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Original post by Anonymous Poster I depends, most of the load/save usage in games i play could be cut down by level design and basic game mechanic refinements.
The health system is part of the game mechanics.
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What you got to remeber is that games are about fun, everything else is secondary. Period.
I personally find your statement that the "save-reload" phenomenon is caused by having health bars/hit points/etc ridiculous.
In fact, a more realistic health system would lead to more, not less, reloading. After all what is more likely to cause the player to reload, losing 5 or 10 hit points, or being shot in the leg and having to limp through the rest of the game?
Alternate health systems have their places in certain genres (e.g. fighting games, such as "Bushido Blade" for PSX), but hit points are here to stay because they''re easy to program, easy to convey, easy to comprehend, and easy to play balance. (Oh, and if you''re gaming experience involves constantly hunting for health packs, either the game is badly designed from the get-go or you are a bad player; the health system has nothing to do with that.)
Remember also that games are not reality; they are an abstraction thereof, and therefore it is enough that every aspect of the game is appropriate for that game. Besides, a game where one hit can kill and injuries take months (of game time) to heal does not sound very fun to ME. (except in a very limited context.)
Out of curiosity, how long have you been playing games, and how wide a variety have you played?
For starters lets do away with the idea that the character is going to limp around the game, lets also do a away with idea that the player is a bad player. Never blame the player.
Keeping a health system simple doesn''t mean that the mechanics behind it will be simple. But by the character health being affected in ways that react react with game elements would provide the player with something new to learn in a game.
I apologize, I''m at work and don''t have time to read all the posts.. I just wanted to comment on a few of the early ones:
If you want extreme realism, I''d go with the one-hit casualty. If the character is hit, he''s not in any shape to fight.. he''s down and out, he''s not longer a threat to the enemy. In current game terms, he''s "dead" (though he''s perhaps not technically deceased).
In this format, the focus is dramatically shifted to avoiding being hit in the first place. Armor and the ability to dodge or deflect attacks are the two most likely resources a player would strive to obtain.
But (surprise) I would STILL include the health bar -- though perhaps in the form of stamina or energy or something. In other words, if the character takes several insignificant blows to his armor, he''s still eventually going to start feeling beat up. Even if his opponent is unarmed, a good pummeling is going to eventually incapacitate the player character. Similarly, a knight with heavy armor taking repeated blows from a light sword is going to start feeling bruised eventually.
BTW, a point I''d like to make (although it actually has little bearing on this discussion) is that computer games were not the first to use the "one-dimensional" mechanics of health bars, they were merely the first to use the visual representation of a red bar (that I know of). Paper & Dice RPGs have been using the HP concept for decades.
Anyway, I''m all for having a more realistic, more complex health-and-mortality system.. but only if it has some bearing on the gameplay, AND it doesn''t affect fun or playability. In other words, having the player fight less effectively depending on the number of HP remaining is, in all likelihood, pure folly. But having dynamically linked stats like Energy/Stamina, Wounds, Bleeding, Constitution, etc. which all affect a single "wellness bar" representing the totality of these statistics is not necessarily a bad idea, especially if they can be affected individually.
Keep in mind though that the more complex the game, the more micromanagement and learning curve come into play.
The downfall of some games is an attempt to be too "real". You might as well criticize chess for having a queen that can kick more arse than any other game unit. Some of the games I appreciate the most are those where gameplay is improved by throwing out the rules of reality. On that basis I see nothing at all wrong with a 1-D health bar.
I think the "1 hit 1 kill" is a good rule for some kinds of games. I'm going to start out my RTS close to that - each unit has 100 HP, armor, and all weapons will do 30+ damage. The armor will outright stop some bullets, but anything over its tolerance breaks the armor (depending on the armor and the weapon, the armor might stop the bullet that breaks it, but maybe not.. kevlar might stop a single shotgun blast{and break after doing so} in the game but not an artillery shell). Units will die very quickly when you engage the enemy, which will help make the game about tactical positioning and movements instead of extreme micromanagement. Or at least, I hope it will. If not, I can always change it to something else.
