Game Design 101 - Immersiveness VS Letting the player choose what to do

[Zazubat]

It's been some time since the last one of these, but I recently thought about something, because unlike films and TV, video games don't have to follow rules about a story, a player can do what they want at any time, and messing with the way the devolopers intended it to be.

 Recently, I have been watching a Far Cry 3 Let's Play, and the guy playing likes to just blow through it all, and putting it on easy just to get through the story as fast as possible, but the game wouldn't really let him do that, making him play the way it wants to (Far Cry 3 seems to be more about cirtical thinking before going into battle from what I have seen of the main story). Furthermore, there's also certain vehicles that the player can't take without it triggering a side mission. This is not how the Let's Player wants to play, and I can see why he would like to storm through and kill a bunch of guys with a flamethrower, because that is FUN. This is why video games are different, they don't sprak FEAR into you when playing Silent Hill if you don't want to play the way it's intended, you can mess around, sure you will quickly die, but you can if you want to. There's almost no games which allow you to play it the "right" way. Not even games whichout much gameplay, such as Heavy Rain, as many of you know, JASON!! has become quite the meme on the internet.

 I think personally that games should always let you play the way you want to, which is why games such as Fallout 3/New Vegas are some of my favorites, as it allows you to either player insane and kill everything you see, or play the story and get another kind of experience. The best way to do this is to make a setting that's called "Hey buddy, go mess around if you wanna" and a setting that's called "This is how we want you to play the game: Sneak around, stealthily kill people, don't make a fool of yourself, because YOU WILL DIE," or something like that.

 But what do you think? Should games always be like this, should a game not allow you to play the way you want to? Is there good examples of which games do this, and which don't? I would be glad to know.

[Aix]

This is really a matter of preference. Games that are focused on being played a certain way sacrifice freedom for making that aspect of the game much better and some games are focused on their story, really just a story which you help in at certain parts.

 

A game like Metal Gear Solid is focused on stealth and that is the game you play when you want to do stuff like that.

[Toffee.]

There's almost no games which allow you to play it the "right" way.

This depends on the scenario.
Gotcha Force, for example, punishes the player if they loose specific levels, but grant them different endings and stages down the road, as specific characters are replaced with other ones from the start, and generally make it easier. So the game, overall, will always let the player play it the right way, regardless of the outcome, as it always leads up to the same ending boss.

[Tentacruel]

Freedom is not an inherently good thing.  Too often do modern gamers want everything to be Grand Theft Auto, a mere simulation allowing them to act out aggression they have towards people.  Games are an art form, a medium of expression if you will.  If all of them are just engineered to cater to the average gamer's self indulgence and violent tendencies, any resemblance of art will be lost.

 

 

It's a game, not a simulator.  Other examples of games are chess, monopoly, and football.  All of these have rules.  If one were to say, "Why I can't I just break the goal keeper's legs so I can score a goal unhindered?" the game of football would be, to put it plainly, ruined.

 

People sometimes say that the player should be able to choose everything, so why not just allow the player to control all of the physics, damage parameters, level layout, and other intricacies?  To answer this, I will ask, why don't books allow the reader to decide what happens?  Because the reader doesn't go to a novel to just to daydream, they read to experience a world foreign and independent of themselves that they can experience and be immersed in.  

 

Games, to me, should remain games.  People scoff at Jack(ass) Thompson for calling Manhunt a murder simulator, but that's exactly what games are becoming.  Simulators that allow people to break the rules that hinder there actions in real life.

 

 

 

Tl;dr:  Immersivness >>>>>>>>>>> Letting the player chose what to do.

[Agro]

Let's play soccer. Except I don't have to follow the rules and can do whatever I want!

 

Other person has the ball? Fuck it, I'll pull out a glock and kill them. Totally okay, right!

 

...no, games should not ALWAYS let you do whatever the fuck you want. Games like Journey and The Walking Dead would be awful if they let you do that.

