Some people (myself included) love open-ended gameplay for the tremendous freedom you have and ability to set your own priorities. However, one thing that can make open-ended gameplay really suck is aimless wandering. I have this idea that if you have some sort of falling resource and resource rechargers (items or locations), you'll always have a goal no matter what board you're on. The rate of decline sets the priority of the goal. If you keep them enough in the background, they can become interesting side-strategies to whatever you're doing. For this weird "game of life in the future" design I'm working on, I'm trying to gauge the appropriateness of this kind of mechanic. On the one hand, it can make the locations around you more real and meaningful. But on the other, falling resources can act as a leash or headache if you just want to wander the map. To clarify, I need to explain the three major character types and their major resources:

---

Humans Here's the scheme as it stands right now: You can choose to be a human or cyborg, or human with implants. Humans are frail, but get the widest choice in life opportunities-- they make more friends, and thus more contacts and they can marry and create a bloodline or dynasty (allies & resources). At the same time, they can die of lack of oxygen, heat, or food, which can make adventuring more deadly. Resources Health - Health is your ability to take damage. It always declines each game hour, and is gone in 3-4 game days. Recharged by eating. Different foods confer different stat boosts / losses, immunities or resistances. (Wounds are handled as stat / skill modifying status effects, so you can eat to heal but you must use medical equipment to remove the wound). At zero, you begin to accumulate status effects and die weeks later. Note: In this game, death isn't final; when you die, you're reborn in a new body. Energy - Energy increases damage done in combat and ability to perform some physical feats (lifting, hanging, climbing). Always declines each game hour, and is gone in 3-4 days. Physical skills degrade 1% for every one point below 0. Resting can recharge naturally up to 50%. Stimulants can also add points, but may lower health or cause status effects like addiction. Sleeping completely restores all points, but adds risk in dangerous environs. Enemies and dangers provide adrenaline rushes, which temporarily boost Energy. Morale - Your HP against psionics attack or mental stresses like mind probes and interrogration, and ability to perform some mental feats (like bluff or intimidate). Also modifies ability to rally / inspire NPCs or charm them. Falls at a rate over several days and is gone in several game weeks. Mental skills degrade 1% for every one point below 0. Recharged by special foods (cuisine), some sleeping quarters (dreambeds), talking to certain allies, and leisure activities. Activities like training can raise total Health and Energy; Morale can be raised by acquiring loyal allies or a family. Some items, like food pills, change the rate of resource decay. Humans may have other resources, depending on character creation options. Cyborgs In this universe cyborgs are super and subhuman. Society is uneasy about the increasing mechanization of humanity. Cyborgs, in turn, have trouble relating to others over time. But they can modify their bodies, OTOH, to become one man armies, meaning they have less need (and respect) for others. Resources Health - Fixed. Power - By default fixed, but upgrades can make this fall at varying rates. Morale - Like human morale, but this can only be recharged by VR leisure activities. Sensation means nothing to them, so food, human contact or sleep do nothing. Cyborgs may have other resources, depending on their model. Cybrids Cybernetic hybrids are humans who are partially cyborgized, most often with internal implants. For resources, the relevant implants are: Cyborg Stomach- Health falls at a slower rate, but subject is more likely to be detected by sensors. Autotrophic Skin- Health recharges in sunlight, but appearance goes down. Fast Forward- Expensive, but speeds reactions and replaces energy with Power resource etc.

---

What's your gut reaction? Also, what type of character would you gravitate to? I want you to feel pressure to make money, but I don't want to instantly kill you off for not meeting goals. I see a wide range of items and strategies to handle each declining resource, which theoretically should make gameplay interesting as you're trying to handle missions and build yourself up.

Since you want us to feel the pressure to make money I'm guessing your former idea of the moneyless society idea has been thrown out. But to be honest none the character types you have presented offer any noticable diffrence that I can see to the actual game mechanics, other then the rate at which stats decline. I would want to know what other effects the choices have on the game mechanics before I could make a choice. If I choose a cyborg can I perform super human feats? If so what are the disadvantages do I have pay 10% of the value of my cyborg body a month for maintence? Which makes it a costly character type but with massive physical advantages. What about if I choose a human? Does that mean that I have to deal with a lot of maintence tasks such as eating and sleeping, and at the same time I have the physical capablitities of a marshmellow when compared to a cyborg? If so what advantages are there to being a human? The things th cyborg gives up makes them less human in many ways but what does it matter if they can no longer enjoy the taste of food or feel the warmth of a summers day in the terms of gameplay? If you humans where some how more adabtable that could be an advantage but how is that reflected in the game?

