The Death of the Death Penalty

[unoleian]

I don't think it was the length of Too Human's death animation thing that was the problem, at least not on its own, I think it was the fact that it happened so damn often because it was WAY too easy to die. WTF is wrong with a good old-fashioned health potion, you bastards?!

I don't remember much about that game now, never even finished it, but the image of that damned golden Valkyrie is etched into my brain to this day.

Punitive indeed.

 

[dough]

My answer: it depends on the game. As has been said, death and death penalties make dying and surviving meaningful. Otherwise, you're just going from A to B with some minor inconveniences along the way.

You want to talk masochistic fun? Get yourself a copy of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, a wonderful game where you don't just die: you die and have to start over from scratch. It sounds like an exercise in frustration, but there is something to be said about that magical feeling of achievement when you can scratch tooth & nail to make it a bit further.

(I've restarted well over 30 times and still haven't come close to the game's goal.)

 

[FFKonoko]

Single player never inflicts more than a couple minutes penalty? Only if you're just trying to complete, games where you're being ranked, a mistake can cost you a fair bit more time than that.

Just to make an example, lets say you're trying to get platinum on a level on Bayonetta, or triple S rank a level on DanteMustDie mode. If during the last boss you screw up and get hit by the instant death attack...you have to use a continue or yellow orb and your shot at platinum/SSS is kinda screwed up, time to go back to the start of the level.

 

[omicron1]

Aye - randomly-generated levels make permadeath workable. I'm the kind of guy who'll ragequit after only a few deaths in a "typical" game - but in NetHack I just jump back in.

 

[Rad Party God]

I see your point. There are games were, as you said, dying feels natural and sometimes even entertaining, but sometimes it's just way too painful.

In singleplayer games, the only game that made death very annoying was FarCry on the PC. That game (without mods that already corrects this problem) only relied on checkpoints and you couldn't never, ever, be able to save and/or quicksave. Sometimes the distance between checkpoints was pretty far and that becomes a real problem about half-way and beyond. I never finished this game for that very reason, and because I hated those damnes mutant monkeys.

For MMOs, belive it or not, I played Ultima Online in a private server a few years ago, after playing World of Warcraft for a year or so (Burning Crusade era) and I felt your pain when you died. I clearly saw where Blizzard took it's inspiration for death, but WoW made it a million times better. Guild Wars was another MMO where the death mechanic is very frustrating.

Guild Wars won't take away your precious XP, it won't wear down your armor or weapons as there is no need at all to repair armor and weapons, in fact, there is no such option, your armor and weapons never wear and are always up and running for the next battle. Nor does it make you walk overly long distances to reach your corpse. So, if those penalties are completely nonexistant on that game, what does it make it so annoying?. When you die, you resurrect at the nearest resurrection shrine, but your stats are lowered temporaly and the only way to remove those are returning to a Post or Town or kill like a million baddies to return to your normal stats.

You're severly weakened and you may not survive the next battle, when you die again, you get even more weaker and so on and so forth until you get your stats at 60% lower than they originally were, forcing you to retreat the nearest Post or Town and battle all the way, again, killing the same baddies you already killed, if you killed any in the first place.

But also death can be rewarding, even make it part of the story itself, just look at Planescape Torment. I can't say much, because it would be a spoiler, but I'll just say that to solve something that may not have a solution at all, death is the only way to go.

 

[Dogstile]

Also, loading kind of bugs me, it's not a punitive death penalty, but with all the advances in game tech, why is it exactly we're still forced to load the game again to re-do a level/area when we fail? I not all that savvy on the technical things, but can someone explain why I have to load a save/watch the loading screen again after dying in an area that's -already- been loaded? Is there not some way to have that info. stored in some kind of temporary buffer when your character dies and make the process instantaneous?

Storing an area in a buffer would presumably (I'm not checking my facts here, i'm about to go to bed and if I check i'll research all night) make the loading screens even longer, due to having to load it and keep an extra copy. It works for small files (youtube videos) but its horrible for larger files.

Actually, this is just in theory, but I may as well think "out loud". I'm pretty sure the level would have to be held in the same state in the RAM constantly. With games trying to use up every inch of a computers capability, it's would just not be acceptable to think everyone has that space in their computer to spare.

I'm going to have to talk this one through with my computing teacher. You've peaked my curiousity

 

[Negatempest]

Well, there is a difference in death penalty for sure. But in the past is was more enjoyable for some games because they made the entire level enjoyable instead of only certain parts. When playing SMB even though the last level had **** being thrown at you from everywhere you never really thought, "God I can't believe I have to play this part again." It was more under the lines "Okay I died in the area coming up, how do I not die there again." You thought this mostly because there were patterns to see and the mistake came from you messing up, not because of the enemy AI.

