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I love Lucasarts adventure games. Sam and Max, Day of the Tentacle, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis... the Monkey Islands... brilliant, brilliant games, that have been lost under the sea of pointless, pointless games that involved horrible level design, all based around how cool the character looks, instead of how cool the character really is.
But for all their greatness, they're hard to pick up and play again. Well, they're easy to, but that's the problem.
Half the fun of Sam and Max is figuring out what to do next, how to solve puzzles. But because the voice acting and story telling is superb, you'll love to play it again anyway... but the puzzles you already know, and can walk through.
So that's point one.
Point two is, virtual reality. We're all supposed to put on these helmets and walk into fantastic worlds, and take on games ourself. This would be cool, but wouldn't work. Helmets only affect our vision, everything else is still not quite there.
So here's an odd little idea that wouldn't work but could be worth discussing. Dream design.
It all goes back to putting chips in your head and so on... but ignore that. What if games designers could get right inside your head. They wouldn't have to worry about how many polygons they use, because if they imagine it, you can reproduce it in your mind.
Somehow tapping into the very concious that allows you to dream, and wiring it up, so instead of "what normal people seem to have" dreams of falling and being chased around school with no clothes on, you take up fantastic journeys, gun fight in the old west, or fly space ships in a giant spacey war thing.
Or a good old fashioned detective story, that you can play again and again, because, after all, you forget dreams when you wake.
That would be odd too. It'll probably blow your mind to have such strong deja vu... in a dream though, it may not be easy to notice.
There are obviously some huge problems with this.
1) You don't want to wake up. Huge problem. Perhaps a save function for when you wake would be nice... but alarm clocks are a neccessity. :0)
2) Reviews would be impossible. Not such a huge problem for a lot of companies, then. :0)
3) You'll have no desire to go back to it. Not that much of a problem I suppose. If you did, there would be a problem of addiction... but you could just resume your game at night, echoed through your brain, to make the dream as real as possible.
Ok... it's only a take on the chip idea Strafex had... but there's a question I want to ask, that meant I had to write all this stuff out.
What means more to you? The actual feeling you get from playing a game... or the memory of playing that game?
Deep, I know. But does it mean more to you to be absorbed in that game so you can have fun for THAT moment... or would you rather be only partly absorbed, and have the memory of it to revisit?
Personally: I'd rather have the memory. Skies of Arcadia, best game ever. I preach it to people because it is.
But what if you couldn't even remember that best game ever... it would have no affect on your life whatsoever, and that's not what design is about.
Game designers, well, at least why I want to design games, is because I want to have an affect on the way people look at things. I don't want to just entertain them for a few minutes, I want to make them think, to make them talk about their experiences in it, to revisit it because they enjoyed it so much the first time... not so they can pass the time.
Sure, fast actiony shooters are great to pass the time, and yes, pretty addictive. But I couldn't make a game like that, I just wouldn't have the patience, and I'll get bored with it.
That's why I like Nintendo and Rareware especially so much. Instead of trying to make simple "pass the time" games, 'press a to fire' sort of things... they really put a lot of time into encapturating the feeling of the entire game. Making you want to progress, instead of simply finish the game. Mario 64 was like that. Getting all 120 stars would be excellent... but it was so much fun getting there, you didn't much care. It's called excellent level design, and you hardly ever see it.
Exploration. Forfilling dreams, passing through what you've learned, and fighting on to the last boss, not a huge clash to the horribly drawn out and boring game, but a finish, a moment for you to look back on what you've achieved through the whole of the game. That's why Nintendo games rule.
And hopefully, that's why my games will rule too. ;0)
But for all their greatness, they're hard to pick up and play again. Well, they're easy to, but that's the problem.
Half the fun of Sam and Max is figuring out what to do next, how to solve puzzles. But because the voice acting and story telling is superb, you'll love to play it again anyway... but the puzzles you already know, and can walk through.
So that's point one.
Point two is, virtual reality. We're all supposed to put on these helmets and walk into fantastic worlds, and take on games ourself. This would be cool, but wouldn't work. Helmets only affect our vision, everything else is still not quite there.
So here's an odd little idea that wouldn't work but could be worth discussing. Dream design.
It all goes back to putting chips in your head and so on... but ignore that. What if games designers could get right inside your head. They wouldn't have to worry about how many polygons they use, because if they imagine it, you can reproduce it in your mind.
Somehow tapping into the very concious that allows you to dream, and wiring it up, so instead of "what normal people seem to have" dreams of falling and being chased around school with no clothes on, you take up fantastic journeys, gun fight in the old west, or fly space ships in a giant spacey war thing.
Or a good old fashioned detective story, that you can play again and again, because, after all, you forget dreams when you wake.
That would be odd too. It'll probably blow your mind to have such strong deja vu... in a dream though, it may not be easy to notice.
There are obviously some huge problems with this.
