"Sandbox" vs. "RPG": mutually exclusive?

[Sardukhar]

Well, you're Polish, I think. That's probably the issue.

No, I kid.

It's a trade-off. I don't casually wander around in the Witcher, mucking with AI and crafting and ambushing people to see which direction they run as I might in Skyrim or GTA or even DEHR. For one thing, Geralt doesn't approve. For another, yeah, what NPC AI? Where? Pretty limited.

The quest endings tend to be variations on theme AND you have to hop hoops to get there. I'm doing the start of Witcher 2 -AGAIN - right now and, yeah, tiresome. Once I get to town, it'll be a bit better but nothing akin to Skyrim.

The 16 endings were exaggerated. Small flavour differences. Not going to replay the whole game to see the difference between Aryan dies/Aryan Lives - Roche path.
You can imbue these endings with great portent for future games, but, yeah just don't affect me that much and don't change the gameplay that much. You will see a different cutscene maybe and a different summary.

The storyline branch is significant once. It's nice they did that but the meat of the game around it is very much the same set piece quests.

Disclosure: I liked the Witcher 1 better. It felt...wider. More like a world and less like an interactive movie.

 

[Garrison72]

Hmm, then my TW2 was different than your TW2. Funny how that works.

Anyway, this thread should be about concepts that help CDPR do both.

 

[Sardukhar]

Hmm, then my TW2 was different than your TW2. Funny how that works.

Anyway, this thread should be about concepts that help CDPR do both.

Absolutely. The thread is pretty misleading anyway - unless your definitions are very narrow, sandbox and RPG are not mutually exclusive.

What we are going to vary on is the degree to which one should litter in the other's kitchen.

 

[lumber_jacck]

I don't think they are mutually exclusive.
We could think of a sandbox environment, a big, open world in Night City. In this world, you would have a, let's say, main storyline (that you would build upon yourself, because it's non-linear); and beside that, you are free to do whatever you like, developing your character however you like: completing side-quests, engulfing in the game in a true RPG way. I think it would also be a good idea for the game not to end after you complete the main storyline, and to have randomly generated elements that keep you going.
So there, you have a sandbox RPG.

 

[Sirnaq]

Depends what you like more.
rpg like planescape - story driven based with hubs (witcher and witcher 2 as examples)
or
fallout with not all that great story but with a lot of things to play around and open world

Personally i prefer planescape model. I like not only good story but story that is interactive, and stories are the core element of rpgs for me. Second most important is atmosphere.

 

[PafetkBazerka]

I think we are pretty much polar opposites. ...

Well for what its worth this is all still largely opinion, and opinions are want to change..
But I think something that hasn’t come across in my statements is that I think sandbox style gameplay is fine as a starting point and in all likely hood the finished version of Cyberpunk will probably have a free roam play style. And I will live with that. Though I may spend less time on side quests this time around.

But I also want something a bit different. I think its OK to force players into moving in a particular direction and at a certain pace to create a certain ebb and flow in the story, especially if it can be achieved without cinematic cut scenes. The rest of the sandbox world can exist beyond the core missions and campaigns as the occasional distraction, or for in-between moments, but there should be moments in the story where you need to focus or you lose, and by focus I don't just mean the current encounter, but makes you think about the next 2 or 3 encounters, or makes you aware of a path choice that you will soon have to take. This idea that you can create your own story is a bit wussy for my idea of the Cyberpunk universe. At the end of the day the Cyberpunk world shouldn’t revolve around you, or wait for you to show up before getting on with the days dirty business. At least initially, your story should be one of Night City, difficult and subject to those that allow you to survive. May be as you develop you could earn some freedoms, ie getting out of gutter gets you into a gated district, or exceptional successes grants more time to explore and of course money and power can grant certain freedoms. But freedoms are one thing that should not be taken for granted in Night City.

As for the other matters
‘ RPG’ elements, video games will only ever be able to deal with stats and a few path choices. That’s just the way it is. Though I suppose the more paths and the more choices the better.

The size of a game world probably has more to do with how much money they have to throw at it. PC only platform and loads of money will produce the biggest. One of the biggest (non-procedural) open world maps I know of would be for the upcoming ArmA3 title, but they don't have scyscrapers and we could safely speculate that CDPR would want at least 1 console. I know the Fallout maps appear huge but they also use some clever scaling and mess with camera depth to achieve much of it. Really quite brilliantly done, but not sure how such an idea would work with night city. It’s one of those areas where we could easily ask for more, but will always be governed by resources.

 

[p45k]

Assuming Night City would be relative in size (on a current-gen system) to Skyrim, (who knows the capabilities on a next-gen 2015 title yet?), having an open-world sandbox could very well work, and i would actually prefer it if there's enough of the core narrative driving the players path, without forcing the player into certain places and quests all the time, and having all the side quests somehow link-in to the core narrative so they don't appear to be lame fetch-quests or completely irrelevent to the storyline and experience. i think coherence is key.

