Stealth
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
I think in good games, the 3-act system isn't in the plot at all, but the gameplay. You start out in the first act, a completely new player losing constantly. Then you get to know what you're doing and start moving along a little bit faster, and finally by the end you're mopping the floor with challenges that would have destroyed you when you first began. You create the drama, the game shouldn't create it for you through the story. Maybe this is why I love old Megaman and Metroid so much: The story is a bookend, and everything important happens during gameplay.
This is pretty much the stealth sections of Batman: Arkham Asylum, except Batman doesn't kill and the baddies never run away. I don't play a lot of stealth games so I don't know if any other games do this, but the bad guys have adaptive AI that change according to the situation. The bad guys always start out cocky, then become more and more panicked as you take them out. You would love it.psychodynamica said:
Ah. Never bothered with the watch! I've just been shooting my way through things maybe a replay will be in order.Onyx Oblivion said:
I think you've hit the nail on the head as to why Hitman attracted me more than Splinter Cell. By all means I enjoyed the original SC back in the day, but looking back now it was probably because I was a lot younger and the thought of actively having to plan out a method of entry from the choices of:
a) climb that pipe over there and go through the window
b) steal a guard's uniform
c) walk around the back and try to get so far away that I can use a sniper rifle to pick off the target through the balcony window when the door to the connecting room is open for a split second
I remember the original SC being reasonably linear and you always knew where to go. Coincidently I was playing Hitman: Blood Money last night and spent a good 45-60 mins on the level as I was intricately planning out my route through the level and learning all of the guard's movements. Furthermore there truly was several methods to complete the appropriate assassinations.
a) climb that pipe over there and go through the window
b) steal a guard's uniform
c) walk around the back and try to get so far away that I can use a sniper rifle to pick off the target through the balcony window when the door to the connecting room is open for a split second
I remember the original SC being reasonably linear and you always knew where to go. Coincidently I was playing Hitman: Blood Money last night and spent a good 45-60 mins on the level as I was intricately planning out my route through the level and learning all of the guard's movements. Furthermore there truly was several methods to complete the appropriate assassinations.
But you are stil interacting with a virtual creation subect to the rules and bounderies of those artists who created it. When all is said and done even the most open sandbox game has walls through which you can't pass. Of course, this all get's back to: what is the universal definition of art anyway? Unless there is some sort of Grand Commity that determines what is and is to be considered art, I don't think there is one definitive definition.Decabo said:
On the subject of Splinter Cell, I don't like it really either. I just recently bought the first game and have been incredibly frustrated with it. Maybe the other games are better, but most of my time in the game was spent repeatedly doing increadably simple tasks to get a shot at doing something hard, then getting caught and having to do all those other bloody things I just did again to get permission to try the hard thing again!
This is basically what I want in Prototype 2. More stealth, better stealth, and better civilian AI. More shadowy infiltrations of bases where the soldiers NOTICE their slowly-dwindling numbers and start panicking, skirmishing, blind-firing at shadows, and eachother... and occasionally you, if you're in the wrong place at the wrong time.psychodynamica said:
You're onto something there. The difficulty curve as gameplay analogue to the three-act story.Nateman742 said:
However, that's not to say we can't have both "gameplay curve narrative" games, and "cinematic three-act story" games, or perhaps even both in one game.
Stealth should be optional, and fun AI non optional(think if Bioshock had AI that could manage hit and run,group and trap tactics) attempt to look for you after begin alerted for you in every other nook and cranny for acouple minetess before going back to their normal rotines....on wait its jsut a random sand box shooter who needs completed AI.....
Give me a mix of UT bots,MGS,BAtman:AA and FEAR AI mixed into whatever yer playing, the odder the AI the better!
Give me a mix of UT bots,MGS,BAtman:AA and FEAR AI mixed into whatever yer playing, the odder the AI the better!
Also, if there are NO LIGHTS lit on the watch, you're uber hidden. Like, invisible.FinalDream said:
Clearly Zelda demonstrated the pinnacle of stealth game play.
But there is something to aerial view stealth, that was the reason Commandos was so awesome.
But there is something to aerial view stealth, that was the reason Commandos was so awesome.