While reading this post I am reminded of "Ghost in the shell" an anime movie and series, which is excellent and effectivly incorpates all three of character types into regular society and has very developed social and cultural system around this fact. It might be worth you watching it to get some ideas.

It could be a good idea you are presenting here but at present the choice only seems to determine the rate at which your resources decline so why pick anything but the one they decline the slowest in?

Each of these "resources" requires a specific type of action to perform, and recharging your character--either by eating, sleeping, or "leisure activities"--represents a deviation from whatever the player is doing. I'm reminded of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

In GTA:SA you're concerned with food, fitness, etc. You have to visit a gymnasium periodically to maintain optimum fitness. Just running from the police or riding a bicycle will help, but you need to pump iron to keep topped up. Food is necessary to prevent muscle atrophy and loss of maximum health.

It's an infuriating segue in the game. I'll be trying to find floating horseshoes, or casually cruising the streets looking for missions or trying to start a gang war, when my health starts to drop due to malnutrition. I have to stop whatever I'm doing, find my way to a burger joint, and buy six burgers, each with its own little animation. Then I walk out and get back to work.

If you're going to do something like this, have it be a sort of interlude between actions. You get back from investigating the seismic disturbances on your asteroid (a pocket of argon; no danger, but with a gas well it'll be quite profitable) and hit the mess hall for a yeastburger and some Powerade. While you eat, you use your wrist-mounted holo-projector to plot your next course (lost contact with an expeditionary force; probably faulty uplink) and review your quantum mailbox. After reading your Q-mail, you make sure the ship's on course and hit the dreambed for the first half of the jump. You wake up, play a game of Telechess with one of your squadmates, and have the tech look at your optical implants (your heat vision malfunctioned in the argon cave). Then you prep your kit for the next mission. As the ship enters low orbit, you board the dropship and head for the surface.

At no time during a "normal" mission should I think, "Uh-oh, I better eat an MRE if I'm going to make it the rest of the way up this ladder." You've done well to give the player several game days to attend to their character's needs. Just make sure that there's (usually) a time during that span when the player doesn't have anything more important to do than get a few hours of shut-eye or hobnob with the crew. I recommend that you make it possible to use these beneficial activities as "time-lapses" during otherwise idle portions of the game.

Hmmmm... I thought I really nailed this one, but it's looking more and more like a smoking ruin...

Quote:

Original post by TechnoGoth Since you want us to feel the pressure to make money I'm guessing your former idea of the moneyless society idea has been thrown out.

I might have miscommunicated on that, but what I meant was no paper. The whole game is built around leveling via money (I didn't think experience systems would work).

Quote:

But to be honest none the character types you have presented offer any noticable diffrence that I can see to the actual game mechanics, other then the rate at which stats decline. I would want to know what other effects the choices have on the game mechanics before I could make a choice.

Good point. In part, I'm trying to offer two major strategies: Go it alone, or build up a faction. Should it be as simple as telling players this at the beginning? ("Cyborgs modify their bodies to become more powerful, humans band together in groups.")

Quote:

If I choose a cyborg can I perform super human feats? If so what are the disadvantages do I have pay 10% of the value of my cyborg body a month for maintence? Which makes it a costly character type but with massive physical advantages. What about if I choose a human? Does that mean that I have to deal with a lot of maintence tasks such as eating and sleeping, and at the same time I have the physical capablitities of a marshmellow when compared to a cyborg? If so what advantages are there to being a human? The things th cyborg gives up makes them less human in many ways but what does it matter if they can no longer enjoy the taste of food or feel the warmth of a summers day in the terms of gameplay? If you humans where some how more adabtable that could be an advantage but how is that reflected in the game?

Look at it this way: Everybody can perform super-human feats in the end. But the leveling is different. Humans do it through RNA injections, muscle grafts and power armor or psionics. Borgs start the game stripped down to human limits, and have to buy their way with upgrades and tech licenses (unless they go black market or join paramilitary/polic factions). To level, they have to swap out skill-capped equipment, which is more expensive that straight skilling up.

