Cl_Flushentityhero

Which reasons are these? Well, the moves are all mocapped, so with the amount of time spent in the studio it seems unlikely that they would have a plethora of different strikes and only one takedown for each situation (armed/unarmed front/back). Martial Artists also tend to know a variety of takedowns, and many like to show them off. Add to that that the CQC is it's own skill and level progression is supposed to grant new combos etc., and it seems like too significant a portion of the game to skimp on visually. Ao2 and K&L didn't even have much in the way of mechanics governing CQC, it was just something you used when you ended up too close. In the case of AP it's a "weapon" skill with its own progression like pistols and assault rifles. That's just my edumacated guesswork though, Sawyer might step in at any moment to tell us (hint hint).

I can think of a few offhand that had good variety: Army of Two, Bourne Conspiracy, Kane & Lynch, Dead to Rights. I would be shocked if AP didn't have at least a few different ones though. I also don't think it will be an issue, albeit for different reasons.

Mocapping more realistic animations would've been a pretty simple step if they so chose, but what's done is done and that wasn't my point. Not sure if you all read Bullock's original post, but he was talking about the theory of making a realistic fighting game, not AP specifically.

I don't think that's any more true for unarmed fighting than it is for shooting or playing baseball. Every interface is dumbed-down. Edit: figuring out what is "authentic" in the first place is a challenge by itself. Separate from that, I think the problem of mocapping animations etc. is very doable. I did not say a realistic fighting game would be easy or a cash cow, I said it could potentially be doable and fun.

Short version: would it be an incredibly ambitious and difficult work to do such a game? You bet. I wouldn't call it impossible or doomed to fail though. I dunno, sounds like fun to me. Should I get examined? I can see how it would be technically very demanding to make such a game. That said, the barriers aren't that different in concept from those one would face making the great authentic shooter, or the ultimate golf game. I'm definitely hoping that over time the industry will make baby steps though. A first move in fighting might be general adherence to the laws of physics (no juggling, etc), then toning down the moves to look a little less over-the-top (or rather to coincide with actual moves), then designing a "meta game" that more closely resembles real dynamics than something arbitrary that developers invented. As with any genre, there is unlikely to ever be a definitive game that does everything. That said, whether it's shooting people or punching them, I think realism is a somewhat neglected source of methods for balancing gameplay. Even "the most authentic" game of any sort is really cherry picked realistic considerations used for balancing a meta-game that somewhat resembles real-life analysis of the actual event. I would say Fight Night 3 does pretty much that for the sport of boxing. It's not that there isn't more *to* boxing than Fight Night portrays, it's that they managed to find the right elements to create an enjoyable experience for which the overall strategy is at least recognizable to fans of the sport. I'd go so far as to say that for any unarmed attack, there exists some kind of effective counter that could be coded into the game. Whether the counter is known or employed depends on a lot of things, many of which go beyond two guys simply squaring off with fists at the ready. So, like anything else, fighting is complicated. If you throw it into the social settings, dominance hierarchies, and motives surrounding real fighting, it gets even more involved. As far as giving players complete control over their character's body, that's (as you say) beyond today's game tech. Since that's a given, the degree of player control beyond that is something that's negotiated on a per title (and situational) basis. For a pure shooter, it suffices to have a single button press lead to a canned animation of a CQC "fight." In this instance, the CQC is as authentic as the mocap actors decide to make it. For a game like Fight Night, something as subtle as being able to control the angle of your punches is central to gameplay. It's arguably important in a real fight as well. Still, the key is to maintain an ideal level of control for the player while still representing the most important realistic considerations. There is a difference between having players play out a fight that looks realistic and having them pay attention to all the things a fighter might. From there it's just a matter of finding the right middle ground. You're not sacrificing realism so much as automating realistic things that can't be handled by current interfaces. In that sense, the game almost becomes commentary of a sort, but commentary where the audience is at least thinking "well, yeah, that could potentially happen." The magnum opus of violent video games, IMO, would be a title that integrated the social, political, and cultural aspects of violence with gameplay mechanics and plot that fit into the world the game attempts to occupy. In itself, it would be both a commentary on the state of the world and on the state of gaming. A reasonably authentic fighting game need not be that, but it would be something you would need to tap into in doing a game about street violence (or an espionage CRPG). If you just wanted a tournament fighting game with no rules, you could mostly avoid the social/cultural stuff and still do a lot of innovation in the genre. The latter might even lead to the former.