 

[Aver]

Assuming Night City would be relative in size (on a current-gen system) to Skyrim, (who knows the capabilities on a next-gen 2015 title yet?),

Sizes of world are not limited by current gen consoles. If Bethesda would like to then they could make world even bigger. There is just no reasons to make it even bigger - it would increase costs, but at the same time it would improve fun for barely anyone. I haven't played much of Skyrim, because I'm bored with Bethesda games (all of them feel the like one game), but I played Oblivion for 120h and I discovered like 30% of map. So making something that would take even more than 350h to explore is meaningless. They should rather improve quality of things that you can discover.

Also I'm pretty sure that CP2077 will be MUCH smaller than Skyrim. It's city game. Biggest city game, GTAIV, is not even remotely big as Skyrim and I doubt that city in CP will be big as city in GTA. Especially because it's RPG and they have to carft some in-doors locations (even if Wisdom would like rather bigger world) .

 

[tsmonteiro]

Part of the conflict, for me at least, between Open World and Storyline interpretation is how easily one can be sidetracked by quests and such. When playing Skyrim, I was actually more involved with a particular city than with dragons coming back and such. There was no sense of urgency and no stronger connection with any city other than the first i happened to go through. It just so happens the world itself was more interesting than any plot in the game and fetch questing were boring, so the game started feeling really flat, nice environments, backstory, but nothing new exciting going on and I had no reason at all to help a bunch of people I never heard of (or that tried to chop my head off).

Now, the way I see a perfect (and likely utopic) Sandbox game, it would have a linear beginning to present a goal to the player and after that, it would be completely open. There would be no main and side quests. There would be the world and I would have to decide the steps and requirements to achieve my goal. This opens up an enormous number of possibilities, but really lets the player creates his links to the world. The whole playthrough would acquire a really different meaning.

This would kickass =D

 

[gregski]

Well, you're Polish, I think. That's probably the issue.

No, I kid.

It's a trade-off. I don't casually wander around in the Witcher, mucking with AI and crafting and ambushing people to see which direction they run as I might in Skyrim or GTA or even DEHR. For one thing, Geralt doesn't approve. For another, yeah, what NPC AI? Where? Pretty limited.

The quest endings tend to be variations on theme AND you have to hop hoops to get there. I'm doing the start of Witcher 2 -AGAIN - right now and, yeah, tiresome. Once I get to town, it'll be a bit better but nothing akin to Skyrim.

The 16 endings were exaggerated. Small flavour differences. Not going to replay the whole game to see the difference between Aryan dies/Aryan Lives - Roche path.
You can imbue these endings with great portent for future games, but, yeah just don't affect me that much and don't change the gameplay that much. You will see a different cutscene maybe and a different summary.

The storyline branch is significant once. It's nice they did that but the meat of the game around it is very much the same set piece quests.

Disclosure: I liked the Witcher 1 better. It felt...wider. More like a world and less like an interactive movie.

Well, we play RPGs for different reasons then, and RPGs mean totally different things to us as you mention GTA in one sentence with Skyrim and Deus Ex.

For me re-playability means being able to start the game over and experience a different story, while you sound like you're more for just playability, meaning you can keep playing the game after you deal with the storyline.

I hope CP2077 doesn't turn your way, but we shall see.

 

[dmaple]

I'll take every crappy inch of Bethesda compared to Rockstar's attempt at games...besides, Bethesda makes RPG's. Rockstar does not. Is anyone seriously going to tell me that Rockstar makes RPG's? So will people quit referencing these cheap douchebags, like they're the only ones who know open-world?

Other than Red Dead Redemption, I haven't really liked Rockstar games, but they have more narrative RPG elements than most of Bethesda's open world setting, where your character goes goes there collects that and brings it back most of the time. The story often gets lost in the open settings of Bethesda.

I think there is a valid concern that "sandbox" games end up too unfocused so that the story gets weakened by how open it is. I tend to get bored of Bethesda games well before I finish the main storyline and with all the little side quests you end up losing what your characters actual motivation is.

 

[Sardukhar]

Well, we play RPGs for different reasons then, and RPGs mean totally different things to us as you mention GTA in one sentence with Skyrim and Deus Ex..

I hope CP2077 doesn't turn your way, but we shall see.

Whereas I hope we both get our way - the story method you describe is easily contained in the wider world I describe. Well. not easily. Let us encompass the effort of coding required. Ow. My head hurts.

If your Witcher turned out that differently, then I am surprised. Did you not fight a Dragon? See a King die? Chase his murderer? Rescue your friends from the hangman? Be perplexed by your own survival and your dreams? Struggle with questions of morality vs expedience?Hit rather a lot of people with swords and/or magic powerz? The details may vary, but the overall story is the same.

It's also this: I played DX HR. And love it. At 150hrs or so played, I better. But I don't need another DX, even one done better. I'd like to see what CDPR can turnout in their idea of open world.

And if it turns your way, Witcher 2 with cyberware, that's great too!


