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The Games and other Sierra Adventure stuff / Worst Adventure Game Tendencies
« Last post by NilG on Today at 03:32:02 AM »Just to kick off a discussion...
I would never want to talk shit on a single game and certainly have no desire to pick out a specific game from 20 years for its faults. There've been plenty of "Worst Adventure Game" threads throughout the years, but...
Since I feel most of us have been playing adventure games for a long time (and some of us may have not been, but the question remains), what are some of the things that have popped up in adventure games that have transfigured joy into irritation or flat out rage?
Not a new question either, of course, but wanted to share my own thoughts on a few things and see what you all thought:
Parser Vs PnC - Possibly the primary question for us old assholes. I'm a parser fan because of the freedom of exploration. I also understand, particularly after coming up with a demo in the format, how reliant the experience is on the understanding of syntax and basic words/synonyms. It's something of an early AI, and very limited by memory when not by care. I always enjoyed parser, though, that ability to look at or try anything. I remember reading the KQ Companion and how the skull in KQ3 was a rudimentary computer. Goofy? Sure. As a kid, I recall wondering why I didn't look at that thing closer. Parser doesn't widen the world, really; PnC can do all the same, but it always seemed to me when I was younger that the world was limitless. You could type ANYTHING and maybe get a response. I enjoyed PnC as well, but was initially disappointed when Sierra went the PnC route. Of course, that wasn't the biggest issue with their first game in that direction, though many of them weren't initially introduced by the change, either:
Dead Ends - These kind of suck. When I was in my single digits or an early teen, it was fine. All the time in the world. As an older dude, dead ends kinda suck. It's tough to come up with a balance that avoids it, particularly in the older memory limitations. But I get it; I can't imagine an adult or most kids today saying, "Sure, my bad, I'll go back and replay 6 hours because maybe I missed something then." Didn't mind it then. Don't have time for it now.
Deaths - Maybe a touchy topic or not. I don't think deaths are awful in and of themselves, but sudden death is frustrating. Again, as a kid, I learned to bounce when the random wolf appeared, but sometimes death makes sense in the context. GK1 did it pretty well, I feel. I think there are two kinds of adventure game deaths. and both can be avoided by saving and restoring, but there's no fun in entering a new screen and dying because fuck you, that's why. It's a puzzle game, not a shitty luck game.
FMV - Obsolete as it was now, anyway. GK2, which I enjoyed as a still young teenager, isn't generally placed on the same level as GK1 for I think obvious reasons. Same could be said for early 3D games, I guess. I'm not a graphics guy, necessarily, but there are certainly differences, and if the technology is negatively impacting the game portion of the... game, then there's probably an issue.
Bad/Impossible Puzzles - Ifnkovhgroghprm and Cat Mustache are obvious and explored to death. This is one I feel like I may be trying to balance still. I'm not sure if the puzzles in Sect are all fair or if there's a bunch of easy ones and hard ones. I can think of one puzzle (as a backup to avoid a dead-end) that probably needs more clarification/hinting, and that's one way around this kind of puzzle. Hints within the text or visuals can probably help bang this one out almost universally, as long as the puzzles aren't completely lacking in logic. Don't want to make it too easy, but don't want a game full of picking up hammers and using them on nails, either. Random, ambiguous letters in unrelated houses obviously don't work to improve it. It needs to make sense. Bad puzzles are a killer seeing as that's the point, right?
Basic Storytelling - Just for the sake of completeness, have an interesting story or an interesting game, like in any other medium. If your game is some dude trying to go to White Castle or finish their term paper, the game itself better be interesting. I shit every day; not gonna make a game around it unless Toilet Paper Quest comes with a pretty epic tale.
Surface exploration; definitely interested to hear any other opinions, though? I feel like we all want to create entire worlds that (or recreate variations of this world in a way which) keeps things interesting and triggers a desire to explore. What's prevented that in some otherwise stellar games?
BONUS! Not enough information - Not as big, but if there's something on the screen that can't be deciphered visually, mention it in the general look or at least make it explorable with the right word. Sometimes the screen just has a bunch of shit on it, and it's all garbage. That's fine; just catch it with something. It's perfectly fine to have garbage on the screen, but give it a LOOK response or something. It sucks to look at that thing which is obviously a ***** and get a generic "don't know what you're talking about" message, particularly if the game's well aware of the word used.
It's tough and imperfect to create an entire world, which I think is part of the thought behind these games, and we want to make them interactive without being frustrating. A tall order, probably. Further thoughts into what just sucks sometimes about adventure games?
