Warren Spector: Games Focus Too Much on Combat and Graphics

[Tiswas]

Epic Mickey's only problem for me was that combat was abysmal. Although part of the blame is the Wii-Mote.

 

[Rad Party God]

Well, Spector is right, but I don't take him seriously by making Epic Mickey a horrible and awful game. Ironically, it had great graphics, but an awful gameplay. I liked the story, but still I think story isn't everything.

Just look at Minecraft, that game doesn't have a bit of story or lore or anything and it's graphics aren't certainly the best I've seen, it's just pure and simple gameplay with lots and lots of exploration, among (a lot of) other things.

 

[Dexiro]

But storytelling is something that other mediums can do...It's nice to have a good story in games. But we really should focus on the core mechanics of running, jumping, fighting, and exploring. Things that other mediums can't deliver.

Or perhaps focus on telling stories through running, jumping, fighting, and exploring.

Games can tell stories in a way no other medium can, its just very few ever actually take advantage of it.

I think what you basically mean is focus more on interactivity, but the article did mention improving the interactive aspects of storytelling.

Things like exploration, taking things at your own pace to take in more layers of detail, and forging your own story through non-linearity and conversations. These are all things that we should be focusing on, just as much as the more action-orientated interactivity.

 

[Wolfram23]

While I do agree somewhat, I think one issue to be brought up is that a lot of these AAA developers are making their own game engines - Frostbite 3 for the new Battle Field, CryEngine 3 for Crysis 2, and I don't even know how many others. There's really only one engine I know of that seems pretty universally used and that is the Unreal engine, which personally I don't like as it favors the grey brown gritty shooters and also doesn't really support Anti Aliasing (none of the PC ports using it have AA).

What I'm getting at is that these companies developing high tech game engines should really RELEASE the damn things so that other stuidios/developers can skip all the bullshit and get nice graphics right off the bat, then they can all focus on what really matters - the gameplay elements including story.

 

[bojac6]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

And I resent this guy for bitching about how CONVERSATION could be so well done. No shit it can be. Do you even pay attention to what Bioware tries to do. Until you've made something better than Dragon Age, Or Mass Effect, Shut the fuck up .

But he did make something better than Dragon Age (I hesitate to say it's better than Mass Effect, but it's up there): Deus Ex. The open choices, the dialogue trees, the non-combat solutions, it was all there in Deus Ex in 1999.

And I disagree entirely that combat = gameplay. Look at an RTS, gameplay is 90% resource management. Look at AC: Brotherhood multiplayer, there is almost no "combat" in it at all. There's a few one hit kill buttons, but the vast majority of gameplay is centered around hiding, blending in, and positioning. And that's a multiplayer game. If you want a combat centric game, like Bad Company or Halo, sure, almost all of gameplay is about combat and there's nothing wrong with that. But I think Spector has a point that we could have games, big Triple-A games, that have deep and well executed gameplay mechanics besides cover and shooting.

Finally, did Mass Effect 2 have a higher level of immersion than 1, because it had better graphics? Is Halo Reach the easiest Halo game to become immersed in? Because it has the best graphics. MW 2 had much better graphics than BC2, but BC2 had destructible environments, which has better immersion? I get bored by Gran Turismo and Forza, but will play Mariokart 64 for hours. I just don't see a connection between good graphics and good game quality. Graphics so poor that you can't tell what you are doing can ruin a game, certainly. But the industry moved past that over a decade ago. Does the square heads and stretched out faces of the original GoldenEye make it a worse game than any of the newer, photo-realistic games coming out? Would an exact remake of GoldenEye in the graphics of Black Ops make it a better game? Or would it just be exactly the same?

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

But storytelling is something that other mediums can do...It's still nice to have a good story in games. But I don't think that storytelling should become the focus on the future of this medium.

We really should focus on the core mechanics of the thrills of running, jumping, fighting, and exploring. Things that other mediums can't deliver.

Story should take a backseat to gameplay.

I am sad to hear this. If we ever want to be accepted by the main stream than we need to move away from explotions and sammy FPS games and actualy have story

I'm not saying me need expolsions and stuff.

I'm looking at games like Okami and Psychonauts.

Gameplay driven, with the story being there, but far from the most important part.

 

[Albino Boo]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

And I resent this guy for bitching about how CONVERSATION could be so well done. No shit it can be. Do you even pay attention to what Bioware tries to do. Until you've made something better than Dragon Age, Or Mass Effect, Shut the fuck up .

I suggest you go and play system shock or deus ex and you will find that 90% of the game play elements that are in mass effect were defined in those games. Spector's work pretty much defend the game play mechanics for the space shooter (Wing Commander), scifi fps (Deus Ex System shock) and stealth mechanics (thief). Pretty much all of Biowares output relies ideas he first implemented. However from your rather silly rant I gather most of these games came out before you were born, so your ignorance is some what forgiveable.

