Some thoughts on urgency, consequences and parallel non-linear missions

[Elerond]

I don't think game where player only get punished if he/she does side quest would be very fun to play. So if there is some urgency sytem like your home town needs new pump on their well or they all will die in water shortage, then there should be positive rewards in side quest which gives player a reason why he/she would do them instead rushing main quest through.

 

I much prefer games where in start there is no real driving force except you curiosity and couple small hints about something larger. And the more you explore world more you find hints and information which finally give you some urgency to do something. But I not give absolute knockout for sytems where world lives on even if your characters spent their time in woodcutting.

[ogrezilla]

Why should your preferred way of roleplaying/ adventuring be preferred over mine though?

 

Because roleplaying requires context. If context dictates urgency, but the mechanics don't, then you're robbed of a roleplaying opportunity. If you don't even act according to the story in spite that Gameplay and Story Segregation... then you're doing many things, except roleplaying.

 

And in that scenario, I do believe his way of 'actually roleplaying' is preferable.

 

Like I said I don't like being forced to do things or miss stuff because I'm taking my time with something.

 

If the game presents me with a clear choice, then sure, but if it makes me mess up without giving me any obvious clue that things will advance without me then it's ridiculous.

 

I don't think his roleplaying choice is more valid than mine, that's entirely subjective. You only think that because you agree with him.

 

If I wanted to play a linear corridor game then I'd go play Final Fantasy 13

I very much agree with the bolded part. You should only be punished for inaction if you know about the situation.

 

Really, its a matter of designing the story. I hope the story is designed in such a way that you are given plenty of chances to take your time. Occasional bits of urgency are great to keep things interesting though.

[Shevek]

It may not be eloquent but its the way I feel. See, there are many ways to challenge the player. You could put difficult obstacles in his way. You could confuse him with a myriad of equally viable options.

 

Timed quests do nothing but punish players who do not look online for the perfect order in which to complete crap so they can see the whole game in one playthrough. They also unduly punish the player for rightfully wanting to experience the entire game.

 

Timed quests are bad.

[ogrezilla]

If the game presents me with a clear choice, then sure

 

Do you do the urgent quest before the time runs out, or do you put it off and fail?

 

That seems like a pretty clear cut choice to me.

I think his point is that if I am in town A and have never even been to town B yet, I shouldn't be able to miss things happening in town B that I have no way of knowing about yet.

[ogrezilla]

I don't like timed missions where the end result is outright failure if you don't complete the mission within a certain time. IMO, those are just flat out frustrating and not fun. What I do like the idea of is, if a mission is "timed" or urgent, that the longer you take to finish it the more consequences you have to deal with.

 

For instance, a village is under siege and asks for your help. It's "timed" in the sense that, eventually if you leave it for months to get around to the quest, perhaps the entire village is taken over by whoever is attacking it. So then your quest for help becomes a quest to liberate the village from an entrenched enemy.

 

That's the extreme case, but even minor delays could produce consequences like the villagers losing their will to fight at your side the longer you take, because they've had to witness a lot of their friends and neighbors dying. Or they lose their trust in you. Or now you have to contend with some villagers being spies for the enemy because the enemy has had enough time during your dallying to infiltrate the town.

 

So outright timed missions are a big NO for me, but missions where there are consequences if you don't do them right away are fantastic, if implemented well.

yes to this. many times yes to this.

[ogrezilla]

It may not be eloquent but its the way I feel. See, there are many ways to challenge the player. You could put difficult obstacles in his way. You could confuse him with a myriad of equally viable options.

 

Timed quests do nothing but punish players who do not look online for the perfect order in which to complete crap so they can see the whole game in one playthrough. They also unduly punish the player for rightfully wanting to experience the entire game.

 

Timed quests are bad.

 

part of the experience could be seeing what happens if you aren't able to save this woman from the bandits. I hope it is literally impossible to see the entire game in one play. That said, I don't want to see a 5:00 clock show up in the corner and then have a timed action sequence. I like the idea of being able to go save her right then and as long as I am actively working towards that (I haven't left the general area) I can still do it. But if I go back to town and have a few drinks at the pub, then by all means there should be consequences. The quest shouldn't just disappear though. I should be able to go to the bandits hideout and find out what they've done with her. Maybe they have beat her up. Maybe they killed her. Maybe they sold her to slavery. Or maybe it was all a big ruse for her to escape her mundane life and join her bandit lover.

