phunx wrote...
Rawgrim wrote...
LTD wrote...
It is sad thing we live in times where mere idea of puzzles in RPG feels like some hostile insult to people playing RPGs. Single player experience in RPGs is very rarely challenging/difficult/competitive. Certainly not unless player wishes for it.
When was the last time you did not know what to do in your RPG?* Last time it was not immemdiately clear how to nudge the story next step onwards? Is it only a good thing these moments are usually completely non-existant in modern RPGs?
It is downright sad how few tools almost all modern RPGs have in store for challenging player; If player insists on it, combat can be difficult. And..well that's pretty much it. Legend of Grimrock and The Secret World felt incredibly, beautifully fresh breaths of wind in this regard. They reminded me of how reality could be very different. And how good puzzle/riddle/mystery to solve or investigate can, in modern video games, be something so much more than some Tower of Hanoi variant.
*something simple and dismissable like failing to notice lever in wall at some SKyrim dungeon doesn't count!
So very very true.
there are probably several different reasons why games don't have hard and tidious puzzles anymore. Developers probably don't want players to quit their game (and possibly not buy the next one) out of frustration, the market is huge, so they could easily play something else. Also the average age of gamers is increasing, we simply don't have the whole summer vacation to play a huge RPG anymore.
I agree however, that Legend of Grimrock had some awesome secrets and The Secret World is a gem among MMOs.
Yeah I bet this is close at the heart of matter. Very gradually them masses consuming AAA games have come to expect two things: One must immediately know exactly how to play the game. Thought of a learning experience involved in the process feels alien. Somehow, discovering and learning *how* to progress is not desireable or rewarding part of game anymore. Secondly, there must be constant smooth neverending sense of progress or modern gamer gets incredibly frustrated. At medium difficulty, there can never be a wall to hit your head on. AAA Videogames have basically turned into Monopoly matches with infinite cash. By the time modern gamer has beaten his void-of-challenge fairy ride, it is entirely likely game hasn't won a single round in Game Vs. Player boxing match. If games had always operated under such depresing rulesets, they would have died of extinction hundreds of years before anyone figured out how to make videogames.
Amazingly, vast majority of achievements, which in theory could add a sense of additional difficulty layer, are always designed to suplement the void-of-challenge joyride. Almost all achievments in almost all games are much harder to avoid than earn. Wtf is that. Admittedly topic of some other thread tho.
Stuff I put in bold is argument you occasionally come by in threads about long and epic games. I've never understood it. Either playing (core) video games is your hobby or it isn't. I'm not sure if that many people feel there is some max. cap of time a game is allowed to take now that they have less time available for their hobby. If you buy three games over three months and use 20 hours on each, you total pretty similar numbers you would if you just spend three months and 60 hours playing Skyrim. My almost finished SKyrim playthrough spend it's one year anniversary at some point around end of July.
Skyrim has one(and only one:p) example of what I consider a good puzzle: Those dragon claws. All you need to do is 'look' at the damn claw, turn it around and see the symbols on it. That is all. Ofc, it ultimately makes such a simple thing..but fine example of what should be in heart of a good puzzle: Player must learn, find and understand something in order to climb over the (pref proverbial..)wall before him. It is the feeling that I must investigate on something, think under laws and logic as they appear in this fictional world that gets my juices flowing, not some arbitary logical thinking flex with 5 levers or Towers of Hanoi variant in the heart.
Modifié par LTD, 11 septembre 2013 - 10:25 .
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But I just thought of the walking dead and how you have to use a (dead) dog's collar to open a doggy door at one point, which is a good example of how to be a "puzzle" without being obvious like "solve this rubix cube and I'll let you in"
