"Living Breathing Ecosystem"
I am a HUGE fan of this game. And since CDP is so receptive to their fans I thought this would be the perfect thing to bring to their attention.
Because for the most part these issues can be solved with a few AI tweaks and spawning efficiencies in the world. Nothing more.
Things like more advanced encounters are things modders can take care of easily, there are plenty of skyrim mods like that.
SO....here we go:
This article points out the fatal flaws in Skyrim’s open world (in addition to other mechanics)
http://mygodwhathassciencedone.blogspot.com/2013/02/great-games-that-actually-suck-elder.html
The gist of it is that the game world is not actually open ended. Wild animals spawn for the purpose of attacking you. Most little encounters are just time wasters between point A and B. The world doesn’t feel dynamic.
This..unfortunately..is basically the Witcher’s “dynamic” world.
what happened to: rotting corpses will attract monsters and killing all the wolves in the arena will increase population of deers etc, if blacksmiths wife is killed he will move to other village and what not.
^Havent seen anything even remotely close to that. All the people in the villages are hardest in their roles for eternity. How can a wife be killed if no enemies attack the settlements?
Nekkers spawn in large groups in ONE spot. A bear has a specific spawn point. Drowners spawn in specific locations.
There is a point where enemy spawn locations become less about “they are there because that is the type of region they live in” and more about “the programmer make them spawn in the SAME SPOT every time"
Civillians have no “day and night cycle”. Certain spots in the game map are populated with specific NPCs who say the same thing over and over again. The children playing “burn the witch” in Novigrad continue playing it for eternity in the same spot. The guards guarding the entrance to The bloody Baron’s fort constantly talk about how they encountered a witcher one time or something. I mean sure, at night all the kids in the city just..walk away and then despawn, but they hardly have any sort of actual routine.
The world becomes bland once you get through the “hand crafted ‘random encounters’ that dot the land. Every time you complete a mission, it makes you feel like you made the world more empty. Because you did.
Monsters, who “populate the world naturally” are 99 percent of the time confined to “guarded treasures” and monster dens, and as I said before..incredibly specific spawn points. A bear always spawns near a certain tree. Nekkers always spawn near this specific ruined cart.
The game, unfortunately, aims to be so big that you only need to visit every part once. Because if you revisit any parts, you are doomed to witness the same enemy spawning, the same conversation occurring, a spot once occupied by a “random bandit camp encounter” disappointingly empty and meaningless.
So what is the solution?
Could it be as simple as tweaking the NPC spawning in the open world? Make griffin and wyvern and cyclops encounters more common and wolf packs and deer families more common? Program more instances of predators chasing down deer. This could give the illusion that the world is just as dangerous around “guarded treasures” as it is in the general open world. Granted, there have been a few times where I came across a random group of bandits by a fire, or a random wvyern. But only VERY. VERY. VERY rarely. Like once a play through of 2 hours consisting of just roaming the world.
Or could a solution be programming more RDR style encounters on the game that TRULY spawn randomly in the environment, like a duel between two noblemen, a woman being chased by dogs, a horse thief, a man robbing a traveler, or just coming across the remains of a battle that dynamically spawns in the world.
I think both. The problem is that, while the first one is easy enough to do with mods, the second one is much more difficult, and would likely require devs’ help.
The witcher 3 seems to be caught between being be a narrative set in a big map, and trying to be an actual systemic open world.
I am not saying that the style of the witcher world is “bad”.
It is just not dynamic, nor does it have much replay ability.
Trailers said that monsters don't just "spawn artificially; they react with each other and NPCs...the world is populated with animals monsters and humans interacting with each other, and you are merely a spectator"
Well I have yet to see a cyclops fighting some harpies that are RIGHT NEXT TO HIM, or even some endregas (I have once fought some endregas, came across a guarded treasure with a cyclops, and there were harpies floating right there THEY ALL GANGED UP ON ME AND DIDNT NOTICE EACH OTHER)
And as for "artificial spawning"..well..like I said, 99 percent of all the encounters are predesigned spawn locations that either never occur again because they are limited bandit camps or something, or only ever occur in the same spot with the same enemies over and over again.
I have yet to see a griffin attack an NPC settlement.
I have yet to see a non scripted more than 1 time only instance of humans "interacting with each other, trying to survive"
I’ve been told that “this game isn’t supposed to be like skyrim”
but then I hear and see in trailers and demos how the world is..well..described like skyrim, with a “living breathing ecosystem”.
I dont wanna sound like one of those people who try to say this game sucks because it isn't like skyrim. In fact it is one of the best games I have ever played. But I am confused between what the devs said and what is actually playing in my PC.
Okay, the kids playing thing I can understand. There is only so much dialogue I suppose. Would still be nice if maybe that event happened in different parts of the city.