Edited September 22, 2012 by ogrezilla

[Odarbi]

I don't like timed missions where the end result is outright failure if you don't complete the mission within a certain time. IMO, those are just flat out frustrating and not fun. What I do like the idea of is, if a mission is "timed" or urgent, that the longer you take to finish it the more consequences you have to deal with.

 

For instance, a village is under siege and asks for your help. It's "timed" in the sense that, eventually if you leave it for months to get around to the quest, perhaps the entire village is taken over by whoever is attacking it. So then your quest for help becomes a quest to liberate the village from an entrenched enemy.

 

That's the extreme case, but even minor delays could produce consequences like the villagers losing their will to fight at your side the longer you take, because they've had to witness a lot of their friends and neighbors dying. Or they lose their trust in you. Or now you have to contend with some villagers being spies for the enemy because the enemy has had enough time during your dallying to infiltrate the town.

 

So outright timed missions are a big NO for me, but missions where there are consequences if you don't do them right away are fantastic, if implemented well.

 

That's pretty much what we're all fighting for. We don't want "Do this in X amount of time or get game over". We just want quests, where it makes sense for there to be urgency, to actually enforce it instead of allowing you to go off the beaten path for 4 in game months and not have any downfall for it. Take too long saving the elf king's daughter? Maybe she dies, but you might end up having to track down and deal with the bandits anyway kinda deal.

[Delterius]

I very much agree with the bolded part. You should only be punished for inaction if you know about the situation.

 

I can understand this concern, because these days 'choices' are handled by a cut to the dialogue tree. The result is a unorganic world, where not every choice you make affects the story. It reminds me of how some games deal with morality, often you'll get to choose to save the dying bandit (Compassion) or kill him for the gold pieces (EVIL AAAAH), but wether you're evil or compassionate in this case, you had no problems with slaughtering other hundreds of them - its not like you were ever given the choice of incapacitating them instead and bringing them to a lawful trial.

 

What I can say about it is to relax and try to comprehend the notion of a organic world. That reacts to both your actions and omissions. That dosn't have to highlight the 'good choice!' and the 'evil choice!' icons as you're doing whatever you're doing - be picking a dialogue choice or pretty much every facet of gameplay.

 

So what we're asking here is if there's a orphanage on fire, and your character cares about that, you have some reason to go and roleplay. Urgency and the world's internal consistency are things that designers should aspire to - not cut because its not casual enough.

Edited September 22, 2012 by Delterius

[Odarbi]

I think his point is that if I am in town A and have never even been to town B yet, I shouldn't be able to miss things happening in town B that I have no way of knowing about yet.

 

Which is easily solveable by not making the quest timers start counting down until the player has heard about them in some way. Maybe walking by a town crier might alert you to the situation, and start the timer. You shouldn't miss the quest because you don't know about it, but you should miss out if you know about it but don't actually do anything about it.

[Shevek]

The best solution is not to have quest timers.

[evdk]

The best solution is not to have quest timers.

"Feature might have some problems, let's cut it out" -the Bethesda school of game design

[Stun]

Not every roleplaying game has to be an exploration simulator now, does it?

Likewise, not every roleplaying game has to be a Navy Seals mission simulator.

 

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, BG2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and Temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force you to play the 'beat the clock' minigame.

Edited September 22, 2012 by Stun

[GhostofAnakin]

The best solution is not to have quest timers.

 

The best solution is to have consequences for delaying getting around to those quests with urgency.

[Odarbi]

Timed quests do nothing but punish players who do not look online for the perfect order in which to complete crap so they can see the whole game in one playthrough.

 

It's a role playing game. You shouldn't be able to see the whole game in one play through anyway. Choices should matter and change the story so that subsequent play throughs reflect the inaction of the player character on certain things.

[evdk]

Torment didn't really try to push a sense of urgency on you that much. I am fine with that (And Curst was ****)

[Odarbi]

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, BG2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and Temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force the player to beat the clock.