[Zazubat]

[quote name="Comrade Tentacruel" post="6193696" timestamp="1367699680"]Freedom is not an inherently good thing.  Too often do modern gamers want everything to be Grand Theft Auto, a mere simulation allowing them to act out aggression they have towards people.  Games are an art form, a medium of expression if you will.  If all of them are just engineered to cater to the average gamer's self indulgence and violent tendencies, any resemblance of art will be lost.     It's a game, not a simulator.  Other examples of games are chess, monopoly, and football.  All of these have rules.  If one were to say, "Why I can't I just break the goal keeper's legs so I can score a goal unhindered?" the game of football would be, to put it plainly, ruined.   People sometimes say that the player should be able to choose everything, so why not just allow the player to control all of the physics, damage parameters, level layout, and other intricacies?  To answer this, I will ask, why don't books allow the reader to decide what happens?  Because the reader doesn't go to a novel to just to daydream, they read to experience a world foreign and independent of themselves that they can experience and be immersed in.     Games, to me, should remain games.  People scoff at Jack(ass) Thompson for calling Manhunt a murder simulator, but that's exactly what games are becoming.  Simulators that allow people to break the rules that hinder there actions in real life.       Tl;dr:  Immersivness >>>>>>>>>>> Letting the player chose what to do.[/quote] You raise an interesting point here. Should we call video games games? As the definition of a game goes most games just arent like that. Yes much games don't let you do certain things, and others let you do what you want. I don't think that we should make games that dont allow you to play the way you want, because then we're limiting ourselves. Though we have to make the right choices when they need to be there. Is your experience in Far Cry 3 gonna change if you do it stealth instead of balls to the wall rambo style? I don't think so. Is it gonna change if you were to have that same option in The Walking Dead? Probably.

[Agro]

You raise an interesting point here. Should we call video games games? As the definition of a game goes most games just arent like that. Yes much games don't let you do certain things, and others let you do what you want. I don't think that we should make games that dont allow you to play the way you want, because then we're limiting ourselves. Though we have to make the right choices when they need to be there. Is your experience in Far Cry 3 gonna change if you do it stealth instead of balls to the wall rambo style? I don't think so. Is it gonna change if you were to have that same option in The Walking Dead? Probably.

You're basically saying that games shouldn't have rules. Do you understand how retarded that sounds?

 

Btw, you CAN play Far Cry 3 with stealth OR with a rambo style. I have no idea where you're getting the idea that you can't.

[Just Crouton]

In a way, games should let you do what you want.

 

It creates re-playability by making you want to replay the game to try a different approach.

 

A strong example is the Metroid series. There are several unintended ways to beat Super Metroid like the "reverse boss order" run, Fusion's 1% run, and while Super's example is likely a "flaw" in programming (the best games have them,) Zero Mission was designed so you could handle the game in multiple ways of your choice.

[Cloister]

Just play the games you like. That's it.

[Lt. Colonel Remo]

A game like Metal Gear Solid is focused on stealth and that is the game you play when you want to do stuff like that.

It's interesting that you mention MGS since Ground Zeroes and MGS:V are going to be open world.

 

So I guess MGS fans get to have both =/

[Tentacruel]

I had a bit of a realization.

 

A game that let's you do [i]anything[/i] is not a game, it's a toy.  There's nothing wrong with that, but let's stick to proper definitions.

[Grunt Issun]

I don't think that every game should play the same way.

I mean, there should be linear and nonlinear games. A straightforward RPG focused on the story and immersiveness is great, but games like the Elder Scrolls, which has a massive world with tons of side quests and other things to do other than the main questline is great too. 

 

I think that there should be games which give you a set thing to do, and nothing else, AND there should be games with an expansive world where you can do whatever you want, because without that, there'd be little reason to play a game once you beat the major quest.

[Zazubat]

You're basically saying that games shouldn't have rules. Do you understand how retarded that sounds?
 

