I liked how Homeworld:Cataclysm did its job, but there were some problems.
There was the first meeting with the Beast, where you were supposed to make 10 ships and send them out to investigate a derelict (before you know about the Beast).
Well I built 30 just to be safe and sent them....only to find out that my ships are getting converted. I thought I was screwed....only to find out that most of my ships were still fine...
This isn''t so bad, as perhaps only 10 can be converted initially, so it can be justified. I never thought it was a huge problem or anything. Most of the cutscenes were nice and part of the game, so I applaud Barking Dog Studios for that. I wonder if I would send less than 10 ships what would happen....


But I do agree that if the cut scenes use the same engine, there should be no excuse for inconsistencies, such as a misplaced item, or different clothes, or different weapons.
Original War, which is a highly unpolished but highly fun and innovative RTS (only $20 new), is a 2D game. I like how from mission to mission, the base layout is the SAME as you left it. No cutscenes that have prescripted layouts that are inconsistent with the way you made it. Little things like that delight and amaze me, even though they shouldn''t.

As for badly triggered sequences, there have been many times where the key to solving something was to step in a specific area or to use a specific item in a certain way.
Original War has some missions timed, where if you don''t defeat the Russian base by then, you are relieved of your command. It sucks when you finally get the force together to do it, and you are told that you aren''t doing anything even though you are in the process of destroying things. Still, at least I had warning and knew what to do.
I played some games where an item exists in the game, and you use it over and over again the same way, but the key to solving some puzzle was to do something that doesn''t happen any other place, like shooting an arrow into a person talking doesn''t do anything, but shooting it at a specific person does.

I would like to see a game where if you died or lost, you didn''t "replay" the mission. For instance, RTCW has some enemies that are in certain areas. If you die and go again, you will find them in the general vicinity, like some zombie who decides to stand to your left instead of your right when you enter the room. That is good, but what would be better is if you can enter the room to find your dead carcass having been eaten or something, and the enemy is somewhere else.
Imagine playing a FP space shooter where you had a suicide mission as a sneak attack...but died before you could do anything. The enemy knows there is an attack, and is now fully aware. Doing it again would just be unrealistic. Now instead of playing that same exact mission with the enemies having no clue, you could try again, but the enemies are more aware of the possibility of attack and probably have reenforcements. Same mission, but requires a new way to play through maybe?
I liked Wing Commander. Each time I played, I tried to shoot down less just to see if the game is different when you''re losing the war rather than winning. It was fun, even though the last mission was to provide cover for the Tiger Claw to make its jump out of the area, because it was not the same thing over and over. The individual missions were replayable as exact replicas, but the game itself in total was not necessarily so.


I liked Alien vs Predator 2''s single player Marine just because I feel I control the flow of the game. When I first met the aliens, I was moving very cautiously around. The pipes falling as I came by scared the hell out of me. The scittering bugs did as well. My radar going off because of a swinging crane or the doors I just opened freaked me out and made me very cautious.
When the aliens finally came, I died because I was armed with a grenade in a very small area. I got that part again and thought I was ready....only the alien crashed through the ceiling right in front of me instead of in the other room like last time!
What made this scripting good? While I was triggering things, instead of making me feel like I watching a movie, I felt like I was in it. It took me probably way too long in hindsight to complete an early level just because I was scared that the next move would result in being face to face with an alien or predator. The music was scripted, which I loved! Falling through a hole in the floor to the next floor, you would hear the same thing you would hear if you were watching a movie. The music gets exciting, then quiet...as if something could have happened but didn''t...yet.

The problem with this is, people want to tell a story through games, and instead of using the virtues of interactivity, they try to make the interactivity fit within the story.
Starcraft was fun, but there was nothing I could do other than fulfill mission objectives, even if they were dynamic.

Wouldn''t it be cool if you could actually have some freedom from the script, so that you could do different things, kind of like Wing Commander? If you failed, you failed and moved on. Not everything deserves a second chance, like defending a base from invasion. If you failed, you can fall back and try to retake it, not assume control and do it again until you get it right.
In a game of Civilization, you have control of the world at your finger tips, so your gameplay session can result in retreats and losses many times without the need to restart from an old save.

It is tougher in games where you lose if you die. You can''t do anything but come back from the dead, which is unrealistic, so restarting the level is the only plausible explanation.
There was a game for the NES where you were a detective. If you failed, you were captured and placed into a trap, where you would eventually be killed but you had the opportunity to save yourself. Thus, the standard three continues were part of the gameplay.
This is tough for games where if you die, well, you can''t just explain it away ("you were really unconcious, and the aliens/zombies/Nazis left you for dead") so it is hard to try to fit this into RTCW or AvP2. Still, I think the immersion of the player into the game might be better if the player can be given the choice to live with consequences of their actions.

Deus Ex did an excellent job of creeping me out, without using cheap tricks. Especially after you swim to the aircraft hangar at LaGuardia, and are wandering through all the cargo boxes.

There were a bunch of those shorter security 'bots, the ones that say "Scanning area...". I started playing that just after I got my EAX enabled sound card.. boy did it ever creep me out. Whenever I'd hear one of those 'bots just around the corner, I'd walk away from it, and I'd be sweating it out trying to move quickly without making noise.

Same thing when you zip off to Paris, later. Trying to skulk around while not being seen by giant patrolling mecha and bots was very creepy. I've never been so creeped out by a game in my life, and it was implemented via simple means. The game makes you paranoid to be seen or heard.

As for the scripting thing, it wasn't used frequently, and when it was used, it was used tastefully. In the same level (with the aircraft hangar), you have the option of executing an important main character. If you do, it causes another character to hunt you throughout the rest of the game, attempting to enact revenge. I actually dreaded meeting up with this character, and when it eventually happened, it fit in perfectly with the storyline, and had a very climactic effect.

The way characters tended to mill about and do things on their own was nice, and could've been used more. The only real use of it was a homeless person pacing across the dock.

There was a scripted hostage situation that was also quite well done, didn't seem forced at all. You go in headfirst, with guns blazing, and the terrorists blow up a train. You sneak about, and they still might blow up the train. (If you're not careful.)

EDIT: And from what I read, DeusEx 2 will have an even looser, rubberier dynamic story line.

-=skjin=-

[edited by - skjinedmjeet on January 7, 2003 8:00:14 PM]

Dark Reign 2. What an excelent game.

One mission you have to assinate someone before the sun comes up and they retreat to the caves. This was in half an hour.

Throughout you were informed of about how long was remaining to assinate the dude, and to "hurry" before the end.

At sunrise I had about 2-3 mins left, so I got a move on with all my units and managed to get into their base.

At 0 minutes, I had the guy on screen - about to be killed and expected to have the game say "The dude has returned to the caves, you have failed". But instead I was indeed supprised when it said "so-and-so will now return to the caves, you must act now".

So I killed him.


However another mission had me searching for two of some dingus in an underground maze. Lucky me managed to get the exact route through the maze to find it first off. Unfortunatly, the dialouge from my team was "we have searched everywhere, this is the only one" when infact I had searched almost nowhere.

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