134 réponses à ce sujet

[AkiKishi]

Red by Full Metal Jacket wrote...

CrustyBot wrote...
It shares this philosophy with JRPGs which is why I suspect so many people come to the conclusion that DA 2 is JRPG-ish despite not actually looking or playing like a JRPG.

People claim that DA2 is like a JRPG but DA2 has very little in common with JRPGs.  In fact are a lot of little things in modern JRPGs (espeically games like Xenoblade) such as UI design that Bioware really needs to take a page from.

Quite true that.

[AkiKishi]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Because they wanted to give the player the experience of being vastly more powerful than his enemies, so the enemies had to be weak. Then, to create interesting encounters, there had to be lots of enemies. Then, because the consoles couldn't render enough enemies on screen at the same time while also doing AI calculations, they introduced the enemies in waves.

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.

Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.



http://t3.gstatic.co...PVujqLy8pgE-qfg

http://t2.gstatic.co...4BacpM2VT4hycKJ

I don't think their engine is any good. I've seen many games do things better and with less restriction.

[Xewaka]

BobSmith101 wrote...

brushyourteeth wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Because they wanted to give the player the experience of being vastly more powerful than his enemies, so the enemies had to be weak. Then, to create interesting encounters, there had to be lots of enemies. Then, because the consoles couldn't render enough enemies on screen at the same time while also doing AI calculations, they introduced the enemies in waves.

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.
Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.
*Photos sniped*

I don't think their engine is any good. I've seen many games do things better and with less restriction.

Yes. The main problem DA:2 has is that the engine is crap and can't handle large numbers at the same time. While this wasn't that much of a problem in DA:O due to combat and encounter design, the higher paced combat coupled with the ludicrous assymetric combat damage meant that, in order to have more challenging encounters, there needed to be a higher amount of mooks to fight in DA 2. And suddenly they hit the engine ceiling and had to release the mooks in waves.

Modifié par Xewaka, 01 juin 2012 - 09:30 .

[DahliaLynn]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Had the spawning come in more realistically (i.e. they came running from out of line of sight) would it have been received better?

It'd prevent the situation where a foe inexplicably spawns right beside the character.

Aside from what you mentioned above which to me sounds like a given, I think one issue is the need for the spawning to be less predictable in its occurance. I always knew I would have a certain no. of spawns occur give or take, and it eventually became annoying.  A once-in-a-while new spawn of enemies can feel more surprising and enjoyable like, "where the heck did they come from..damn!"  But it gets old rather quickly if done repetitively. "I just beat the heck out of these guys, and..well, here we go again, as usual". Any feeling of accomplishment  quickly turns sour as the fights become more like a chore.

Also, the more realistic the amount of enemies in a given predicament, the more immersive it gets. You're in a town square. How many gang members could possibly come out of the woodwork? When you start to notice a game mechanic, you're no longer your character, but rather a metagaming player.

I think Legacy definitely made an improvement.  Enemies coming from *somewhere* helped a lot. But also the fighting setup. There were traps in a room, and these were great to try out before actually fighting enemies. It made it very interesting to experiment with the new temporary tools you've been given, which inspired optional tactical thought beyond your own familiar abilities.

The same with the level design/tactical combat in the Deep Roads. That whole ramming-along-the-narrow-bridge thing was a joy to play around with. I can distinctly remember many of the battle confrontations in Legacy. That's a good thing :happy:

Modifié par DahliaLynn, 01 juin 2012 - 12:28 .

[Swordfishtrombone]

I don't think the waves had anything to do with the game having been (undeniably) rushed. The recycled environments, yes, the waves, no. There's no reason having all the enemies in the battle field from the start would be less easy, or slower to implement than the waves.

The waves were a design choice, and it did do at least one good thing: in DA:O, in big battles, there was terrible lag in many systems running the game. No lag in DA2. I suspect this has to do with fewer enemies being on the field simultaneously, though probably some code optimization was involved too.

The only thing that kinda bothered me about the waves was the implementation - enemies should have been running into the battlefied from behind corners, from bushes, from doorways, not dropping out o fthe sky. Now the fact that something like that wasn't implemented, I think, may have come down to the rushed schedule.

[PinkShoes]

i hope next time we get enermies that are strong, 5 strong any time. 100 weak is just boring

[brushyourteeth]

Xewaka wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

brushyourteeth wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Because they wanted to give the player the experience of being vastly more powerful than his enemies, so the enemies had to be weak. Then, to create interesting encounters, there had to be lots of enemies. Then, because the consoles couldn't render enough enemies on screen at the same time while also doing AI calculations, they introduced the enemies in waves.

