Archived from groups: alt.games.tombraider (
More info?)
McGrandpa wrote:
>
> "Gary Mitchell" <wb6yru@ix.nospam.netcom.com> wrote in message
> news:42644EE7.B41E3DE7@ix.nospam.netcom.com
> > McGrandpa wrote:
> >>
> >> "Gary Mitchell" <wb6yru@ix.nospam.netcom.com> wrote in message
> >> news:426374DE.A6A00D2D@ix.nospam.netcom.com
> >>> Ghost wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> "McGrandpa" <McGrandpaNOT@NOThotmail.com> ha scritto nel messaggio
> >>>> news:_5v8e.7003$h6.4878@tornado.texas.rr.com...
> >>>> <snip>
> >>>>> So, where is the cross point of realism and Fun in the games?
> >>>>> That's a bit of a variable as applied to each player. We all see
> >>>>> it a little differently, and we all enjoy different aspects of the
> >>>>> same things in the games. Some might want to see only jumps and
> >>>>> no ropes in the game, but there is both so each tolerates a
> >>>>> dislike to be able to enjoy their respective likes
> >>>>> Peace Brothers!
> >>>>> McG.
> >>>> That's the point, almost everyone has his likes or dislikes. Since
> >>>> TR series was groundbreaking back at beginning. Today it would be
> >>>> groundbreaking to add variables, to tailor the game closer to ones
> >>>> liking. Most important to offer alternative ways to achieve the
> >>>> objectives. Offer choices that affect, the outcoming of your
> >>>> adventure,
> >>>> without beeing tedious and most important without affecting the
> >>>> original
> >>>> concept of the game. IMO it's technically possible to create the
> >>>> game that it's possible to play, as any TR game before, if that's
> >>>> your desire. And to give options to less experienced gamers to
> >>>> have a game that's easier to solve, without using cheats, level
> >>>> skips or gamesaves.
> >>>> And most important - without dumbing it down.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> There's a lot of things they could do to add variability without
> >>> adding too much in the way of programming complexity. It wouldn't
> >>> take much to add a difficulty setting. There could be a variety of
> >>> difficulties too, more or fewer weapons, more or fewer bad guys, bad
> >>> guy aggressiveness, rougher terrain, etc., etc.
> >>>
> >>> The question of linearity always comes up. That *would* add to the
> >>> programming complexity, but IMO would be well worth it. McG is
> >>> always talking about how nice it is in Morrowind to just go off on
> >>> your own in any direction. TR is the kind of game where they could
> >>> do that to some extent.
> >>>
> >>> -- G
> >>
> >> Non linear. Well, that could take several directions. Within the
> >> TR's there is a degree of non-linerarity, even in AoD somewhat.
> >> With a game like Morrowind, you have to *choose* to do a specific
> >> thing. Then, of course, there is linerarity....to solving a quest.
> >> The thing is, you have the whole existence of the game world to do
> >> it in. Not some "level" or map. When I got the game I was excited
> >> to realize I could traverse the entirety of the whole game world and
> >> not *do* the story, or quests as it were. I could simply adventure.
> >> I have since then added the two expansion packs and and not done
> >> completing my travels. July 1 will be three years since I started
> >> this adventure
And there are so many ways you can complete the
> >> quests parts of it too. I think this qualifies as a Wide Open game.
> >> It was also built to be modded.
> >> The complex programming would be in the quests, the story.
> >> Tombraider could indeed be built to do this, and would be enormously
> >> great fun for a lot of people. You could pick up and adventure to
> >> go on just like in the movie, where Hillary opens a big 3 ring
> >> binder and mentions a shipwreck and Egypt. Lara could meet with
> >> someone in a local place, like the British Museum. It would be
> >> very easy (comparatively) to create a fictional place for Laras
> >> world of adventure. They wouldn't have to be "accurate" in mapping
> >> details, like streets, buildings etc. Granted, there would likely
> >> have to be sections to the game because of the sheer size of the
> >> locations. But within those sections (Ievels) they could be
> >> completely contiguous and Lara would always be able to cover every
> >> inch repeatedly. Even in Morrowind, you do have 'sections' of a
> >> sort. You have INdoors and OUTdoors, there is a transition from
> >> going inside a home, room or ship etc. There is also fast-travel.
