   Letting the player do whatever they want.
  I like non-linear games. I like having sidequests and being able to explore on my own in an RPG. I like branching level structures and big, explorable levels in my action games. I like having an open-ended mission progression in strategy games.And I DEFINITELY love being able to find multiple solutions to a given problem.I don't like games described as Go Anywhere, Do Anything, though.This isn't really a recent trend, but was more popular back in the day. Daggerfall was probably the biggest example of this structure -- and even the sequels to that were nowhere near as open as the Daggerfall was. Of course, predating Daggerfall, you had the Elite series. I'm sure you can all think of other examples.But I think it's still sort of common amongst new indie developers. I think part of the allure is the whole "single-player MMO" aspect, and also the notion that, well, nobody's ever really done a game where the player really CAN do whatever they want, so I'll be the first.So, generally, I don't think these games work. From a practical standpoint, it's not really feasible to let your players do whatever--which is why this kind of game isn't really made anymore. This is really apparent with Daggerfall, where you can theoretically go wherever you want but in terms of stuff you can do, you're pretty much limited to taking on quests which all sort of end up the same, and characters are kind of restricted to being a thief, mage, or fighter, or some combination thereof. Same issue with the elite games, although that's more of a mercenary, pirate, or merchant breakdown. I think the bigger issue is that letting the player do whatever they want is less of a design and more of a non-design. You design a game by coming up with rules and boundaries. What you can do is defined by what you can't. A go anywhere, do anything type game still ends up having those boundaries, only more out of necessity and not because the devs really wanted them there, and so you end up with this sort of weird, frankenstein design that's never really coherent and never really finished.What do you guys think?   
  I think that we need to differ between simulations and games at some point. When talking about games (digital/electronic games, board games, dice games, card games, sports etc.) we're talking about an activity mainly participated in for purposes of amusement and/or entertainment. And they all have rules and tools. It is the very foundation of a game. A game has rules you must follow, and you try to win while restricted by these rules. And then you have certain tools provided by the game which you use to win (or at least try to).Simulations have a different purpose. A simulation does just that: simulates something. Certainly a simulator can be used as part of a game - for instance, a flight simulator may still contain timers, score, and various other game-related aspects that enables you to play a game in the simulation with the intention of winning. Then you have soccer simulations like the FIFA or PES games (I like to think of them as simulations) that are interchangeably games. Because soccer in itself is a game, an activity, with rules and tools which you then adhere by and win within the restrictions of these rules, and where breaking a rule is followed by a penalty. Then you have other simulations like life simulations with games like The Sims.What do I think? I think one really should separate games and separations. And merging the two requires additional effort. More importantly, letting a player do anything they want is a simulation of some sort of quasi-reality (even our physical reality has rules and limitations. Gravity, for instance). These simulations are not games. Even if you make a "game" with mages and elves and knights and dragons, you ultimately simulate an alternate reality. You are not playing a game.I think there are games out there that are fundamentally games with a lot of features that are sim-like. They sacrifice core aspects of gaming like "fun" and "entertaining" for the purpose of simulating something. Especially when these games are multiplayer or massively multiplayer games, where balancing becomes more than a game issue but also a sim-issue. World of Warcraft (and various other MMO's) are good examples of this. Online FPS games like Call of Duty are also good examples of this.That is not to say that these game/sim games can't be fun. But the closer you take a game to simulation, the closer it gets to realism. The closer you get to realism, the further away from a digital game you get. When moving towards a simulation, be cautious. Strike a good balance between the two, and make sure that your game remains in essence just that: a game with rules and tools that should be fun and/or entertaining.   ;Quote:Original post by MetallonThat is not to say that these game/sim games can't be fun. But the closer you take a game to simulation, the closer it gets to realism. The closer you get to realism, the further away from a digital game you get. When moving towards a simulation, be cautious. Strike a good balance between the two, and make sure that your game remains in essence just that: a game with rules and tools that should be fun and/or entertaining.There is nothing wrong with going all the way to the simulator side either, as long as you are simulating something interesting, People use simulators primarily because the real thing is too expensive, too dangerous, or just not very accessible, and if you aim for you software to be an alternative to the real thing it needs to get very close)   ;  A simulation is not inherently bad. But in some cases an open-ended simulation is not good. And a simulation is still not a game. In my eyes, at least. Unless you are simulating a game.   ;  I was referring to games.   ;  The MMO design I'm toying with is based around the concept of letting players do whatever they enjoy within the game, but not totally freeform.  I think of the game as being starfish-shaped.  