 

[eelel]

But storytelling is something that other mediums can do...It's still nice to have a good story in games. But I don't think that storytelling should become the focus on the future of this medium.

We really should focus on the core mechanics of the thrills of running, jumping, fighting, and exploring. Things that other mediums can't deliver.

Story should take a backseat to gameplay.

I am sad to hear this. If we ever want to be accepted by the main stream than we need to move away from explotions and sammy FPS games and actualy have story

I'm not saying me need expolsions and stuff.

I'm looking at games like Okami and Psychonauts.

Gameplay driven, with the story being there, but far from the most important part.

Game play elements when done well are important. I agree with you there but with out story to go along with that you would just have a boring game with some interesting game play. So the story is just as important as game play elements.

 

[WingedFortress]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

But does gameplay always have to be combat? Spector is grumbling about that sort of tunnel-vision, that designers are sticking too much to "blow 'em up" games with ever-more ludicrous gibs.* There is more to gameplay than weapons and armour.

-- Steve

*That being said, I'm having a blast in Fallout: New Vegas and the VATS slo-mo is a lot of fun in it. Then again, there always has been a lot more to the Fallout series' gameplay than just the fighting.

Ok - I could accept that interpretation of the article. However, given his recent history with Epic Mickey, I feel obligated to point out that if your game chooses to include combat and graphics as a driving force of the overall experience, they should hold up to a certain standard.

All in all though, I agree with your sentiment completely. The emphasis of pure combat over simple action has led alot of games down a pretty bad path, and I for one will always find the the simple joys of precision jumping infinitely more satisfying than running and gunning.

 

[dibblywibbles]

the only games I get truly immersed in are ones with at least a decent story. if the gameplay sucks then I won't play it either. give me an epic rpg over a shooter anyday. that being said, sometimes I don't give a shit about a story and just want to bash somethings head in or shoot someone in the face. it's rare where you can strike a balance between the two, but there are a few games that make it happen. for games that dialog is a part of the game the biggest problem for me is there's rarely an option for what I really want to say. letting me use my own words would be the only way I could find dialog more compelling than what I see in games already. and I'm pretty sure that would be hard as hell to do.

 

[eelel]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

And I resent this guy for bitching about how CONVERSATION could be so well done. No shit it can be. Do you even pay attention to what Bioware tries to do. Until you've made something better than Dragon Age, Or Mass Effect, Shut the fuck up .

Mass Effect is a good game I like it a lot but the problum with those games is that while the conversations have an effect on the game you can't chose to be totaly diplomatic. I am tired of games where the only option is to blow shit up all the time with no diplomatic option. That is part of the reason immersion is broken for me. The only option we seem to have is to blow shit up and kill people.

 

[archvile93]

But storytelling is something that other mediums can do...It's still nice to have a good story in games. But I don't think that storytelling should become the focus on the future of this medium.

We really should focus on the core mechanics of the thrills of running, jumping, fighting, and exploring. Things that other mediums can't deliver.

Story should take a backseat to gameplay.

I am sad to hear this. If we ever want to be accepted by the main stream than we need to move away from explosions and sammy FPS games and actualy have story

True, but you have to be very careful when doing that. I've seen games before where I swear the developers must have said.

"Okay let's make a great story driven game."
"What about the gameplay parts?"
"Just throw them out the window."

While I do agree somewhat, I think one issue to be brought up is that a lot of these AAA developers are making their own game engines - Frostbite 3 for the new Battle Field, CryEngine 3 for Crysis 2, and I don't even know how many others. There's really only one engine I know of that seems pretty universally used and that is the Unreal engine, which personally I don't like as it favors the grey brown gritty shooters and also doesn't really support Anti Aliasing (none of the PC ports using it have AA).

What I'm getting at is that these companies developing high tech game engines should really RELEASE the damn things so that other stuidios/developers can skip all the bullshit and get nice graphics right off the bat, then they can all focus on what really matters - the gameplay elements including story.

But, but if they do that, the CEOs will only be able to afford six huge mansions instead of the eight they need to survive. How can you do that to them? sarcasm/

 

[eelel]

But storytelling is something that other mediums can do...It's still nice to have a good story in games. But I don't think that storytelling should become the focus on the future of this medium.

We really should focus on the core mechanics of the thrills of running, jumping, fighting, and exploring. Things that other mediums can't deliver.

Story should take a backseat to gameplay.

I am sad to hear this. If we ever want to be accepted by the main stream than we need to move away from explosions and sammy FPS games and actualy have story

True, but you have to be very careful when doing that. I've seen games before where I swear the developers must have said.

"Okay let's make a great story driven game."
"What about the gameplay parts?"
"Just throw them out the window."

You do have a point there that I totaly agree with

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

Modern games completely ignore one of the main aspects that made older games immersive; management. Inventory management, time management, party composition, loot allocation, meaningful leveling choices.