Yes, and I do enjoy a good story, but again, as a player the story usually feels like a completely separate element to me, unless the game is extraordinarily gripping. It just ends up being a stage for the game's mechanics. In any case, plot can be created without making it a huge cinematic flourish.BobisOnlyBob said:
Are they definitely making a prototype 2?BobisOnlyBob said:
I agree, the stealth in that could have been a lot better. Wait until no-one's looking, absorb relevant person, then either absorb others one by one whilst their squadmates pay no attention to disappearances, or cut everything into small bloody chunks. Although, come to think of it, it did have all 3 parts of the 'conflict triangle'. At the start, you have no powers, you have to disguise yourself as the military to get close to them. Part way through, you stealth to get into bases or to escape, and at the end, you're a nigh-unstoppable killing machine! Just a shame about the distance at which the camera stopped showing you anything, really...
How about a real life stealth game where you play a CIA agent under cover to find out information about some crime like drug trafficking and murders ? you get no help only instinct this can create th tension, or you could just risk your job and point the gun at who ever you think might be the criminal...
"Ideally, a game with a three-act plot would use all three corners of the triangle - start out with evasion when you're vulnerable, use stealth in the middle to redress the balance guerrilla-style, then gain sufficient strength to sort everything out with violence in the end. But that's mixing gameplay styles, which is almost inevitably rubbish."
perhaps a game which gives you the option to do either?
or different classes in which you follow the story with different gameplay?
perhaps a game which gives you the option to do either?
or different classes in which you follow the story with different gameplay?
Y'know, stealth is all well and good, but I for one would love to see some more games that focus on evasion.
Some of the most intense and most fun moments I've ever had in video games involved desperately fleeing from enemies of superior strength. However, I am yet to see a game really nail evasion as a gameplay mechanic. Or as a story element for that matter.
Mirror's Edge came pretty close at times. Running for dear life and vaulting obstacles with the cops in hot pursuit and bullets whistling past your head was pretty damn exhilarating. Unfortunately that game kept making the player fight. Besides, the player character, despite being an ordinary (if athletic) human, could shrug off bullet strikes like mosquito bites. So the danger was mostly an illusion.
Then there was that Call of Cthulhu game that features a bloody excellent level where the player is attacked in his hotel room by possessed villagers and has to run for his life, locking doors and creating obstacles as he goes. But that was something of a once-off before the game turned into a fairly mediocre FPS.
Lastly, there was a pretty good episodic indie horror title called Penumbra that made a point of giving the player utterly inadequate weapons and pitting them against starving guard dogs and disquietingly large spiders. However, with a bit of practice and common sense, fighting was still an all too viable option. To their credit, they tried to fix this in the second episode by depriving the player of weapons altogether. But then they messed it up by having only four or so individual enemies in the whole game.
And, sadly, that's about it. I can't really think of any others.
Oh well, here's to less macho space marines and more scared little protagonists fleeing for their lives.
Hey, a guy can dream.
(Also, this post turned out way longer then planned. Verging on wall-o-text territory.)
Some of the most intense and most fun moments I've ever had in video games involved desperately fleeing from enemies of superior strength. However, I am yet to see a game really nail evasion as a gameplay mechanic. Or as a story element for that matter.
Mirror's Edge came pretty close at times. Running for dear life and vaulting obstacles with the cops in hot pursuit and bullets whistling past your head was pretty damn exhilarating. Unfortunately that game kept making the player fight. Besides, the player character, despite being an ordinary (if athletic) human, could shrug off bullet strikes like mosquito bites. So the danger was mostly an illusion.
Then there was that Call of Cthulhu game that features a bloody excellent level where the player is attacked in his hotel room by possessed villagers and has to run for his life, locking doors and creating obstacles as he goes. But that was something of a once-off before the game turned into a fairly mediocre FPS.
Lastly, there was a pretty good episodic indie horror title called Penumbra that made a point of giving the player utterly inadequate weapons and pitting them against starving guard dogs and disquietingly large spiders. However, with a bit of practice and common sense, fighting was still an all too viable option. To their credit, they tried to fix this in the second episode by depriving the player of weapons altogether. But then they messed it up by having only four or so individual enemies in the whole game.
And, sadly, that's about it. I can't really think of any others.
Oh well, here's to less macho space marines and more scared little protagonists fleeing for their lives.
Hey, a guy can dream.
(Also, this post turned out way longer then planned. Verging on wall-o-text territory.)
sorry yahtzee, normally you write good stuff, but this seemed to just ramble. im still unclear as to whether you made any statements at all. something about stealth, and you not liking splinter cell stealth. but then you went onto plot structure in games. dont forget the random interjection about violence in video games. pretty incoherent dude.