Oblivion: PC Gamer Praises in Preview

[alanschu]

It depends. You aren't really under "time pressure" with Minsc, unless you decide to completely ignore finding Dynaheir. But it's not too transparent.

 

 

I think we're just beating a dead horse though, as IMO it's clear your expectations of a video game do not coincide with mine (or Roleplayers it seems).

[Slowtrain]

It depends.  You aren't really under "time pressure" with Minsc, unless you decide to completely ignore finding Dynaheir.  But it's not too transparent.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

I didn't have a problem with that. Minsc wanted to find Dynaheir. He meakes that clear early on. He gives you time to find her. He gives me plenty of warnign that he is getting annoyed. Then finally he just leaves. No penalty beyond that. I think that was well-implemented as a time sensitive event.

 

I think we're just beating a dead horse though, as IMO it's clear your expectations of a video game do not coincide with mine

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Or yours with mine. WHich is fine. We all have different takes on games, sometimes they are widely disparate, sometimes they overlap.

 

 

 

(or Roleplayers it seems).

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I play games.

[alanschu]

I didn't have a problem with that. Minsc wanted to find Dynaheir. He meakes that clear early on. He gives you time to find her. He gives me plenty of warnign that he is getting annoyed. Then finally he just leaves. No penalty beyond that. I think that was well-implemented as a time sensitive event.

 

I had to fight him.

 

Or yours with mine. WHich is fine. We all have different takes on games, sometimes they are widely disparate, sometimes they overlap.

 

Naturally. If your don't overlap with mine, then mine don't overlap with yours.

 

 

I play games.

 

So do I.

[Diogo Ribeiro]

And I know you are denying the "real world" aspect of your suggestions, but the pressure of time is a "real world" pressure.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I'm not denying it has an analogue in the real world; I've explained as much in my posts addressed to LoneWolf16. However, there's a clear difference between a gameplay mechanic that is trying to simulate real life and one that isn't - regardless of what parallels one might find in real life. Wouldn't you agree it would seem out of place to suggest a game which has swords is realistic simply because swords exist in real life?

 

Pressure of time is present in real life, just as the need to make decisions and perform actions - but simply because this is also applied in videogames as wells doesn't mean it's doing so with the intention of being realistic, aka imitating real life or carrying the same expectations of elements found in real life or in the real world into a videogame. In fact, the very application of those things in videogames may not coincide with how they operate in real life at all.

 

That's why I've outlines several times the nature of my suggestion wasn't meant to be realistic, but didn't deny there's a parallel in the real world.

[Diogo Ribeiro]

I think we're just beating a dead horse though, as IMO it's clear your expectations of a video game do not coincide with mine (or Roleplayers it seems).

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Actually I'm surprised when I do find people who actually have similar expectations to mine when it comes to games in general, and roleplaying games in particular.

[alanschu]

What can I say? I like choices too

[Slowtrain]

 

I had to fight him.

 

 

I thought he just left. But I haven't played BG in a very long time so I'm probably wrong.

 

If you have to fight him, I take back what I said, it wasn't well implemented.

[alanschu]

To be fair, I haven't played it for a long time either, so I'm probably about as confident that I had to fight him as you are that he just left.

 

 

I do agree that the "resolution" of it was not handled properly.

[Slowtrain]

However, there's a clear difference between a gameplay mechanic that is trying to simulate real life and one that isn't - regardless of what parallels one might find in real life. Wouldn't you agree it would seem out of place to suggest a game which has swords is realistic simply because swords exist in real life?

 

 

Pressure of time is present in real life, just as the need to make decisions and perform actions - but simply because this is also applied in videogames as wells doesn't mean it's doing so with the intention of being realistic, aka imitating real life or carrying the same expectations of elements found in real life or in the real world into a videogame. In fact, the very application of those things in videogames may not coincide with how they operate in real life at all.

 

That's why I've outlines several times the nature of my suggestion wasn't meant to be realistic, but didn't deny there's a parallel in the real world.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Actually I disagree totally, in this specific instance. Time is not like a fake sword in a crpg. TIme for a player is as real in a crg as it is in the real world, IF you force a player to acheieve result X wthin a given timeframe. Granted, the RESULTS of failing will have limited, if any, real world consequence. But the unpleasant feelign of being rushed through something, the fear that you might be screwing it up and making your game experience less enjoyable, would absolutely be there and be very real. At least for me.

 

AGain, I am not saying that all timers would result in this situation, but that would be my concern.

[alanschu]

At the same time, wouldn't there be more exhiliration for completing the task?

 

It also helps to define what "rushed" is. I enjoyed the experience in Fallout when I was literally days away from Vault 13 dying as I scrambled for a solution. Whenever a game can illict an emotional response from me (which is typically quite rare), it automatically becomes more enjoyable.