> >> You can get to Solstheim on foot and swimming...but its tedious.
> >> You can also take a ship or even use Mage teleportation. You can't
> >> do that with Tribunal, but you can with Bloodmoon.
> >> One of the first thoughts I had when I started playing in Morrowind
> >> was "This would be a fantastic way to do Tombraider!!!" And Laras
> >> life and world and character means it wouldn't resemble Morrowind at
> >> all.
> >> I don't know anything about the game engine CD is using to build the
> >> game around. I already see some things I don't like. They already
> >> have a good engine that was used with AoD. Doesn't look like
> >> they're using it.
> >> McG.
> >
> > Well, I've never played Morrowind, but I have played Myst. It's a
> > little bit like Morrowind in the sense that you can go anywhere you
> > want, even back the way you came.
>
> Morrowind and Myst are completely different engines. Each area in Myst
> is a self contained worldlet. Four 'ages' to explore, plus 'home'.
> Morrowind is a world composed of 'cells'. On some slower systems there
> is a slight pause or hesitation crossing cell boundaries. It doesn't
> affect anything visually, that's contiguous. You could generate all of
> Egypt with that game engine.
Sounds like some flight sims... as you go along, it eventually loads up
the scenery of the up coming area and you simply continue. The area you
explore (fly over) is limited only by the data on the disks and the number
of disks. If they did that with TR... wow, unlimited exploring! They
could have sold add-on disks for the games, just like extra detailed
scenery disks for the fligh sim.
> But, there are loads of spaces that would
> be 'dead' areas, nothing to do but literally walk or run through them.
> You'd want to go where the action is. You naturally head for that.
> It's like that in Morrowind really
>
> > In TR, you can only do that to a
> > small extent, you can't go back to a previous level for example. But
> > there really isn't any reason I can think of why not, they just
> > decided to not give
> > us that ability for some reason. Even if they did, once you go
> > through an area, there isn't much else to do except look around.
> > It's the same with Myst, except many of the things you find continue
> > to work. The stuff in TR tends to be one-shot deals.
>
> Right, with their engine, it'd be too easy to break the script. This
> does happen occasionally in Morrowind BTW. But not often. TR is said
> to be "on rails" because of the way it's scripted. It is mostly in at
> one end, exit at the other, adventure and puzzles in between, move to
> the next section of the 'ride'...repeat. In this sense, Laras world has
> always been rather finite. Lots of fun in those levels, but it's still
> A to B to C to D to END.
Instead of a scripted play, it should be more like a simulator. The
engine would simply handle whatever is going on at that particular spot
at that particular time. It looks like it is a kind of simulator already,
but, well, you know what I mean. If the engine doesn't care about anything
except what's there at the moment, all you need is more data on more disks.
Lara's world could have been huge, and not on rails. The more I think
about my add-on disk comment, the more I like it.
> >
> > The real challenge for the programmers would be to come up with a way
> > to make it interesting to go through an area again. They made an
> > attempt in TRLR... remember we had to revisit some of the levels?
> > That was the first time they did anything like that. It was OK, but
> > could have been better. It'd be nice to see what they could have come
> > up with after some practice and experience. I hope Crystal Dynamics
> > uses Core's past experience, but I'm not going to hold my breath. At
> > least they said something about returning to TR's roots, so there's
> > hope. But from what little I've heard about the engine, it doesn't
> > exactly sound fantastic. Maybe at least it will run on older
> > machines.
😉
>
> Going by the look of that Flash thing, yep, it will run on older
> systems. I had hoped for more
🙁
Well, not so fast... (no pun intended). A little creativity and
cleaverness will go a long way. The older machines may not be able to
keep up with a 100,000 poly Lara and grotesquely detailed environments,
but there's more to making the game fun and interesting than that. Just
like special effects in movies, they can help a good story, but can't
make up for a bad story.
-- G
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