Alright, I''m no genius when it comes to game design, but I think I have some pretty off the wall ideas for game design. LEt me rephrase that. I have some original ideas for storytelling. To me, there are two ways to approach a game (and combination thereof). The first style of game is what I would consider a true game. It consists of rules that you use to beat your opponent. Classic games like chess, checkers, poker, or any other board game is a hallmark of this. This is pure mental strategy. However, there are also games in this genre that require physical skill. Any athletic game is representative of this. IT takes both excellent strategy and the physical skills to beat your opponent (although one can help compensate for the other to a degree). Then there is another kind of game. This is basically an interactive story. The emphasis is less on rules but a focus on a setting, theme or tale. You navigate through a world to discover its secrets. It''s less about beating an opponent or adversary as it is to see how the tale or world unfolds. Of course, most games are a slight combination of one or the other such as some adventure games, or even a game like Half-Life or No One Lives Forever (which in my personal opinion should go down as the best single player FPS of all time...no flames please). What many game designers seem to forget is that it''s perfectly possible to tell a story around a "rules" based game. As I mentioned earlier with Half-Life and NOLF. Until HL came around, people just assumed that FPS''s was a genre solely for deathmatching....ie showing how much better you are at gibbing someone than everybody else. For all intents and purposes, a shoddy game background was put in as an afterthought, and the focus of games like this was almost entirely on graphics. I''m looking forward to WarcraftIII which will blend RTS with a story. In my opinion, story is more important than gameplay, not the other way around. What I mean by this is, not everyone is going to be a top-calibre FPS shooter or great strategist for RTS''s, but there should be something that pulls them into the game DESPITE their poor skills. And this is what a good story or background does. And speaking of backgrounds, why is virtually every FPS set in the future, near future or modern day? Other than Hidden and Dangerous, and the abysmal Mortyr, why does everyone always pick those settings? Does every game designer think their intended audience are teens that can''t get enough of outrageous BFG''s? OR that every "mature" FPS''er wants to play counter-strike or Rainbow6? How come no one''s made a game where you can play the 75th Infantry assaulting the gun emplacements at Omaha? how come no one''s made a game about the Trench Raiders of WWI (these guys would sneak across the "No Man''s Land" in WWI, and slit a few guys throats in the middle of the night). Heck, how about playing a 7th cavalry trooper fighting in the Old West? Jesus...like I said, I''m no genius, but I''m sure there would be an audience for ANYTHING different. And RTS''s aren''t much better. At least they come from a more military minded wargaming perspective, so not everything is in the near future, space or fantasy. Nevertheless, I''d like to see some STORY in an RTS. When I look at the crop of games (and genres) out today, it boggles my mind at how little territory has been explored. Partially its the game designers fault(well, game publishers really...afterall, they don''t want to support what they think won''t sell, and game designers won''t make what they don''t think they can get a publisher to support...), but in many ways, I think it''s the game buyers fault too. I think too many people pass up on different styles of games mainly out of fear. Look at System Shock 1 and 2. Excellent games, and both got high praise, but neither did that well. Ditto with Battlezone and Thief...games far ahead of their time, but people were too afraid to try them despite rave reviews. I read the latest PC Gamer where they gave No One Lives Forever a score of 84%. I was in shock, primarily because of their reasoning for not giving it an Editor''s Choice. Basically they said it was an excellent game, but that it might have been too campy or oddball for serious FPS players. I about smacked my forehead and thought the reviewer was the biggest dumb @$$ I''d ever heard. I guess in his world, every game is supposed to fit in a neat little mold, and if it doesn''t, somehow it is subpar. It is precisely because NOLF is different that it is a breath of fresh air. It''s not a run of the mill FPS game, and although Half-Life may have been the originator of the "Storytelling FPS game", should NOLF be knocked points for that? Why not knock Half-Life for being just another futuristic shooter that''s essentially a modified version of Quake? I hope the game designers in here look not just at game mechanics (ie the rules) or even at what makes games "fun", but the holistic inclusion of storytelling, art/background, game mechanics, and programming...and exactly in that order of priority.

You are right on the money.

Personally I think computer games have finally evolved into a fad. That inherits a lot of superficial garbage.

When I played M.U.L.E. on my C64 in the early 80''s, we only had a handful of great games to choose from. But they sure as hell weren''t written to make some guy a ton of cash. I seem to recall Jumpman and Ultima IV being the closest thing to a "blockbuster" back then.

Today I have a shelf-full of junky games. It has come to the point where I *refuse* to buy a game unless I''ve tried a demo first because 9 times out of 10 the raved-about games are crap; with few exceptions (like Battlezone).

The other disturbing thing is that I need to upgrade my computer *again* if I want to play any of the newer games like NOLF, Giants etc. I loved the NOLF demo but even with a Geforce DDR, my PII450 just can''t give me decent framerates. Giants just drags unless I have the clipping set to minimum. On the other hand, Quake 3 gives me 55+ FPS. I can only pray that developers other than Carmack start to take OpenGL seriously. It''s currently my platform of choice because my card does all the work.

I''m not going to go into a big argument, but I just want to say this: story IS important yes, but most definitely not more important than gameplay. That said, things like improved graphics of Quake 1, 2, 3, 100, .... added jack sh*t in gameplay over what Doom had. Sure it looks nice but how different is the gameplay (let''s be realistic now and not count BS like jumping and free mouse look)

Anyway, gameplay is more important than story because it gives the game its replayability. Sure adventure games and RPGs are fun, but how many times can you play them before it gets boring? RPGs are more replayable usually because their gameplay allows for that. Adventure games - forget it.

I don''t understand what your problem is with RTS games. You''re saying you''d rather have a good story in a RTS but crappy gameplay? Sure a good story would be cool, but at the cost of gameplay? I don''t think so. StarCraft has a good story in case you haven''t noticed, along with some awesome gameplay. That game is how many years old now? Three I think? And it''s still really widely played. Why is that? Because its gameplay beats ths crap out of every other RTS game, not because it has a better story than every other RTS game.

My point is this: a good story is definitely a plus, but if you''re making something like an RTS, it is much more important to have GOOD gameplay.

Oh well, I guess I ended up writing much more than I intended I didn''t mean to sound offensive, but if I did don''t take it personally.

If you read "Game Architecture and Design", you''ll see that it makes the same points I''m making. Books are not games, and games are not books. A book is passive, a game is active. The point of games is interaction. I personally never repeated a game just because its story is good. When you play a game, do you enjoy the parts where you are not an active participant, or the parts where you are? Would you want to play a game that consisted mainly of FMV''s just because it has a good story?

RPGs have good stories usually, but there''s also a lot of gameplay involved! All the characters, spells, items, enemies, etc. interact with each other in a way that the player can somewhat control. Sure the story will stay the same, but you do get to control the little details of it, if not the big outcome.

On the contrary, in books, you don''t get to do anything. You''re a passive observer. A game like this would not be a game, it would be a book or a movie. The bottom line is you can''t compare books to games, because a game has to be more than just a story to be a game.

Damn this. Why can''t it just enter your name automatically..

quote:Original post by RareBreed72
And RTS''s aren''t much better. At least they come from a more military minded wargaming perspective, so not everything is in the near future, space or fantasy. Nevertheless, I''d like to see some STORY in an RTS.