Obe's RPG Epiphany

[obediah]

While commenting in the Witcher thread this morning, I realized why I hate gaming and think gamers are retarded.

To me, playing a great video game is like an interactive book.

To raving ADHD retard masses, playing a great video game is like an interactive movie, an interactive Michael Bay movie to be specific.

I want an engrossing world and characters that breathe and react to the world around them. I want a game to have parts that are tense, touching, thoughtful, etc, but I want to experience to unfold at my own pace - stopping to consider a dialog choice or combat action is akin to thinking about a difficult or compelling passage in a book. I'm comfortable with text descriptions and voiced dialog is a goofy concept.

Wii60Lover96 on the other hand, wants balls-to-the-walls andrenline rush with the best special effects evar!. Reading is straight-out, and dialog has to be short, extreme, and it better all be photorealistic, or else how is he supposed to connect? You can't pause the movie theatre, so requiring the player to stop and think about anything in the game is like splashing them with cold water and giving them a boring time out.

 

[Lesifoere]

To me, playing a great video game is like an interactive book.

Would it depress you to know that a great deal of the reading public also want the text equivalent of flashy special effects, cheesy dialogue and generally shallow, well, everything?

 

[cardtrick]

I realized while playing The Witcher that I don't want either an interactive book or an interactive movie. I want an interactive game. Between the two options, I lean more towards the book side, but gameplay above all else is paramount.

 

[obediah]

To me, playing a great video game is like an interactive book.

Would it depress you to know that a great deal of the reading public also want the text equivalent of flashy special effects, cheesy dialogue and generally shallow, well, everything?

I can enjoy a good pulp or cheesy book. I can also enjoy a cheesy story in a video game, I played through Jade Empire, the Freedom Forces, etc...

I realized while playing The Witcher that I don't want either an interactive book or an interactive movie. I want an interactive game. Between the two options, I lean more towards the book side, but gameplay above all else is paramount.

I used to think that. But I devoured Arcanum and PS:T despite not liking their gameplay at all, while ToEE which I really enjoyed sat on my hard drive for months and months and months.

Now there are some games that I play w/o a story - civ, moo(1|2), etc. Those are computerized board games, nothing like a book or movie.

 

[Hory]

...

If you want an interactive book, get a "Choose Your Own Adventure", because that's how far books got while still being books. Computerized interactive stories and universes aren't books anymore. What you want is a strong narrative that you can interact with.

I realized while playing The Witcher that I don't want either an interactive book or an interactive movie. I want an interactive game.

Then go play Tetris, because all games are interactive. What you want is a story that you can interact with.

 

[Imbecile]

Whats wrong with both? I love both reading and films, and what you say strikes me as a bit pretentious. Theres room enough for Cinematic action RPGs like Mass Effect alongside yer literary style Torments.

Admittedly the market seems to be moving towards games with a cinematic emphasis, but as graphics get more and more capable thats bound to happen. These kind of games are not intrinsically worse, but hopefully the fact that market is getting flooded by casual gamers who don't give two shits about graphics will sway developers back towards a cheaper middle ground again.

Viva la middle ground!

God its dull here

 

[obediah]

...

If you want an interactive book, get a "Choose Your Own Adventure", because that's how far books got while still being books. Computerized interactive stories and universes aren't books anymore.

Maybe you shouldn't participate in threads you don't understand. By "interactive book" I didn't only mean CYOA , and by "interactive movie" I didn't only mean Dragons Lair.

What you want is a strong narrative that you can interact with.

The sounds like what I said. But I went further to say I want to interact with the narrative in a manner more like how I read books than watch movies.

Whats wrong with both?

Other than I like one, and the market is racing towards the other? Nothing.

Theres room enough for Cinematic action RPGs like Mass Effect alongside yer literary style Torments.

That's hilarious. But you're right, someone should save the poor endangered cinematic action genre. The constant onslaught of Torment clones has them on the brink of extinction.

 

[Spec]

This may come off as a bit wierd but I think the industry is shooting itself in the foot with all of this stratification between highbrow games with slower pacing, extensive dialogue, and less attention to AV* detail vs. lowbrow games with breakneck pace, laughably shallow plots/characters, and killer AV production values.

The advances in eye and ear candy allow developers to jam more thematic/plot/character information into a short span than ever before and for the most part no one is doing it. Why not have games that are slow paced, well thought out, and expository until the excriment hits the fan and things get frantic and confusing? Don't give the player time to mull over every critical decision but instead force them to ACT!This provides for extensive post-action soul searching: what really happened when (event X happened)? How does the protagonist feel about his own actions? Did he do the right thing? Does he care? Will it come back to haunt him later?

