11 réponses à ce sujet

[zyntifox]

For the last 10-12 years the gaming industry, in my opinion, have been quite liberal in what is considered a RPG. I have always considered that RPGs are games where the game and player together creates a story. But for the last decade there seems to have been a shift thoward telling this story by through cinematic at the cost of player input. Now, i do not hate or love this shift because i like both types of games but for very different reasons. But i do play these types of games very different.

The question i have that i think would be interesting hearing from you guys is:
At what point does a RPG turn into another genre? That is, what are the fundamental requirement you have for a game to be considered an RPG. I've bolded the "you" for a reason because i do consider this to be something subjective.

[Allan Schumacher]

My "prereq" it seems for an RPG is a game that focuses on the following:

- A story of appropriate scope (probably at least 20+ hours. Willing to go less if replayability is divergent and interesting)
- Some level of player agency (the more the better IMO, and am willing to concede length)
- Some form of character progression. The most obvious is some sort of XP system, but other forms work for me.
- Interesting character interactions (party is not required, but typically greatly adds to interesting interactions. I'm looking at you Planescape: Torment!)

[Allan Schumacher]

By player agency I mean the ability to influence the story and to have the game respond to the actions I make in the game.

Ideally, I prefer mutually exclusive choices in the narrative.

[Allan Schumacher]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

I would call that character agency.  The character is able to do things.  But if they're only things the game is pre-written to allow (as they would have to be in order to have the game react to them), then I don't see any opportunity for the player to be part of the creative process, and as such I would not classify that as player agency.

Player agency involves the player being able to decide things on his own and have the game accept those decisions (even if the game doesn't acknowledge them).  That's what BioWare has lost in all their post-DAO games, and that's what I want back.

They're mostly indistinguishable to me.

One of the presumably many differences between Sylvius the Mad and Allan Schumacher

[Allan Schumacher]

EntropicAngel wrote...

MichaelStuart wrote...

I still don't see why stats would be needed here?
My character being a lousy shot can shown by making the shooting mechanics harder, like increasing the spread, reducing reload speed, etc.

I rather learn what my character is good at by actually doing something, than be told by a character sheet.
 

As I said on the previous page (I swear, I always end up as the last person...)

That doesn't show your character being a lousy shot.

That shows YOU being a lousy shot.

Your limts are imposed on the character.

This doesn't have to be the case.

If the shooting mechanics are more difficult with a poorer shot and easier with a character that is a better shot, it's still a reflection of that character's ability with said weapons.

[Allan Schumacher]

Nope not really, this is just a filter applied on player gaming skills, even if we were to apply level and or stat modifiers to make it more RPG.

Try running and gunning in the original Deus Ex with a player untrained in small arms compared to one that is fully trained.

While player skill still exists, it doesn't matter how good I am at shooters if Denton is untrained with the weapons, I'm not going to be successful.


Keep in mind that I was responding to someone that unequivocally stated that a system like this cannot show that your character is a lousy shot, to which I disagree.

[Allan Schumacher]

However, I'd wager you'd still be more effective than someone who is terrible at shooters, even if you gave them Master skill level...

This is true, and I don't disagree. But the game has still shown me that a character with Master skill level is more proficient than a character that is Untrained.

To the other side of that, though.... if I suck at shooting - as in, as a player, I will shoot myself in the foot if I was aiming for the sky - then Denton is NOT a master small arms, despite the fact that his character sheet looks that way, despite the fact that I want to play him that way.

The thing is, at no point is the game ever a complete disassociation from the person playing it, unless the game is playing itself.

Even in a game where all combat is handled purely by the game mechanics with "no player skill," the player is still required to make decisions and influence the character. In a game like Baldur's Gate, you're still going to get people that make poor decisions that don't do nearly as well as me or you, even if they're playing characters with near genius level intelligence. Why can my character with 3 intelligence still come up with an optimal attack order that maximizes my combat effectiveness and recognizes that Target A is a more serious threat than Target B?

It's entirely possible for a good player to do better in Baldur's Gate with a Fighter that is 12s in all attributes than a poor player that has a fighter with all 18s.

If a "true RPG" requires that the player's skill not affect the game, then why are we still allowing players to make decisions for the character in our RPGs?

[Allan Schumacher]

I would argue that most if not all can eventually figure out things based on logic, as opposed to twitch gameplay--some people aren't going to be good at it, no matter how long they try. It puts them at a disadvantage, while anyone can utilize logical thinking.

I'd argue that, barring actual physical disability, most people can learn "twitch" skills as well. The biggest advantage logic/understanding has is that it's easier for someone to solve the issue for you. If you're stuck in combat in BG2, someone can tell you a strategy. If you're stuck in combat that's more player driven, you can't really give a strategy for aiming in most cases. It just comes down to practice.