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.
Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.
*Photos sniped*

I don't think their engine is any good. I've seen many games do things better and with less restriction.

Yes. The main problem DA:2 has is that the engine is crap and can't handle large numbers at the same time. While this wasn't that much of a problem in DA:O due to combat and encounter design, the higher paced combat coupled with the ludicrous assymetric combat damage meant that, in order to have more challenging encounters, there needed to be a higher amount of mooks to fight in DA 2. And suddenly they hit the engine ceiling and had to release the mooks in waves.

I'm not someone that knows much about engines, admittedly, but this actually makes a lot of sense. Thanks for making that clearer for me.

[AkiKishi]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Xewaka wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

brushyourteeth wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Because they wanted to give the player the experience of being vastly more powerful than his enemies, so the enemies had to be weak. Then, to create interesting encounters, there had to be lots of enemies. Then, because the consoles couldn't render enough enemies on screen at the same time while also doing AI calculations, they introduced the enemies in waves.

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.
Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.
*Photos sniped*

I don't think their engine is any good. I've seen many games do things better and with less restriction.

Yes. The main problem DA:2 has is that the engine is crap and can't handle large numbers at the same time. While this wasn't that much of a problem in DA:O due to combat and encounter design, the higher paced combat coupled with the ludicrous assymetric combat damage meant that, in order to have more challenging encounters, there needed to be a higher amount of mooks to fight in DA 2. And suddenly they hit the engine ceiling and had to release the mooks in waves.

I'm not someone that knows much about engines, admittedly, but this actually makes a lot of sense. Thanks for making that clearer for me.

Does not bode well for DA3 especially as they will likely go for better graphics.

[Dakota Strider]

It is unfortunate that we are spending time discussing the best way to implement waves, when in fact, they should be done away with entirely.  Rather than hordes of cannon fodder as our combat opponents, what ever happened to a handful or two of opponents that had similar abilities as the party?   Going back to an old PnP philosophy, the toughest battles were when the GM found a way to turn the players upon each other.  There is little challenge, and not much fun in fighting a bunch of cloned mooks.  Give us some opponents that are worth our time, and you will not need 50 of them, to make the combat "interesting".

[Nomen Mendax]

Dakota Strider wrote...

It is unfortunate that we are spending time discussing the best way to implement waves, when in fact, they should be done away with entirely.  Rather than hordes of cannon fodder as our combat opponents, what ever happened to a handful or two of opponents that had similar abilities as the party?   Going back to an old PnP philosophy, the toughest battles were when the GM found a way to turn the players upon each other.  There is little challenge, and not much fun in fighting a bunch of cloned mooks.  Give us some opponents that are worth our time, and you will not need 50 of them, to make the combat "interesting".

The problem is that what people find interesting differs.  I much preferred DAO's combat to DA2, but clearly many people found it too slow.  

Whatever they do with the combat I want them to focus on making encounters both interesting and different (from each other).  Some encounters could be waves of enemies (but please only where it makes sense), some could be one or two powerful opponents, others could be set pieces where the players have the initiative.  Also make things interesting - if we have to storm a castle give us multiple ways to go about doing it (do we sneak over the walls in the night, bluff our way in the front gate, or come in through the sewers).

If the goal is to find the one way of making encounters better and then make all of them follow that pattern then it's doomed to failure from the start.

Modifié par Nomen Mendax, 01 juin 2012 - 04:51 .

[Dakota Strider]

Nomen Mendax wrote...

Dakota Strider wrote...

It is unfortunate that we are spending time discussing the best way to implement waves, when in fact, they should be done away with entirely.  Rather than hordes of cannon fodder as our combat opponents, what ever happened to a handful or two of opponents that had similar abilities as the party?   Going back to an old PnP philosophy, the toughest battles were when the GM found a way to turn the players upon each other.  There is little challenge, and not much fun in fighting a bunch of cloned mooks.  Give us some opponents that are worth our time, and you will not need 50 of them, to make the combat "interesting".

The problem is that what people find interesting differs.  I much preferred DAO's combat to DA2, but clearly many people found it too slow.  

Whatever they do with the combat I want them to focus on making encounters both interesting and different (from each other).  Some encounters could be waves of enemies (but please only where it makes sense), some could be one or two powerful opponents, others could be set pieces where the players have the initiative.  Also make things interesting - if we have to storm a castle give us multiple ways to go about doing it (do we sneak over the walls in the night, bluff our way in the front gate, or come in through the sewers).

