Question of the Day, April 19, 2010

[Jared]

I think they are nice. I mean I look at FF13, and I can rememvber so much variety, and there are some which really stand out for me, and some which really made me go "wow"

but, in terms of it. They are nice, but, they certainly dont make or break game for me

 

[Denamic]

Depends on the game.
RPGs in particular has to have a feeling of progression and thus needs a change of scenery fairly often.
Scenery is vital in some games, and while not as important in other types of games, it is fairly important overall.

 

[Garrett Richey]

Distinctive is a must, everything else is a bonus... Half-Life and Half-Life 2 are so memorable for this reason alone. Placed in other environments the Half-Life games would fall flat on their face as simply another run of the mill shooter. The environments alone achieved a level of immersion that IMO is unmatched by any game I've played.

 

[crotalidian]

Good backgrounds and scenery can save a bad game, and some good games can be (slightly) spoiled by being fugly but the best games balance it well so its nice. but not neccesary

 

[Spiner909]

Critical poll error: we are missing a y.
Environments can make or break a game. Red Faction Guerrilla comes to mind.

 

[The_Decoy]

Yes, yes a million times yes.

Compare Morrowind and Oblivion - Morrowind is more immersive and feels alot bigger than Oblivion because of all the different regions, while Oblivion gets stale as it look copy pasted.

Generally it just makes things more fun when there's lots of new, unexplored and unknown environments to ramble through.

 

[Eleima]

I went with absolutely. Some of my favorite environments include Dreamfall (gorgeous Casablanca), Oblivion (gazing at the Imperial City from Dive Rock or a sunset on the Gold Coast in Anvil), Mass Effect 2 (just look at that Illium skyline)... They make the game so real...

 

[DuX1112]

Absolutely yes. One example: ZENO CLASH.

Awesome gameplay: CHECK
Weird surreal story: CHECK
Even weirder surrealy immersive environments: DOUBLE CHECK

 

[Julianking93]

Sure, it's good when they add that, but it is by no means a necessity.

Certain games have the same environment over and over and over and over for every level and it still manages to be fun and addictive, IE Fallout 3.

 

[ethaninja]

I would not say they are essential to the gaming experience.
Just look at games like Fallout 3. Brown-on-grey-on-brown. Yet that was still a great, addictive game.

Aye. Some games can work it (Like Fallout 3), and some that don't (like Gears of War).

 

[Flour]

Depends on the game.

I go through shooters too fast to even notice how pretty the area is. Someone spends days creating an area and I ignore everything because it's not important, this is problematic when I have to backtrack(not that watching my surroundings would prevent me from getting lost when backtracking in those games). The only exception to this is Painkiller but it's impossible to not be impressed by the areas of that game even though there's barely anything in it.(go find a video of Opera House)

Games where I spend a lot of time in a certain area need to be pretty. I've abandoned a lot of games simply because there was barely any action and Quake was more colourful.

 

[Comma-Kazie]

Believable environments are a must for me--distinctiveness, I think, goes hand-in-hand with that.

 

[Layz92]

I enjoy interesting places (probably going to get insulted for this bit) like WoW for example, it has some boring zones I'll grant you but there are some great places like Ten Thousand Needles, Zangar Marsh, Silvermoon and Netherstorm. They were interesting and also pretty in many cases. Nagrand is a personal favourite of mine. I like the open hilly fields with the floating waterfalls, I also play a tauren so go figure... Zones make a place for me in many cases. I appreciate some inventive terrain like that bit on Gears of War 2 (at least I think it was) where you are advancing down a gentle hill that is actually the former outside of an office building, and in the larger picture that whole sinkhole level where the creature is burrowing through all the city and you get the weird atmosphere of wrecked buildings with massive caverns dug through them all.

 

[KimberlyGoreHound]

Absolutely. If the environments are boring and samey, I don't feel any progression in the game. Ie: if I'm playing a first person shooter, and every environment looks the same, I don't feel any sense of accomplishment as I complete objectives, because the new place looks exactly like the old place. That's not to say that a game set entirely in a lush jungle environment is bad, as long as different areas look and feel different from the place of an hour ago, I'm satisfied.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

It's nice to include a pretty place to play. I'm sure I would have enjoyed Dark Void more if I could plainly see all of it. Other games, like Marvel vs Capcom 2, are so smug about knowing they don't need a background that a background less area is available...well, it isn't exactly background less, it just looks like the holoshed [from Futurama because I can't remember what the Star Trek version is called] if it had run out of power.

 

[KimberlyGoreHound]

I enjoy interesting places (probably going to get insulted for this bit) like WoW for example, it has some boring zones I'll grant you but there are some great places like Ten Thousand Needles, Zangar Marsh, Silvermoon and Netherstorm. They were interesting and also pretty in many cases. Nagrand is a personal favourite of mine. I like the open hilly fields with the floating waterfalls, I also play a tauren so go figure... Zones make a place for me in many cases.

Absogoddamnlutely. Though I didn't really enjoy Thousand Needles, I loved flying over it, looking at the pillars sticking up from the ground. Netherstorm felt very difinitive - the chaotic scenery gave an excellent impression of 'this is up to what those 69 levels before this was leading.' I have to agree entirely on Nagrand. I stayed in that place as long as I possibly could, because it was just so pleasant to view. You, sir have good taste.

 

[Proteus214]

They are absolutely necessary. Having everything look and feel similar is just boring. Having a wide variety of environments that actually have personality always makes a game better.

 

[mexicola]

Yes they are important, just keep in mind distinctive doesn't have to mean pretty. For example The Zone in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is the focus of the game and it's what keeps the whole thing going. However it is of course possible to make a good game without focusing much on the setting, so it's not "essential", just important.

 

[Kollega]

I can easily say that yes. Absolutely.

 

[Mechsoap]

for instance in halo 3 i couldent care less about envoirment becouse i dident see any connection it had with each other, and then games like fallout, its strange to call it nuclear ravaged if evrything was green and wolfs where eating rabbits and rainbows evrywhere, so its more after what game it is