Now when you play games like we have today, the AI tends to take cheap shots at us for no expected reason nor can we tell when it will come. AI could go from magically 1-shoting us with a pistol from 300 yards away. To knowing the exact moment to throw a grenade that will give the player no time to react and die.

Could you imagine playing Mega-man where the boss knew when you would jump and countered you every time. Or in Zelda where the enemy knew the second you brought your defense down and attacked. I would say that deaths have been less about the player messing up and more on how the computer AI can just **** with you. Which doesn't make gaming fun in deaths as it used to.

To me there would be a simple fix: Blame the AI. No I don't mean that it would be the games software's fault. I mean that if you took a cheap shot on the enemy in the distance and were able to place the blame on the enemy near you, you could have his own friends turn on him. There are multiple occasions in real life where a feud between two people somehow brought in the spectators as well. Turns into a messy free for all but enjoyable to watch.

 

[FaceFaceFace]

No, death penalties make games more fun. Case in point: EVE Online the game with the best pvp combat that I've ever experienced. In EVE Online when you die you lose your ship, your ship's inventory, and even some skills if you don't have an up-to-date clone. That's like if in, say, WoW every time you died the only things you'd have left would be your money and whatever is in your bank. This makes the combat amazingly pulse-pounding. The threat of real loss gives a thrill in combat that makes the experience all the more worthwhile. It's a bit like the feeling of bungee jumping.

There's another game, Vindictus, which has a different take on death penalties. In Vindictus every character has the option to resurrect themselves... for about 0.30 USD in real world money. Soloing in Vindictus thereby becomes extremely fun. $0.30 is not much but just the fact that you might lose something real gives every threatening boss fight real dramatic weight.

In every other narrative medium death is very often permanent. When a character dies in a book or film and later returns perfectly fine the book or film is met with a lot of hate (see: Highlander: Endgame) Without death resulting in real loss it's impossible for fights to have significant emotional impact.

I have to disagree with the flat "no" at the beginning of your post. When you have a legitimate threat of loss, yeah, the game is more pulse-pounding. And when you then do lose, it's decidedly unfun and you (or at least I) want to throw something, and possibly do. The moment a game stops being fun is when it fails, and in my opinion getting pissed off is unfun.

 

[Zakarath]

Well, on one heand I hate most severe death penalties... but on the other hand, I love EVE Online and its PVP combat is awesome in part because of the death penalty... putting a lot on the line can really ratchet up the intensity, and even a relatively uneventful lowsec/nullsec roam can up my heart rate a bit.

Also, on the debate about Guild Wars's penalty: It didn't really bother me. yes, the penalty could be a thorn in your side and it did provide positive feedback for defeat, which is not a good thing, but I thought it felt pretty natural and did a good job at keeping players with an incentive to avoid death in a game where the resurrections are otherwise pretty cheap and easy to come by.

 

[Orry]

On the topic of death penalties, Guild wars 2 is supposedly not going to have one past having to wait for someone to resurrect you (which anyone can do and they get a small xp bonus for doing so) or teleporting to a waypoint of your choice. In fact you get rewarded for just participating in the world events even if they fail (granted, it's a smaller reward)

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

I think they have to lighten up death penalties in games because they actually might be getting HARDER these days.


Some people like to rage that casuals are making games released these days easier, but I think that's only because death is less noticeable. Look at a game like mirror's edge or Call of Duty, if you pay attention, you might notice you die more times in games like that then in "Super Mario Brothers" or even demon souls. If they were to add a penalty to that, it would make the game near impossible to play.

I think people are claiming games are "easier" just because death isn't as noticeable now, just a simple save and load, etc. But imagine every time you die in a game like Prototype, or Call of Duty, that you had to restart the whole level over again? You probably would be throwing your controller at the TV at that point because you can't pass a certain level without checkpoints.

Not really, try going back some and have very long times in between saves, an easy to fix it is checkpoints before and after every large enemy encounter and the ability to start the area over again. Basically give me the choice of location to start from when I die and do remember what my fng equipment was.... I really hate it when a game only saves the level and no tthe location and the has the nerve to give you default equipment....

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To the op
Frankly for SP games I miss the life system, in more of a way you access check points than you dead go back to square 1.

Also death needs to work in a fashion that you simply do not want to die, IE you die you lose half of your money. Something bioshock bypassed completely a shame when a dev goes retarded like that.


