Hi all, The problem is this: Recently I''ve been very busy at work which has left me with little time for gaming. Trying to get through some of the big titles I''m currently playing (Zelda, Resi Evil:Zero, etc) is proving very difficult. However, I still like to have a little dabble to relax in the evenings in whatever time I do have. This normally amounts to sticking on Vice City and just shooting/driving/crashing around for a while. This is a game you litteraly can just turn on and start having some fun with straight away. I bought Ikaruga for the same purpose but the game is a tad too hard core to just relax and play (I swear I''m going to need some crack or something to get past level 4..). Anyway, that got me thinking about games whose core dynamic was all about having fun and just "playing". Perhaps these would be games that are often classified as toys such as The Sims or Sim City etc that basically give you a sandbox environment to play in. Or perhaps it''d be smaller games that can be completed in a short time (shareware titles, a game of ISS, Wario Ware Inc etc). Enough ramble. What I''m after is peoples opinions about games and their ability to reward a short play as well as a lengthy gaming session. Do you think its possible to provide both in a single title (GTA succeeds but it has a rather unique subject)? Or is it something better suited to a specific application? cheers, T

I think most games either swing to the hardcore, play for 200 hours extreme, or go exactly the opposite to the solitaire and minesweeper end of things. Granted, there are lots of games that settle in between, but few manage to hit that sweet spot like GTA.

Some of the requirements for that spot, off the top of my head:

- Simple but effective controls. Consoles are good for this, and platformers are the best in terms of computer titles. Some FPS titles (RTCW comes to mind) like to have "action buttons" that take the place of more complex controls. Simple controls let you jump in without a long learning curve, and also reduce the likeliness of quitting the game from sheer exhaustion. Most FPSes are weak in this area, having all manner of controls, "moves," and various actions to master. Similarly, the vast majority of RPGs and the derivatives thereof fail miserably here, because learning a stats system and interface is no small task.

- Open ended, engaging setting. Not necessarily a grand big story (as in GTA) but rather some kind of environment that doesn''t run out of interest. FPS games are weak here because single-player levels are only interesting once (or maybe twice). RPGs and in general multiplayer games (even multiplayer FPSes) introduce an openness and unpredictability that make it fun after the first try. GTA''s freedom of movement and random pedestrians are good examples of openness without convoluted RPG-esque plotlines.

- Lots of hidden challenge or secrets of some kind. This doesn''t necessarily mean secret areas; in fact, once all of the secret areas are found, the level becomes boring again. GTA2''s kill frenzies are again a good example here; they are often challenging, but it isn''t annoying to try them over and over. The ability to offer continuing challenge, somewhat steadily increasing difficulty, and lots of nifty little stuff to discover is what makes games highly immersive and replayable.

I for one am all for seeing more games like this. Maybe someone can pull some inspiration from the thread

I agree that this is tough to accomplish. For me mission based games tend to be good short term diversions, but the first time through the games I can sit down and play for hours.

In a sense racing games are mission based with each race equating to a separate mission. It''s easy to sit down for a few races without being forced to find a save point when you''re ready to quit.

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I think the trouble is making the game scalable. It's one thing to make the "pick-up-and-play" game, another to make the "epic quest, devote your life to me please" game, and a third to do both well and integrate them too.

But making a game allowing for that does depend somewhat on the subject. The game has to be made more complex or have more content as it gets bigger. GTA thrives on having a world which has most of the gameplay infrastructure built-in, and the plot is more like icing. Final Fantasy, on the other hand, is too plot-driven to work that way, making it hard to play in 15-minute segments.

[edited by - RTF on July 2, 2003 9:14:03 PM]

For games I''ll sit and play forever:

I''ll play Civil War Generals forever... I don''t know why, and I only have the demo version, so I get to play one battle (Confederate or Union) and have 19 turns. But its fun as hell, because the AI always does something a little different at the beginning that snowballs into a totally different battle.

Caesar III is great, as are Roller Coaster Tycoon and Sim City. You can build a city - which takes some time - and fix it up, launch large monsters at unsuspecting citizens, call out the National Guard and repair the damage, build huge coasters for the hell of it with ULTRA-UBER-INSANELY-HIGH nausea ratings, build a whole empire and fight off the Gauls... Its great. Civilization, The Sims, all these just get you hooked and you''ll sit there and watch your guy go to work every single day as a guard or something, come home, force him to learn, send him to watch TV, call his gf, pick up the trash he just throws on the floor... and you get the idea.