 

 

At the same time though, I never felt "rushed" through Fallout.

Edited January 23, 2006 by alanschu

[Slowtrain]

At the same time, wouldn't there be more exhiliration for completing the task?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Yes, that would be the upside of it. Or one of them anyway.

 

 

It also helps to define what "rushed" is.

 

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

For me, rushed would be the feeling that I am skipping over things I would really like to stop, do, see, or explore. True you can always replay, but the first time through is always the best time for me.

 

  I enjoyed the experience in Fallout when I was literally days away from Vault 13 dying as I scrambled for a solution.  Whenever a game can illict an emotional response from me (which is typically quite rare), it automatically becomes more enjoyable.

 

 

At the same time though, I never felt "rushed" through Fallout.

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

For some reason I was OK in FO. I never felt rushed either, never had any problem finding the waterchip. I still felt I had plenty of time, and I didn't even know about the Water Merchants. The only time I ran afould of the time limit was on a replay when I had all the implants installed by the BoS. The recovery time on all those surgeries ended up costing me the deadline.

 

But, FO is one of the best games ever, imo. I don't expect many games to hold to that level. I still don't know (and never will now) if FO was an exercise in awesome game design or just a blinding stoke of luck for the devs, really.

[alanschu]

For me, rushed would be the feeling that I am skipping over things I would really like to stop, do, see, or explore. True you can always replay, but the first time through is always the best time for me.

 

That's the real kicker. I suppose the fact that I have no problems replaying a 100% linear game (if it's good) makes it much less of an issue for me than for you.

 

True the first time is always the best, but at the same time it's also cool to learn about new things that you didn't even think existed before.

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Actually I disagree totally, in this specific instance.  Time is not like a fake sword in a crpg.

 

I wasn't making a direct comparison between both; only illustrating that using something in a videogame which has a parallel in real life does not necessarily make it more realistic, if at all.

 

TIme for a player is as real in a crg as it is in the real world, IF you force a player to acheieve result X wthin a given timeframe. (...) AGain, I am not saying that all timers would result in this situation, but that would be my concern.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

No doubt, although there doesn't have to be a need to force the player to achieve a result in a given timeframe; instead, you can just let the player do things at his own leisure, but simply provide different consequences for the time he takes.

 

Of course, this is different than an overaching timer which will eventually spell Game Over, but then again, different timers with different concepts behind them.

[alanschu]

Just to make it clear, I'm not saying that a timer should mean that a failure to make it in the time means "game over."

[Kasoroth]

I personally think that timed events can be very beneficial to a game if they're implemented well. They can also completely ruin a game if they're implemented poorly (but this is true of any significant aspect of gameplay).

 

One thing that I think is lacking in most CRPGs is the ability to fail (other than by dying and reloading). For me, if there is no chance of some kind of failure (or at least a sub-optimal success), the game often becomes simply an exercise in either wasting time slaughtering easy monsters, or grinding through tough battles and reloading a lot. In the end, the outcome is always success (with the occasional option to choose an "evil" type of success), but even when multiple endings are given, they're usually based on a pretty obvious player choice, rather than how well you did things.

 

Wing Commander 2 actually had a rather simple but effective plot structure that allowed you to continue the plot even if you failed at a mission's goals (the ship you're escorting got blown up, etc), as long as you survived (I think you could even eject if your ship was about to be destroyed, and get picked up by your allies after the battle) However, if you failed enough missions in a certain section of the plot, you would move into a "setback" plot branch. If you did poorly in the "setback" branch, the humans would lose the war and the game would end. If you did well, you would move back into the main plot thread (but you would have skipped over some section of the "successful" plot thread and gotten the "setback" thread instead). From there your success would determine whether you went into the "setback" or the "successful" variation of the next plot section.

 

It was a nice system because there were very few individual things that could immediately end the game (generally just dying or getting your carrier blown up), but there were many things that influenced your success or failure. In a CRPG, a timer could be one mechanism for allowing some kind of failure without death, which tends to be lacking in many games. I'm just looking for a way to avoid the "Win or die, those are your only options" type of gameplay because it just doesn't really interest me that much. It also allowed several "branch points" but without an exponential increase in the content that needed to be generated by the developers.

 

Regarding the details of timere implementation:

 

I think it's important to make a strict distinction between "player time" and "character time" Games with a highly accelerated time passage (like 1 game hour for every 2 real minutes in NWN) can be highly problematic in this regard.

 

For example imagine an event with a 1 day time limit to complete and requires no travelling, waiting (or other "off-screen" time passage), which would take about one hour of real time to complete. The character should reasonably expect to be able to rest for 8 hours and stop at the store, and then talk to some locals for a while, and still have plenty of time to complete the task within 24 hours. With NWN accelerated time, however, that "1 day" would pass in 48 minutes, which means that even if you really rush, there's a chance you might run out of time. This kind of design would make me want to chuck the game out the window, and I like timers.