Is reality actually all that unbalanced? Even within the rather limited arena of MMA, you can see a variety of techniques and strategies employed successfully. MMA is not a real fight. MMA has a ton of rules that allow fighters to actually have careers of any length. Which means you see even *more* viable techniques in a real fight. Again, what are the balance issues?

It's possible they did, though I'll believe it when I see it.

Exploration?

Is reality actually all that unbalanced? Even within the rather limited arena of MMA, you can see a variety of techniques and strategies employed successfully.

I don't think people will accuse them of being the same. I think ME's dialogue interface is the standard upon which AP's will be judged, which is why I said it would be an easy win for AP. For clarification, when I say 'compare' I do mean 'accuse of ripping off.' I suppose certain politically correct gaming journalists use the terms interchangeably, but that's damned annoying.

And, ironically, in doing so, he compares them.

So, you don't think most people will compare the two at all?

The concept is similar: attempt to boil down options to the essence of the response without telling the player the particulars, and also include skill-based dialogue options. I think both systems attempt to make the dialogue feel more "alive" and less like interactive fiction. This involves forcing the player to make a decision based on incomplete information. Hopefully, what information AP *does* provide on your choices will be useful.

ME is waaay more popular though.

The dialogue system will no doubt be compared to Mass Effect. That said, given that the Mass Effect dialogue system was not as exciting as it was cracked up to be, AP should have a pretty easy win there.

How is it "certainly" so?

I personally go the other way. Delivering a perfect shot and having it not affect the enemy is a pet peeve of mine. Having to repeatedly pump headshots into an enemy to make them go down is just not satisfying to me. It also makes no sense and breaks any sort of continuity in the world (continuity like a 9mm hollow point is a 9mm hollow point). If some lowly thug shoots you between the eyes, you glare at him and punch him in the face. If Jack Bauer shoots you between the eyes with the same gun, your skull explodes. Why? Think of it this way: even a layperson can score good hits with a firearm at point blank (unless they get disarmed). The solution for a character with low accuracy would just be to get within their effective range before firing. By contrast, there isn't really a solution for a character whose weapon won't do enough damage. He has to expose himself to enemy fire in order to deliver hits, but his hits don't do sufficient damage and the enemy always gets to return fire. This results in a constant downward trickle of health and eventual death by attrition. Gee, wasn't that an exciting firefight? Since we already know which way AP is going with it, this is somewhat of an academic point, but I think a poor handling of damage stats can be just as disrupting to the experience as poor handling of accuracy stats.

They don't affect chance to hit, but they affect damage. Since when is how many shots it takes to kill somebody not an important part of a shooter's mechanics?

What do you mean by "not based on stats"? There are definitely stats involved.

To nitpick, AP is not in first person, hence does not have FPS combat.

So, Splinter Cell and MGS4 are generic action games?

It's an action RPG, which pretty much means that RPG gamers will criticize it for having a shallow skill system/dialogue trees and action gamers will criticize it for not being as good as a pure shooter or stealth game.

How does one stun an enemy? . . . it depends. Either way, why draw it there as opposed to somewhere else? Even Bond has taken a turn for the gritty.

Btw, in case there was any confusion, I segued from real-life talk to game talk in the middle of that paragraph.

I agree with the original poster, mostly. My main disagreement is that there are American Kenpoists who are (note the lack of a hypothetical phrasing) very dangerous in a "real fight," but that's because they use strategies appropriate for the situation. Pummeling isn't a one-size-fits-all approach (as no such thing exists in MA). The takedowns look cool, but how viable is it tor really pull them off? I cite the first Riddick game in which counters were arguably the coolest part of the game, yet I can count the number of times I pulled them off on one hand. I'm sure AP wouldn't be that bad, but would the takedowns mostly just be a reward for stealth?