If the goal is to find the one way of making encounters better and then make all of them follow that pattern then its doomed to failure from the start.

About once or twice a game, usually after the mid-way point, I enjoy fighting a horde of lesser opponents and be able to wade through them, carving a path left and right with minimal effort, to display how "powerful" my character has become.  However, when this becomes standard fare, I cannot see how it can be much more than tedium except to the most devote hak'n'slasher.

[Nomen Mendax]

Dakota Strider wrote...

About once or twice a game, usually after the mid-way point, I enjoy fighting a horde of lesser opponents and be able to wade through them, carving a path left and right with minimal effort, to display how "powerful" my character has become.  However, when this becomes standard fare, I cannot see how it can be much more than tedium except to the most devote hak'n'slasher.

I remember doing this in a PnP campaign I ran.  The players returned to where the campaign started and fought the same bad guys they had initially had to escape from, and easily slaughtered them.  I recall that the players found it very satisfying.

Modifié par Nomen Mendax, 01 juin 2012 - 04:55 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.

The inability of the consoles to render enough enemies was one of the reasons given for the absence of the tactical camera from the console versions of DAO.

Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.

But those creatures weren't all acting independently.  You had groups fighting all around you, but the results of that combat were probably determined en masse rather than one-by-one like RPG combat.

[Sylvius the Mad]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Does not bode well for DA3 especially as they will likely go for better graphics.

I thought they said they wouldn't do a 180° turn...

[brushyourteeth]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

brushyourteeth wrote...

Consoles aren't to blame for low numbers of enemies. Maybe the spread of resources to other priorities, but not the limitations thrust upon us by consoles.

The inability of the consoles to render enough enemies was one of the reasons given for the absence of the tactical camera from the console versions of DAO.

I think that means you either misunderstood or they lied.

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

brushyourteeth wrote... Take the game Viking: Battle for Asgard, for instance. You'd run into literally hundreds of enemies and even allies that were in your environment all at the same time and waiting for you when you arrived there. And it played just fine on both XBOX 360 and PS3 while still managing to have stunning visuals and fun combat. It was meh on story, but my point still stands.

But those creatures weren't all acting independently.  You had groups fighting all around you, but the results of that combat were probably determined en masse rather than one-by-one like RPG combat.

They seemed pretty independent to me. You might find them in groups (it wasn't uncommon to accidentally wander into a legion - yes as in 100 of them - on patrol) but they each attacked individually and classes had their own tactics going. Plus if your point was that the enemies were dumbed down so that we could have waves and waves only because consoles can't handle large numbers, that point is still moot.

Just defending your everyday console gamer. Not everything is to blame on console limitations.

Modifié par brushyourteeth, 01 juin 2012 - 05:11 .

[Brockololly]

Allan Schumacher wrote...
This is actually an interesting problem that exists in many games I find, where the it seems the game world only exists to react to the player.  This applies to more than just combat too.

The STALKER games do a great job of giving the feeling that the player character is just another person in the world, with other NPCs going about their business.

[bEVEsthda]

Dakota Strider wrote...

It is unfortunate that we are spending time discussing the best way to implement waves, when in fact, they should be done away with entirely.  Rather than hordes of cannon fodder as our combat opponents, what ever happened to a handful or two of opponents that had similar abilities as the party?   Going back to an old PnP philosophy, the toughest battles were when the GM found a way to turn the players upon each other.  There is little challenge, and not much fun in fighting a bunch of cloned mooks.  Give us some opponents that are worth our time, and you will not need 50 of them, to make the combat "interesting".

Actually, do give us 50. Or even 100. And 3, and 7.
Scrap these pretentions to seem like an action game. Get back to tactical gameplay (not just tactical fighting). Make a combat system that takes no impact from number of opponents or hardware specs.

Such combat can look very good. That's just a question of generating good animations. The point is that you have to accept forced pauses and the fact that the game will only react to your input at certain paused points. The game can be turn based (BG), or (better) based on timeline, or action/reaction points (X-Com). What it won't be is action, or "feel" reactive. Button and "awesome" will definitely be disconnected. But the combat will be perfectly under player control.

Timelined might look something like this: Every char (player and enemy) follows an order (player or AI) that ends at some checkpoint. They could all be moving to some spots, for instance.
 
Logic and pathfinding computes each's position along the timeline. If nothing happens (various checks) the positions are computed on the timeline until one char reaches its destination spot. If it's an AI controlled char, a new order will be derived. It could be to continue to a new spot, or stop and wait for followers. If it waits for followers, the char will now have a new checkpoint -> Follower A, B, C have all reached their spots.
 
When the followers reach their spots, they in turn will receive new orders and checkpoints. The orders could be wait, and the checkpoint could be that the leader has started moving again. So this group is moving towards some destination. The quickest periodically stopping to let others catch up, thus keeping the group together.

This is still just a timeline. Nothing is happening. But there are checks. A check if a player char has discovered them. When this check returns positive, a pause mark for this char is placed on the timeline. Other char's orders still take them beyond this pause mark, but no further computing of the timeline is done.
 
Instead, the timeline is animated. And then the animation is played, all the way to the pause mark. There everything stops, and the player can give an order. The timeline is then computed again. Now other chars will get new checkmarks for reacting to either the player char, or their own discovery. If other chars are player controlled, these checkmarks will be pause marks, and the chars will accept player input at reaching these.

Basically, you should understand the system by now. In pure form you cannot pause the game manually. The animation is already generated to the next pause mark. It runs in intervals, between orders and computing. Pauses are injected to stop the timeline by various events. Order is completed, of course, and checks for if the order is still viable, and checks for important discoveries.
 
However, it's probably desirable to have some player ability to react to the animation. So put in a manual pause. This will halt the animation and truncate the timeline at that pause. After new orders, the timeline will be rebuilt towards next pausemark, new animation generated and played.

Considering the fantastic possibilities (scalability, intelligence, injuries, retreat, surrender, fleeing, integration into the rest of the game, even dialogue) of such a system, it seems a pity to give it all up for some tiresome, 'same ol', 'same ol', "action", combat 5 vs 5, always until death, abilities 100% until last drop of blood is shed, etc gaming clichés.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 01 juin 2012 - 06:08 .

[Nomen Mendax]

Brockololly wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...
This is actually an interesting problem that exists in many games I find, where the it seems the game world only exists to react to the player.  This applies to more than just combat too.

The STALKER games do a great job of giving the feeling that the player character is just another person in the world, with other NPCs going about their business.

How does STALKER achieve this?

I can think of two ways (off the top of my head) of doing this for quests:

• timed quests (which apparently people don't like)
• being very careful about how and when the player gets quest information

Skyrim does this very badly.  I have a quest log full of things I have to do, many of which were claimed to be urgent. Some of them seem reasonable ("go and find this book when you have time"), but many of them are very silly.  For example the civil war will happily wait for me to go away and become head of the thieves guild unitl it continues. 

One suggestion would be to not give the player "urgent" quests unless you are going to force them to complete them before wandering off and doing a whole lot of unrelated things.

Personally I'd be happy with some timed quests.  I recall the fuss about the quest for the water chip in Fallout (which was an awesome game btw) but I never really bought into it.  I often wonder if some of this received wisdom from previous games is really true for most players.

Modifié par Nomen Mendax, 01 juin 2012 - 05:55 .

[bEVEsthda]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

But those creatures weren't all acting independently.  You had groups fighting all around you, but the results of that combat were probably determined en masse rather than one-by-one like RPG combat.

They seemed pretty independent to me. You might find them in groups (it wasn't uncommon to accidentally wander into a legion - yes as in 100 of them - on patrol) but they each attacked individually and classes had their own tactics going. Plus if your point was that the enemies were dumbed down so that we could have waves and waves only because consoles can't handle large numbers, that point is still moot.

Just defending your everyday console gamer. Not everything is to blame on console limitations.

Agree, - not just a matter for consoles. Lot's of reactive enemies in real time will always be hardware limited. On any hardware.

But St. Mad is right. Vikings Asgard cheats a lot. Chars are initially and periodically grouped. And then I have to also say that the graphics standard is more akin to PS2, than XB360 and PS3 era. So more than such a "better" engine, it's a case of adapting the 3D world and AI to what you want to achieve in the gameplay. A perfectly viable solution, of course, and I salute it.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 01 juin 2012 - 06:04 .

[AkiKishi]

Nomen Mendax wrote...

Brockololly wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...
This is actually an interesting problem that exists in many games I find, where the it seems the game world only exists to react to the player.  This applies to more than just combat too.

The STALKER games do a great job of giving the feeling that the player character is just another person in the world, with other NPCs going about their business.

How does STALKER achieve this?

I can think of two ways (off the top of my head) of doing this for quests:

• timed quests (which apparently people don't like)
• being very careful about how and when the player gets quest information

Skyrim does this very badly.  I have a quest log full of things I have to do, many of which were claimed to be urgent. Some of them seem reasonable ("go and find this book when you have time"), but many of them are very silly.  For example the civil war will happily wait for me to go away and become head of the thieves guild unitl it continues. 