1) You don't want to wake up. Huge problem. Perhaps a save function for when you wake would be nice... but alarm clocks are a neccessity. :0)
2) Reviews would be impossible. Not such a huge problem for a lot of companies, then. :0)
3) You'll have no desire to go back to it. Not that much of a problem I suppose. If you did, there would be a problem of addiction... but you could just resume your game at night, echoed through your brain, to make the dream as real as possible.
Ok... it's only a take on the chip idea Strafex had... but there's a question I want to ask, that meant I had to write all this stuff out.
What means more to you? The actual feeling you get from playing a game... or the memory of playing that game?
Deep, I know. But does it mean more to you to be absorbed in that game so you can have fun for THAT moment... or would you rather be only partly absorbed, and have the memory of it to revisit?
Personally: I'd rather have the memory. Skies of Arcadia, best game ever. I preach it to people because it is.
But what if you couldn't even remember that best game ever... it would have no affect on your life whatsoever, and that's not what design is about.
Game designers, well, at least why I want to design games, is because I want to have an affect on the way people look at things. I don't want to just entertain them for a few minutes, I want to make them think, to make them talk about their experiences in it, to revisit it because they enjoyed it so much the first time... not so they can pass the time.
Sure, fast actiony shooters are great to pass the time, and yes, pretty addictive. But I couldn't make a game like that, I just wouldn't have the patience, and I'll get bored with it.
That's why I like Nintendo and Rareware especially so much. Instead of trying to make simple "pass the time" games, 'press a to fire' sort of things... they really put a lot of time into encapturating the feeling of the entire game. Making you want to progress, instead of simply finish the game. Mario 64 was like that. Getting all 120 stars would be excellent... but it was so much fun getting there, you didn't much care. It's called excellent level design, and you hardly ever see it.
Exploration. Forfilling dreams, passing through what you've learned, and fighting on to the last boss, not a huge clash to the horribly drawn out and boring game, but a finish, a moment for you to look back on what you've achieved through the whole of the game. That's why Nintendo games rule.
And hopefully, that's why my games will rule too. ;0)
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Basically you are talking about Total Recall, but id rather have the feeling while i was playing it rather than be stuck with just the memory, memories fade, live for the moment.
Its a nice idea but theres the annoying fact about dreams. Whenever i have a dream i never can ever realise that i'm dreaming. Or i wouldn't get so embarrsed over things in it. Its extremly annoying, and if you didn't know you were dreaming and you suddenly were attacked by Zombies ect. You'd be having nightmares each night! Not that 'm complaining about nightmares, they keep you on the edge!
WHOA! Have you been playing Sam and Max a lot revently!?? ;)
That is quite a good and inetresting idea, but also potentially quite a dangerous one. I don't know if many people would like to have chips inserted into their brains - so it could also fail.
That is quite a good and inetresting idea, but also potentially quite a dangerous one. I don't know if many people would like to have chips inserted into their brains - so it could also fail.
I love Lucasarts adventure games. Sam and Max, Day of the Tentacle, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis... the Monkey Islands... brilliant, brilliant games, that have been lost under the sea of pointless, pointless games that involved horrible level design, all based around how cool the character looks, instead of how cool the character really is.
But for all their greatness, they're hard to pick up and play again. Well, they're easy to, but that's the problem.
Half the fun of Sam and Max is figuring out what to do next, how to solve puzzles. But because the voice acting and story telling is superb, you'll love to play it again anyway... but the puzzles you already know, and can walk through.
So that's point one.
Point two is, virtual reality. We're all supposed to put on these helmets and walk into fantastic worlds, and take on games ourself. This would be cool, but wouldn't work. Helmets only affect our vision, everything else is still not quite there.
So here's an odd little idea that wouldn't work but could be worth discussing. Dream design.
It all goes back to putting chips in your head and so on... but ignore that. What if games designers could get right inside your head. They wouldn't have to worry about how many polygons they use, because if they imagine it, you can reproduce it in your mind.
Somehow tapping into the very concious that allows you to dream, and wiring it up, so instead of "what normal people seem to have" dreams of falling and being chased around school with no clothes on, you take up fantastic journeys, gun fight in the old west, or fly space ships in a giant spacey war thing.
Or a good old fashioned detective story, that you can play again and again, because, after all, you forget dreams when you wake.
That would be odd too. It'll probably blow your mind to have such strong deja vu... in a dream though, it may not be easy to notice.
There are obviously some huge problems with this.
1) You don't want to wake up. Huge problem. Perhaps a save function for when you wake would be nice... but alarm clocks are a neccessity. :0)
2) Reviews would be impossible. Not such a huge problem for a lot of companies, then. :0)
3) You'll have no desire to go back to it. Not that much of a problem I suppose. If you did, there would be a problem of addiction... but you could just resume your game at night, echoed through your brain, to make the dream as real as possible.
Ok... it's only a take on the chip idea Strafex had... but there's a question I want to ask, that meant I had to write all this stuff out.
