-gaming exploiters through people who press "Autolevel" all the time to those who manage to put the points in all the wrong places, how do you tune your game so you don't put players up against an insurmoutable barrier?

Usually devs assume players will not make brilliant choices, make some mistakes and not go out of their way to hunt down every last sidequest or collectable. So when someone actually goes the extra mile, he usually outlevels the game. On the other hand, if you tune the game to demand a certain degree of competence from the player, you threaten to alienate the less hardcore players. And then the terribly designed enemy leveling systems come in and make an even bigger mess by making all your progress meaningless (Oblivion, I'm looking at you).

Which is the correct choice, I do not know. But the fact that Yahtzee is discovering it only now makes me wonder what the hell he's been playing all these years. My Little Pony games?

 

[Evil the White]

I agree, it seems ever since Deus Ex all shooters need to have a super soldier who can't hold a pistol straight without someone to pat them on the back for their creative knifing skills. I like how they did it in Arkham Asylum, reminded me of Spiderman 2 without the need to run around for ages going 'whurr spider store?'.

Good times.

Exactly. Because the skill increases where applied to a group of weapons as a whole, then it meant that you could get a new gun and still be able to use it at the same efficiency of the others. It also gives you more room for other solutions to a puzzle. You either open a door with a lockpick, blow it up with explosives, or search for a way around or the key. In many cases, finding other solutions that may be harder or require more resources to get past offer extra skill points, which in turn can be used to help you get skill points.

Unfortunately, the problem with this method is balancing out the difficulty curve. In Deus Ex towards the end you got tougher enemies that weren't supersoldiers, in Batman you got some of your previous options stripped away from you in the environment design (the explosive charges on the statues). Plus supersoldiers, that you had to develop new tactics for to defeat without dying a lot.

One of the best things about Oblivion was the character creator, I don't understand why the FPS genre doesn't support this.

Because its too hard to balance out the difficulty curve without offering a rational reason. For example, in Deus Ex, part of a mission that you have to do sees you trying to free the prisoner without alerting the guards. Now this wasn't one of the usual "they hear you, game over" stealth action. You either took them out silently, one by one, so you could get into the room, or you sneak into the room via a ventilation shaft, and you kill the guards in the prisoner's room before they exactue the prisoner. The reward being that you get a nice skill point bonus and a code to a sub you would otherwise need to search everywhere for.

But although using supersoldiers to ramp up the difficulty curve all the time is bad, placing them around the base with a larger amount of regular guards makes the game more interesting. Add in that if a guard raises the alarm the other soldiers are more perceptive, turrets become active (unless you find the panel and de-activate them) and nearby guards will rush in, guns blazing. The fact that sometimes enemies will run from fights, so other guards will join in, and they may try and attack you later, if they did not drop their weapon.

 

[Uncompetative]

Well Deus Ex 3 sounds great, I'm really looking forward to it.

see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus_Ex_3

(I don't understand how your character looks in the game makes all that much difference... I suppose a Team Fortress 'Heavy' would be too clumsy and lumbering for stealth even without the minigun, but on the other hand this never stopped Riddick icing mercs.)

 

[Zagzag]

Some RPG elements in shooters fit. Like in Ratchet and Clank

I really have to agree with you here. However Ratchet isn't your typical shooter.

Also if Yahtzee hates Australia so much why not go elsewhere...

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

RPG elements= depth, how much depth will very on the attention span of the devs....or player....

 

[GonzoGamer]

What about an RPG with Shooter Elements?
The only one I can think of is Valkyria Chronicles but I think that's got too much J in it for you.

Who in the Australian government takes this talk of bans seriously? It's discussed in America as well but mostly by religious nuts who forget that there's plenty of offensive material in the Bible.

 

[A Weary Exile]

Fallout 3 did the RPG elements pretty well but I hated how many shots it took to kill certain enemies even towrds the end of the game. Bioshock screwed up it's RPG elements by allowing the player to have about eighty tonics/plasmids at one time, but I still love that damn game.

 

[Captain Pancake]

Now I'm afraid that australia may do something stupid. Like, say, kill an archduke.

And liberate Serbians from supposed Austro-Hungarian oppression?????