System Shock 2 had a tetris inventory and you could spend your limited "leveling" points to increase your inventory space if that was a priority for you.

IMO Bioshock wasn't as good of a game as it could have been because the consolization process explicitly removed almost all of the management activities.

 

[WingedFortress]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

And I resent this guy for bitching about how CONVERSATION could be so well done. No shit it can be. Do you even pay attention to what Bioware tries to do. Until you've made something better than Dragon Age, Or Mass Effect, Shut the fuck up .

But he did make something better than Dragon Age (I hesitate to say it's better than Mass Effect, but it's up there): Deus Ex. The open choices, the dialogue trees, the non-combat solutions, it was all there in Deus Ex in 1999.

And I disagree entirely that combat = gameplay. Look at an RTS, gameplay is 90% resource management. Look at AC: Brotherhood multiplayer, there is almost no "combat" in it at all. There's a few one hit kill buttons, but the vast majority of gameplay is centered around hiding, blending in, and positioning. And that's a multiplayer game. If you want a combat centric game, like Bad Company or Halo, sure, almost all of gameplay is about combat and there's nothing wrong with that. But I think Spector has a point that we could have games, big Triple-A games, that have deep and well executed gameplay mechanics besides cover and shooting.

Finally, did Mass Effect 2 have a higher level of immersion than 1, because it had better graphics? Is Halo Reach the easiest Halo game to become immersed in? Because it has the best graphics. MW 2 had much better graphics than BC2, but BC2 had destructible environments, which has better immersion? I get bored by Gran Turismo and Forza, but will play Mariokart 64 for hours. I just don't see a connection between good graphics and good game quality. Graphics so poor that you can't tell what you are doing can ruin a game, certainly. But the industry moved past that over a decade ago. Does the square heads and stretched out faces of the original GoldenEye make it a worse game than any of the newer, photo-realistic games coming out? Would an exact remake of GoldenEye in the graphics of Black Ops make it a better game? Or would it just be exactly the same?

Deus Ex is a credit to Spector, no doubt. I simply found it agitating that Spector seems to be lashing out on the entire industry after getting panned for a pretty mediocre game. Acting like no one in the industry is trying to push conversation to realistic medium is ignorant - because so many people are trying.

And as I said above, I *agree* the combat shouldnt equal gameplay in every regard. My post was more a comment on Spectors attitude lately than the industry as a whole.

Although I should mention that graphics shouldnt be pigeon holed as simply bigger and badder pixels. Mario Kart is gorgeous, and executed with precision. No wonder you find it more entertaining than Gran Turismo(Although lets be honest, you might just be running purely on personal preference there). Graphics will always be a staple in the immersive experience of videogames, not the be all to end all, but an important part. Like c'mon, I kinda liked that on top of all the cool things Mass Effect 2 was offering, it was prettier to boot.

 

[Woodsey]

Do you know what really detracts from a great game? Shit graphics.

There. I admit it. I am a whore and the graphics card my pimp - whatever, but that's how it is, and I think that's how it is for a lot of people whether they admit it or not.

 

[WingedFortress]

Spector, your gonna become a household joke if your not careful. For alot of gamers, COMBAT(Or - GAMEPLAY) is the whole reason we're buying a game, and graphics, well like was said above, it only adds to immersion.

And I resent this guy for bitching about how CONVERSATION could be so well done. No shit it can be. Do you even pay attention to what Bioware tries to do. Until you've made something better than Dragon Age, Or Mass Effect, Shut the fuck up .

I suggest you go and play system shock or deus ex and you will find that 90% of the game play elements that are in mass effect were defined in those games. Spector's work pretty much defend the game play mechanics for the space shooter (Wing Commander), scifi fps (Deus Ex System shock) and stealth mechanics (thief). Pretty much all of Biowares output relies ideas he first implemented. However from your rather silly rant I gather most of these games came out before you were born, so your ignorance is some what forgiveable.

Pah. Look past your own nerd rage and get that I was commenting on spectors attitude after everyone realized Epic Mickey was bullshit. Instead of acting humble, and admitting he over hyped it, he's just spouting off at how no one else is much better.

Also, get over yourself. And be thankful I don't assume everything about you after one post.

 

[CatmanStu]

You've got to love the gamer community sometimes; the only 'fans' who will tear down a lifetime of exceptional achievement because of one AVERAGE game. I have nothing but respect for WS; he helped create Deus Ex over a decade ago and single player RPG's have hardly moved since. The industry needs people like him and Peter Molyneux.

To elaborate on comments I made back when the 'disappointment' of Fable was being widely voiced:

If you aim for the ceiling, you'll never leave your room; if you aim for the stars, the universe is your playground.

 

[WanderingFool]

I give the guy credit for the games he did in the past (save SystemShock, but thats my own personal preference), But this guy should just keep his mouth shut.