They're also vulnerable to both EMP and psionics, but better at fighting Siegers (not as much emotional output).
As a starting borg, what I want you to notice is that the world seems more against you and you're more suited to a solitary, go-it alone existence.


To be honest, I'm really trying to bring together two communities, the "gardeners" and the "adventurers." The gardeners are simulationists. They want homes in games, towns where the buildings actually do something, and human-like limits. The adventurers just want to go out and explore, stealth, blast, level without tethers. I thought cyborgs and cybrids would be a compromise.

Quote:

It could be a good idea you are presenting here but at present the choice only seems to determine the rate at which your resources decline so why pick anything but the one they decline the slowest in?

Gotcha.
It's hard to convey, but I'm trying to imbed a feeling of difference in "virtual future life" via gameplay.
In the second Ghost in the Shell movie there's an awesome interplay between what it means to be human (family, children, pleasure) and what it means to be cut adrift from all of that. Games normally don't imbed such philosophical depth in gameplay.

The trouble is how do you convey "inhuman" in gameplay terms? Social interaction with NPCs and social ladder climbing is one way: You don't get the resources, the aid, or simply the same acknowledgement that humans get. I don't know if this would be good or not, but it would be interesting if the player could feel some of the isolation / disconnect that a cyborg would feel in this universe.


But as for powermaxing, you have a great point: At "first level" maybe humans should be more agile, and borgs more hardy? Law could be an excuse for why they're in the same physical league.

Quote:

Original post by Iron Chef Carnage In GTA:SA you're concerned with food, fitness, etc. You have to visit a gymnasium periodically to maintain optimum fitness. Just running from the police or riding a bicycle will help, but you need to pump iron to keep topped up. Food is necessary to prevent muscle atrophy and loss of maximum health.

D'oh! Didn't know they were doing this!

Quote:

It's an infuriating segue in the game. I'll be trying to find floating horseshoes, or casually cruising the streets looking for missions or trying to start a gang war, when my health starts to drop due to malnutrition. I have to stop whatever I'm doing, find my way to a burger joint, and buy six burgers, each with its own little animation. Then I walk out and get back to work.

Is this a problem of not buying into the game's context? If I told you you were a vampire and you had to drink blood, would it work? This I think is the mechanic that Morrowind uses if you become a vampire (and Gauntlet, too, in general?); Morrowind's Fatigue management is a vaguely similar mechanic.

Quote:

At no time during a "normal" mission should I think, "Uh-oh, I better eat an MRE if I'm going to make it the rest of the way up this ladder." You've done well to give the player several game days to attend to their character's needs. Just make sure that there's (usually) a time during that span when the player doesn't have anything more important to do than get a few hours of shut-eye or hobnob with the crew. I recommend that you make it possible to use these beneficial activities as "time-lapses" during otherwise idle portions of the game.

You have a strong point, and one I'm very nervous about, but let me say this: I thought of this mechanism to both reinforce the story and the objects in the world. The cyborg exists partly as an escape hatch in case most people hate it.

How do you make the mundane civilian facilities and buildings meaningful if you don't create a need for them? I've had freakin' nightmares trying to figure out how to allow you to be a crew member of a ship or get the feeling of being an average joe in a futuristic city. (It's what I deserve for trying to mix "game of life" with RPG!)

Rather than an intermission, could this be made into interesting gameplay? (Just throwing these out, not committed to any one)

• Conversion - Nanite equipment assembles organic material, but outputs heat and uses lots of power
  (environment and stealth tradeoff)
  
• Supplies - Carry cheap foodblocks or morale raising cuisine; you get a "Supplies" bar on the UI to help monitor (this was to be default with ship & crew anyway, as in Pirates!)
  