 

As an example of good separation of "player time" and "character time", I'll cite Fallout. Except when resting and traveling (and a few specific situations like recovering from surgery), 1 minute of "player time" was 1 minute of "character time", but when you traveled or rested, "character time" passed very quickly. This meant that the time limit gave you tons of time to explore an area and talk to people without fear of using up your time, and in fact encouraged you to explore each area as thoroughly as you could before you left, because if you missed something it would take a lot more "character time" to go back later. Learning about places and getting them marked on your map allowed you to hit more locations with less random wandering on the world map and thus save time.

 

The time limit in Fallout was primarily a restriction on resting and world-map travel, which makes it effective as an "opportunity cost" without forcing the player to rush. If I remember correctly you get something like 150 days to find the water chip, which is 3600 hours. I've heard people complain that Fallout was too short, but I've never heard anyone say it took them 3600 hours to finish, which means that it was never really "rushed" in terms of the player needing to hurry, but it was potentially "rushed" in terms of the character needing to be concerned about limiting unneccessary world-map travel and resting. This is how a "time limit" in a CRPG should work in my opinion, it should rush the character, NOT the player.

 

Fallout's timers did have some problems though, and the main problem I have with them is that they end the game completely (at least that's what I've been led to believe). I can't really speak from experience on this issue though, because I've never even come close to timer expiration even when I'm very thorough and try to do everything.

 

In general I think that timer expiration should change some aspect of the storyline (probably in a negative way), but not end the game completely. I also think that there should be at least some point in the game that is "timer free" to give the characters a break for long distance exploration and random wanderings.

 

This "timer free" section could even be placed after the main story is completed. Imagine a game like Fallout where you could continue after the main quest. Now make the following changes: Put in just the main ending cutscene at the end of the main plot, then ask the player if they want to retire or keep playing, and don't show all the individual area ending slides until the player chooses to retire. Then, if you continue playing a "Retire" button would stay on the interface so you could go finish up quests that you had skipped earlier and still see the effects of their completion in the end game area descriptions when you finally do choose to retire. They could even throw in some extra dialogue or other changes so you could see how the world reacts to your defeat of the big bad evil, or whatever was threatening it. An end cutscene followed by credits, and then back to the main menu always seemed a little disappointing to me.

 

-Kasoroth

Edited January 24, 2006 by Kasoroth

[alanschu]

It was actually Wing Commander 1 that had your branching paths. The success/failure of the Tiger's Claw depended on how well you did your missions. Every two failures, put you down another "setback" so to speak.

 

Wing Commander 2 focuses on a much tighter story involving the characters on the TCS Ticonderoga.

 

But I'm just in a nitpicking mood

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Fallout's timers did have some problems though, and the main problem I have with them is that they end the game completely (at least that's what I've been led to believe).  I can't really speak from experience on this issue though, because I've never even come close to timer expiration even when I'm very thorough and try to do everything.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

The timer abruptly ends the gameplay because it's counting the time the Master and the Mutant Army take to find out where Vault 13 is. Since it's the Vault Dweller's duty to protect the people of the Vault as well as stop the Master's plan of mutating all the humans of the wasteland, when they reach the Vault so the Master can access it for its experiments, it ends. In that context I think it's a valid 'Game Over'.

[Llyranor]

Screw the real world, screw immersion. Let's focus on gameplay and on the GAMEworld's internal logic.

 

How is gameplay enhanced because you get access to everything, despite contrary logic? Is this the justification Bethesda is using to allow the player to join ALL factions with no drawbacks, and people are agreeing with them? This isn't about immersion, it's about actual consequence. What good is your decision-making if it's ultimately inconsequential? Just because one game allows it, now every game has to be like that, and anyone trying something different gets no appreciation? Why are we favoring a gaming convention just for its own sake?

 

A house is burning. A cat is inside. As you try to get inside, a boy approaches you. "Hi, wanna fetch me some shoes for $$$?" Before you can answer, an old blind lady drags you by the ear. "You, my grandson is missing, can you find him?" You notice the boy looks like the old lady, and you notice the old lady is wearing shoes. You also notice a house is burning. You can:

1) Punch the old lady and steal her shoes.

2) Punch the boy unconscious and drag him to his grandma.

3) Jump into the burning and save the cat or die trying.

 

Let's see the options. If I punch one or the other or both, then decide to go to the library and read some books, then burn the library to erase all evidence, should I still have time to save the cat? Is it wrong to want the gameworld to have its own function, to exist other than to serving the player's every whim? Time as the gameworld knows it halts when the player isn't looking? And it's okay to go on a picnic when assassins are hunting you? Because time is a real world notion, suddenly it has no more bearing on the gameworld? What about the plausibility of the gameworld? What happened to consequence?