The way games are today, there arn't many rules. Look at old games like Pong or Pac Man, those had 1 objective, and if you didn't follow that would you lose. Today, you look at something like Call of Duty, and there may be a mission where you got to be stealthy, if you shoot you will fail the mission. That has rules, but then there's another mission where you gotta just shoot everything in sight. Nothing is saying that you cannot crawl all the way through that mission if you so wish to. No, games as the word is described should have rules, video games on the other hand rarely has them, and it's because games are more advanced, and unlike Pong, you don't have a "goal" most of the time, you simply play it the way you want. And they should have rules, at least as long as we desribe them as games, not as something else like toys.

Btw, you CAN play Far Cry 3 with stealth OR with a rambo style. I have no idea where you're getting the idea that you can't.

Well maybe the guy just sucked then, but at the same time, he did play on easy, and difficulty is a whole other Game Design 101 discussing.

[Agro]

The way games are today, there arn't many rules. 

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...there really aren't many ways I can articulate the few words it takes to say that you're completely and totally wrong.

 

Far Cry 3, you're restricted by your movements and your supplies. Your objective is to complete mission stories, find objects, create things out of animal pelts, capture command posts, hunt animals, and complete any other assortment of side missions. Each and every one of those parts of the game have their own requirements and rules, and your failstate is being shot, beaten, mauled, or fell to death. I'm not even getting into some of the more abstract parts of the game, both story and exploration-wise including animal spawning, etc.

 

Pacman, you are resticted by your movement. Your objective is to collect dots and the fruit in each level. And your failstate is running into an enemy. Add in the dots that make the enemies not kill you for a short period of time, and that's literally ALL of the rules in the game.

 

But no, keep talking about how there are so fewer rules in games today, please. Please do. You're definitely doing yourself a favor.

 

Which is the better game? You could literally argue for either because they do what they use so well.

 

And don't tell me that "no games as they are described, should have rules". That's the exact opposite of the truth. ALL F*CKING GAMES SHOULD HAVE RULES. Or else they aren't even games anymore. Like I pointed out earlier, in a way that debunked every point you're doggedly trying to make, if I take the rules out of soccer, or any other sport-which, if you can comprehend this fact, ARE actually considered games-then they cease to become anything. They're literally nothing. You're not playing soccer. There's just 2 goals, a ball, 22 men on a field in a stadium where literally no one knows what's going on or why they're there. They lose any meaning and become absolutely nothing.

[Cute Rotten Yoshika]

there is a difference between having rules and being open ended. dark souls is a great example of this. dark souls has A LOT of rules (your equipment must be under a certain weight or you take a movement penalty, your stats must be high enough to use your weapons or you take a damage penalty. you have limited casts of spells and the only way to increase that is rare equipment or getting multiple sets of the spells. and on and on and on.) but it isnt LINEAR by any means. not only does the game completely open up after getting through the first several bosses, but it is also very possible to use shortcuts and tricks to skip those initial bosses. you can do the game in almost any order you desire. you can go through the whole thing and miss several areas. you can murder literally everybody if you want to. if you want you can even build your character in a way so that you completely remove the need to level up, relying instead on taking advantage of the RULES the game provides you.

 

you are close minded when you think that 1) modern games have few to no rules 2) no rules is always better than rules 3) that rules are by their nature restrictive instead of guiding and 4) that games should be forced to cater to every crowd, instead of the ones THEY want to cater to. dark souls is upfront. it tells you it isnt an easy game. its a game for people who want to have a challenging, rewarding, and open ended experience in a unique world. and thats fine. if a game wants to be linear, thats fine too. theres no one right way to go about it, and having variety in options is the best.

[Zazubat]

I can see what you people mean, though there's still a few things I disagree on. I don't think that every single game should have you do exactly what it wants you to do, but I also don't think they should allow you to do it if you so wish. I think it's important to find a balance of those two, so we don't restrict what we can do with this fantastic media. But that is just my opinion, which you can disagree on, but don't be like this, seriously, there's no need for it.