• Harvester Drones - In wilderness, fly out from your pack, grab material, come back (but can be tracked or shot down); Load-out, environment and stealth tradeoff
  
• Roaming Kiosks - Why go to the store when it can come to you? Floating drone kiosks with holographic sales reps might make cities more cool? (Expense tradeoff)
  
• Defensive Perimeter - This may be stupid, but for some reason it sounds cool to click & set up a mini-base of operations, complete with autoguns, a shield dome and storage bins. This could be your ship, or gear you carry into the dangerous wilderness. (Strategic tradeoff)
  
• Telepresence - Get in a pod, freeze, and control stuff with your mind (Mobility, comms, equipment tradeoff, lots of weird possibilities here)
  
  
• Drugs - Risk addiction to sleep once a month via stims
  
• Psionics - Now transcending limits means something, if you can slow down metabolism or suck HP from the environment to nourish yourself
  

Honestly, I don't know. I can see making overcoming natural limits fun. But is the premise so offensive that nothing can make it palatable? If so, everything will seem like a band-aide.

It sounds like a decent system to me, although I do worry it might become too much of a hassle to get food / look after wounds / whatever.

If you integrate it seamlessly with the play, and make sure that you don't have to go too far out of your way to attend to basic needs (but still keep the pressure to look after them there - just make them EASY to look after) then I think you might have a good idea there.

Not to be rude, but I'm only addressing the general issue of aimless wandering in open-ended games.

All I think the game should do is make sure to let the user know what they may do, if they so choose. A simple journal system that notes their progress (and how they may progress) in main quests is all that's necessary I think.

An avid fan of the elder scrolls series, the only thing I ever had problems with was remembering what in the world I was doing in the main quest. As long as that information is easily accessible, I think you can be infinitely open-ended with no problems.

I should clarify my earlier complaint about San Andreas. I think that the needs-based elements of gameplay would have been more toerable and appreciable if it hadn't been the sequel to Vice City. I spent a lot of time playing VC, and I got used to the feel of racing through the city and having gunfights while the sun and moon took turns illuminating my criminal episodes.

If you start from scratch and make sure thatyour systems are well implemented and not an interruption of the game, then I'm sure you'll have no trouble keeping players interested. The risk I see lies in the sheer variety of gameplay types you seem to be including.

You've got a neat spacefaring game, and a neat sim game, and a neat combat game all rolled into one, but each new element serves to narrow your audience. Your game will only really appeal to people who enjoy all three types of game. If I like shooting stuff and interacting with NPCs, but hate the tomagotchi-raising part of the game, I'll spend two-thirds of my experience saying, "Oh, yeah!" and one third saying, "Oh, for crying out loud, can't I skip this crap?"

Your game won't be the sum of three genres, it'll be the intersection of them, and so you'll only appeal to an intersection of three audiences.

Your use of different races and character types to affect the balance of gameplay toward or away from each gametype is a stroke of genius, and I think you should put special effort into making it possible for a player to start the game by deciding which elements he wants to deal with in-depth. Of course, if you want to explore the nutritive elements and you have a cyborg, you might need some sort of "organic stomach" upgrade that lets you enjoy gustation and its benefits.

I don't know. It seems to me that the free-form notion applies not only to the player's behavior in the world, but also to the gameplay experience itself. In order to make these needs seem important, you'll have to hold the player to them, but that risks alienating them. You either have to foist gameplay elements on players, or let them burn bridges in the beginning, thus depriving them of a particular manner of enjoying your game.

If it's easy to start new characters, though, you might be okay.

I think limiting the mobiility of someone when their eating, but still allowing them to multitask by checking their PDA, or organizing their inventory so they don't have to sit their and watch their character eat 100 burgers would be good.

Their've been a few food management systems, such as Arx Fatalis, Ultima Underworld, Amulets & Armor, but in most instances it felt like food was far to abundant that it made eating food more for the sake of the player's enjoyment rather than his character. Limiting food availability and having visible penalties for going hungry may have a more desired effect.

As for your Cyborg, I'm reminded of a game called IronSeed. In this game, you control a crew of digitial Personlities of people who died long ago. The interesting part is that these electronic Personalities were managed using Chemicals mixtures, which is a different approach to VR recreation. This could be used as a way of stabilizing a cyborgs personality when under undue stress. Here's an excerpt from the game manual on the subject:

Quote:

The marvels of modern science have made a fine art of personality containment. Before the bodies of your crew were disposed of, the magnetic signature of their brains were copied, or encoded, into the ship's computer. This has several interesting side effects. First of all, it is possible to make adjustments to a person's psychological attributes. Multiple copies of an 'encode' may also be made. The transparent container on the left side of the screen contains the physical manifest of an encode. When psychological containment was in its infancy it was discovered that for a soul to have permanence it had to have a physical focus. After hundreds of years of trial and error it a very specific chemical bath was found to contain the proper staying materials to keep a soul viable. The material itself is called Ego Synth, while the chamber into which it is placed is termed the Psychotropic Enhancement Chamber. A personality is defined by its biorhythms, the three primary attributes by which any personality encode may be described. These are mental prowess, physical viability, and emotional strength. Selecting evaluate will allow you to see an encode's biorhythmic graph. The tick marks to the right of the graph show the mental, physical, and emotional ratings for that encode. The higher the mental rating, the greater that person's Skill; The higher the physical rating, the quicker that person's Performance; The higher the emotional rating, the greater that person's sanity. While these aren't equal, they are directly related. The combination of these values determine the resulting color of the egosynth.

When injured or under stress, it could throw some of these 'atributes' out of whack, requiring the player to introduce chemical solutions to restore his Phycological balance, or he could even augment himself for increased accuracy and intelligence, though he may drive himself insane. Syndicate i beleive also used a similar system for managing Cyborg Troop's performance. There's also the Anime movie, Ghost In The Shell. ;D

[Edited by - Gyrthok on March 21, 2005 8:32:47 PM]

Quote:

Original post by etali It sounds like a decent system to me, although I do worry it might become too much of a hassle to get food / look after wounds / whatever.

Thanks. It will definitely be a balance challenge. I agree it should be easy to handle most of the time, and there also needs to be strategies that make a difference.

Quote:

Original post by digitec devil All I think the game should do is make sure to let the user know what they may do, if they so choose. A simple journal system that notes their progress (and how they may progress) in main quests is all that's necessary I think.

Technically, I agree with you, and that's the way I play. But even the Elder Scrolls games, especially Morrowind, cause people to get lost (which I understand is why Oblivion's being reworked so hard). We have to accept the fact that some people need strong goals. I'm hoping the idea of survival no matter the level will offer an acceptable type of goal for those players, as well as make the simulationist folks happy.

Quote:

Original post by Iron Chef Carnage I should clarify my earlier complaint about San Andreas. I think that the needs-based elements of gameplay would have been more toerable and appreciable if it hadn't been the sequel to Vice City. I spent a lot of time playing VC, and I got used to the feel of racing through the city and having gunfights while the sun and moon took turns illuminating my criminal episodes.

Thanks, yes, I think that many times when we start playing a game we need something to compare it to. People need an associative anchor, that's just how the brain works (according to a marketing guru, anyway-- don't quote me on that[wink]).

Quote:

Your game won't be the sum of three genres, it'll be the intersection of them, and so you'll only appeal to an intersection of three audiences.

I've kept this in mind since you talked about hijacks months ago. You get this challenge if you're making a hybrid. But what if you're not making a hybrid?

This is a huge assumption to make, but how do you create your own genre in a player's mind? Dune was neither arcade nor war game, but that's what we had to compare it to. The Sims isn't an RPG, but has character interaction, goals and stats.

What makes you drop your notions and appreciate something for what it is? I'm not sure. I know personally I had to do it just so that I'm not so damn disappointed in the latest crop of games. Both I-War, Vice City and Freelancer were huge disappointments until I simply accepted that my only expectation in those games should be to kill, level, and do missions. Then I could enjoy what they did offer.

One way to set a player's expectations is to establish a strong identity. What is the game supposed to be about? Half the problem I've had is posting here without really firmly knowing that. I've wanted to make a highly personal game about future societies and worlds, but that's impossibly nebulous to define. The "adventurous future life" with story angle may act as an umbrella for most of it. (I will likely find that I have to cut things as the identity solidifies.)

Quote:

Your use of different races and character types to affect the balance of gameplay toward or away from each gametype is a stroke of genius, and I think you should put special effort into making it possible for a player to start the game by deciding which elements he wants to deal with in-depth. Of course, if you want to explore the nutritive elements and you have a cyborg, you might need some sort of "organic stomach" upgrade that lets you enjoy gustation and its benefits.

Thank you, good advice. It will be critical to accurately and clearly describe the characters at the start of the game to help manage expectations.