Springheel on 13/3/2014 at 22:48
Quote Posted by Platinumoxicity
The most important thing I got out of the video was how Randy described the design philosophy of Thief. That you need to make the simulation as perfect as possible, so that all the player freedom and emergent gameplay can just naturally form from how the game is designed from the ground.
This was the key thing EM didn't seem to get. Instead of presenting an immersive sim, they focused on trying to control the narrative.
New Horizon on 13/3/2014 at 23:30
Quote Posted by Springheel
This was the key thing EM didn't seem to get. Instead of presenting an immersive sim, they focused on trying to control the narrative.
Yeah, I was thinking about that earlier today. EM's understanding of implementing immersion seems to revolve around pulling the player out of the simulated world and hammering them over the head with the narrative. Narrative front and center. In my time with the game, I feel like any chance of slipping into the role of Garrett, and the world in general is constantly at odds with the developers insistence that they 'show me something cool'. I was making my way to the clock tower in the first level, seeing the tower in the distance and looking forward to walking up to the front steps to gain entrance for the first time. Did that happen, nope. Pulled out of the game to view it all being done for me in a cinematic. I felt cheated. Immersion went kerflush.
Melan on 14/3/2014 at 08:27
Since I already posted this bullet point list to the Codex, I might as well do it here as well for the benefit of those who didn't have the time for the show. My highlights:
* Musing about how "player-unfriendly" and "inconvenient" their level design might look like compared to modern streamlining. But Thief's roots in a swordfighting game and its multiple design stages had also made it broader than how a focused game about thieving might have turned out, and this has made the game better.
* Thief's designers, aside from drawing from D&D and the Ffahrd & Grey Mouser stories, were also familiar with Thieves Guild, the late 70s thief-centric D&D clone made by Gamelords. That's kinda amazing - Thieves Guild is seven kinds of awesome, but I never thought anyone but really old people or collectors knew about it.
* Dramatic tension arising from ambiguity, being on a knife's edge between being in control and your vulnerability when exposed as a core part of playing a thief.
* "The word 'taffer'. Why?" "'Cause you don't want to swear... (...) swearing is sort of déclassé." :cool:
* Thief 2, made in response to fan criticism, took things a bit too far in the "normal" direction. A certain lack of coherence in level design (which was part of that period in gaming) is to the game's benefit. Thief was more a product of several individuals and a few fortunate accidents than a top-down design, and this individual character helped it stand out. It also grants it some believability - too tight direction ends up feeling artificial, limited in perspective.
* "If you are in a position to take chances... take them."
* "You should trust the simulation. You build the simulation, but never try to make it do specific things like ... what we want is for the player to do something cool in the world, and not tell them 'You can't do that right now'. ... Trust the system, put the player on stage was a pretty big [part of the design philosophy]."
* There was a conscious effort to trim the interface down - instead of training tips, they preferred in-game ficition telling you how to play. And you learn a lot by blundering through things.
* Dishonored has been the game in the last few years that has been most faithful to the LGS tradition.
* High fidelity puts a lot of strain on design groups in a way that does not benefit gameplay.
* Rope arrows were cut from Thief 3 due to time/budget constraints. Climbing gloves seemed more logical (coming from D&D and other ideas about thieves), but in the end, they felt less satisfying. The decision to cut water was a fully conscious design decision, though, since they felt water was played out in the stealth context.
* You should separate a casual audience from a dumb audience. Casual gamers might not be super-deep into gaming, but they are not necessarily dumb people, and they may be ready for sophisticated, interactive gameplay concepts.
ValmontPhl on 15/3/2014 at 17:31
Sorry to say I had no time to watch the whole thing, but I was a bit disappointed when after Greg LoPiccolo mentioned he hadn't seen T1 in years before having his kid play it, he made no mention or observation of what the intl fan community has done with it, ie widescreen, FMs, scripts, textures, newdark, etc
AluminumHaste on 19/3/2014 at 03:53
Thank you for posting this, I've never seen this one. You know what I can't figure out? Why are these people just so BAD at playing the games.
Just god awful, fumbling around, running into walls, just horrible newbie playing.
ZylonBane on 19/3/2014 at 06:50
Quote Posted by AluminumHaste
Thank you for posting this, I've never seen this one.
It's barely existed for two weeks. Of course you haven't seen it.
AluminumHaste on 19/3/2014 at 07:55
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
It's barely existed for two weeks. Of course you haven't seen it.
Do you ever have something constructive to say?
Melan on 19/3/2014 at 08:19
Quote Posted by AluminumHaste
Thank you for posting this, I've never seen this one. You know what I can't figure out? Why are these people just so BAD at playing the games.
Just god awful, fumbling around, running into walls, just horrible newbie playing.
It's really bad, but the guy might just suck at multitasking. Making a good interview, especially a live one isn't easy - you've got to think ahead and process all the info you are getting, and work with the material to create new, interesting questions which make it flow. I suppose the interviewer was also looking at the ongoing chat (he made some comments to that effect), so that's a third thing.
ZylonBane on 19/3/2014 at 17:13
Quote Posted by AluminumHaste
Do you ever have something constructive to say?
"Think before you post."
