Thats what I think too.
Basically my thought for an action RPG is that you have the full capabilities to evade a blow, but if you can''t (or choose not to) you''d best PRAY that your armor soaks the blow.
With that mentality in mind, I hope to develop something where secondary skills such as stealth and traps become more meaningful: a player can take 1 orc, easy, but can he take 4 in straight up combat, assuming he is not ubered out (at which point 4 orcs should still present a risk, however)?
I see no problem at all with punishing the player for not approaching a situation analytically. If they choose to charge into a group of 40 monsters, without trying to use some tactical thought (maybe some exploding arrows fired while stealthed, or maybe a blind spell, or maybe some traps laid out in a careful ambush), they should be rewarded with a game over.
Think about it, in the end the best Rainbow 6 player wasnt the one with the best aim: it was the one who took things slowly, used their full resources, and planned things out.
Unfortunately, games have been watered down since ye days of yore. That is because the focus went from performance to completion...it isn''t how well you do, its a matter of seeing the rest of the story.
What I would like to see is the story rewarding performance...a player who has teh uber 5k!11Z should be rewarded with more/alternate storyline...such as a better ending or some such.
Moo.
Make Games Challenging!
This is one of those times that I am intrigued by the original post but am too lazy to read through the whole thread.
What about increasing difficulty level dynamically? Consider a FPS: For players that get through an area quicker, easier, with less damage or better accuracy for instance, increase the difficulty level in later levels accordingly. I''m not talking about a dramatic increase, I''m talking about something that changes over time.
Make the first level very easy, and if the player whizzes through it and wonders where the challenge is, the next area will be proportionately more difficult, with more, stronger, more intelligent, and better equipped enemies. If the player is very inexperienced and hits one enemy in the entire first level, then obviously the difficulty should be toned down, and later missions/levels/areas should have a relatively small number of less challenging enemies. The same could even apply to simple puzzles -- leave a locked door unlocked for an inexperienced player, and for very experienced players, manufacture additional obstacles. And if the experienced player starts to get frustrated half way through the game and is feeling very defeated all of a sudden, tone down difficulty a bit in the next area.
There''s not necessarily motivation here for players to play badly. Most players want a challenge, they just want a challenge that they are capable of overcoming. And besides, its not like you need to TELL the player that if they play badly the game will be easy.. the goal here is to increase enjoyment for the player by quietly adjusting the difficulty level in the background.
****************************************
Brian Lacy
ForeverDream Studios
Comments? Questions? Curious?
brian@foreverdreamstudios.com
"I create. Therefore I am."
What about increasing difficulty level dynamically? Consider a FPS: For players that get through an area quicker, easier, with less damage or better accuracy for instance, increase the difficulty level in later levels accordingly. I''m not talking about a dramatic increase, I''m talking about something that changes over time.
Make the first level very easy, and if the player whizzes through it and wonders where the challenge is, the next area will be proportionately more difficult, with more, stronger, more intelligent, and better equipped enemies. If the player is very inexperienced and hits one enemy in the entire first level, then obviously the difficulty should be toned down, and later missions/levels/areas should have a relatively small number of less challenging enemies. The same could even apply to simple puzzles -- leave a locked door unlocked for an inexperienced player, and for very experienced players, manufacture additional obstacles. And if the experienced player starts to get frustrated half way through the game and is feeling very defeated all of a sudden, tone down difficulty a bit in the next area.
There''s not necessarily motivation here for players to play badly. Most players want a challenge, they just want a challenge that they are capable of overcoming. And besides, its not like you need to TELL the player that if they play badly the game will be easy.. the goal here is to increase enjoyment for the player by quietly adjusting the difficulty level in the background.
****************************************
Brian Lacy
ForeverDream Studios
Comments? Questions? Curious?
brian@foreverdreamstudios.com
"I create. Therefore I am."
According to the designers of Halo (I think it was them anyways), players believed enemies with more HP acted more intelligent, even if their AI was exactly the same as that of enemies with lower HP.
I think an interesting idea would be to make the game keep track of the damage the last 5 enemies of each type did to the player. After each monster is killed, check if the average damage to the player (from the last 5 of that type) was below/above an expected amount, and if so increase its HP by the same % the damage is too low/high. That way, you can design levels with the idea that a monster of type X will do Y damage to the player before dying, and if its doing not enough/too much it will be adjusted automatically so that eventually it will do that much.
As the player increases in skill, the monsters apparently do as well(they don''t get smarter, but they become harder to kill), and its really easy to code something like that in (or at least it sounds easy =-).
I think an interesting idea would be to make the game keep track of the damage the last 5 enemies of each type did to the player. After each monster is killed, check if the average damage to the player (from the last 5 of that type) was below/above an expected amount, and if so increase its HP by the same % the damage is too low/high. That way, you can design levels with the idea that a monster of type X will do Y damage to the player before dying, and if its doing not enough/too much it will be adjusted automatically so that eventually it will do that much.
As the player increases in skill, the monsters apparently do as well(they don''t get smarter, but they become harder to kill), and its really easy to code something like that in (or at least it sounds easy =-).
The only problem with a hidden adaptive difficulty system is that it negates bragging rights - realistically, someone''s going to catch on to the fact sooner or later, and once word gets out, the competitive element dries up. I suppose you could track some sort of compensation measure through the course of the game and stick that up at the end. The problem then is that the difficulty is pretty much fixed - and there''s some players like me who enjoy playing DOOM on both Ultra Violence and I''m Too Young Too Die (I never quite acquired the taste for Nightmare since I''m more of a slow and cautious FPSer than the kamikaze guns-blazing type needed to handle the respawn).
I guess side paths, and hidden mini-games that don''t have a significant impact on the "main game" would be one way to do things, but equally you want some reward for them.
I guess side paths, and hidden mini-games that don''t have a significant impact on the "main game" would be one way to do things, but equally you want some reward for them.
[lazy]i didn''t read every post[/lazy] but the system used for hitman2 was good. u could complete the game if you''re crap (like me), but u just get a bad score at the end (and less weapons to choose from etc...)
This room is green
This room is green
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