What means more to you? The actual feeling you get from playing a game... or the memory of playing that game?
Deep, I know. But does it mean more to you to be absorbed in that game so you can have fun for THAT moment... or would you rather be only partly absorbed, and have the memory of it to revisit?
Personally: I'd rather have the memory. Skies of Arcadia, best game ever. I preach it to people because it is.
But what if you couldn't even remember that best game ever... it would have no affect on your life whatsoever, and that's not what design is about.
Game designers, well, at least why I want to design games, is because I want to have an affect on the way people look at things. I don't want to just entertain them for a few minutes, I want to make them think, to make them talk about their experiences in it, to revisit it because they enjoyed it so much the first time... not so they can pass the time.
Sure, fast actiony shooters are great to pass the time, and yes, pretty addictive. But I couldn't make a game like that, I just wouldn't have the patience, and I'll get bored with it.
That's why I like Nintendo and Rareware especially so much. Instead of trying to make simple "pass the time" games, 'press a to fire' sort of things... they really put a lot of time into encapturating the feeling of the entire game. Making you want to progress, instead of simply finish the game. Mario 64 was like that. Getting all 120 stars would be excellent... but it was so much fun getting there, you didn't much care. It's called excellent level design, and you hardly ever see it.
Exploration. Forfilling dreams, passing through what you've learned, and fighting on to the last boss, not a huge clash to the horribly drawn out and boring game, but a finish, a moment for you to look back on what you've achieved through the whole of the game. That's why Nintendo games rule.
And hopefully, that's why my games will rule too. ;0)
But for all their greatness, they're hard to pick up and play again. Well, they're easy to, but that's the problem.
Half the fun of Sam and Max is figuring out what to do next, how to solve puzzles. But because the voice acting and story telling is superb, you'll love to play it again anyway... but the puzzles you already know, and can walk through.
So that's point one.
Point two is, virtual reality. We're all supposed to put on these helmets and walk into fantastic worlds, and take on games ourself. This would be cool, but wouldn't work. Helmets only affect our vision, everything else is still not quite there.
So here's an odd little idea that wouldn't work but could be worth discussing. Dream design.
It all goes back to putting chips in your head and so on... but ignore that. What if games designers could get right inside your head. They wouldn't have to worry about how many polygons they use, because if they imagine it, you can reproduce it in your mind.
Somehow tapping into the very concious that allows you to dream, and wiring it up, so instead of "what normal people seem to have" dreams of falling and being chased around school with no clothes on, you take up fantastic journeys, gun fight in the old west, or fly space ships in a giant spacey war thing.
Or a good old fashioned detective story, that you can play again and again, because, after all, you forget dreams when you wake.
That would be odd too. It'll probably blow your mind to have such strong deja vu... in a dream though, it may not be easy to notice.
There are obviously some huge problems with this.
1) You don't want to wake up. Huge problem. Perhaps a save function for when you wake would be nice... but alarm clocks are a neccessity. :0)
2) Reviews would be impossible. Not such a huge problem for a lot of companies, then. :0)
3) You'll have no desire to go back to it. Not that much of a problem I suppose. If you did, there would be a problem of addiction... but you could just resume your game at night, echoed through your brain, to make the dream as real as possible.
Ok... it's only a take on the chip idea Strafex had... but there's a question I want to ask, that meant I had to write all this stuff out.
What means more to you? The actual feeling you get from playing a game... or the memory of playing that game?
Deep, I know. But does it mean more to you to be absorbed in that game so you can have fun for THAT moment... or would you rather be only partly absorbed, and have the memory of it to revisit?
Personally: I'd rather have the memory. Skies of Arcadia, best game ever. I preach it to people because it is.
But what if you couldn't even remember that best game ever... it would have no affect on your life whatsoever, and that's not what design is about.
Game designers, well, at least why I want to design games, is because I want to have an affect on the way people look at things. I don't want to just entertain them for a few minutes, I want to make them think, to make them talk about their experiences in it, to revisit it because they enjoyed it so much the first time... not so they can pass the time.
Sure, fast actiony shooters are great to pass the time, and yes, pretty addictive. But I couldn't make a game like that, I just wouldn't have the patience, and I'll get bored with it.
That's why I like Nintendo and Rareware especially so much. Instead of trying to make simple "pass the time" games, 'press a to fire' sort of things... they really put a lot of time into encapturating the feeling of the entire game. Making you want to progress, instead of simply finish the game. Mario 64 was like that. Getting all 120 stars would be excellent... but it was so much fun getting there, you didn't much care. It's called excellent level design, and you hardly ever see it.
Exploration. Forfilling dreams, passing through what you've learned, and fighting on to the last boss, not a huge clash to the horribly drawn out and boring game, but a finish, a moment for you to look back on what you've achieved through the whole of the game. That's why Nintendo games rule.
And hopefully, that's why my games will rule too. ;0)
Page: