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"Flawless Characters"

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Wed 07/11/01 at 20:50
Regular
Posts: 787
Every post you seem to find nowadays that is related to games has something to do with either the state of graphics of the realism involved in the game. So I wish to ask you lot, are games too perfect?

Let me start by trying to explain the situation. We are gamers, we play games, we give the games company’s money, they make another game and it carries on from there. There are certain rules they have to abide by to make a game what it is, and frustrating is not one of those aspects.

So they make games to give us fun, and still people carry on to moan about realism. We are given games to entertain ourselves and not to get ourselves into a mood or give us a stressful time as stress is not good, and will make most people look away in the other direction.

Have you ever noticed that games characters tend to be flawless? I don’t mean, no bugs and that in general there is nothing wrong with them. I mean that the characters seem to be perfect. You never found Solid Snake tripping over, you never find football players not being able to control the ball and you never find the character being able to do something one time then failing at it the next.

Now this might be something that we don’t want, as like I said it would create something of such realism that we would begin to get annoyed at the game. The games designers have no choice in this; you either make it to give the public pleasure and satisfaction whilst at the same time giving us a challenge.

Each game has a character that you must control, whether it is several hundred characters or just the one it makes no difference, none of them seem to have any faults. They are all perfect. Take Red Alert 2 and Age of Empires 2 for example, have you ever seen one of your tanks or troops have a better ability then the other? They are the same, and this makes the game what it is. Creating the same troops over and over again with no difference in their ability.

It makes the game more like a game and less real life. Is this what we want? Do we want to be playing games were possibilities are endless and characters are faultless? Well in my opinion I feel that we do, we don’t want to find out that on the final boss our character has a fear of close spaces or that during the world cup final are play trips over his shoelaces.

ISS Pro Evolution gives you the ability to play as the worlds finest, the crème da la crème as they would say, and even though this is the case, it doesn’t mean that never once are they unable of making mistakes. You find people scoring outside the area with their wrong foot, kicking the ball half the field accurately to a team mate when facing the opposite way to them and being able to have a team who never make mistakes.

In Metal Gear Solid, notice that in the time that you control Solid Snake, he never makes one mistake, he never accidentally trips over a damp floor grabbing the attention of a near by guard. So what can be done about this to improve it to every one's likeness? Perhaps, he should become less of a stereotype, he is a very typical covert agent. He needs to have flaws to make him more human, he appears to be perfect at everything he does.



We are in control of human beings with fantastic abilities; we are given this new opportunity to do something that would otherwise be impossible. But, every one has their flaws, and computer characters should not be excluded. So is there any way of making everyone happy? Is there a happy medium?

We do tend to expect too much from games designers nowadays and realism is and will always be one of the most important factors. We are disappointed when they don’t have the right to use the proper names in games, they aren’t allowed to say the name ‘Owen’ or ‘Pepsi’ and this seems to put us off. We want everything to be near to perfect, yet no one seems to complain about it being that too perfect, is this because we are not bothered by the fact? Or maybe it’s something that we are just yet to notice.

So what are your feelings on this?
Sat 10/11/01 at 13:37
Regular
"Fishing For Reddies"
Posts: 4,986
Don't listen to that Snuggly guy, feed that punk-áss some crocodile skin!! :D :D

Game: Stirring Trouble
Sat 10/11/01 at 13:30
Regular
"TheShiznit.co.uk"
Posts: 6,592
Please boys, put those handbags down.
Sat 10/11/01 at 13:18
"period drama"
Posts: 19,792
right then. here it is.


