Do you think that slowing the game down would make it significantly less realisitc?

That would be my largest concern.

I mean, turn-based is unrealistic, but at least it's on the furthest end of the spectrum, as is real-time. Slowing down is sort of in-between and I'm wondering if it would be terribly unrealistic to the point where it would lose much immersion.

"'Nazrix is cool' -- Nazrix" --Darkmage --Godfree

Edited by - Nazrix on October 3, 2000 3:30:30 AM

quote: Original post by Wavinator

Since this idea is picking up steam for me, I''ll plug it again here: Cover.

One of the main reasons you can''t have blazing fast action and detailed decision making is because you need time to stop and think. Turn-based is practically no good, because it interrupts the adrenaline.

I''ve been having some second thoughts about this. I''m thinking that this adrenaline rush comes not from the action but the importance of the situation. If an event occurs too fast then this could diminish the affect of a adrenaline rush but if the player has time to contemplate the importance of the situation then it could actually be better to have combat slowed down or even turn-based.

The player has to know that an event holds a specific value or importance. From here, the effects branch out into thrill, adrenaline, suspence etc. That''s what i''m thinking.

quote:
You don''t have to stop the action with this, then, and it''s natural. You can still create suspense and drama (heck, even more so) since the bad guys may still be bearing down on you. But a few pop shots (thinking guns here) will keep them from rushing ya! (To make this work, I''d say suppressing fire and enemies that don''t always charge blindly would be key.)

So somehow in the game you have to supply the player with the opportunity to hide instead of building slow-mo or turn-based systems into the game design?! I like that idea a lot. Now i''ve got to think of elements that will allow the player to hide.


"So you're the one that designed that game are you?"
*Gulp* "Umm, yeah"

quote: Original post by Nazrix

Do you think that slowing the game down would make it significantly less realisitc?

That would be my largest concern.

I mean, turn-based is unrealistic, but at least it''s on the furthest end of the spectrum, as is real-time. Slowing down is sort of in-between and I''m wondering if it would be terribly unrealistic to the point where it would lose much immersion.

It depends on your perspective of realistic. I lot of people will argue that turn-based is more realistic becasue it allows you to do in a game what you would do in real-life. Controlling a character with a joystick/mouse doesn''t allow you to do many real life actions but turnbased allows for the extra input through other reasources. Maybe you mean "realistic feel"??!


"So you're the one that designed that game are you?"
*Gulp* "Umm, yeah"

Why is people concerned that things are realistic? The goal is to make fun games. If they are realistic too, great, but it should not be a requirement.

Some of you keep talking about andrenaline rush is incompatible with slowing down of the game, true, but this kind of timing model was never intended for high-paced action games.

However, strategy games like X-COM Apocalypse benefited very much from it. In fact even though I played both games mostly in slow mode in was very exciting and tense.

I think we must consider one more thing. By slowing things down we allow more complex control of a character (or a full party) than is possible using a mouse in real-time. It is impossible to tell 10 characters in detail what they should do all the time. Slowing things down makes this possible - and controlling a full party of characters allows for much more tactic in a game than just controlling a single character does. If one has to control so many characters simulataneously in a game it quickly becomes a RTS where each character is very simply to control.

To summarize my opinion (again):
Hard real-time pacing model: Action Games / RTS.
Adjustable real-time pacing model: Complex Strategy/Tactical games.

Jacob Marner

quote: Original post by Paul Cunningham

It depends on your perspective of realistic. I lot of people will argue that turn-based is more realistic becasue it allows you to do in a game what you would do in real-life. Controlling a character with a joystick/mouse doesn''t allow you to do many real life actions but turnbased allows for the extra input through other reasources. Maybe you mean "realistic feel"??!


"So you''re the one that designed that game are you?"
*Gulp* "Umm, yeah"

Yes I suppose I did mean "realistic feel". You are right though. I guess that the best features to use is what works effectively. Most things in games aren''t exactly realistic anyway. We should just do what works, and feels right.

"'Nazrix is cool' -- Nazrix" --Darkmage --Godfree

One game that''s going to use slow-motion for a cool effect is Max Payne, where the game will slow down when you kill someone, letting you rotate the camera (like the Matrix, I guess).

To me the only good use of slow-motion is for "artistic" purposes like this...

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