*ahem* Okay, I accept that we have to have scripted sequences in many games these days. We want the right elements to be in the right place so that when we trigger the sequence, things go as planned and (hopefully) our players get a memorable experience (such as when the tentacle monster busted through the glass and grabbed those two scientists in Half-Life). But I''m wondering if we can be smarter about the trigger conditions? Today I was playing The Thing and was required to bring back a blood testing kit to a paranoid ally to prove I wasn''t a monster. You have to find three, but I unknowingly found just one, brought it back, and tested myself in front of him. What happened? The game ended because I didn''t find all three first and step in front of him so the scripted sequence could show me testing myself and my tainted squadmates. IOW, I did exactly what the game told me to do, just not the way it told me to do it. This happened to me in Independence War 2 as well: I stole equipment that should have given me FTL travel (and even used it in the game), but by next mission the game acted as if my clever theft had never happened. Have you ever experienced stuff like this? If you didn''t discard scripted sequences altogether, what would you do to make them more robust? Here''s some thoughts: - Absolutely no teleporting: Don''t teleport enemies in, or characters or resources, just because they need to be there or because you think it would be dramatic. It''s fake and it breaks immersion. In the case of a reloaded game, if you''re concerned about players being unsurprised by the challenge, work instead on varying the challenge itself. More testing? Yes, but alot less lame. - Make cutscenes more modular and load the world and player as is to avoid dissonance: I remember in Red Faction I declined to sneak around in a white lab coat armed only with a pea shooter, electing to face the bad guy with rocket launcher and railgun in hand. What happened? The cut-scene showed me menancing him with my itsy-bitsy pop-gun, wearing a white lab coat. Since the game was using the engine to do cutscenes I''d think this would have been easy. - Avoid cheap thrills: Yes, I know that when I step into this dark space something scary or shocking is going to happen. Which is why I jump in, or play the corner game where you snipe the elbow of the enemy until he dies. For once it would be nice if you walked into the obvious trap and it turned out... to be nothing. Even better would be if it was something one game, and not the next. -------------------- Just waiting for the mothership...

Oh yeah - I am Da King of elbow sniping! My favorite is when a part of the enemy is poking through the geometry and still take hits. Goldeneye was very bad about that - gun barrels poked through doors all the time and you could kill the guy holding it by shooting the visible barrel...


God was my co-pilot but we crashed in the mountains and I had to eat him...

IMHO, Scripting is cool, IMO. IMO, games should have more scripting, IMHO.

Good and interesting thoughts.

I''ll try to have them in mind

I remember that scientist, in Half-Life, just before you entered the blast pit control room. He said something, then had a heart attack.

I remember pulling out a shotgun and filling him with buckshot while he was talking, but no matter what I did the little guy kept on babbling...

Perhaps a way to override those scripted sequences could be good (like making it a state of a finite state machine controlling the objets).


EDIT - I only remember ONE scientist getting caught by that tentacle...


ToohrVyk
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[edited by - ToohrVyk on January 5, 2003 7:00:17 AM]

My favorite scripting sequence of all time goes to the elevator scene in Half-Life: Blue Shift! Its just before you start getting into the real action.

You step into an elevator where two cocky scientists are awaiting your arrival to fix the damn thing and make it go (as if they, in their fast intelligence, could not do the same). The elevator starts to go down a few levels then there is a slight rumble and the elevator stops.

At this point I was like "eer this could suck." So then after the computer-automated voice reports of things going on in the Anomalous Materials Lab, the elevelator continues to go down several more levels. After only a few more seconds it stops again and it gets really quiet. Then you hear the sound of metal bending above you and just then the elevator plummits like 2 or 3 stories then stops where there is a large opening in the wall which appears to be some kind of view to another area of the station.

Then you see a scientist in an enclosed room get chased off the screen by an alien and then shoot him with his electricity beam or whatever, another scientist gets chased away by those little dog-like things and a security guard is pursuing close behind fireing off rounds in a vain attempt to save the scientist just as an equipment tram barrels down the track the scientist is standing on and flys outward crashing into huge crates.

And just as the action reaches its climax, the distinct sound of bending metel bars is heard again and the elevator freefalls about 6 more stories to ground level where you fall unconcious and await the next chapter in the game.

[edited by - neurokaotix on January 5, 2003 7:09:16 AM]

quote:

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Original post by Wavinator

- Avoid cheap thrills: Yes, I know that when I step into this dark space something scary or shocking is going to happen. Which is why I jump in, or play the corner game where you snipe the elbow of the enemy until he dies. For once it would be nice if you walked into the obvious trap and it turned out... to be nothing. Even better would be if it was something one game, and not the next.

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Thief did this to perfection. The game world was very consistent so that you can know with certainty when a room is clear, nobody is behind your back etc. When you make a mistake (and in the constant darkness, sooner or later you do)... Once you trust the game, the designer can pull some tricks on you: tree monsters that look like weird but still plant life, until they swing their branch arms at you, and even run for you; almost silent mechanical guards that catch you completely unprepared when you see them the first time (when you _know_ every threat will either stay still or make noises). I''ve screamed more than once in this game, sometimes just by watching it. It''s at times more intense than movies can be.

my favorite script is in max payne.

you come up from behind two thugs arguing with eachother on which wire they were supposed to cut to defuse a bomb on a door, confused they come to an unsure conclusion which wire to cut and cut it - boom!
you turn the corner, and they are deco art. you try to walk through the door on the wall, but its locked, seconds later the entire wall falls around the door granting you access to move further.

quote:

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Original post by Wavinator
- Absolutely no teleporting: Don''t teleport enemies in, or characters or resources, just because they need to be there or because you think it would be dramatic. It''s fake and it breaks immersion.

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Ever played Serious Sam?
Well, that game doesn''t really try to create a believable environment...

However, I think many of your thoughts also apply to the adventure genre. I''ve played "Runaway - A Road Adventure" lately, and I find it kinda cool, but it''s also frustrating because it takes the "not what you do, but how you do it" thing to the max.
For example, there is a fire alarm on the ceiling you want to set off. You have (among other things) matches and a spray. Now, everybody thinks of using the spray as a flamethrower, but no matter how often you try to combine spray with mathces, it doesn''t work; you have to combine spray and fire alarm.

Plus, some of the items can''t be found easily as they''re very small and look exactly like a part of the background, so you have to search every single pixel of the screen to find everything.

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"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." (Albert Einstein)
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Have you ever replayed a game and then realized how much cinematics are so over-rated? I mean, it''s a GAME not a MOVIE!!! When you replay a game and then you get to a cinematic scene that you can''t skip -- that''s just annoying. What do you think about that?

The first time you play the game, sure, cinematics are great. But after you play it a couple of times, you need a cinematic that will work for every time. (But it''s really hard to create classic scenes that are good every time you watch them.)