But the animal thing is not as "complex" as you think it is.
@jjavier
"What happens when they wander inside a village, get in the area of guarded treasure or coincide in time and place with the player in the middle of a scripted quest?"
That is exactly what a dynamic world addresses. NPCs should ward off the animals or fight them. If they are near a guarded treasure, that would give the player a second thought of trying to take them and the guardian on.
And I am not talking about scripted quests, in which devs always simply essentially "shut off" certain parts to avoid getting in the way. Thats why there are no "dynamic encounters" during missions in RDR for example. I am talking about the open world.
Also, obviously I am not trying to be the one who is all "oh it has to be so realistic with geralt having hunger and plants growing and animals reproducing based on Darwinian principles"
I am simply asking for the complex and organic AI interaction system they promised. It isn't super impossible. RDR did it. You see coyotes chasing down and killing things all the time. You see hunters roaming the land shooting down birds and fending off predators.
In witcher 3, the only hunter I've seen is safely in the confines of a village looking at...the side of a cliff.
"The problem with that is the complexity grows exponentially because of interactions between the elements of the simulation."
Not really. I am not asking for "world simulator". But for the next gen complex ecosystem they promised. This is next generation, isn't it? It has been done before.
"To fully simulate children playing, the developer would need to script the same children NPC playing in different groups, different games and with different partners. Each NPC should some times win the game, some time lose, from time to time fight, leave in rage, suffer accidents, get sick and the list keep going to the infinite."
...really? Obviously that is not what I mean. I was talking how instead of maybe that conversation occurring organically in different parts of the city, it only spawns in the same spot outside that one tavern.
(bolded cuz a few of you guys mentioned my comment about the kids)
"I think limiting "enemies" to areas and periodical respaws is a reasonable option for a quite complex problem."
And that is my point. I am not condemning them for having this sort of gameplay..I don't like it when they..echem..say one thing and give another. Because that^ is not a living breathing ecosystem. They said "they aren't spawned artificially" and look at that..they are spawned forever and beyond in a single location.
You all have arguments that this sort of programming is hard. But this is next gen, and this game promised to deliver this sort of living breathing ecosystem. This game is supposed to be a breath of fresh air, a step in a new direction, a new height for open world games, remember? So you can imagine my confusion when the game fails to do the things many last generation open world games have been able to achieve.
I am a HUGE fan of this game. And since CDP is so receptive to their fans I thought this would be the perfect thing to bring to their attention.
Because for the most part these issues can be solved with a few AI tweaks and spawning efficiencies in the world. Nothing more.
Things like more advanced encounters are things modders can take care of easily, there are plenty of skyrim mods like that.
SO....here we go:
This article points out the fatal flaws in Skyrim’s open world (in addition to other mechanics)
http://mygodwhathassciencedone.blogspot.com/2013/02/great-games-that-actually-suck-elder.html
The gist of it is that the game world is not actually open ended. Wild animals spawn for the purpose of attacking you. Most little encounters are just time wasters between point A and B. The world doesn’t feel dynamic.
This..unfortunately..is basically the Witcher’s “dynamic” world.
what happened to: rotting corpses will attract monsters and killing all the wolves in the arena will increase population of deers etc, if blacksmiths wife is killed he will move to other village and what not.
^Havent seen anything even remotely close to that. All the people in the villages are hardest in their roles for eternity. How can a wife be killed if no enemies attack the settlements?
Nekkers spawn in large groups in ONE spot. A bear has a specific spawn point. Drowners spawn in specific locations.
There is a point where enemy spawn locations become less about “they are there because that is the type of region they live in” and more about “the programmer make them spawn in the SAME SPOT every time"
Civillians have no “day and night cycle”. Certain spots in the game map are populated with specific NPCs who say the same thing over and over again. The children playing “burn the witch” in Novigrad continue playing it for eternity in the same spot. The guards guarding the entrance to The bloody Baron’s fort constantly talk about how they encountered a witcher one time or something. I mean sure, at night all the kids in the city just..walk away and then despawn, but they hardly have any sort of actual routine.
The world becomes bland once you get through the “hand crafted ‘random encounters’ that dot the land. Every time you complete a mission, it makes you feel like you made the world more empty. Because you did.
Monsters, who “populate the world naturally” are 99 percent of the time confined to “guarded treasures” and monster dens, and as I said before..incredibly specific spawn points. A bear always spawns near a certain tree. Nekkers always spawn near this specific ruined cart.
The game, unfortunately, aims to be so big that you only need to visit every part once. Because if you revisit any parts, you are doomed to witness the same enemy spawning, the same conversation occurring, a spot once occupied by a “random bandit camp encounter” disappointingly empty and meaningless.
