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Some very interesting articles about classic games by Fabien Sanglard:
* Prince of Persia - code review
* Wolfenstein 3D - let's compile like it's 1992
More in depth analysis of various historic games and gaming technology here.
* Prince of Persia - code review
* Wolfenstein 3D - let's compile like it's 1992
More in depth analysis of various historic games and gaming technology here.
[video=youtube;-PjonzjqCVo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PjonzjqCVo[/video]
A lot more online about the connection to Tom Stoppards Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead since this video was upped. Last time I looked the whole movie was in pieces there too. Great stuff.
A lot more online about the connection to Tom Stoppards Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead since this video was upped. Last time I looked the whole movie was in pieces there too. Great stuff.
I hope Bioshock games will come out DRM-free. The first one briefly appeared on HB, but not the rest.
I felt sort of the same way at the end if Infinite, once you do get it it'll make a lot of sense.
Have you played the Burial at Sea dlc yet? If so what'syour feelings on it?
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Not yet. Are they recommended? I usually purchase things on Steam only on Sales, when I can.
Welcome to Quake, Tribes and PlanetSide2(without mapsize) at the same time.
an eliharel obeys
An man chooses...
an eliharel obeys
MCA on handling existing IP, classic vs modern RPGs/games and some other stuff:
http://games.on.net/2014/08/chris-avellone-talks-rpg-design-why-new-games-are-too-hand-holding-and-more/
http://games.on.net/2014/08/chris-avellone-talks-rpg-design-why-new-games-are-too-hand-holding-and-more/
Interesting. I can see how people would think "randomness" defeats planning, but I'd argue you plan with the risk of failure, not with certainty (see my thread "what people expect from games ...").
I think a good approach to non deterministic game worlds is the possibility to affect other characters' dispositions progressively, like approximating an unknown function or distribution. We do what we can and even if we miss, we can try again and slowly reach our goal or totally diverge if we don't know what we're doing. Even the most skilled, silver tongued diplomats may fail to coerce a given individual (for instance if he's a fanatic), so the chance of failure should always be there. It's the foundation for reactivity which leads to what is now called "choice and consequence".
I trust Wasteland 2 and Tides of Numenera to push the genre forward by bringing this back.
You have a point. At least for certain game situations. Combat for example, greatly profits from an element of surprise by some limited randomness.
The example you are giving on the other hand does not. Why would the outcome of an attempt to persuade someone be random? That's not comprehensible and just leads to a quickload fest. Of course, there should be a chance of failure. But in most game situations that should be determined by a skill or the lack thereof - or even better, by your actions, e.g. the dialogue choices you make in your attempt, in conjuction with the skills of your character.
Certainly random elements should not be abandoned entirely (and MCA does not demand that), but in some situations old school RPGs did too much in that regard. I think it's owed to cRPGs emulating PnP RPGs. In PnP the dice are necessary to control the flow of the game (+ dice rolls are hilarious in social interaction), while at the same time giving the players some feeling of influence on their fates instead of feeling completely at the mercy of their DM - it's far easier to accept that you failed at a persuasion attempt because you didn't roll good enough than to accept that it's because you have less skillpoints in persuasion than some secret threshhold that one might suspect was set by the DM to deliberately make you fail. In cRPGs it's the other way around: The flow is controlled by the game itself - and therefore it's easier to accept that you don't have enough skillpoints to tackle a threshhold which you know is fixed, than to accept that some RNG arbitrarily made you fail.
Next TR game is an Xbone exclusive. Most likely timed exclusive, but I had hoped exclusives for AAA games were becoming a thing of the past. It's such a pathetic business move.
The model of exclusives will die out only with stronger competition. It's a shadow of lock-in approach. So far consoles market is not competitive at all. Valve has a good potential to disrupt it, but that didn't quite happen yet. If they succeed with Steam Machines, MS and Sony will be threatened, and as known competition leads to such companies reducing their crookedness. Why would a developer want to make a game for one exclusive console, if that means losing sales on all others? When competition is poor, they can get away with it but in truly competitive market exclusives are complete nonsense.
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The thing here is: an element of randomness doesn't mean each outcome has equal probability. An element of randomness could be, say, 5% chance of failure. This simply helps by adding some non-determinism, because even the most skilled [anything] can fail at what they do. What I'm saying is: transform this into a game element. So instead of having one fixed dialogue option that tips the balance to either side, have a slower progression where, for instance, a persuasion attempt failure doesn't mean you cannot keep trying. It just means you have to try harder. Eventually your poor choices might close this opportunity for good.
What I would like to avoid is that other idea of situations being "determined" by either skills or dice rolls. For instance, a character with low persuasion trying to convince someone to do something, and failing, but due to that character's knowledge of certain events slowly tipping the balance in his favor. The alternative would be "if persuasion >= threshold then pass; otherwise fail." This means slowly approaching that threshold by other means. In either case, I believe the chance of failure should always be present. Think of an experience diplomat giving a speech and accidentally burping or throwing up in public, this should fail to convince at least one person (if anything because he couldn't even deliver his idea clearly).
I think the problem with people blaming the dice rolls (or RNG) is a game's poor (or complete lack of) mechanisms of explanation, specially in the case of failure. I think saying the "RNG arbitrarily made you fail" is like saying "life arbitrarily made you fail".