Games, development, history, etc.

[Bijo]

What aspects throughout history that have been implemented in games you think unnecessary, ruining, or any other negative thing?

Why have certain game aspects been implemented? Examples: hitpoints, amount of lives.

Example: in a game, if you shoot a bullet from a gun into a person's head or unprotected torso, should this person not perish at once (or be severely wounded and incapacitated)? Why, in some games, old and new, the necessity to hit the target more often for his hitpoints to attenuate?

I am questioning why the development of games has gone in certain directions and I am almost certain you can think of more such issues besides hitpoints and abundance of lives.

[Husar]

I've always seen hitpoints as some abstract version of missing projectiles in older games. Especially in strategy games units would often hit with every shot which is unrealistic but probably easier on the CPU and the programmer. Now if the battle was over after the first volley was fired, there would be no time to react to anything and the game would be over quite fast. Noone wants that, so we have hitpoints to make fights longer. I think this has changed a bit in some games, like the Total war series, but apparently most developers keep the hitpoints because it's easier. It's something you can calculate because there are no random numbers involved usually and if you look at Supreme Commander, which has calculated projectile pathes with misses etc, it takes a quad core to run fluently in really big battles...
Yeah, I have a Core2Duo E6600 and when there are lots of units shooting at one another it can start to become very sluggish until the fight is over.

[The Spartan (Returns)]

Well I am a bit annoyed of RTS games using the collect,advance,and fight (like AOE). There should be more tactical games like TW. (I saw this awesome WW2 game that works like TW forgot name)

[Warmaster Horus]

RTS games are changing, I think. There's still the same basic notion of base building, troop recruiting, and enemy killing, but there's less of the first two items, especially in Relic games (Dawn of War, Company of Heroes).

[Phatose]

Hitpoints were imported from old PnP rpgs. It works in games for the same reason it works in PnP - if you're invincible, there's no fun in the challenge, but playing a 'hero' with two broken arms and a broken leg isn't much fun. Abstraction allows a player to be vulnerable without having to worry about being useless the entire rest of the game because he got shot in the leg on level 1.

[Husar]

You should try some Massive Entertainment games, namely Ground control, Ground Control 2 and World in Conflict, none of them has base building, they're all tactical. The first doesn't even have reinforcements, in the other two you can order reinforcements via airdrop.

[Navaros]

I can't stand jumping puzzles or even worse, timed jumping puzzles. Or even worse still, jumping puzzles or timed jumping puzzles in games where you can only save at designated save points. Jumping puzzles are the epitome of what should never ever be put into any game at all. I can understand a few obvious exceptions like Super Mario, but if it's not a Mario-type of game then jumping puzzles should not be there. I'll never understand why so many games are tarnished/ruined due to having stupid, incredibly annoying, vastly unfun, jumping puzzles in them.

Thankfully in recent years it seems most game makers are finally starting to move away from that horrible jumping puzzle trend.

[Husar]

I second that, Navaros.

[TinCow]

SAVE POINTS! I actually rant about that a bit in the August Gahzette. I hate games where I cannot save whenever I want.

[Bob the Insane]

Hit points are an abstraction, they allow a game to progress without getting bogged down in excessively complex rules. This was true of PnP and still remains true in computer games.

Now computers these days do give us the ablility to workout in real time the effects of a injury sustained by a projectile if it is so programmed. But would it be any fun?

In roleplaying there are two basic schools, simulationisim and dramatisation. A good game needs both but each side has had greater favor at different times. Games of a simulationist nature tend to be cruchy with lots of rules for everthing and lots of dice rolling and can be quite hazzardous to the in game characters. Dramatisation games tend to have fewer rules and let the flow of the story decide what should occur. Some of these games go as far as throwing out dice and almost all rules about what occurs in the game and leave rules about how to create the story.

Different people like differeing amounts of the two sides. Personally I am quite simulationist as I am a strong beleiver in cause and effect and need to see the logical results of actions to maintain my suspension of disbelief. Even when dealing with concepts like magic you can be simulationist by introducing a logical (if completely made up) structure for hwo magic works with rules and such.

Any how hitpoints (which do originate in the table top wargaming that predates traditional RPGs) in RPGs are a interaction of these two schools. On one hand you could be completely simulationist with a chance of dying of shock if you are shot in the foot (not much fun really if you are trying to tell a story) and completely drama based where you immune to being hurt unless the stroy requires it (blows away the challange for many people). There are games out there that hit these extremes (no hitpoints in the early Rainbow 6 games, just injury or death) but the really popular ones need to tell a coherent story or at least make room of holywood-esk heroics which require the dramatisation of the events.

As always you have what the public at large demands from it's entertainment media and what the niche groups demand and it is the same in movies and books as it is in games...

[Lorenzo_H]

Well I am a bit annoyed of RTS games using the collect,advance,and fight (like AOE). There should be more tactical games like TW. (I saw this awesome WW2 game that works like TW forgot name)

That would be Company of Heroes.

The fact that bullets do not bring people down in one shot is unrealistic, but to make it fair they have to be this way.

[doc_bean]

Example: in a game, if you shoot a bullet from a gun into a person's head or unprotected torso, should this person not perish at once (or be severely wounded and incapacitated)? Why, in some games, old and new, the necessity to hit the target more often for his hitpoints to attenuate?

If you're referring to enemies in FPS games, it has a lot to do with poly count. Quake was notorious for having so few ennemies on screen at one time and subsequent games have followed the idea of creating big and detailed enemies, which need to be though. Only a few went back to throwing lots of enemies at you (Serious Sam, Painkiller), though most games seem to have found some sort of middle ground.

Tougher enemies also allow the developers to show of better AI and animations, cannon fodder just gets killed quickly.

I can't stand jumping puzzles or even worse, timed jumping puzzles. Or even worse still, jumping puzzles or timed jumping puzzles in games where you can only save at designated save points. Jumping puzzles are the epitome of what should never ever be put into any game at all. I can understand a few obvious exceptions like Super Mario, but if it's not a Mario-type of game then jumping puzzles should not be there. I'll never understand why so many games are tarnished/ruined due to having stupid, incredibly annoying, vastly unfun, jumping puzzles in them.

Thankfully in recent years it seems most game makers are finally starting to move away from that horrible jumping puzzle trend.

Depends on how they are done. I've never seen them done right in an FPS game, it just doesn't work because your movement control is so limited. But in third person games it can work (Prince of Persia is an excellent example). God of War proves that they an still be very frustrating though...

[Marshal Murat]

I always thought of hitpoints not as heal but 'chance', maybe even luck. A couple shots, and my luck is down. I took to many chances.

I have to say that Black Hawk Down:Delta Force (Not the exact title, something along those lines) makes combat challenging. If you get shot, your lucky if you don't die. The game was challenging, I did enjoy it.

Maybe roll dice for chance?