Editorial BioWare says: Don't innovate, just give me more Elves PLZ!

[DarkUnderlord]

Tags: BioWare

<a href="http://au.gamespot.com/news/6157385.html?sid=6157385">There's an interesting article up on GameSpot</a> about BioWare lead combat designer Damion Schubert. It focuses mainly on MMO's but it's all about innovation (or the lack there-of) in games and it explains why combat has such prevalence in games today. I call it <a href="http://au.gamespot.com/news/6157385.html?sid=6157385">The Lazy Game Developer's Guide to Making Games</a>:
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<blockquote>Schubert says the key is to innovate smartly, choosing a handful of specific areas to key in on. He singled out a pair of points World of Warcraft lead designer Rob Pardo made in his Austin Game Conference keynote address. Specifically, Schubert praised the game's polish, saying it was "the first game in our genre that didn't release in an absolutely shameful state as far as connectivity, replayability, et cetera."</blockquote>
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<b>Step 1:</b> Games should work. The innovashun! The wonder! Why, who would have thought gamers want games that *actually work* out of the box? <i>The mind boggles!</i>
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<blockquote>He also emphasized that it flew in the face of industry convention by letting people reach the highest levels even if they chose to play through it entirely on their own.
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"WOW comes along and says, 'Hey you know what? The problem with MMOs is sometimes your friends aren't [online] and everyone else is an idiot,'" Schubert noted.</blockquote>
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<b>Step 2:</b> If it's an MMO, remove any and all aspects of the MM part. That's innovation for you right there folks.
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<blockquote>It's difficult enough making sure that each set of unique class abilities aren't overly powerful when combined and mixed. With World of Warcraft's handful of classes, Schubert said it would be relatively easy to add another class and balance it against the existing character types. Schubert said if a developer were to add a new skill to a system without class limits, the problem would not be easily solved.
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"You basically have to compare a billion possible combinations to a billion other possible combinations," Schubert said. "Classes help keep that under control." </blockquote>
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<b>Step 3:</b> Keep your gamers in a neatly confined box. It makes all that hard thinking work easier.
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<blockquote>As a game mechanic, experience points reward devotion over skill, Schubert said. That's particularly fitting for MMO games, as the current subscription-based business model requires devotion to make money. And as he said, the problem with skill is that "not a lot of players have it."</blockquote>
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<b>Step 4:</b> Make your game really, really easy by removing any and all challenge what-so-ever (Well, I guess that explains Oblivion then).
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<blockquote>"The thing about fantasy games is that people know what they are almost universally," Schubert said.
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He pointed to two Sid Meier games, Alpha Centauri and Civilization IV, as being a pair of similar games with wildly different settings. He asked the audience how many people played the sci-fi Alpha Centauri for 15 minutes and then longed to be playing a historical Civilization game instead.
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"It's pretty much the same game mechanic, but we know what the wheel is," Schubert said. "We understand what the railroad is. We get that intuitively, whereas Alpha Centauri was trying to teach us all these terms in this fiction that they created."</blockquote>
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<b>Step 5:</b> Save yourself lots of work by just sticking to Elves. Yes, just because someone decided to make an Elf game all those years ago, we're stuck with them now. It's familiar! It's what you want! Why bother creating your own game universe? That stuff's hard!
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<blockquote>Both the film Stargate and its TV adaptation, which are already being turned into an MMO game, feature an archeologist main character who can't do anything in combat and gets captured a lot. Schubert said one of the developers on the game confided to him that one of the team's biggest challenges was to deliver a Stargate experience that feels like Stargate without that character.</blockquote>
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<b>Step 6:</b> When dealing with a non-combat game, just turn it into a complete combat game. One wonders how The Sims managed to get through production without becoming "Household Argument Simulator". Oh wait, that's maybe because they had <i>real</i> innovashun?
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<b>Step 7:</b> Don't confide in anyone at BioWare unless you want your great innovashun leaked to GameSpot.
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<blockquote>"I'm not saying don't innovate," Schubert emphasized. "I'm really not... but I really want you guys to be sure that you're not over-innovating, that you're not going out of bounds. Be sure that your innovations are things that players want."</blockquote>
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<b>Step 8:</b> Don't "over-innovate" and make sure to stay "within the bounds" of what-every-other-game-has-done-before-you. You wouldn't want to "over-innovate" like Alpha Centauri, Myst or The Sims (the highest selling PC game of all time) did, would you now?
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Thanks <b>Dmitron</b>!

 

[Zomg]

I think MMO developers are right at parity with pornographers in the fast-growing field of cynical pandering.

 

[Elwro]

Vogel had some pessimistic thoughts about innovation, too...

edit: and here's a guy with some really strange thoughts about open-ended games. Basically, Oblivion made his poor mind explode.

 

[Jon]

here's

an article by someone who thinks everything should be exactly the way he wants it because it just isn't possible that people look for other things in a game than that which he does.

open-ended games

It is really just about Oblivion but it apparently it isn't PC to speak ill of Bethesda in the gaming press so he has to damn a whole genre to get his point across.

 

[7th Circle]

Re: BioWare says: Don't innovate, just give me more Elves PL

He pointed to two Sid Meier games, Alpha Centauri and Civilization IV, as being a pair of similar games with wildly different settings. He asked the audience how many people played the sci-fi Alpha Centauri for 15 minutes and then longed to be playing a historical Civilization game instead.

"It's pretty much the same game mechanic, but we know what the wheel is," Schubert said. "We understand what the railroad is. We get that intuitively, whereas Alpha Centauri was trying to teach us all these terms in this fiction that they created."