So what is the solution?
Could it be as simple as tweaking the NPC spawning in the open world? Make griffin and wyvern and cyclops encounters more common and wolf packs and deer families more common? Program more instances of predators chasing down deer. This could give the illusion that the world is just as dangerous around “guarded treasures” as it is in the general open world. Granted, there have been a few times where I came across a random group of bandits by a fire, or a random wvyern. But only VERY. VERY. VERY rarely. Like once a play through of 2 hours consisting of just roaming the world.
Or could a solution be programming more RDR style encounters on the game that TRULY spawn randomly in the environment, like a duel between two noblemen, a woman being chased by dogs, a horse thief, a man robbing a traveler, or just coming across the remains of a battle that dynamically spawns in the world.
I think both. The problem is that, while the first one is easy enough to do with mods, the second one is much more difficult, and would likely require devs’ help.
The witcher 3 seems to be caught between being be a narrative set in a big map, and trying to be an actual systemic open world.
I am not saying that the style of the witcher world is “bad”.
It is just not dynamic, nor does it have much replay ability.
Trailers said that monsters don't just "spawn artificially; they react with each other and NPCs...the world is populated with animals monsters and humans interacting with each other, and you are merely a spectator"
Well I have yet to see a cyclops fighting some harpies that are RIGHT NEXT TO HIM, or even some endregas (I have once fought some endregas, came across a guarded treasure with a cyclops, and there were harpies floating right there THEY ALL GANGED UP ON ME AND DIDNT NOTICE EACH OTHER)
And as for "artificial spawning"..well..like I said, 99 percent of all the encounters are predesigned spawn locations that either never occur again because they are limited bandit camps or something, or only ever occur in the same spot with the same enemies over and over again.
I have yet to see a griffin attack an NPC settlement.
I have yet to see a non scripted more than 1 time only instance of humans "interacting with each other, trying to survive"
I’ve been told that “this game isn’t supposed to be like skyrim”
but then I hear and see in trailers and demos how the world is..well..described like skyrim, with a “living breathing ecosystem”.
I dont wanna sound like one of those people who try to say this game sucks because it isn't like skyrim. In fact it is one of the best games I have ever played. But I am confused between what the devs said and what is actually playing in my PC.
Okay, the kids playing thing I can understand. There is only so much dialogue I suppose. Would still be nice if maybe that event happened in different parts of the city.
But the animal thing is not as "complex" as you think it is.
@jjavier
"What happens when they wander inside a village, get in the area of guarded treasure or coincide in time and place with the player in the middle of a scripted quest?"
That is exactly what a dynamic world addresses. NPCs should ward off the animals or fight them. If they are near a guarded treasure, that would give the player a second thought of trying to take them and the guardian on.
And I am not talking about scripted quests, in which devs always simply essentially "shut off" certain parts to avoid getting in the way. Thats why there are no "dynamic encounters" during missions in RDR for example. I am talking about the open world.
Also, obviously I am not trying to be the one who is all "oh it has to be so realistic with geralt having hunger and plants growing and animals reproducing based on Darwinian principles"
I am simply asking for the complex and organic AI interaction system they promised. It isn't super impossible. RDR did it. You see coyotes chasing down and killing things all the time. You see hunters roaming the land shooting down birds and fending off predators.
In witcher 3, the only hunter I've seen is safely in the confines of a village looking at...the side of a cliff.
"The problem with that is the complexity grows exponentially because of interactions between the elements of the simulation."
Not really. I am not asking for "world simulator". But for the next gen complex ecosystem they promised. This is next generation, isn't it? It has been done before.
"To fully simulate children playing, the developer would need to script the same children NPC playing in different groups, different games and with different partners. Each NPC should some times win the game, some time lose, from time to time fight, leave in rage, suffer accidents, get sick and the list keep going to the infinite."
...really? Obviously that is not what I mean. I was talking how instead of maybe that conversation occurring organically in different parts of the city, it only spawns in the same spot outside that one tavern.
(bolded cuz a few of you guys mentioned my comment about the kids)
"I think limiting "enemies" to areas and periodical respaws is a reasonable option for a quite complex problem."
And that is my point. I am not condemning them for having this sort of gameplay..I don't like it when they..echem..say one thing and give another. Because that^ is not a living breathing ecosystem. They said "they aren't spawned artificially" and look at that..they are spawned forever and beyond in a single location.
You all have arguments that this sort of programming is hard. But this is next gen, and this game promised to deliver this sort of living breathing ecosystem. This game is supposed to be a breath of fresh air, a step in a new direction, a new height for open world games, remember? So you can imagine my confusion when the game fails to do the things many last generation open world games have been able to achieve.
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