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that slow doesn't neccissarily mean thoughtful and fast doesn't neccissarily mean shallow. The industry just seems to make it that way.

*AV=Audio Visual, this encompasses the graphical and auditory execution of the game.

 

[Imbecile]

Whats wrong with both?

Other than I like one, and the market is racing towards the other? Nothing.

Fair enough. In fact I actually agreed with you, the problem I had was the way in which you painted your perspective as uber enlightened, and the other perspective as wii60jock 192. It just isn't that black and white.

 

[Joe Krow]

Consider the market:

1. 15-25 minute play sessions= Designers pack as much as they can into as short a time frame as possible (action and graphic intensity). Objectives that take longer then thirty minutes frustrate the player as they try to "remember where they were" between sessions. Extensive journals and pop-ups are used to remind the player.

2. One play through= Why bother having branches that the majority of gamers will never discover? Rather then dividing the material into alternate paths and leaving much of it unused, designers string the sequences end to end so that the player sees almost everything; the game length is drastically increased giving it that "epic" feel (and ostensibly giving the player his moneys worth).

3. Addiction to progress= The player wants to know he is playing a "cutting edge" product. The visuals are the most obvious (and most easily implementable) aspect of this. Designers have tried incorporating todays computing power into other aspects of the game (radiant AI, advanced faction systems, etc.) but these changes have been either unsuccessful or deemed irrelevant. Designers are forced to bludgeon the player with their "newness" to get noticed. If you're playing a game they could have just as easily made for the PS2 why did you buy the PS3? The hardware market drives the software market.

We, on the other hand, don't mind the long play times, utilitarian graphics, and we often play the games we enjoy more then once. I wish I could see a light at the end of the tunnel but, unfortunately, I don't see things swinging back our way anytime soon.

 

[pug987]

I want an engrossing world and characters that breathe and react to the world around them. I want a game to have parts that are tense, touching, thoughtful, etc, but I want to experience to unfold at my own pace - stopping to consider a dialog choice or combat action is akin to thinking about a difficult or compelling passage in a book. I'm comfortable with text descriptions and voiced dialog is a goofy concept.

There are tons of older adventure games that fit this description. If you want to take it to the extreemes, there are a lot of text adventures developed every year. Many modern adventure games feature very easy puzzles so the fit more with your description of an interactive book (there are a few older adventures that are actually interactive books). The problem is that even pretty early adventures have voiced dialog, but I don't think that's a big deal. Many let you deactivate it and just read the text.

 

[obediah]

Whats wrong with both?

Other than I like one, and the market is racing towards the other? Nothing.

Fair enough. In fact I actually agreed with you, the problem I had was the way in which you painted your perspective as uber enlightened, and the other perspective as wii60jock 192. It just isn't that black and white.

Well it is all based on personal preference, so I'm not trying to be fair and balanced (TM). I may loathe halotards and beg god to kill them all every night before I go to bed, but I can't say their games are objectively "wrong" and mine are "right".

There are tons of older adventure games that fit this description.

I've got a bunch of adventure games on my to-play list. I kinda skipped over the whole genre the past 20+ years to focus on rpg and strategy games, so now I'd like to go back and run through them. The first and last adventure game I seriously tried was Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy when I was a kid. I never even came close to beating it. I was stuck forever because I didn't know people "lie" rather than "lay" down, and I never figured out the babelfish.

 

[Keldorn]

I like FO1&2, and to a slightly lesser extent BG2, because of the dialogue & interaction with a very diverse number of NPC's. Sometimes you converse with a gullible twit, so easy to manipulate and lie to. Other times, you tremble as you ponder what to say to a ruthlessly independent mind and stubborn will which you know will commence thrashing you as soon as you instigate the slightest degree of irritation.

Keldorn LIKES it like that.

And btw, the Codex has a touch of that "teetering on the edge of pissing someone off" feeling as well, which of course, makes this place the most dynamic forum on the planet.

And if you disagree, then you are WRONG.

 

[Lord Chambers]

Keldorn LIKES it like that.

And thanks to Keldorn and Jedi, The Codex: now with 80% more crazy!!

 

[dagorkan]

I too would like more text, as long as it isn't Biowhorian text which leads nowhere. In that case I'd prefer full video and audio because it's less painful and there's usually a skip button when nothing important is said.

Voiced dialog is OK in a few games which are focussed on a specific story, action/adventure hybrids like Vampire which you're not going to play twice and which want to impress a particular setting and atmosphere on you.

But most RPGs should focus on gameplay and should be text-based apart from the occasional cut-scene maybe.

