Stealth Games Don't Have to Be About Killing People

[Kuomon]

I think this could be the basis of a new kind of 007 licensed game. As much as I enjoyed Goldeneye, Nightfire and a couple of other ones, it's always bothered me that all the games based on the world's greatest spy devolve into unhinged firefights. Enter Yahtzee's concept, but instead of making it 3 RPG like classes, just make it various different game play mechanics available to Bond.

 

[synobal]

The Conman game is something I've toyed with a lot in my head. Watching and reading about conmen, plus with White Collar being as popular as it is it really has possibilities. I think it could be done but if it was done it would have to be done by a small development studio with out a big publisher parent company. As no big corporation is going to run the risk on making a game so nontraditional. Telltale might be able to do it.

 

[PunkRex]

So basically the Con-man is Sherlock Holmes.

 

[Quellist]

Alpha Protocol had some 'Conman' moments, mainly by snooping info about people to fill dossiers to give you a better idea of what made them tick. The best example was Marberg though, if you managed to complete his Dossier, at a cruical moment you could get inside his head so efficently (by convincing him that he'd been made a fool of so many times and never learnt from it) you could make him betray his employer and avoid one of the nastiest fights in the game.

Back OT: Totally agreed, i lost interest in the Splinter Cell series long before it officially went south due to the fact that Stealth seemed to mean only follow a predetermined path killing or knocking out every guard en route.

 

[skylog]

Beyond Good & Evil is a good example of stealth and not killing enemies. Even though you can fight any of the guards that spot you, you are much, much weaker than they are. So there's an added incentive to not getting caught; not only will you not complete your mission, but you'll also die.

 

[Jimmy T. Malice]

The Conman might be hard to implement because he would need unique responses to every encounter rather than general game mechanics, but imagine the potential. Dress yourself up as a maintenance worker, then shout "There's a bomb! Everybody out!" to get rid of all the guards.

 

[5mj7R7yf4Dwr3gdZyyu9PeGNwYjlNrjzuh3iTXQG]

Yahtzee I want to play this game!

TL: DR When I encountered Disney's failed attempt at a nonviolent FPS, I came up with a number of ideas of where the gameplay would be, if not by dispensing helpful bullets [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HgejSCHRi8&feature=player_detailpage#t=212s]

I'm reminded of an idea I had not long after Disney came up with their Atlantis FPS [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantis_The_Lost_Empire:_Search_for_the_Journal] which they promised to be non-violent, but simply used context to allow people to kill guards without killing guards. Being an old student of the Thief series, my approach was to look at the gameplay elements of that that wasn't killing or blackjacking the guards.

~ Opening Doors: because of this one (and my fondness of the simple lockpick system in Thief: TDP and Thief 2: TMA) this game idea got the working title of Sonic Screwdriver. The tension of timing a guard's beat with running and picking open a lock was some of the richest I've felt in games. Making a player feel like they've earned access to the facility does a lot (and not by killing bunches of dudes to get a keycard on a pedestal). On the flip side:

~ Closing Doors: Obstructing access by guards to areas (or the less conspicuous forcing them to take the long way around). Typically this is done from master control rooms and such, but was elegantly done in SWAT 4 with a tactical doorjam [http://www.botachtactical.com/tacwedge.html] that is evidently standard SWAT equipment. And when you had a key in Thief you could lock doors and guards wouldn't notice.

~ Killing The Lights: Nicely done by dousing torches in Thief, also softening noisy floors. Smell-sensitive guards may not go down stinky corridors and such.

~ Finding Secret Routes: Appears in some of the less linear Splinter Cell levels (also Thief, Thief, Thief). Bettered if ropes, climbing claws, portal guns [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal_gun] and such are necessary (or help) to access said secrets. Better still if this facilitates avoiding / escaping guards.

~ Manipulating Guards: Teleporting them, slowing them, distracting them, trapping them, stunning them, recruiting them and so on all may be regarded as killing-light (though the context allows them to recover, some games spawn new guards with time and low active population), but all fits in to the category of sweetly humiliating your enemies and leaving them to never live it down.

Anyway, with this kit of stuff, it's what Disney should've utilized in a "non-violent" FPS rather than allowing the player to kill things and just saying it's not really killing them.

238U

 

[Zeras]

Mass Effect 2 did stealth in a strange way, since it's a third person shooter/RPG hybrid not a stealth-game. To be said, though, the feeling of getting that achievement specifically geared towards not letting the guards see you was very sweet! The Arkham series (Batman) did stealth very well - you're playing the G&%d&%ned Batman, so stealth and how the baddies react as you systematically take them out was pure gold.