I guess my main problem is that knowing to attack a target that is dealing more damage to the party as opposed to attacking a random mook that poses less of a threat is an issue of the player UNDERSTANDING how to play the game... not an obstacle to the player being ABLE to play the game.

I don't think they're that different. One is a cognitive skill and the other is a physical skill, but ultimately both are still skills that people develop.

For me it just represents a diversification of the RPG genre, and I don't think that that is a bad thing. It'd be suboptimal if all RPGs required physical player skill for combat, just as it'd be suboptimal if all RPGs made physical player skill irrelevant.

Some may say "Well you can go play some other game to satisfy your "twitch" skills, but sometimes I want "the whole package" in one game. It's probably no surprise that I love games like Deus Ex, Vampire: Bloodlines, and Fallout: New Vegas. I think they are games that merge the twitch and cerberal aspects of gaming quite well.

The thing I find interesting, though, is that the only aspect that ever seems to come up are the physical limitations. A game like Baldur's Gate only utilizes Intelligence for combat purposes, but my Int 3 character can still happily go around solving complex logic puzzles yet it's often held up as being one of the pinnacles of RPG gaming in large part because it's "character driven" rather than "player driven."

Allen.... I feel I have to ask here... given that it is past midnight in your neck of the woods on a school night smilie, do your bosses ever give you grief if they see you've been posting on your work site until the wee hours of the night... or is that brownie points?

I'm typically an "in bed by 1 or 2" type, and I am heading to bed after this message haha. None of my bosses has ever made a comment on me posting here though. I did let Mike and Mark know (of my own volition) that I had decided to post on the forums, and they were quite supportive of the idea. I know some were concerned my job would be in jeopardy when I was posting on ME3 forums back in April, but for the most part I'm here because I gain some level of enjoyment out of it

[Allan Schumacher]

Personally, I don't think there's a harsh cut-off between player skill and character skill. As long as one doesn't contradict the other outright, there's no issue with having both be part of the equation.

THIS is something that does bother me. IIRC Morrowind was a game where I could straight up hit someone with a bow, but whether or not I did damage was based on my character's skill which was just confusing and frustrating IMO.

In regards to the scenario Allan has put out there, I'm pretty sure a guy like Sylvius will respond along the lines of intentionally making suboptimal decisions according to the character concept and stats.

I can see this. It's more difficult to make decisions on behalf of someone that is magnificently more intelligent than I am though

[Allan Schumacher]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Back on topic, what if I were to phrase this discussion in a silly, but analogous way?

When we play a game with guns, we use shooting mechanics to simulate gameplay. If a player is good at shooting, then the character makes the shot most of the time.

Let's go to another genre outside of RPGs, one that uses statistics as much (if not more, <gasp!>) than RPGs... sports games.

If I play NBA2K12, my skill at dunking is never called into play. If I have the ball, and am in range for my character's stats to dunk, I press a button and it happens.

You would never say "what, you can't dunk in real life? Well, practice. Then maybe you can pull it off in game." The same can be said of Madden and not being able to throw a perfect spiral football, or hockey in not being able to skate.

I know it is a flimsy argument, to be sure. But these games result in more of a causal effect based on your stats rather than your skill. If you try and hit the dunk button from the half court line, your character will instead likely shoot (and miss) a three point shot. If your hockey character has low skating skill, they may be slower and less mobile on the ice, but they would rarely just fall flat on their face and fail terribly.

But when you make a game where a player has to aim a gun at a target, the player can be terribly bad. They CAN aim at the floor. They CAN be staring at a wall instead of facing the enemy, or utilizing cover. Granted, many sports games use player skill as well, such as Tiger Woods mimicking a back swing with the analog sticks, or Fight Night basing the punch strength and direction off of player timing, so its not a flawless genre to pull examples from. But most of the time, it is simply "press X to pass, press Y to steal, press A to shoot." And while skill definitely comes into play, there is no option to fail terribly. You can't dribble the ball off of your foot. You can't shoot at the other team's goal. You can't jump in the air to dunk and not get high enough off of the ground. In a shooter RPG, you CAN shoot completely off base of an enemy, you CAN throw a grenade at your own foot and you CAN fail at pulling up a menu to get your healing packs while trying to back pedal away from an enemy.

I find it interesting that you bring up NBA 2k12 since I happen to really enjoy that game too.  And you're correct in that it takes into account player ratings to determine success.  Though I think your analogy is invalid.

When I mention "practice" I'm not talking about going to a firing range and learning how to fire a gun.  I'm talking about moving the mouse and pointing and clicking.