As well, GTA and games where you can just wander around and destroy things in various and cool ways are great. I''ll play Rainbow 6 in fifty different variations on a single level, kill of my teammates, murder hostages with various weapons, grenade poor nobrainer (kills ai) terrorists... over and over. I could have played (before I sold the N64, that is) Goldeneye 007 for days on end. A friend and I played the Silo level as a team (2 controllers split) until we got it in under 2 minutes - and incredibly difficult task, by the way - and I would just turn on random cheat codes and play with random weapons, randomly kill people (you know how it is - you turn on invisibility, and drag your silenced-PP7s around and take down the guards... and then do it again with dual rocket launchers and lasers...)

...

Anyways, these are the kinds of games that get me hooked. REALLY hooked. In fact, I''m going to go play Civil War Generals right now...

//EDIT - NOO! 500 ERROR X20++! Jesus that''s annoying. I thought we got rid of these...

-geo
red eye is coming back (the old site is still around, albeit in a weird transitional form)

I like pick up and play games as well as longer games. Longer complex games tend to get me totally addicted for a while and then I get bored with them rather quickly. Some of my favorite pick up and play games are shareware 2D arcade or puzzle type games, like Bubble Puzzle, Snood, DX-Ball, and Pocket Tanks. There is just something about those games that makes them really fun to just open up and play a round or two.

Currently, I am working on a 2d arcade shooter game (my first real game), and I am trying to borrow some of the ideas from the games mentioned above, to create a good pick up ad play game. I want to make one of those games that once someone in a class or at work has it on their computer, suddenly everyone needs a copy on their computer. I have seen the games that I mentioned have that affect.

Man. That Pax Solaris game has me addicted totally. I was playing Mission Risk (much the same, actually, just different graphics and UI) before that, and Civil War Generals before that, and am starting to dig Caesar 3 out of the dust. Starcraft had me hooked, bad. It was my life. Then Jeff took his CD back. BTW, withdrawl for that is 3-6 days.

Really, 2D shareware stuff is the greatest for this. It''s simple, but has a fun system to try and beat (and you race against the AI and/or the clock) the game more and more efficiently, then you branch out and try different ways to do it, etc etc.

I do like playing games that take a long time, however. I eventually beat Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, all the Monkey Islands, Starcraft, all the Rainbow Sixes, the actual mission on Caesar III, Imperium Galactica, Yoda Stories, Outlaws, Indian Jones and his Desktop Adventures, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, The Dig, Afterlife, the Civilization series, all the levels on SimCity, Sam and Max Hit the Road, all kinds of FPSs, shooter games, XvT... A little of everything. But most of those games take FOREVER to beat because they have INSANELY difficult and hard to follow plots - DotT, to name one. Oh, and geez - Chip''s Challenge. Wow. You might see this in the near future, 3D...

-geo
red eye is coming back (the old site is still around, albeit in a weird transitional form)

Games that do really well tend to be open ended and allow the player to do many things (The Sims, Sim City, etc). Another thing which makes a lot of games addictive is when they are less linear. They may have a linear story but the game allows the player to go off and do whatever he wants to(Final Fantasy series). Other games just let you go do whatever you want without forcing you do to ANYTHING in the real game (Grand Theft Auto). They all have a big thing related as well "FREEDOM". Each game allows the player to do many things without them having to always stick to the story.

This pick up and play is a rule i call the "5 by 5" rule, it means you can have just as much enjoyment, fun and accomplishment playing a game for 5 minutes, or 5 hours...diablo II to me was a great example of this. I could hop in kill some things, get some loot, hop out in 5 minutes and have fun doing it..or i could hop in, kill A LOT of things, get a LOT of lute and hop out after 5 hours and have just of much fun.

Since having a family, real job etc...it seems these games are the only ones i care for anymore, I used to love games of RPG grand status like 50+ hours to beat, difficult as hell etc...but as of lately
id take an easier game where i can get somewhere fast in it than a harder game with a long learning curve and get no where fast.

RTS games (good ones) are the exception, they take longer to play but u can hop in and play a good online skirmish in about 20-40 minutes now had have fun usually.



-Shane

For me Diablo 2 was definitely not a game I could play for a short period of time. Not because of gameplay, but because of the save system. I''d sometimes be forced to play for up to an hour after I wanted to stop just because I couldn''t find a save point.


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