P.S. The problem with exclusionary definitions, i.e. terms used to shove things away as much or more than include them, is that they tend to be inherently limiting.

GTA IV can be role-played and with a savage glee. Likewise, you can treat Skyrim as a pure action/exploraton title and develop your character and his story very little.

 

[gregski]

Whereas I hope we both get our way - the story method you describe is easily contained in the wider world I describe. Well. not easily. Let us encompass the effort of coding required. Ow. My head hurts.

If your Witcher turned out that differently, then I am surprised. Did you not fight a Dragon? See a King die? Chase his murderer? Rescue your friends from the hangman? Be perplexed by your own survival and your dreams? Struggle with questions of morality vs expedience?Hit rather a lot of people with swords and/or magic powerz? The details may vary, but the overall story is the same.

It's also this: I played DX HR. And love it. At 150hrs or so played, I better. But I don't need another DX, even one done better. I'd like to see what CDPR can turnout in their idea of open world.

And if it turns your way, Witcher 2 with cyberware, that's great too!


P.S. The problem with exclusionary definitions, i.e. terms used to shove things away as much or more than include them, is that they tend to be inherently limiting.

GTA IV can be role-played and with a savage glee. Likewise, you can treat Skyrim as a pure action/exploraton title and develop your character and his story very little.

I'm just being realistic when talking about game development ideas, thus I tend to move within specific boundaries, it's my idea of being cnstructive, that's all. I agree that some ideas might be realised as contained in other, broader visions, but at the end I try to stick to something I find do-able.

That doesn't mean that you EDIT: can't /EDIT dream big, of course. I'm sure CDPR are hearing us all well and will definitely aim at the sun with their approach to the CP game.

 

[Sardukhar]

I'm just being realistic when talking about game development ideas, thus I tend to move within specific boundaries, it's my idea of being cnstructive, that's all. I agree that some ideas might be realised as contained in other, broader visions, but at the end I try to stick to something I find do-able.

That doesn't mean that you can dream big, of course. I'm sure CDPR are hearing us all well and will definitely aim at the sun with their approach to the CP game.

Yeah. Ironically, you and I are on opposite sides of the discussion whereas chatting with Wisdom, I tended towards your point. Because it's the realistic one. Vehicles, free-roaming AI NPC interaction, self-renewing story mechanics...these are fine ideas.

Goooood luck seeing them though. And given the choice between Witcher 2 style storytelling with cyber and some crappy GTA CPunk mod, I'll go with great story anytime.

I did so want to diveroll from my Cyberbike into that would-be Fixer menacing those out-of-towners, though.

 

[MattTreck]

Possible? Yeah it is possible. Is it easy? Hell no.

Pretty much this.

They aren't mutually exclusive, but it will be interesting to see how they pull it off either way.

 

[DarthTrethon]

Fallout: New Vegas


There is nothing else to be said here....it's absolute proof that a sandbox RPG with huge and world shaping choices is 1,000,000,000% possible.

 

[Yngh]

I'm sure CDPR are hearing us all well and will definitely aim at the sun with their approach to the CP game.

Actually, they should adopt a pragmatic, down-to-earth approach IMO. Making promises which they cannot keep will only annoy the players. I'm sure that CDP RED has a list of priorities and if I had to bet, a good, non-linear story would probably be at the top of the list. This is what they are famous for, after all.

 

[gregski]

Actually, they should adopt a pragmatic, down-to-earth approach IMO. Making promises which they cannot keep will only annoy the players. I'm sure that CDP RED has a list of priorities and if I had to bet, a good, non-linear story would probably be at the top of the list. This is what they are famous for, after all.

I'm not talking about promises that they should give but rather their own ambitions. That's not the same

 

[p45k]

yes, i love Peter Molyneaux who created Fable etc., but his genuine excitement and love for creating games always lead him to over-promise on what his next projects will feature.

i think these guys at CDPR are more cautious than that, yes they want to create something amazing, but even in the trailer claiming the release date is "when it's ready" shows a commitment to creating a title released only when it's considered complete, and isn't announcing anything that doesn't exist until it actually exists.

it's a way that more dev teams should go, but alas, in most cases, publishers force early releases to fit schedules, hence why we now usually buy half our game as add-on-pay-more-cash DLC rather than getting it on-disc if the game were released a year later.

 

[wisdom000]

it's a way that more dev teams should go, but alas, in most cases, publishers force early releases to fit schedules, hence why we now usually buy half our game as add-on-pay-more-cash DLC rather than getting it on-disc if the game were released a year later.

I love DLC, I love the small stuff, like weapons, clothing and vehicles packs, and I love the big stuff, like new map areas, new storyline arcs, etc...

But there really is no excuse for putting out a game that isn't finished and then releasing the items that were left out as DLC.

Even worse is the growing trend of On-Disc DLC, which is just about the most greedily reprehensible practice to come out of the video game scene since DRM.

Man screw THQ for their support of this garbage.