That I am not able to dunk a ball has no bearing on whether or not I think player skill should be taken into account, and unfortunately I find NBA 2K12 to be a game that requires rather exceptional player skill in order to be good at.  Both cognitively (recognizing the play as it develops) and physically (accurate thumbstick movements, especially for the dribble moves, and knowledge of the controller in a real time environment).  In order to be good at the game, you're definitely going to need to spend a lot of time just practicing.  Once you get good though, woo it's a lot of fun to do a double crossover into a jab step for a pull up jumper with time expiring to knock your opponent out of the playoffs!


There's no expectation that the game player should know how to fire a firearm before playing a shooter RPG.  I have killed probably millions of virtual characters in shooters and the first time I fired a pistol I jammed it because I didn't know how to shoot it properly.

So much like how the baseline basketball player doesn't dribble the ball off the foot, even with poor stats, in a shooter RPG it's not like the "untrained" firearm guy is jamming his pistol while firing, stumbling about trying to figure out where the safety catch is, or the how to change a magazine.  I don't have to account for the physical requirements of making sure I'm holding the gun properly for recoil reasons and so forth.  Typically all "untrained" means, is that my character is less accurate with the gun, and perhaps the weapon does less damage and it reloads slower as well.


When I practice NBA 2k12, I'm not outside working on my jumpshot.  I'm in the gym in game practicing the thumbsticks and improving my skills within the game.  When I say that all it takes is practice for a shooter RPG, barring disability I'm referring to the ability to move and click a mouse and perhaps coordinate with your other hand to move your character.  All very "computer focused" skills.  Not going out to a firing range and shooting a real firearm.

In a shooter RPG, you CAN shoot completely off base of an enemy, you CAN
throw a grenade at your own foot and you CAN fail at pulling up a menu
to get your healing packs while trying to back pedal away from an enemy.

In Baldur's Gate you can misclick (or intentionally...) and fireball your own party to death with a single blast, or use the wrong potion, or click the wrong ability, and so forth.  Both games require player skill.  When I first played Baldur's Gate it was way too difficult for me and I didn't get far past Beregost.  After playing with a friend several months later, I learned how to play the game better.  I grew my skill at Baldur's Gate.

In NBA 2k12 I can attempt to do a behind the back but fail at the input and do a crossover instead, exposing the ball and getting it stolen.  Heck, sometimes I can just plain ol' hit the wrong button and jack up a shot instead of passing.  So while Fast Jimmy's personal skill at dunking is never in play, Fast Jimmy's skill at playing the game so that he can get into a position to actually dunk the ball is always in play.

[Allan Schumacher]

Practise shouldn't be necessary. If I build a character who;'s good at shooting things, I shouldn't need to be good at shooting things. The whole point of roleplaying games is playing characters who are different from us, not characters who suffer from the same limitations we do.

This argument is just plain false. You're not actually shooting a gun, nor firing a bow, nor swinging a sword. You're pressing a controller button or a key on a keyboard or a mouse button.

At no point in any of these games is your ability to do any of these actions actually called into play. So when you say "characters who suffer from the same limitations we do" you're actually creating a strawman argument that doesn't reflect the reality of skills being called into question. Unless you're playing a game where you take control of someone that is playing a video game, the argument falls apart.

In fact, the ONLY thing that draws a parallel is the cognitive aspect. That I'm swinging a sword in a fantasy world already wholly satisfies your RPG requirement of "The whole point of roleplaying games is playing characters who are different from us" regardless of whether or not I need to actually move my mouse and click a mouse button to fire my gun.

Practise shouldn't be necessary.

Practice is required to become good at all games. I'd wager that you're actually quite practiced at a game like Baldur's Gate and would do significantly better than someone that has picked up the game for the first time and has no experience playing similar types of games.

The only way to have a game that is devoid of any player skill is to have a game that plays itself without requiring any form of player input.

[Allan Schumacher]

Word of the wise, in order to not multipost this is very likely going to be a VERY long post.  I'll try to break up my replies.  (Actually I'll reply in chunks since I won't be able to get through all this over lunch!)

EntropicAngel wrote...

Practice shouldn't be NECESSARY, Allan. It's alright if it's necessary to become good, but if I can't aim with my mouse worth a d*mn, I shouldn't be expected to practice just to play the character.

If you wish to become good at something, practice is always necessary.  Practice is simply another word for "experience."  The first "FPS" game I played that required mouselook was an older game called Uprising.  Until then, I would flat out refuse to play FPS style games with the mouse because it was clunky and something I was not familiar with.  Uprising was a game I wanted to play, however, so I pushed through and eventually got comfortable with it, to the points where I would only play FPS games with mouselook.

It's also important to note that my comment regarding "practice" is in regards to your claim about how anyone can use logical thinking.  Problem solving is a mental skill, and one that becomes better with practice.  I contend that, just as someone may have poor physical skills, they can have poor mental skills, and with practice (or rather, experience) they can be improved upon.  I do not think that just anyone can utilize logic to the same level of everyone else.