 

I really hated how those games had no basis of time in them. "Go save Imoen quickly? Pfft, I'll just take 4 years off and go do side quests, since the story isn't going to progress without me anyway."

[Delterius]

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, Bg2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force the player to beat the clock.

 

That, coupled with what is called a 'degenerate rest system' were flaws of design, true.

 

But let me point out that there was the occasional urgency in BG: Jaheira and Khalid might quit on you prior to Nashkel. Likewise with Xzar and Montaron. A lot of people don't know that, I believe, because many recent tweak mods remove that feature.

 

And that's the difference between a nostalgic and a reasonable person. I love the IE games for what they were good at and I don't believe they were perfect. Many of them had pathetic C&C outside of combat.

[ogrezilla]

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, Bg2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force the player to beat the clock.

 

That, coupled with what is called a 'degenerate rest system' were flaws of design, true.

 

But let me point out that there was the occasional urgency in BG: Jaheira and Khalid might quit on you prior to Nashkel. Likewise with Xzar and Montaron. A lot of people don't know that, I believe, because many recent tweak mods remove that feature.

 

And that's the difference between a nostalgic and a reasonable person. I love the IE games for what they were good at and I don't believe they were perfect. Many of them had pathetic C&C outside of combat.

 

you just said the old IE games aren't perfect. I love you so much right now.

[Shevek]

"Feature might have some problems, let's cut it out" -the Bethesda school of game design

 

There is a difference between features that have problems and features that are problems.

 

Timed quests are by their very nature bad and unfun. Getting some quest, doing your very best and having the game tell you a couple hours you invested were for nothing because you didn't beat some internal timer is not my idea of good game design. Having the game tell you to hurry the hell up and ignore game content to get things done is not good game design. Punishing players in this way in not a fair challenge. You give a sense of urgency through narrative devices not through internal timers.

 

All of us have enough deadlines and urgency in our lives. Lets not let it bleed into our virtual entertainment.

Edited September 22, 2012 by Shevek

[GhostofAnakin]

Another thought with regards to urgency and doing these quests quickly ---

 

What I'd also like to see is a bit of balance. Take my village under siege example in my previous post, but to balance it so that players don't just rush in and save the village the very second they get the quest, perhaps there's consequences for being too rash. Maybe your characters simply aren't strong enough yet? So you (the player) has to strike a balance between consequences to the village for delaying, and consequences to yourself and your party if you try and take on an enemy you're not yet ready to face.

 

Or maybe it's smarter to take a bit extra time to "scout" the enemy. Perhaps rushing in right away will get the villagers slaughtered, but if you take a bit of time to both "level up" your party and allow the villagers this same time to get themselves organized into a resistance force before you take on the enemy, you'll have more allies at your disposal.

 

This could add a dynamic where you have to balance the fact that there is urgency, but that you also shouldn't just rush in every single time you get a quest for help.

[Odarbi]

 

There is a difference between features that have problems and features that are problems.

 

Timed quests are by their very nature bad and unfun. Getting some quest, doing your very best and having the game tell you a couple hours you invested were for nothing because you didn't beat some internal timer is not my idea of good game design. Having the game tell you to hurry the hell up and ignore game content to get things done is not good game design. Punishing players in this way in not a fair challenge. You give a sense of urgency through narrative devices not through internal timers.

 

All of us have enough deadlines and urgency in our lives. Lets not let it bleed into our virtual entertainment.

 

Amusingly enough, I love timed quests when they're done right. Makes you have to play smart, which is something I want in a game.

Also, if the timers are internal and not shown to the player, you won't know if you made it there on time or not. Maybe you just weren't meant to complete the quest, and the urgency was simply implied.

[Stun]

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, Bg2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force the player to beat the clock.

 

That, coupled with what is called a 'degenerate rest system' were flaws of design, true.

 

But let me point out that there was the occasional urgency in BG: Jaheira and Khalid might quit on you prior to Nashkel. Likewise with Xzar and Montaron. A lot of people don't know that, I believe, because many recent tweak mods remove that feature.