For MMOs you have 2 issues at play a much longer and complicated game needs a less annoying death mechanics. I kinda liked FF11s death mechanic but for one thing when you get knocked a level you lose the ability to use that levels stuff, and that should not be, the death mechanic should focus on levels 2 levels per death under 20, 2 levels twice as much exp to gain per death under 40,ect,ect.

Tho for new games like wow:AC and such where you can level to 10 in 3-6 hours you need to start out 2 at double exp rate, the only thing that the game cares about is all the stats/bonus you gained, but to use and get powers,equipment ect,ect it sees your real numbers.

Now we can take this mechanic and add a pay off mechanic say you are tried of dredging for exp either in game money or IRL money under 4$ you can pay it all off.

The best way to pay it off is to calculate the cost of the character minus rare equipment, includes cash/items/equipment on hand or in storage, say current character costs about 2000 , so first DP is half that 1000, then anymore than 1 DP is a quarter that so if you are 4 DP in its 1750 to pay it off.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Death needs to exists as a failure to slap the players hand and say "you fail." A game need to have a failure condition or its no fun. We like to win, but winning all the time is predictable and boring. Like you hinted at in your article, its all about balance and what is appropriate to provide a punishment but not be so severe that it the player gives up. For example, lets take the (new) Prince of Persia. Lots of people complained about never being able to "die" and it being too easy. This drove them away because they felt no difficulty and incentive to try and win. Yet, I found that although you couldn't "die" you could still fail, and failure still set you back and punished the player. The punishment was light, only setting the player back a minute or two, a mechanic that seems to encourage trying again until you get it and minimize time to get back to where you fail over punishing for failing. I personally think that forcing the player to traps back through a section and redemonstrative there knowledge of obstacle they already did is pointless and like the idea of immediately putting you back to take on the challenge you lost not the ones you already know. Still, it is clear from opinion that the perception here is that there is not enough punishment and thus an empty sense of accomplishment. It's the designer's job to find the sweet spot that is between "too much, I give up" and "too little, this is boring."
It's not an easy task and clearly no one can ever be right since people and players are all different but its an important design point for any game.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

Awesome games discussion Shamus (as always) but coincidentally I've always wondered at the death penalties found in old rts genre games. Like compare Close Combat: A bridge Too Far and Dawn of War.

Every soldier, from every unit, from every theatre, had a name, rank, experience, morale, number of bullets. And this was carried into the *next battle* fought in the theatre as well in the campaign modes.

Every dead/incapacitated soldier meant the loss of that soldier, permanently from your campaign in CC: ABTF.

So do you risk that rifleman unit you've had since day 1 of Operation Marketgarden to storm that german machinegun unit that has been 'smoked' when theres a good chance it will be assaulted by a german infantry platoon hiding in the cottage on the other side of the road? Or do you all that machinegun unit to hold you up as they allow german infantry to get into defensive position for a counter attack ... inevitably losing more of your beloved troopers?

Whereas modern games such as the Dawn of War, you don't get these attachments beyond the mechanics of their presence ... the attachment to a squad of guardsman is very very low because if a guardsman dies ...? Meh ... hit train button .... done.

But in the old close combat series? A dead soldier was a dead soldier ... he will never be back, his experience is gone and will never return ... and if casualties get too high you may be forced to disband the unit permanently to make room for a more effective (albeit rookie) unit of troops.

That sort of death penalty in a game without death penalties beyond victory or defeat I always found startling.

Then there's defcon: Everybody dies ... and that's just bleak and terryfying ... no DP ../. just that knotted pit in your stomach as you see 50-60 nukes bearing on your cities and you have only 2-3 towers left and knowing that you've been utterly destroyed.

 

[Iron Lightning]

le snip

There's another game, Vindictus, which has a different take on death penalties. In Vindictus every character has the option to resurrect themselves... for about 0.30 USD in real world money. Soloing in Vindictus thereby becomes extremely fun. $0.30 is not much but just the fact that you might lose something real gives every threatening boss fight real dramatic weight.

In every other narrative medium death is very often permanent. When a character dies in a book or film and later returns perfectly fine the book or film is met with a lot of hate (see: Highlander: Endgame) Without death resulting in real loss it's impossible for fights to have significant emotional impact.

Gandalf. Didn't see the LOTR books/movies met with a lot of hate over that. Even Harry Potter in book 7

Spoiler

he dies, but comes back fine

.
And charging to come back? That's just stupid and cheap. Please tell me you can come back without paying, as that is just a TERRIBLE idea. Charging for failure + an online fee does not look like fun for me. I get "I might lose something" being fun, but charging for making a mistake is NOT A GOOD IDEA. We'll have activison charging a nickel for every online death on CoD if you want to keep playing.