 

[Keldorn]

Keldorn LIKES it like that.

And thanks to Keldorn and Jedi, The Codex: now with 80% more crazy!!

Excuse me, Lord, but may I simply state that I reject being lumped in with Jedi. Jedi is generally much more amicable than I, and I am much more spiritually and mentally grounded than Jedi, due mainly to my galloping intellect, my unique ability to conversationally pummel people, and my unyielding faith (in myself, of course).

But do remember how I started off the previous paragraph, I was quite humble, indeed. I am quite modest, actually, this is undeniable.


I *never* brag.

 

[Keldorn]

I too would like more text, as long as it isn't Biowhorian text which leads nowhere. In that case I'd prefer full video and audio because it's less painful and there's usually a skip button when nothing important is said.

Voiced dialog is OK in a few games which are focussed on a specific story, action/adventure hybrids like Vampire which you're not going to play twice and which want to impress a particular setting and atmosphere on you.

But most RPGs should focus on gameplay and should be text-based apart from the occasional cut-scene maybe.

There was definitely some misleading dialogue options throughout BG1&2 as well as other Bioware games. Multiple dialogue paths to the same destination just for the sake of providing multiple paths is rather redundant, wasteful, dishonest and uncreative. To repeat : multiple dialogue paths to the same destination just for the sake of providing multiple paths is rather redundant, wasteful, dishonest and uncreative.

I am weary of voiced dialogue because it tends to eat up the budget. Except when it occurs minimally, such as in the introductory statements/greetings of NPC's, and with the most prominent NPC's.

Worst of all, would be a combination of recycled universal dialogue (as spewed in Morrowind & Oblivion), combined with high salary voice actors doing multiple takes for meaningless lines in FP eye candy clickfests (which I anticipate for FO3).

Bethesda writers and designers should really play Planescape:Torment, Fallout 1 & 2, Ultima 4-7, The Realms Of Arkania Trilogy, Betrayal At Krondor and Darklands so that they may be equipped *with* and be aware *of* options beyond shallow and flashy hype-type (tripe).

But RPG fans are picky bitches when it comes to dialogue. The modern FPS eye candy clickfest crowd simply hates it (because it doesn't adrenalate them), the truly literate/highbrow/grammatically obsessive types dismiss it as garbage art (AKA "garbart"), and the rest are indifferent.

I'm actually going to go out on an optimistic limb here, and predict that Dragon Age and The Broken Hourglass will have some of the best interactive dialogue *DYNAMISM* in the history of CRPG's.

 

[Andhaira]

@Obe:
You could always play a text based rpg. That would have the nice side effect of keeping you off these forums.

 

[Destroid]

@Obe:
You could always play a text based rpg.

My thoughts precisely. Also, if you have ever read teen fiction (of any genre) then you know why most modern games have crappy shallow stories.

 

[Hory]

@Obe:
You could always play a text based rpg. That would have the nice side effect of keeping you off these forums.

And where would he find text-based RPGs?

 

[obediah]

@Obe:
You could always play a text based rpg. That would have the nice side effect of keeping you off these forums.

That means a lot coming from someone that just recommended FFX.

 

[Squeek]

Consider the market: 3. Addiction to progress... The hardware market drives the software market.

That's right. The other points are good too, but that's it more than anything else.

It's advances in chip-level technology. We're seeing the kind of games we're seeing because Intel, AMD, Nvidia and ATI keep producing better and better chips; and game developers are struggling to keep pace with them.

The thing is, those of us who work in the hardware business know that it's a mistake to expect technology to drive markets all by itself. That's the old-school way of looking at it, the way IBM saw it back in the day.

So here we are at The Codex, trying to figure out and agree on what the heck's wrong.

The solution is to take the emphasis off of using the PC as a tool for graphical interpretation and start emphasizing its value as a tool for collaborative storytelling, one that can effectively evaluate the complexities of imaginary worlds with asserted realities.

 

[dagorkan]

@Obe:
You could always play a text based rpg. That would have the nice side effect of keeping you off these forums.

And where would he find text-based RPGs?

I think it was The Great God Pan... or possibly Human Shield who once recommended a bunch of them, he gave me a list a year or so ago.

There was also one CYA game you could play in a browser.

I don't have any of the bookmarks anymore, were on my old computer just do a search for Interactive fiction.

edit: OK here is something, http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic ... d726b0d689

 

[TheLostOne]

Skimmed the topic, but didn't find any links to finished text based rpgs. Really interested in seeing if any decent examples are out there.

 

[cardtrick]

Er . . . Darklands, kinda.