 

There's also the "Poisoned!" quest in chapter 5. And that dwarf who will leave your party if you don't flood the cloakwood mines. And Edwin will leave your party if you don't hunt down Dynahier. But lets be honest here, that's not really what we've been debating in these last 2 threads. It's not "urgency" when you're given a game month (or 2 game months) to do something. And you guys aren't asking for this sort of stuff anyway. No, you guys want something far more unneccessarily strict and "action-y"

Edited September 22, 2012 by Stun

[ogrezilla]

"Feature might have some problems, let's cut it out" -the Bethesda school of game design

 

There is a difference between features that have problems and features that are problems.

 

Timed quests are by their very nature bad and unfun. Getting some quest, doing your very best and having the game tell you a couple hours you invested were for nothing because you didn't beat some internal timer is not my idea of good game design. Having the game tell you to hurry the hell up and ignore game content to get things done is not good game design. Punishing players in this way in not a fair challenge. You give a sense of urgency through narrative devices not through internal timers.

 

All of us have enough deadlines and urgency in our lives. Lets not let it bleed into our virtual entertainment.

 

I disagree. Timers that cause you to lose if you don't finish in time are unfun. Timers that create consequences if you don't finish on time can be great. You never need to see a clock show up in the corner. You never have to know you were being timed. You might just play through the game thinking you are always a step behind and that is how it was designed. You keep finding towns burned down. But the story still progresses.

[ogrezilla]

Man, you must have really hated Planescape Torment, BG1, Bg2, Icewind Dale, Icewind Dale 2, and temple of Elemental evil. As none of those games even *tried* to force the player to beat the clock.

 

That, coupled with what is called a 'degenerate rest system' were flaws of design, true.

 

But let me point out that there was the occasional urgency in BG: Jaheira and Khalid might quit on you prior to Nashkel. Likewise with Xzar and Montaron. A lot of people don't know that, I believe, because many recent tweak mods remove that feature.

 

There's also the "Poisoned!" quest in chapter 5. And that dwarf who will leave your party if you don't flood the cloakwood mines. And Edwin will leave your party if you don't hunt down Dynahier. But lets be honest here, that's not really what we've been debating in these last 2 threads. It's not "urgency" when you're given a game month (or 2 game months) to do something.

 

what about the example of the woman being taken by bandits? You can choose to follow them and save her, or go about your business and come back later. At that point, some sort of consequence would have happened. You don't "fail" the quest line, you just fail to save her outright. The questline could be completely different depending on your urgency. Save her right away and her family rewards you for her safe return. Don't save her and you find posters in town about a missing woman. You can then talk to the family who send you to investigate and rescue her if possible. You could even have the PC force the family to pay you for what information you know.

Edited September 22, 2012 by ogrezilla

[Moonlight Butterfly]

I very much agree with the bolded part. You should only be punished for inaction if you know about the situation.

 

I can understand this concern, because these days 'choices' are handled by a cut to the dialogue tree. The result is a unorganic world, where not every choice you make affects the story. It reminds me of how some games deal with morality, often you'll get to choose to save the dying bandit (Compassion) or kill him for the gold pieces (EVIL AAAAH), but wether you're evil or compassionate in this case, you had no problems with slaughtering other hundreds of them - its not like you were ever given the choice of incapacitating them instead and bringing them to a lawful trial.

 

What I can say about it is to relax and try to comprehend the notion of a organic world. That reacts to both your actions and omissions. That dosn't have to highlight the 'good choice!' and the 'evil choice!' icons as you're doing whatever you're doing - be picking a dialogue choice or pretty much every facet of gameplay.

 

So what we're asking here is if there's a orphanage on fire, and your character cares about that, you have some reason to go and roleplay. Urgency and the world's internal consistency are things that designers should aspire to - not cut because its not casual enough.

 

Hey I'm the least casual gamer in the world, if anything I think it's more casual to want to rush through the main quest and not explore.

I'm all for urgency if it's restricted to side quests which only activate when my character is aware of them giving me a chance to respond either way or parts of the main quest like 'There is an army outside the keep'. I don't think that's an unfair idea.

 

What is unfair is making people miss out on 80% of the game because you want things to be 'realistic'

Edited September 22, 2012 by Moonlight Butterfly