Yes sir, in Vindictus if you die then you can choose just to fail the dungeon and return to town or wait for someone else to resurrect you. I'm sorry if I was unclear.

It's true that there isn't a lot of hate over the Gandalf's death and subsequent resurrection. I attribute this to the fact that it was somewhat explained and if anyone could come back from the dead it would be Gandalf. Still I know I wasn't the only one who bated an eye at Gandalf the White. It's still a lot better than when someone comes back without any explanation like in Highlander: Endgame. My point is that videogames need more dramatic weight in their combat and that can be best achieved by a significant death penalty.

 

[loc978]

Honestly, I prefer fairly harsh death penalties in MMORPGs. But I don't play 'em for community, or Skinner Box rewards... the only way I've ever had fun in any of those damn games is immersion through light role play. I'd prefer to be part of a fantastic world that tries not to break my suspension of disbelief.

 

[Iron Lightning]

No, death penalties make games more fun. Case in point: EVE Online the game with the best pvp combat that I've ever experienced. In EVE Online when you die you lose your ship, your ship's inventory, and even some skills if you don't have an up-to-date clone. That's like if in, say, WoW every time you died the only things you'd have left would be your money and whatever is in your bank. This makes the combat amazingly pulse-pounding. The threat of real loss gives a thrill in combat that makes the experience all the more worthwhile. It's a bit like the feeling of bungee jumping.

There's another game, Vindictus, which has a different take on death penalties. In Vindictus every character has the option to resurrect themselves... for about 0.30 USD in real world money. Soloing in Vindictus thereby becomes extremely fun. $0.30 is not much but just the fact that you might lose something real gives every threatening boss fight real dramatic weight.

In every other narrative medium death is very often permanent. When a character dies in a book or film and later returns perfectly fine the book or film is met with a lot of hate (see: Highlander: Endgame) Without death resulting in real loss it's impossible for fights to have significant emotional impact.

I have to disagree with the flat "no" at the beginning of your post. When you have a legitimate threat of loss, yeah, the game is more pulse-pounding. And when you then do lose, it's decidedly unfun and you (or at least I) want to throw something, and possibly do. The moment a game stops being fun is when it fails, and in my opinion getting pissed off is unfun.

While I agree with you in that receiving a death penalty can be unfun, I'm of the opinion that the risk is worth the reward. That's just my opinion, though.

 

[Noggy]

I have to agree with PaulH. Having harsh and/or permadeath penalties changes the way that you play. I'm guessing the penalties in wow are for the pvp areas, to prevent one wide from becoming nearly invulnerable if they happen to be close to a resurrection point.

It also works to make you play more conservatively even without competition. In the free mmo www.realmofthemadgod.com , you can reach the top level within a few hours... But you'll constant be paranoid trying to prevent them from permadying and probably poising all of the equipment. The agonizing situations happen when your friends are in trouble and you have to weigh preventing their deaths against loosing you own skin. In RotMG the permanent death and loss of items makes people keep coming back to what would otherwise be a pretty short game, and the item loss both prevents the game from being flooded with top tier items and encourages player to work together to save each others items from fading away (or steal the items for themselves but that's a different story).

Much like old school roguelikes, he permadeath adds depth to RotMG because it changes the way that you play. but this would not work out well for a game like WoW where each character takes an exponentially great time investment. Not to mention the pvp elements in WoW. Can you just imagine the grieving in WoW if the deaths were permanent? Players from each side would be regularly trying to wipe out the other sides' low level characters before they become a high level threat. Assassinations of high level characters would be server wide news. There would be huge arms races for to tier items. It would be a totally different game.

Actually that sounds like a cool idea for a different kind of game. It would be a lot less casual though.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Is it time to retire the death penalty in games?

No, and I'd fight to keep it.

You talk about how death is a punishment. I'd say death can also be a reward and a learning experience in itself. It just has to be handled properly.

Example: Gordon Freeman's HEV suit

You know when you're dying, you know what death will cause you, you're actually frightened of death. And you swear at the enemy rather than the death.

Same as the A.I. Director in Left 4 Dead. You swear at it, rather than the death.

BUT...in Too Human, you're stuck in treacle trying to defend yourself and then it slings in 10 seconds of "You were shit!".

That's where the problem comes, IMHSHO. Treat death with respect and it's as meaningful as it's ever been. Turn it into a fingerwag and you'll piss people off.(Unless you want to piss them off - IWBTG)

(Seriously, what would you replace Death with in IWBTG?)