'Interactive movie' is basically my blanket slur for games which rely on scripted sequences and tightly-railed level design to force the player down a sequence of events laid out carefully by the developer. Games like CoD and Homefront are pretty much the shining examples of that kind of 'game' design.
Yeah pretty much, although those games don't allow interaction with the actual story (which I personally find adds alot to the immersion/interactive parts of the game), and the actual gameplay in both games isn't really much of anything worthwhile, such as shooting and FPS tactics (well, at least for CoD, I never personally played Homefront but did read reviews of it).
Homefront is even better at being CoD than CoD is.
What about games with tightly railed level design but not scripted sequences? If you're going to start calling Megaman a bad game I'm gonna have to call serious bullshit.Originally Posted by rossmum
Lol my mind went there too.
it depends on the game, the genre, and the tech
making a super tightly-railed shooter is fucking stupid. making a side-scroller where you have something of a set path is just the done thing, because that's how that genre works best.
Shooters have historically also worked best with linear design as well. Scripted sequences don't detract from game-play because, by nature, they are not game-play. What does detract from game-play in a shooter is predictability and lack of options. It's the difference between Call of Duty and Metro 2033. Call of Duty will always happen exactly the same way at exactly the same time with exactly the same equipment and with only one avenue for progression. Metro 2033 will present you with the same situations, but your foes will be rearranged, they will react differently, you may not have the ideal equipment for the situation, and you are presented with more than one way to progress. Both are linear, both are on rails, but one takes more thought than the other. Even more, the latter's scripted events are done so seamlessly that it's hard to tell that they are scripted on the first run through the game, as it should be.
So yes, tightly-railed can work and isn't "fucking stupid." What is stupid is making the play sections of the game as minimally interactive as possible (*coughBF3cough*); the two need not go together.
Also, very few open-type shooters have been successful. The only ones I can think of are Far Cry, Borderlands, and the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series. Fallout 3 doesn't count because it's more of an RPG and the shooting mechanic relies on dice rolls in the background. Crysis also idoesn't count because it sn't open, it's just a really wide foot path. I guess you can count the ArmA series, but it is very different from the shooter norm; it's a sim more than it is a game.
The bottom line is that games aren't being made to tell a story and stories aren't being made to move games along. The two components are being developed exclusive from one another and we wind up with shit like Spec Ops and Call of Duty. That's the fucking stupid part.
scripted sequences detract from gameplay by disrupting it, if not removing it entirely. watching as the game makes you do something is not exactly playing, is it?
ps, metro was a good game based on atmopshere, in terms of actually 'being a game' it was okay but decidedly worse than games like stalker which are far less constrained by nature. if you need the game to give you a strict path to follow, then you may as well watch a movie or play space invaders, since you don't want mental engagement. the reason so few open world shooters were successful is because they are so fucking rare.
I don't think you understand the facets that comprise "game-play." It's more than just giving you a path to follow. So what if the general direction the game is forcing you to go is north? There are lots of things to do on your way. Do you take the sewers or do you take the tracks? Do you want to move up silently or go in guns blazing? Do you want to try to preserve as many lives as possible or do you just not give a fuck? Do you try to gain good karma or bad to influence the ending? If all you want to do is kill things, does it matter whether you do it on rails or do it in a box? It's all the same mess, isn't it? There is plenty of choice in a game like Metro. Halo 1 is the same way. The final outcome of the game isn't the only thing that determines play. So what if Halo blows up in the end regardless, I still had lots of things for me to do, lots of ways for me to do them, and all the time in the world to do it.
Also, pure open-world shooters are rare because they generally suck. Borderlands is open in the narrowest of terms. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is just a set of deceptively small box levels with a story that is still on rails; you just get the choice to ignore it if you wish. Comparing Metro and S.T.A.L.K.E.R., they both have the most of same actual play mechanics and options. Metro has the more refined experience, more enticing game world, and better atmosphere. It also has a better story.
What you are after is a "pure game." Personally, I don't care much for games that have no substance to them. It's why I hate Grand Theft Auto, All Points Bulletin, and Saints Row. It's why I'm not much of a fan of early shooters that just drop you into a level with the objective "kill shit, reach exit" and that's it. I want to play a game that justifies the things I actually do. I want to see what the results of my actions are.
If you just want pure play, go play multiplayer. Why just run around an empty world killing game AI that have zero hope of defeating you when people offer a much more compelling challenge?
Well, I don't think perspective really has anything to do with openness.
Open world Sidescroller:
Open type shooter:
Yes, it's not a completely free roam game, but it's not very linear either.
Both types of game design can work, it mostly comes down to execution. Obviously every type of game won't be for everyone.
Last edited by Pooky; August 6th, 2012 at 06:35 AM.
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