Remember back when you went to pick up a key in Doom and creatures started spawning all around you for no reason? Or in Descent, you wandered too far into that room with the powerup at the end and the walls suddenly opened up with robots hiding inside? Or even in Mario when you ran around bopping question marks and collecting gold, and kicking turtles around - mm hmm that made a lot of sense. ....... What would games be like to today if they were like that? Say in Deus Ex, you hit a jump pad along with your enemies, forcing you to time your shots as you both went up and down? Or you walked into the middle of a dungeon room and doors on the upper balcony would randomly open and close with orcs firing bolts down at you, such that you had to have your shot ready to pick them off one at a time? Or in Soldier of Fortune, a line of gunmen danced back and forth in a line as they fired at you? Are games trying to be too much of something anymore? Everything has to have a realistic reason to be there otherwise it is criticized. I remember reading a review for the add-on Opposing Force for Half-life, and one critique was that the boss creature room strangely had the combination of tools and weapons necessary to defeat it right there. I guess there are different kinds of immersion. There is game immersion, story immersion, realism immersion, etc. I understand Battlefield 1942 moved away from realism and takes a more comic-book style approach to WWII situations. Battlezone 1 was a wonderful game that had a lot of "play room" but had balance issues in multiplayer. They fixed a lot of that in Battlezone 2, but a lot of the "fun" was taken out of it in favor of pleasing the serious strategist. I''m just spitting out observations. I think some of the pleasantry of playing games is taken away by a game design that clearly expects a lot out of itself, sometimes much more than just delivering a game to play. I''d like to see more games with emphasis on the "fun" factor instead of a game that might, for example, make you think you could actually be a good sniper in real life by playing the game because of how realistic it attempts to be. Any other obsevations or comments?

I couldn''t agree more!

However I like to at least have some logic to games...but I really think "realisam" is over rated....I HATE how games are trying to become simulations and crap

I agree about Deus Ex not needing jump pads. I brought it up to illustrate how something gamey like that would have affected our perception of the game. Some game designs demand a strong sense of "realism" within the created universe to be taken seriously.

I just don''t want games to become "we can make something more profound, intense and realistic than the next guy, do not deny us" (exaggeration). Simple goofy or ridiculous fun has its merits, too.

Part of it might be because you''re looking at PC games. Console game still have a lot of arcadish nonrealistic gameplay and themes.

I agree 100%. I always feel like slapping designers and coders in the head and shouting "ITS A GAME YOU DORK!"
Ultra realism sucks, unless thats the whole target market (Micosofts Train sim, flight sims etc).
Games run into BIG trouble when they try and do everything realistically.
Even Sims don''t have to be realistic to be fun. I''m sure SimCity isn''t a realistic portrayal of being Mayor, but its fun so who gives a damn.
I''m waiting for the first email to tell me the cities are disproportionately large in Planetary Defense...
Good post dude.

http://www.positech.co.uk

Gameplay is king.

Games have to be consistent, not realistic, they need a reliable set of rules known to the player.

I love to play "Luigi's Mansion", and ghosts aren't real, still I'm hunting them down throughout the haunted mansion, and I don't care those ARE the rules, they are simple and they are consistent => good gameplay.
Same for "Super Mario SunShine", "PIKMIN", "Super Smash Bros: Melee", "Star Wars Rogue Squadron : Rogue Leader", they aren't realistic, they have good and simple rules.

My only problem is "Resident Evil", the game looks realistic, the weapons are from the real world, but I've to get keys in order to open doors, while I've a shotgun and I bet a wooden door won't resist a shot...
The weapons are NOT consistent, they are ONLY effective against monsters, and useless otherwise, that's weird.
Realism only put problems into a game.

So my take on the problem is definetly that games needs consistent rules, nothing else.

-* So many things to do, so little time to spend. *-


[edited by - Ingenu on October 20, 2002 11:03:24 AM]

[edited by - Ingenu on October 20, 2002 11:07:25 AM]