The same works for more tactical games, and it's why I dislike a couple of DA fights like the Arishok fight. I spent the entire time kiting. That's not cool. I can understand if I'm playing on a hard diffficulty, but if I'm playing on Normal he shouldn't be five times as hard as any other boss in the game.

The Arishok fight is a fight that could be a lot better (especially the 1-on-1 fight).  I didn't enjoy that fight either, but it has little to do with being good at controlling the character in the game, or really challenging the player's skills.  It's mostly a tedious fight (although poorer players will be prone to struggling with it.  By the sounds of it, your experience with gaming knows about the term kiting.  If someone hasn't thought of that then they'll struggle a lot more than you did with that fight).


=================================================================

Sad Dragon wrote...

Take the skill system from the original Deus Ex in which even a skilled
FPS player would have problems hitting the broadside of a barn with a
weapon they were untrained in. Couple that with a V.A.T.S System and you
now have a system were players skilled in FPS games and players
unskilled in the genre both gain something from skilling up that weapon
skill.

Could be done.  As always, adding in extra features may or may not be worth it.  Sometimes someone is going to want to make a game that requires more player skill, while someone else is just going to want to make a game that completely removes player skill.  Or they can combine the two.  All are valid ways to design an RPG.


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Reamlzmaster wrote...

It should not be because I as a player cannot aim. My character is the
one doing the aiming and attacking. I tell them what to attack and what
ability or tactic to use. That is where in my humble opinion player
skill should come in.

It's still a player skill imposed on the character though.  For example, if you're familiar with particular tactics that tend to work in prior games that you like, you'll still find yourself being more successful than another player that does not, despite having the exact same character.

I don't think it's a stretch for anyone in this thread to acknowledge that any player picking up DAO as their first ever RPG video game is going to struggle with it, compared to people that have a vast history of playing prior games from BioWare, Black Isle, Obsidian, etc..

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Fast Jimmy wrote...

In regards to the INT score of 3 (not really applicable in any Bioware
game; but hey... what the heck) this is solved easily with Fallout style
leveling. If you have a high INT score, you get more skill points.

I actually scored a roll in Baldur's Gate that let me set my INT to 3 and set all other attributes to 18 with my Paladin.  Strength was 18/96 to boot.


3rd Edition D&D does something similar with intelligence feeding skill points as well (though the CRPGs tend to not really use those skills in my experience).  I don't think it's a perfect system (I think there are still fundamental issues a person that is almost incapable of rational thought can become a master at something, though I suppose it's akin to becoming a savant), but it is better.

Though I did have a fun idea that journal entries and the quest compass should be affected by intelligence.  Imagine a journal that has poorly written (or just incorrect) journal entries if you have a low intelligence.  And quest markers that always take you to food or some other immediate gratification thing!  Hahaha.

Allen, to your point of 2K12, yes it does require a good deal of skill
to dribble, shoot and dunk WELL in these games (I too have been known to
play a sports game - the shame! The horror! Lol) but if you drop the
difficulty down to Easy/Casual, you can do all things pretty simply by
pressing a button. Mass Effect makes combat super easy as far as enemy
health, but it still requires me to line up a shot while being hounded
after by Husks, a very Action-intense sevens t of gameplay that is
present throughout.

Are you not able to actually shoot the husks to relieve the pressure?  I'd almost like to do a test with a non-gamer and see how they do in ME3 in story mode.  If the player is virtually invulnerable and the enemies easy to kill I don't see the problem.  People may not be able to shoot "WELL" but if they can still accomplish the tasks similar to 2k12?

If I'm not in control of Isabella, a character who anyone in their right
mind would pump as much Dec and Cun into as humanly possible, and she,
as the most dexterous and crafty person in the fight, cannot dodge the
Rage demon attack, but I, as a bumbling Mage, can? That's a rift that
cannot be explained except by player skill.

It's a rift that's easily explained by artificial intelligence.  By the same token, when I run away from someone in DAO while they're swinging, and their sword swings into the air but I still take damage, that's a disconnect in line with "I hit someone with my bow but nothing happened" in Morrowind which is far more foolish.

Since your example represents cognitive decision making, however, (the decision to avoid the charge) I see it as a parallel to any BioWare game where the player is better able to control the characters than the AI.

I would say that because a game like ME or Fallout give you control of
one player, they have mechanisms which can mitigate this (pause and
shoot, VATS, etc.) but since DA is a GROUP based combat system, there is
no way to easily fix this without either A) getting rid of control of
your party (I.e. maybe just power/ability control like in ME or
altogether like in Dragon Dogma) or getting rid of the action
segments of combat.

You can still issue move orders to all your characters, and with the ability to pause I did just that with the encounters that required evasive action by the party.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 14 août 2012 - 07:31 .