The bottom line is make a game about a character that does things stealthy/non-violently, not put those elements in a game that doesn't look like it would fit.

 

[JarinArenos]

Why must you keep describing these awesome game concepts that never come to light? Why must you keep breaking my heart, Ben?

 

[Username Redacted]

Also, this article made me want to play Vampire: The Masquerade again soooo bad.

What's stopping you?

Also funny how several people mentioned Deus Ex as I think that the social enhancement mechanic from that game would adapt very well to the conman class.

 

[tangoprime]

Everything mentioned herein.

I REALLY like the idea of this- I'd like to imagine it used in a (naturally) open world city game a la GTA4 where you perform corporate espionage/heists for profit. Start small in a crappy efficiency apartment or hotel room stealing recipe secrets from local restaurants or sabotaging the ovens prior to a chili cookoff or something for chump change, and eventually you're in your Saints Row 3 style penthouse prepping for major data heists in the shimmering towers of downtown.

Each character type you outlined would have to acquire and maintain different types of equipment, and could optionally perform different types of preparatory missions to make the main assignment go easier (think of every assignment being like the prep for the suicide mission in Mass Effect 2). For instance-

The conman would tend to maintain surveillance equipment and low-key vehicles to blend in and gather information on people involved at your target.

The spy would want a bevy of power suits (that is, bespoke business attire, not exoskeleton powered armor), and vehicles that could be resprayed with corporate logos, or just high-end vehicles in general to fit the extreme white-collar image, and preparation missions would involve acquiring credentials and uniforms.

The sneak would, of course, have their aforementioned ninja sneaking suit, and an assortment of high-end intrusion implements that Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta Jones would drool over (if they were in a movie together). Prep missions for this player type would involve getting equipment into place and pre-emptively disabling or setting in place the ability to remotely disable security features during the main assignment.

Story optional, many things could be done, a couple even done right, but the real fun would be just doing these tycoon style and playing around with your wealth, as well as having random side jobs for when the main jobs dry up. Also, I tend to hate being forced to interact with other humans remotely during my precious gaming time, but a co-op element to these could be damn good fun too- a heist where you have a conman talking the guards to let him bring his buddy in, who is a spy, who in turn disables surveillance allowing a sneak to infiltrate and get information for a conman to help him talk a password out of a junior boardmember that the spy then uses to steal blueprints to the newest widget mk3 pro... that could be a hell of a lot of fun.

 

[baconmaster]

We could use Yahtzee's idea. Or we could make the same game, but abandon this restrictive, overused class-based nonsense and just let the player tackle each mission using whichever tactic he/she deems to be the most effective or interesting at the time. But I'm sure somebody is going to call me an idiot for that. Forcing people to commit to a single play-style is, like, so deep, after all.

 

[Sheo_Dagana]

I've always liked the idea of a game that's more role-play heavy than action-based stuff. Honestly, in stealth games, I avoid killing as many people as possible. In a game where I don't have to kill in order to get around, I always take that route because it's just more interesting.

 

[inkheart_artist]

I love the name drop for Vampire: the Masquerade. That's a great game. I think a more appropriate name for the sneak would be the thief. Sneak sounds silly for a class name. It might be a better name for the game idea.

 

[Silly Hats]

I really liked Dishonored because you could play any form of Stealth you wanted, I didn't kill any guards and always played for Ghost. Nothing lamer than an Assassin that has to barge through head on then kills the entire population to escape. Going in -> out undetected is how I feel like an assassin should be.

Even in Skyrim, I try to sneak past everyone and just kill the Chief Bandit for the extra difficulty.

 

[Ymbirtt]

I'd play this game. The "conman" style would certainly be interesting, I can't think of any game that has really done that type of stealth gameplay.

The only games that come to mind for me are Neverwinter Nights 2 and the Geneforge series.

I had an enjoyable playthrough of NWN2 where I rolled a chaotic evil halfling bard, who would be the biggest dick to everyone he ever met right up until he needed something from them, where he suddenly started to ooze charm from every orifice. It worked well in a few situations, right before some big fights when a conversation window popped up there was occasionally an option to say "haha no you can't fight me I'm too charming", and this would actually work and you could get through a lot of encounters like this. Unfortunately, it was always just an extra button that said "you have a high enough stat - click this to not get stabbed and lose a pile of experience for not killing things", and in all other situations I just played the bongos at my party to make them not die in the unavoidable combat. Still wasn't as fun as that time I rolled a wizard who was canonically 52 years old, making him older than his foster father, and making that scene with the ~20 year old elf lady particularly creepy, but I digress.