 

Let's take a 'real life' scenario. You're a medical student on overnight call during your internal medicine rotation. You're the first responder to three medical floors. Your only official backup is the ICU resident, who's covering the ICU - so he's pretty busy and you need to maximize efficiency when bothering him. Here's a conflict of interest. You want to:

1) Get as much sleep as possible.

2) Provide the best medical care possible for your patients.

3) Piss off the ICU resident as little as possible.

4) Grab dinner before the cafeteria shuts down soon.

Starts off as a quiet evening. Some nurses are bugging you to check up some medical orders that aren't legible. You have the time, so you can tend to those immediately, but you also need to remember to get dinner. The cafeteria IS going to close, and it's your responsibility to remember that detail. Imagine this in a gameworld, time isn't going to stop just to please the player. So, there you are, dealing with some of the nurses' issues. 6:30, you better go get food, because the caf closes at 7. Pager goes off. "Hi, elderly man, retrosternal chest pain. Have a nice day." You run to the floor, ask the nurses to prepare to draw some bloods and get the ECG, and grab the nitro at the nurses' desk. As you prepare to enter the patient's room, boom, pager goes off. You need to make a decision on the spot. Whether you answer it now or tend to the man's needs first, there WILL be consequences. Being able to do both at your leisure is NOT an option. Running off to the cafeteria is not a recommended option, but you can still do it, because the player can do whatever s/he wants!!! Let's say you quickly go assess the man and do a brief history/physical. His vitals seem ok, he doesn't look that much in distress, just really worried he's having a heart attack. We'll do the blood tests anyway, and do the ECG. Maybe a few more tests, maybe a trial of nitro. While the nurse is doing all these, you go answer the pager. Looks like someone fell and doesn't remember what happened. Head trauma status unknown. There you go, you go see over there. You past by and check on the nurse, and see how the man's doing. "I think I'm feeling better now." You look at the ECG. Looking good. "Page me if something comes up, it'll be my pleasure," you smile widely. You go assess the fall. Quick history, quick neuro exam. Patient with dementia doesn't remember what happened. Nothing seems broken. The neighboring patient just heard the fall, curtains were blocking the view. Seems relatively ok. You might do a more in-detail exam, just in case. Whoops, pager time. "Hi LOL some resident forgot to sign these meds, I can't give them to the patient ROFL" "What's the order?" "post-surgical pain meds" "Hmm, that sounds important, I'll tell the resident." Whoops! Forgot to tell the resident about the potential heart attack. Uh-oh. You page the resident, and look at the clock. 6:55. Hmm, you could run down and get dinner, but you have to wait for the resident to call you back. What do you do? Run off, pretent nothing happened, then page the resident again in 5 min? Or just wait? This scenario wouldn't be the same if you were just being handed sidequests after sidequests without having to do any prioritization, because you know that doing anything in any order would lead to the same thing. 'Doing things at your leisure' isn't really an option when you're being hunted by assassins.

 

This doesn't have anything to do with 'real life', it has to do with the gameworld's narrative, and its internal logic. This isn't an argument for realism, it's one for logical gameplay and narrative flow.

 

Just because some people like Hades have no reflexes and that anything related to real time wouldn't work because they'd explode doesn't mean the actual concept of time can't be applied in the gameworld - whether 'real time' or not.

 

'lol lol be realistic cuz improving and innovating gaming design costs money ROFLSAFASJFHSJAGAS' is no excuse. Full voice-acting doesn't cost anything, of course. Yay for mainstream commercialism.

 

"Despite some of the worst review scores for a mainstream game released in 2005, VUGames sent out a press release announcing that 50 Cent: Bulletproof has now sold over 1 million units in the US."

 

<3 <3 industry

[Nick_i_am]

I agree entirely with the above post.

[Diogo Ribeiro]

*snip

[Volourn]

As for the Minsc situation, I like that it is on a timer of sorts. What i don't appreciate is Minsc going even more psycho and needlessly attacking you. It be ok if he simply elft the party; but him attacking 5 other party members is stupid on so many levels. What a dumbo design.

[Nick_i_am]

well, in his defence, Minsc WAS pretty stupid.

[Llyranor]

That was just bad design, pure and simple. It has nothing to with the timer feature in and of itself. POR2 doesn't make TB games bad.

[Volourn]

He had decent intellogence, and wisdom. He also was supposedly good. You shouldn't be attacking people just because they don't do what you want. LOL

 

Overall, though, I am one of those who like 'time limits' as long as they make sense in context of the quest.

[Nick_i_am]

'You shouldn't be attacking people just because they don't do what you want.'