For games where the player controls only 1 unit (an FPS, RPG, etc), I really like the damage system of GURPS(the advnaced combat rules) where passive defense, active defense, damage resistance, damage type, and weapon type all effect if and how much damage is done. I feel the much more complicated system allows much more tactical play than D&D style HP that inflate to insanely high numbers after a few level ups. You can get the basic rules for GURPS from http://sjgames.com/gurps/lite/, but it doesn't contain the advanced combat rules I was speaking of. It does contain the basic combat rules though, along with many other rules for the GURPS system.
[edited by - Extrarius on March 21, 2003 9:20:19 PM]
"Walk not the trodden path, for it has borne it's burden." -John, Flying Monk
I think you need some sort of indicator for "healthy", "damaged" and "imminent death" statuses in any game that has them. If the flavour of a game suits a particular representation - for example, a percentage for deflector shields in a Star Trek game. For a high paced mindless action game, heartbeats, flashing the status bar red, or similar may be better.
In any case, while humans tend not to come with an external health bar, they still have a pretty much instantaneous self-assessment system built in as standard - in effect an internal health bar (rather than a numerical value).
I''m not really sure what the original post of this thread is aiming at. On the one hand, the complaint that health is a one-dimensional attribute seems pretty pointless - a two dimensional system is certainly possible - for example, independent physical and stun damage - but I don''t see much practical difference between that and a weapon type vs armour type model with one dimensional health. On the other hand, the idea of food not instantly replenishing leads into a potentially very rich field - ways of changing the one-dimensional health value can be more complex than just immediately adding and subtracting. For example, delayed effects, variable effects based on current status, side effects on other aspects.
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by rmsgrey In any case, while humans tend not to come with an external health bar, they still have a pretty much instantaneous self-assessment system built in as standard - in effect an internal health bar (rather than a numerical value).
True but you may say that you''re feeling pretty crappy right now but be in top health (and vice versa), which is pretty much my state of health right now incidently
It is funny how we try to rely on our ability to think out side of the box of idea''s when trying solve an issue by coming up with methods to explain ourselves. As much as i resist its drawn i must comply so here''s a thought i''ve had recently.
I''ve been kind of obsessed with the effects of the cardio systems and its value to one''s ability to perform much like the hearth beat thingy someone mentioned earlier. I''m trying to work out a method in which the player can manage it instead of it simply starting at high and working its way down to low then pause till it comes back up. Oxi-masks is one way, players are then given X amount of oxygen allowing them to develop strategies that will force enemy oxi use which will result in an enemy that is more easily incapacitated.
This is the kind of example i''m talking about where the health system would be brought into the ''gameplay'' rather than it merely acting as a scoring mechanism.
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Original post by Paul Cunningham {quote}by rmsgrey In any case, while humans tend not to come with an external health bar, they still have a pretty much instantaneous self-assessment system built in as standard - in effect an internal health bar (rather than a numerical value). {/quote} True but you may say that you''re feeling pretty crappy right now but be in top health (and vice versa), which is pretty much my state of health right now incidently
You may feel pretty crappy, but you presumably know that you don''t have any seriously mangled limbs and you''re not bleeding heavily, heavily bruised, etc.
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I''ve been kind of obsessed with the effects of the cardio systems and its value to one''s ability to perform much like the hearth beat thingy someone mentioned earlier. I''m trying to work out a method in which the player can manage it instead of it simply starting at high and working its way down to low then pause till it comes back up. Oxi-masks is one way, players are then given X amount of oxygen allowing them to develop strategies that will force enemy oxi use which will result in an enemy that is more easily incapacitated.
This is the kind of example i''m talking about where the health system would be brought into the ''gameplay'' rather than it merely acting as a scoring mechanism.
FF8 had a "limit break" system whereby any character below 30% health had a chance of being able to perform a special attack - this meant that it was a viable strategy to deliberately play through most of the game with your characters on low health - and against some bosses, the difference between winning and losing the fight lay in whether your characters started in limit break range (and could be kept there) - particularly when the boss'' attacks could take you straight past limit range. In my opinion, it was a ''broken'' system as implemented, but some sort of last ditch power-up could be interesting if done well.
Health as a managed resource like your Oxy example has been done in the past - the problem is that it is generally hard to balance right - if burning health gets too much of an advantage, then it dominates the game, if it doesn''t give enough advantage, then it''s a cute feature that no-one ever uses...