One suggestion would be to not give the player "urgent" quests unless you are going to force them to complete them before wandering off and doing a whole lot of unrelated things.

Personally I'd be happy with some timed quests.  I recall the fuss about the quest for the water chip in Fallout (which was an awesome game btw) but I never really bought into it.  I often wonder if some of this received wisdom from previous games is really true for most players.

Fallout would not have been half the game it was without the timer. The Atelier games still do it, everything you do from travel to combat takes time. Initially it does not seem like you have a lot of it and for someone unfamiliar it's probably quite overwhelming.

While I don't like "real time" because it means you need to rush around (finish dungeon X within 15:00 for an S rank). I do like abstract time which moves when you travel. It makes everything you do important and can have consequences later on. I don't think you will find many developers who will actually allow people to fail in that way though. Nothing beyond the obligitory mission critical fail reload stuff.

[AkiKishi]

brushyourteeth wrote...
I think that means you either misunderstood or they lied.

I heard it had something to do with ceilings.

[Provi-dance]

CrustyBot wrote...

I won't go on a usual tl;dr addressing verisimilitude and holistic game design (waves, hp bloat, power curve, level scaling, animation speed, they are all linked).

 Dragon Age 2 decided to go in the direction of a more Arcade-y philosophy with gameplay elements there seemingly for arbitrary reasons. Random Immunities, the Waves, level scaling, the In/Out of Combat modes, HP Bloat (see: Arishok) and the like.

Yes, it's all linked. It's like a chain, if a link fails the entire chain falls apart. If they manage to get rid of these specific issues that you mentioned, combat may finally become something that in itself is a worthy reason to play this future game. The likelihood of that happening is.. small, but as Dakota said, one can hope. Hope dies last.



Also, I'm not sure why time limits are mentioned at all, in the context of Bioware games. A time limit is the ultimate, hardcore step towards a world that isn't there just for the sake of reacting to the player. Bioware has yet to make baby steps in this direction (away from the game=movie thing), so it's out of place to even discuss the "issues" of such a system in a Bioware game. They can't run a marathon if they haven't started walking yet.

[Nomen Mendax]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Fallout would not have been half the game it was without the timer. The Atelier games still do it, everything you do from travel to combat takes time. Initially it does not seem like you have a lot of it and for someone unfamiliar it's probably quite overwhelming.

While I don't like "real time" because it means you need to rush around (finish dungeon X within 15:00 for an S rank). I do like abstract time which moves when you travel. It makes everything you do important and can have consequences later on. I don't think you will find many developers who will actually allow people to fail in that way though. Nothing beyond the obligitory mission critical fail reload stuff.

I don't know the Atelier games (I don't have a PS) but I agree with you about Fallout.  I never really understood the objections because you actually had a substantial amount of time to find the chip (and were periodically reminded that you needed to find it before everyone died).

[bEVEsthda]

Nomen Mendax wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

Fallout would not have been half the game it was without the timer. The Atelier games still do it, everything you do from travel to combat takes time. Initially it does not seem like you have a lot of it and for someone unfamiliar it's probably quite overwhelming.

While I don't like "real time" because it means you need to rush around (finish dungeon X within 15:00 for an S rank). I do like abstract time which moves when you travel. It makes everything you do important and can have consequences later on. I don't think you will find many developers who will actually allow people to fail in that way though. Nothing beyond the obligitory mission critical fail reload stuff.

I don't know the Atelier games (I don't have a PS) but I agree with you about Fallout.  I never really understood the objections because you actually had a substantial amount of time to find the chip (and were periodically reminded that you needed to find it before everyone died).

I think timers are so disliked, much because it's so hard to judge the urgence. That's what bothers me anyway. You don't get a feel for the timer and your goals, the first time (or even times) you play the game. And I have to say that the first time I play a game, is the all important one. That's when I let all my choices stand. That's when I care.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 01 juin 2012 - 06:33 .

[Nomen Mendax]

bEVEsthda wrote...

I think timers are so disliked, much because it's so hard to judge the urgence. That's what bothers me anyway. You don't get a feel for the timer and your goals, the first time (or even times) you play the game. And I have to say that the first time I play a game, is the all important one. That's when I let all my choices stand. That's when I care.

But that sounds like a very manageable problem.  It would be easy to provide this information in a journal, and even remind the player periodically (or have NPCs come and complain that you haven't completed their quest and time is running out).