I would never want to talk shit on a single game and certainly have no desire to pick out a specific game from 20 years for its faults. There've been plenty of "Worst Adventure Game" threads throughout the years, but...
Since I feel most of us have been playing adventure games for a long time (and some of us may have not been, but the question remains), what are some of the things that have popped up in adventure games that have transfigured joy into irritation or flat out rage?
Not a new question either, of course, but wanted to share my own thoughts on a few things and see what you all thought:
Parser Vs PnC - Possibly the primary question for us old assholes. I'm a parser fan because of the freedom of exploration. I also understand, particularly after coming up with a demo in the format, how reliant the experience is on the understanding of syntax and basic words/synonyms. It's something of an early AI, and very limited by memory when not by care. I always enjoyed parser, though, that ability to look at or try anything. I remember reading the KQ Companion and how the skull in KQ3 was a rudimentary computer. Goofy? Sure. As a kid, I recall wondering why I didn't look at that thing closer. Parser doesn't widen the world, really; PnC can do all the same, but it always seemed to me when I was younger that the world was limitless. You could type ANYTHING and maybe get a response. I enjoyed PnC as well, but was initially disappointed when Sierra went the PnC route. Of course, that wasn't the biggest issue with their first game in that direction, though many of them weren't initially introduced by the change, either:
Dead Ends - These kind of suck. When I was in my single digits or an early teen, it was fine. All the time in the world. As an older dude, dead ends kinda suck. It's tough to come up with a balance that avoids it, particularly in the older memory limitations. But I get it; I can't imagine an adult or most kids today saying, "Sure, my bad, I'll go back and replay 6 hours because maybe I missed something then." Didn't mind it then. Don't have time for it now.
Deaths - Maybe a touchy topic or not. I don't think deaths are awful in and of themselves, but sudden death is frustrating. Again, as a kid, I learned to bounce when the random wolf appeared, but sometimes death makes sense in the context. GK1 did it pretty well, I feel. I think there are two kinds of adventure game deaths. and both can be avoided by saving and restoring, but there's no fun in entering a new screen and dying because fuck you, that's why. It's a puzzle game, not a shitty luck game.
FMV - Obsolete as it was now, anyway. GK2, which I enjoyed as a still young teenager, isn't generally placed on the same level as GK1 for I think obvious reasons. Same could be said for early 3D games, I guess. I'm not a graphics guy, necessarily, but there are certainly differences, and if the technology is negatively impacting the game portion of the... game, then there's probably an issue.
Bad/Impossible Puzzles - Ifnkovhgroghprm and Cat Mustache are obvious and explored to death. This is one I feel like I may be trying to balance still. I'm not sure if the puzzles in Sect are all fair or if there's a bunch of easy ones and hard ones. I can think of one puzzle (as a backup to avoid a dead-end) that probably needs more clarification/hinting, and that's one way around this kind of puzzle. Hints within the text or visuals can probably help bang this one out almost universally, as long as the puzzles aren't completely lacking in logic. Don't want to make it too easy, but don't want a game full of picking up hammers and using them on nails, either. Random, ambiguous letters in unrelated houses obviously don't work to improve it. It needs to make sense. Bad puzzles are a killer seeing as that's the point, right?
Basic Storytelling - Just for the sake of completeness, have an interesting story or an interesting game, like in any other medium. If your game is some dude trying to go to White Castle or finish their term paper, the game itself better be interesting. I shit every day; not gonna make a game around it unless Toilet Paper Quest comes with a pretty epic tale.
Surface exploration; definitely interested to hear any other opinions, though? I feel like we all want to create entire worlds that (or recreate variations of this world in a way which) keeps things interesting and triggers a desire to explore. What's prevented that in some otherwise stellar games?
BONUS! Not enough information - Not as big, but if there's something on the screen that can't be deciphered visually, mention it in the general look or at least make it explorable with the right word. Sometimes the screen just has a bunch of shit on it, and it's all garbage. That's fine; just catch it with something. It's perfectly fine to have garbage on the screen, but give it a LOOK response or something. It sucks to look at that thing which is obviously a ***** and get a generic "don't know what you're talking about" message, particularly if the game's well aware of the word used.
It's tough and imperfect to create an entire world, which I think is part of the thought behind these games, and we want to make them interactive without being frustrating. A tall order, probably. Further thoughts into what just sucks sometimes about adventure games?