FFS, that was one of the great things about AC. It was an interesting spin on the civilisation-style gameplay and I really appreciated that the creativity and effort involved in developing a somewhat coherent futuristic tech tree.

But lately, one of the current industry-wide objectives is to find a way to capture and engross the "casual gamer" and turn them onto playing video games. Oblivion failed to do that on every account.

So, Oblivion wasn't dumbed down enough for the casual gamer? I don't know what I find it scarier - that someone might think that or that their thoughts might correspond to reality.

 

[The_Pope]

The biggest thing I don't get is the contrast between the internet response when Bethesda and EA do the exact same thing.

EA multiplatform - Dumbing Down
Bethesda - OMG STFU ELITIST

EA Microtransactions - Ripping you off
Bethesda - NO WUN IS FORCING U TO BUY IT

EA Bugs - Half assed QA
Bethesda - THE GAEM IS 2 BIG 2 TEST

EA Celebrity voices - adds nothing to gameplay
Bethesda - OMG PATRICK STEWART!!1!

EA makes LOTR Game - Shameless movie cash in
Bethesda turns tamriel into middle earth - IMMERSHUN

EA ignores fans of its IP - Corporate evil
Bethesda - COMPANIEZ NEED 2 MAEK MONEYZ LOLZ

 

[HotSnack]

Re: BioWare says: Don't innovate, just give me more Elves PL

And as he said, the problem with skill is that "not a lot of players have it."

Them players sure are a crazy bunch. Anyone who has ever played an online fps knows the majority of players suck arse, and yet those guys keep on logging in every night.

Step 6: When dealing with a non-combat game, just turn it into a complete combat game. One wonders how The Sims managed to get through production without becoming "Household Argument Simulator". Oh wait, that's maybe because they had real innovashun?

The list of problematic adaptations the guy runs through was altogether pretty funny. God forbid we put the circle in the circle hole, no, let's just keep shoving it into the square hole until it mangles into shape, while ignoring the fact that the setting was popular when it was originally a circle. If this guy were told to make a Spiderman game, he'd probably cut web swinging as the physics were just to hard.

 

[elander_]

Its just usual obcession for the casual gamer and the 10 year old gamer who hasn't played too much games and needs little chalenge to have fun. When you read "innuvatun" it's all about making as much money as you can with the most simple gameplay possible.

 

[Leo Valesko]

The only thing why I even bother reading previews of NWN2 is a Toolset.

Nothing Else Matters.

 

[elander_]

The Toolset is the way game devs have of apologising themlseves for not doing decent games. If you want to play a game with some decent gameplay wait for mods to create some or to fix the game for hardcore players. Which sometimes is completely impossible.

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

The Toolset is the way game devs have of apologising themlseves for not doing decent games. If you want to play a game with some decent gameplay wait for mods to create some or to fix the game for hardcore players. Which sometimes is completely impossible.

As I recall, NWN's focus was on modability-ness from the start.

 

[Claw]

edit: and here's a guy with some really strange thoughts about open-ended games. Basically, Oblivion made his poor mind explode.

Actually, he has good points, but difficulty putting them together. For instance, he first seems to complain about the length of games and the amount of content - too much, apparently. But when he start comparing GTA III and Oblivion, he gets to the real issue: The gameplay (in games like Oblivion) isn't fun.
I doubt he had more time each day to play GTA III, and I doubt it's a short game or that he viewed the content "as an obstacle" as he put it earlier. He didn't finish is quickly as the complaint about aiming for "100+ hours of gameplay" earlier seemed to suggest. The fact of the matter is, he always came back for more because it was fun to play.

I find his point about providing distractions interesting, because it presents a link between many small elements I like in games. Attention to detail, elements not relevant to the central plot, like baking bread in Ultima VII, interactive objects in Gothic.
I think the lesson is that content doesn't need to be "relevant" to some larger goal in a game, it needs to be self-sufficient.

 

[Balor]

Fortunately, NWN2 was pried from shaking hands of Bioware. It's develped by Obsidian, and THOSE guys have potential.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

Yea balor, but what are they doing with that potential?

 

[Balor]

Well, it sounds rather good so far. But so was Oblivion... we'll see, I guess.

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

Yea balor, but what are they doing with that potential?

Well, JE Sawyer at least seems to be pissed off because he has to make games which will appeal to the "casual gamer" and not the "hardkoar" crowd. It's a shame.

 

[Balor]

Well, a good RPG does not have to be 'teh hardkore!". Take Witcher - it does look like a good RPG that is not all that hardcore and pretty accessable at once.
We'll see... can't help being an optimist.

 

[jiujitsu]

That was one sorry ass article. For all the reasons DU already pointed out.

 

[Bradylama]

Funny. After Alpha Centauri I couldn't play another Civilization game again.

 

[kris]

I think MMO developers are right at parity with pornographers in the fast-growing field of cynical pandering.

Yeah, except the MMO:ers bite on your cock and then put it in the meatgrinder.

 

[Direwolf]

Funny. After Alpha Centauri I couldn't play another Civilization game again.

Fuck Alpha Centauri. I am still waiting for my Master of Magic 2.

 

[Twinfalls]

"It's pretty much the same game mechanic, but we know what the wheel is," Schubert said. "We understand what the railroad is. We get that intuitively, whereas Alpha Centauri was trying to teach us all these terms in this fiction that they created."

From what infernal fountain have these glib, cynical fuckers seeped into the gaming industry? Creativity and challenge-seeking used to be hallmarks of game coders and designers.

 

[psycojester]

We generally call that place the corporate world Twinfalls

 

[Sentenza]

"innovashun"? What the hell?

 

[OccupatedVoid]

I hope that there's innovation and not "INNOVASHUN!!!!111one" in NWN2.