10 réponses à ce sujet

[Guanxii]

No Man’s Sky style procedural world generation and reinventing the side-quest in the next Mass Effect:

 

Ironic perhaps that No Man’s Sky contains no questing or narrative structure of any kind as far as I’m aware and yet it might finally solve the riddle of creating satisfying secondary/optional questing content in the Mass Effect series revolving around exploration of uncharted worlds which BioWare have experimented with somewhat un-successfully in all of the games so far to a diminishing extent. Genuine uncharted worlds. I’m going to let that sink in for a minute.

 

The concept of UNC words/quests is ‘box art bullet-point material’ and yet the execution has always been somewhat underwhelming. Most hated the physics of the Mako and the copy-paste prefabs and barren worlds and I didn’t care for the pretty but tightly scripted linear N7 missions either as a second attempt, but as we’ve seen lately, this doesn’t necessarily have to be the case in 2014-5 – could you ever envision a best of both worlds scenario (UNC + N7) using content creation algorithms? Perhaps in harnessing the power of the game and the hardware to generate side content BioWare could finally do the concept justice in a cost effective way.

 

With procedural content algorithms you don’t necessarily have to sacrifice graphical fidelity or complete control over your secondary level design in theory – especially with a large and experienced well funded development team. You can generate huge, lush, vibrant and varied worlds filled with life on a budget. We have seen a number of indie games randomly generate their own fantastic level design also on a budget. With a series of smart design choices (such as reusable voice assets for secondary questing) a studio like BioWare with a flagship IP like Mass Effect ought to be able to fully realize the original vision of the UNC quests back in the original title and create these huge detailed worlds with deep exploration with the graphical fidelity of a potentially infinite number of N7 quests with the kind of secondary level design we have come to expect of the series. Unlimited questing and exploration with the production values of Mass Effect would look pretty good on the back of a box or during a press demo don't you think as a decidedly next gen feature.

[Farangbaa]

Only if they make an MMO.

[Mcfly616]

Lol been seeing a bit too much of No Man's Sky eh?

 

 

 

 

Me too....

[AlanC9]

Sounds fairly boring. OTOH, procedural stuff is cheap, so who cares?

[RoboticWater]

Sounds fairly boring. OTOH, procedural stuff is cheap, so who cares?

 

Though I wouldn't put it so bluntly, I agree. While it may produce varied environments, procedural generation doesn't always create consistently polished results. 

 

Bioware distinguished themselves not by the amount of content they produced but by the quality of it. Every single Bioware game (at least in recent history) has been very cinematic and crafted experience. Though the thought of essentially infinite exploration may seem like a perfect fit for Mass Effect, having an algorithm simply churn out content wouldn't work well with Bioware's vision of an RPG.

[Probe Away]

I don't think this would mesh well with the mission structure. The UNC worlds were fine (for their time) in ME1 because (i) they were consistent with the exploratory nature of the main missions and (ii) there were specific, quest related points on the maps.

In ME2 the more linear N7 missions went hand in hand with the nature of the main missions (even if people bemoaned the lack of planetary exploration): locate the objective, land, get in, get out.

Procedural generation might work to a limited extent - for example, in some missions you could trace an objective down to a large area on a planet and have to explore that area to find your target, which would be in a different location on different terrain each time. However, in general random planetary exploration with no clear goal or focal point doesn't fit with Bioware's or the MEU's style.

[Guanxii]

Examples of Randomly Generated Quest/Content Templates which you might see on procedurally generated maps:

 

Bounty Hunting (including vehicle missions)

Enemy Compounds

Scripted Random Encounters (Red Dead)

Artifacts/Collectables

Crafting Quests (Far Cry 3/RDR)

Hunting Legendary Creatures

Random Creature/Hostile NPC Encounters

Distress Calls/Vigilante missions

Escort Missions

Minigames

[AlanC9]

I don't think this would mesh well with the mission structure. The UNC worlds were fine (for their time) in ME1 because (i) they were consistent with the exploratory nature of the main missions and (ii) there were specific, quest related points on the maps.

The main missions were exploratory?

[Probe Away]

The main missions were exploratory?

As in driving around in the Mako to get to your destination. You covered far more territory on the ground in each main mission in ME1 than you did in the sequels.

[Malanek]

I haven't seen No Mans Sky, but assuming this is similar to Diablo, I think this could be a great way to enhance the game. As you mentioned exploration, but I can also see certain Multiplayer modes benefiting from it.

[Madcat 124]

Only if they make an MMO.

And that would be terrible...

 

A side story game might not be bad with procedural generation, maybe even work it in to multiplayer, but I don't think it would work well in a story based game.