The player community is in the middle, that's the world marketplace and the world chat channel and guilds.  From that home base the player can, whenever they want, venture down any or all of the 6 arms of the starfish (which represent different types of gameplay such as pvm, pvp, minigames, crafting/sim, monster capturing/breeding, and interactive story/relationship building).  The goal is that the player should earn approximately the same amount of money or equivalent items no matter which type of gameplay they are doing.  And all the types of gameplay are optional, none is a prerequisite for another.  So hopefully there will be nothing preventing players from doing whichever kind of gameplay they want.   ;  Love the topic but if I understand your definition correctly (Elite and Daggerfall-like games) then I've got to strongly disagree with your conclusions. First, feasibility doesn't to me seem to be an issue unless we're talking AAA titles. As rogue-likes prove, we've had the capability of using procedurally generated content for decades. And although expensive, Spore proves that PCG can be quite successful even for a AAA title if you have the programming firepower.Second, I don't think you can call these sorts of games "non-designed" at all. The very fact that you have to create functioning content and set how it's interacted with creates the design. The difference is that one of the most important elements, the goals, are left in the player's hands and can be discovered in an unstructured fashion. A great example of this can be found in how Halo: ODST's supply points help create intermediary goals in relation to the landscape of threats on the map. The player isn't compelled to seek them, but their very presence creates an opportunity for the player to obtain gear which can alter their play strategy.In truth it comes down to liking the game type or not. Either you're a self-directed player who likes to play by your own rules or you enjoy a more guided, meaningfully paced experience. I think by the game industry's trend toward cinematic experiences we can safely say that the majority of players are of the latter persuasion (which isn't a value judgment, just demographics).   ;  I don't think the problem with Daggerfall was the fact that you "could go anywhere, do anything". I think the bigger problem was that they couldn't make enough content to fill what they had made (or perhaps wanted limitless content?), so they made things procedurally generated. Procedural generation of those kinds of things have never been very good, especially back then when you had technological constraints. And don't get me started on the (non-story) dungeons! In my opinion, they should have spent less time on books (remember 'The Real Barenzia'? :X), instead spending it on hand-crafting the quests & dungeons.Another game that did this was S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl and Clear Sky. The random quests were garbage. Then the third game replaced them with a limited number of interesting, human-created quests. It turned out to be the most playable game in the series.So on some level, I do agree with you. I'd rather have a limited amount of meaningful content than infinite, indistinguishable content. Then again, it's easier to do the latter and mark it down as a benefit, "game length".   ;Quote:As rogue-likes prove, we've had the capability of using procedurally generated content for decades.This isn't about procedurally generated content. This is about restricting what the player can and cannot do within the game. And yes, feasibility is an issue, because if you seriously want to let the player do whatever they want, you're going to run into places where they want to do things that you never really predicted they'd do.Quote:A great example of this can be found in how HaloNo, that's not what I was talking about at all. Yes, you can find multiple approaches to solving problems in Halo: ODST, and explore and find stuff early that lets you come up with these new solutions, and I specifically said in my first post that that was NOT what I was taking issue with. Quote:I don't think the problem with Daggerfall was the fact that you "could go anywhere, do anything". I think the bigger problem was that they couldn't make enough content to fill what they had made...The problem is the go anywhere, do anywhere mindset. The lack of meaningful content is the end result of that. In attempting to make a game where the player could go anywhere and do anything, they probably found that actually hand-crafting that was impossible, at least in terms of "going anywhere" because that somehow mandated having a huge world. This led to a big, randomly-generated world that was devoid of... anything.Similarly, with the gameplay, they were so divided between providing seperate warrior, mage, and thief gameplay mechanics that none of them were really fully developed, and this at least carried into the rest of the series. Unfortunately. So, from an end-state perspective, I'd absolutely agree that the lack of meaningful content is what killed the game. Except the lack of meaningful content is more of a symptom of a greater underlying problem.Quote:Another game that did this was S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl and Clear Sky. The random quests were garbage.Can't speak for Clear Sky, but the random quests in SoC were a pretty minor portion of the game and I think you only got them from two different NPCs anyway. They also weren't really randomized, either. There were like, twenty of them, and they'd just run on a loop. They were mostly there for if you somehow completely ran out of money and needed to get some loot of disproportional value for your otherwise junk items.   ;Quote:Original post by MeshGearFoxI was referring to games.I know. I was stating my opinion, which is that games that let you do anything you want aren't really games IMHO, but more akin to simulations. I realize now that my first post may not have been entirely relevant to what you wanted feedback on.   