Why do people in computer games always do everything perfectly?
I think games would be better if the heroes or heroines mucked it up once in a while. For example, Solid Snake could trip over a wire and have to roll around on the floor shooting guards while tring to pick the right moment to stand up again.
Someone from Resident Evil could get turned into a zombie then the second playable charater would have to find a cure while fending off attacks from the first character without killing them.
And (running out of ideas now) Lara could fall off a ledge, break her leg and have to be taken to hospital, then the next level would be trying to escape and continue her quest with a limp that would gradually heal during the rest of the game.
These ideas would make games more interesting with exiting twists in the plot and a break in the storyline just as more of the the game plot is about to be revealed.


i won a steering wheel in issue 56 of Power, the playstation mag.
Sat 10/11/01 at 08:43
Regular
"Wasting away"
Posts: 2,230
Firstly FFF, no one reads your posts, including me, secondly, you're a SPAMMER and never write anything good. Thridly, I've never read your post before, cos I wouldn't waste my time, fourthly I don't get any magazines to read and fifthly I don't see how someone with your writen ability could have won anything.
Fri 09/11/01 at 19:59
"period drama"
Posts: 19,792
hey, that sounds a bit familiar.
wait a minute! i've did the exact same topic ages ago, even with the idea of snake tripping over.

it was originally a letter that got published in Power, and i won a prize for it.

copy cat!
Fri 09/11/01 at 15:30
Regular
"Picking a winner!"
Posts: 8,502
maybe in future MGS games snake will have a full time smokers cough, have to ocassionaly cough up large amounts of horrible coloured spit. Maybe if he gets to cold he could develop hypothermia and unless he gets heated properly and quickly he just falls to the ground shaking until his body just gives up. But would ideas like this make games better??
Fri 09/11/01 at 15:19
Regular
"TheShiznit.co.uk"
Posts: 6,592
You're wrong about Metal Gear Solid though. When it's cold, Snake sneezes voluntarily, and he smokes too, which kills him.
Fri 09/11/01 at 15:12
Regular
"Picking a winner!"
Posts: 8,502
whats with the boxes? must be due to word pad I guess. Please still read it though.
Fri 09/11/01 at 15:08
Regular
"Picking a winner!"
Posts: 8,502
Well it looks like I have finally managed to post something, I was
starting to get withdrawal symptoms. The characters will always look
realistic but will they ever behave realistic. A good post Tom so here
is my latest rant similar point to yours.

Take Solid Snake from the Metal Gear Solid games. He looks and moves
like a real life human being but developers have restrictions in the
actions he can perform and the things that he can do and that can happen
to him.

Will we ever see the time when a character has to go to the toilet at
certain times, has to eat food or they become weak and cant do certain
things. Picture the scenario in metal gear solid. Snake approaches the
guard from behind, he is a few meters away when suddenly his stomach
rumbles and he is caught. Or he eats something that disagrees with him
and he gets a touch of the runs which means he cant run about as much
and has to stay quite close to the loos. It could even be part of the
game where you have to reach to loo within a time limit or face the
ultimate humiliation. Or if you find a bottle of some alcoholic drink
and drink it then your character staggers around with blurred vision
(Deus Ex touched on this idea but it didnt last too long).

Or driving on an endurance race on Gran Turismo 3 when suddenly the car
in front screeches to a hault at the side of the track and the driver
gets out, jumps the fence and relieves himself in a bush. Ok so thats
highly unlikely. It is more likely that the driver would have his/her
own characteristics as to how they drive, aggressive, calm and
controlled or just plain crazy. Most of the drivers in todays games all
behave on a similar level

So will we see more of a step to trying to improve what a character can
and has to do within the game. Basic things like getting food and water
could be first. Making sure a character eats at certain points could be
a challenge.

We could have games were you are about to make it to the end and then
suddenly  Ill just stop here and have another sandwich or hold on
cant kill you now must dash to the loo.
I know some of this sounds a little silly and probably because my
examples havent been the best so Ill try see it from another point of
view.

It looks like most things in gaming are improving with time and Im sure
we will see lots more exciting and new things being developed that
improve the whole experience. Could improving the characters abilities
and actions also help improve the games? I like a game with a lot of
options for what the character should do, maybe even make them more
realistic, but this could maybe make them too realistic which a lot of
people dont want as it may well spoil the game instead of improving it.
They could include to much things that we have to do at certain points
that there isnt much time to get on with the game and it could take
ages to progress through the game.

There may soon be a time when there is enough space on a disk to not
have to worry about how much to use for graphics, game-play and the rest
of the game that we can have as much of each as the developer sees fit.
Im sure most games could benefit from extras like this in them,
especially point and click games and adventure/strategy games like MGS2.
The main aim of games is to be fun and surely anything which increases
the fun must be a good addition.

Things like the ability to use nearly everything in the environment. I
was playing resident evil Code Veronica X and you enter a room with
loads of automatic weapons in a case. Why cant you just shoot the lock
or blow the doors of and take the guns? Its things like this that I
would like to see improved. The ability to use hand-to-hand combat when
you dont have any weapons, Take resident evil for another example, you
run around shooting zombies and other mutated creatures, it is extremely
good fun but when you run out of ammo you are stuck with the knife. Why
not use the end of the shotgun to bash their heads in or kick them Buffy
the vampire slayer style. You wander about looking for keys when you
know that one shot from the grenade launcher would do the trick. Also
when you are being chased by a huge monster I think you might run a
little faster than a normal jogging pace. I would like to see developers
improving details like this and what the character can do and what he
has to do.

Similar things could be said for games like GTA3, this game is loads of
fun as you can do so much and can use a lot of the environment to your
advantage, but there aspects that in the future could be improved to
make a great game even better. What about paying other people to assist
you in your missions, pay them a little bit of cash for their help.
Modifying your vehicle to go faster? Fire various weapons?

Footy games could also benefit from improving characters, they could all
behave uniquely and realistically. Also the way the game is played could
take a leap towards what it is like in real life which is what most
footy games try to do. If they became more realistic we could see
players falling over the ball, keepers running into the posts, players
getting hit in the groin and falling in agony. The list of ideas could
go on and on but I think you understand what I mean.

One thing you have to realize with todays gaming. It is very hard for
developers to get things right. People always pick out flaws and
problems and forget the whole point to gaming in the first place. Fair
enough if the game is very poor then it deserves all the criticism it
gets. One thing for sure gaming is bound to get better and with advances
in technology it is only a matter of time and more effort from
developers before we may well see characters that behave far more
realistic than they do now. There could be a downside though. With
improving the characters overall behaviour its sure to take a little out
of the graphics and the game-play, so what's more important? Also do
controllers limit how much can be added to a characters abilities, they
can do basic moves and actions at the moment and that already uses all
the buttons, no doubt developers will find better ways of getting the
most out of the controllers. Would all this really make them better? If
they didnt get it right it could severely damage any decent game.
Gamers expect footy games to play fast paced football and dont expect
their world class striker to miss kick the ball or trip over it while
clean through on goal.

As to characters no longer being flawless, it is a possible idea but
only when storage mediums and abilities of consoles allow developers to
do exactly what they want to do. Imagine Snake climbing out the water
and developing a bit of a cold and on occasions sneezing making him
vulnerable to being caught by guards. Its a nice idea but one that
would have to be considered and planned very well (will developers want
to make that extra effort?) also if it isnt done properly the chances
are it will spoil the game as the gamer will become more frustrated and
their view of the game will go downhill. Gamers dont want to waste time
as their striker falls over the ball or Snake falling over on damp
ground and using up some of his health in the process. I think this is a
fine line that has to be crossed correctly for it to work the way it is
intended to work and get the most out of any game. There are other steps
that will be worked on before this, better graphics, game-play, gaming
engines, computer A.I. But after these reach a good standard in all
games (and really good in the best games) then it will only be a matter
of time before some more really good stuff comes along and ideas like
these may well be part of that.

The thing with today's gaming I don't think we see enough developer
getting feedback from gamers, if we complained more as to what bothers
us and what we like and dislike then we could see more and more games
that make being a gamer what it should be. When ideas like this get
turned into reality and become part of most games then games could reach
levels that a few years ago would have been unimaginable. Hopefully
ideas like this aren't too far away and should add to the overall
enjoyment of any game.
Wed 07/11/01 at 23:12
Regular
Posts: 8,220
They were saying how in the latest round of (bronsnan) bond films they were actually going to try to make him more human, and to develop his 'sensetive side'. Not going to mention the obvious plans for that in the next film, for those who don't want to know.

Isn't that a bit like when he got married though. Unless i'm mistaken, it was 'on her majesty's secret service', with lazenby, the worst bond film ever. Maybe it wasn't just the actor then?

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