Geneforge also suffered from this kind of problem, but less so - it was possible to never lift a sword but still win the game; you could win sieges by giving a rallying enough speech to the people camping outside, talk people down from fights before they leapt at you, and generally be a silver-tongued badass. It even gave you exp for doing it, so you didn't lose out for not killing people. Unfortunately, it was exactly the same system as before - if your leadership stat is high enough, then you can pick more dialogue options. The wordiest option is invariably the best one.

I like the direction that these games point in, but what I think we really need is some model of conversation that isn't just "pick the right thing". Yahtzee (again) had the decent idea of having a sort of conversation wheel, where each spoke represented a topic, and the cursor's distance from the centre represented how strongly you approached it, so you could move the mouse around in a nice fluid way to lead the conversation in various directions. The downside here, of course, is that you'd need about 7 years of voice acting to make this kind of thing possible.

 

[Pink Gregory]

I love the name drop for Vampire: the Masquerade. That's a great game. I think a more appropriate name for the sneak would be the thief. Sneak sounds silly for a class name. It might be a better name for the game idea.

I don't know; naming them 'Fingers the Sneak' has a certain charm.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

I'd play this game. The "conman" style would certainly be interesting, I can't think of any game that has really done that type of stealth gameplay.

The only games that come to mind for me are Neverwinter Nights 2 and the Geneforge series.

I had an enjoyable playthrough of NWN2 where I rolled a chaotic evil halfling bard, who would be the biggest dick to everyone he ever met right up until he needed something from them, where he suddenly started to ooze charm from every orifice. It worked well in a few situations, right before some big fights when a conversation window popped up there was occasionally an option to say "haha no you can't fight me I'm too charming", and this would actually work and you could get through a lot of encounters like this. Unfortunately, it was always just an extra button that said "you have a high enough stat - click this to not get stabbed and lose a pile of experience for not killing things", and in all other situations I just played the bongos at my party to make them not die in the unavoidable combat. Still wasn't as fun as that time I rolled a wizard who was canonically 52 years old, making him older than his foster father, and making that scene with the ~20 year old elf lady particularly creepy, but I digress.

Geneforge also suffered from this kind of problem, but less so - it was possible to never lift a sword but still win the game; you could win sieges by giving a rallying enough speech to the people camping outside, talk people down from fights before they leapt at you, and generally be a silver-tongued badass. It even gave you exp for doing it, so you didn't lose out for not killing people. Unfortunately, it was exactly the same system as before - if your leadership stat is high enough, then you can pick more dialogue options. The wordiest option is invariably the best one.

I like the direction that these games point in, but what I think we really need is some model of conversation that isn't just "pick the right thing". Yahtzee (again) had the decent idea of having a sort of conversation wheel, where each spoke represented a topic, and the cursor's distance from the centre represented how strongly you approached it, so you could move the mouse around in a nice fluid way to lead the conversation in various directions. The downside here, of course, is that you'd need about 7 years of voice acting to make this kind of thing possible.

And your telling me this awesome NWN2 story after I decided not to buy it in gog.com's DnD promo over the weekend -_-

Yeah I can't even imagine how much dialogue would need to be recorded for that type of conversation system, I guest you could just use text but I imagine that would break the flow of gameplay a bit too much.

 

[Happiness Assassin]

IMO games where stealth is the only option generally aren't fun to play, as often you are at the mercy of game and all its quirks. They become more frustrating than challenging. I liked how Dishonored did it, by making stealth as viable as normal combat.

 

[rofltehcat]

Sounds intriguing.
I always played the Splinter Cell games as a ghost, never letting anyone know that I had been there. Later Splinter Cell titles made this basically impossible ("Oh shit, it's FISHER!!!!!!").
Deus Ex HR... I ghosted that one, too... though the bosses were simply badly designed. Even didn't use cheap invisibility and silent running until he's mesmerized and trapped by a swat team.
Mark of the Ninja: Ghosting FTW!
Dishonored: Haven't played it yet but it seems ghosting is possible but from what I saw about it up to now made "cheap" by teleporting around.

I'd love to play more stealth games but they are rare