Anyone ever heard of "A Tale in the Desert"?

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Original post by grbrg
Can a game still be fun if the player has to earn the money for his equipment while following some other game goal? What jobs could the player character take that do not involve the usual adventure-stuff?

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As fun as the adventure stuff? Only if you boil down gameplay and analyze what EXACTLY makes adventuring fun.

You have a few elements that you''ll have to duplicate:

• Risk - This helps to create adrenaline rushes and addictiveness
  
• Meaningful Choices - This of course creates different strategies
  
• Strategy - This provides excitement and challenging thinking, and different ways to approach the same situation
  
• Variety of Encounter - This keeps you from facing the same thing again and again and again (different maps and monsters do this)
  
• Reward - The is the ultimate capstone, and what you get should be proportional to the risk and strategy you''ve employed
  

Old school games like Tapper and Paperboy made mundane gameplay interesting. I think you can do alot with minigames and golf-swing meters, btw, to do this.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

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Original post by Hyatus
Yikes.

Hasn''t anyone played the Shenmue series?

You are required to get a job in those games.

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"How about a game of lucky hit?"



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Just waiting for the mothership...

I actually think a boring job is not that bad, as long as the player clearly feels he is getting some reward from it and it only takes up a small part of his time.
For instance resource management in most RTS''s is really boring. However, becuase it is necessary to strengthen your forces, most players are willing to learn to do it well. Also it usually takes less than ten percent of the time you spend playing the game, with the other ninety being much more interesting.
So as long as the player doesn''t feel the developer is forcing them to do this really boring stuff and/or taking up all thier time with it, even a boring job can be a good addition to a game.
It will also give the player a sense of responsibility, and hopefully (like in vangelis'' example), a sense of accomplishment.

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There are two things he who seeks wisdom must understand...
Love... and Wudan!

Have you guys ever played MUD (Multi-User-Dungeon) or similar types of online games? Those games are online games and are purely text-based (no graphics at all) which you start with nothing and can''t even fight the easiest monster. The only way to get experience is do some jobs. The game I played, you have to start sweeping floors, filling water tanks, working with a blacksmith, even polishing shoes for every NPC! It is not so much of an excitement but it is the necessary steps to become stronger (e.g. work with a blacksmith to increase strengh, copy book for a teacher to increase intellegences etc.), which is so much close to reality.

It always amuses me to see that many kinds of single player games have the easiest monster (e.g. slime) near the starting town and have blue dragons near a town in the end, as if those kids who born in that town can go out and fight a blue dragon. And that fighting monster is the only way to gain experience and level up. Which just makes fighting a boredom rather than excitement.

One really good game is "Lunatic Dawn" by Artdink, which features job system as well as dungeon system. So a beginner would start doing simple jobs and later with harder jobs, and finally exploring dungeons.

Monotony shouldn''t be a problem. After all, if a player is willing to spend six hours straight chopping at ogres, he''ll probably find mopping to be a stimulating and nuanced profession.

Being able to see progress just by doing the same thing time and time again is generally enough to keep an RPG''er going for hours. And if you give them a nice high number to brag about (I''m an elite level 58 ditch digger!) they''ll be freaking ecstatic.

That''s probably an overstatement, since escaping into a world where you get to kill anything you can catch is part of the draw of games, but Harvest Moon was a champion, and nobody likes farming.

I would suggest starting the player out in a "mundane" job or role in life and giving them the tools to turn themselves into an adventurer. Make them work their way up, so to speak. For example, the shop boy rises up to lead his people to freedom from the tyranny of ...

Could be cool.

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Original post by Iron Chef Carnage
Monotony shouldn''t be a problem. After all, if a player is willing to spend six hours straight chopping at ogres, he''ll probably find mopping to be a stimulating and nuanced profession.

Being able to see progress just by doing the same thing time and time again is generally enough to keep an RPG''er going for hours. And if you give them a nice high number to brag about (I''m an elite level 58 ditch digger!) they''ll be freaking ecstatic.

That''s probably an overstatement, since escaping into a world where you get to kill anything you can catch is part of the draw of games, but Harvest Moon was a champion, and nobody likes farming.

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Never underestimate the "sexiness" factor of a role. Most games sell the feeling of being someone or something you couldn''t be.

Although, there''s the sims, so being an uber-janitor may be a possibility!

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Just waiting for the mothership...

I''m curious what a "more mundane" job would be like in a fantastical universe. Being a shop owner or machine operator in the Star Wars universe might be interesting just out of the sheer unusualness of the environment.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

Actually an interesting idea just occurred to me; what if you combined "The Sims" with an adventure/rpg game with a strong story line? Basically you''d be trying your best to go about your virtual life while the world around you threatens to collapse into chaos. Example:

You''re a shop owner. Things are going great. Suddenly this guy runs in and starts shouting. Something about the [enemy] bombing a village in the northen part of the country, heading this way; better get out. People start to move out, nervous but not panicked. You ask him, "What about my shop?" "You better leave it," he says. The look in his eye tells you he''s right. You grab all the money you can out of the til (sp?), and head for the exit...

...pretty soon the tanks come. People huddle in secret shelters undeground, makeshift hideouts. The military barely put up a show at resistance. There''s talk of a civilian led uprising. Some people are confident and talk boldly; others seem less sure. You consider your options. The borders are guarded; you might make it out. You could surrender and become a citizen under the new government, assuming they let you. You could fight in a uprising in the hopes of restoring power to your people.


That''s just one possible example of course, but you see the point. Man''s struggle to live in the mist of a world spiraling out of control. Of course then there''s the possibility of controlling a whole family (as in "The Sims"). I think it could be intriguing.