Effectively lighting a powderkeg of distrust and national prejudice, starting an epic game of dominoes with the european nations?

[sub]note: "Dominoes" is purely metaphorical, britain and france weren't really toppling each other over.[/sub]

 

[jono793]

"Under half of the sites on the given blacklist were related to child porn. Most of the rest were perfectly legal, normal, wholesome grown-up porn."

Not really legal. Porn is a restricted category of film in most parts of the world, and I presume that goes for Australia too. There are licenses to produce and distribute, with restrictions on the how and where. Then the internet came along and blew all that out of the water, making it impossible to enforce any of those restrictions on the local stuff, not to mention anything from abroad.

I imagine the authorities are keen to make up for their impotence hitherto.

 

[xscoot]

Hmm, so I'm guessing you didn't play CoD 4's online then, huh Yahtzee?

As you play the game you get points and level up. By leveling up, you unlock better guns and even "perks", such as extra ammo or extra health. So, a person that just started would only get a pistol one grenade and a weak SMG, and a person that has been playing for longer will have a magnum, three grenades, a powerful assault rifle, double ammo, and extra health. Of course, these are only some of the perks. Some perks drop a grenade when you die, give you two rocket launchers on top of your other weapons, etc. etc.

 

[xscoot]

Fallout 3 did the RPG elements pretty well but I hated how many shots it took to kill certain enemies even towrds the end of the game. Bioshock screwed up it's RPG elements by allowing the player to have about eighty tonics/plasmids at one time, but I still love that damn game.

Huh? You were only allowed to equip 6 plasmids, and 6 tonics per slot. And, each tonic slot was pretty isolated; one for the regaining of health/eve, one for hacking and alarms, and one for combat. Three separate areas.

 

[Kenjitsuka]

I understand why the Communist government in China wants to maintain a deathgrip on their section of the Internet, but Australia? Which bandwagon are they jogging 50 feet behind this time? Maybe they want to be ahead of the curve this time and a medium told them China will dictate most issues in 2109...

Our Prime Minister speaks Chinese too. And now he's trying to do this, after promising the opposite in his election campaign. This piece of shit country voted in a goddamn communist.

Oh wow... I didn't know that! I wonder how many foreingers like myself do!

 

[Axeli]

Considering a roleplaying game consists of taking on the role of another character, I'd have to say JRPGS are no less of an RPG than the next.

I hope I don't double-post. I got Ninja'd, and I just want to respond to this.

In every game you play a role. But Western RPGs--the kind many of us gained familiarity with first--are touted on playing any role you want. You know that whole freedom of choice thing that most games tout now? That's been a hallmark of the Western RPG genre for a lot longer. But in JRPGs (at least the handful I'm familiar with, such as the FF series) provide you with a character and backstory already. You play the role they've created for you, instead of inventing your own character. And that's what bugs me about them. If I want to play an RPG, then I want to have a say in my character. I want to pick his origin, his class, and I want to create my own back story. You can't do that in a lot of JRPGs, which I think is the point Yahtzee is trying to make.

The problem with the WRPG method of character creation is that you either end up not caring about the main character because he/she has no inherent personality (and even if you pay great attention to make his/her choices in the game reflect the personality you want him/het to have, the game fails to note the details finer that saint/evil bastard, making the whole effort seem really pointless) or then the experience becomes completely based on Mary Sueism.
Granted, it's more your Sue that the author's, and when done right it can be extremely entertaining to have your avatar be the centre of the game's world, but it still is a Mary Sue story.

 

[xscoot]

Well Deus Ex 3 sounds great, I'm really looking forward to it.

The lead designer on the project announced that Deus Ex 3 will focus more heavily on shooting than on the other aspects that made the original game great.

The Deus Ex sequels don't exist, because I don't want them to.

 

[Naheal]

Well written, Yahtzee.

A question for you to clarify your stance on this. Would weapon customization via parts collected in the game (I.E. a grenade launcher for an M16 in a typical shooter) be a more effective way to handle this in the game?

 

[Lord_Gremlin]

These situation with Australian government depresses me. I hope some day those old coots will pass their seats to some more intelligent people.
P.S. I've checked the bear behind me - we get on pretty well.