Poll: Enough with this 2-weapon limit bullcrap

[God's Clown]

If anything it should be 3 guns. Assault Rifle, Pistol + one other. Pistol is something you strap to your waist, it barely takes room, and doesn't weigh a lot. It shouldn't take up a slot that can be used for other guns, it should have its own separate slot, just like a knife does.

 

[GloatingSwine]

fun fact: the whole "regenerating health" mechanic also seems to be a staple of realistic games despite being far less realistic than a health bar.

Tell you what, before you make that argument again, walk out in the street and ask the first person you meet to kick you really hard in the balls, then come back and tell us how much your health bar went down.

A kick to the balls hurts but it's superficial damage. If three bullet wounds in a row is going to kill you, then one bullet wound, then a second 10 minutes later, then a third an hour later, with no medical treatment between them *cough*medkits*cough* is still going to kill you.

Well, actually no, real life does not work that way it depends where the bullets hit and how your body reacts. You might survive all three, you might die from one, you might die all but instantly, you might bleed out for minutes, or you might last for hours, the physical trauma itself might not kill you, going into shock might kill you. Health bars are just as unrealistic as regenerating health, but it turns out that they're also a good deal less fun, because they mean that the designer never knows even a ballpark of how much health the player has unless, like pretty much the last holdout of the Old Ways Half-Life 2 they shower the player in medkits every three seconds.

Regenerating health means that the designer always knows how much health the player has when they enter a given encounter, so the challenge level of the encounters can be finely balanced to match the progression of the game.

 

[Clive Howlitzer]

fun fact: the whole "regenerating health" mechanic also seems to be a staple of realistic games despite being far less realistic than a health bar.

Tell you what, before you make that argument again, walk out in the street and ask the first person you meet to kick you really hard in the balls, then come back and tell us how much your health bar went down.

A kick to the balls hurts but it's superficial damage. If three bullet wounds in a row is going to kill you, then one bullet wound, then a second 10 minutes later, then a third an hour later, with no medical treatment between them *cough*medkits*cough* is still going to kill you.

I loathe regenerating health. I think it's the worst new staple of the FPS genre. Its so frustrating to have a protracted gunfight with someone and everytime they hide and cry to themselves for a few seconds, they are back to full life.

 

[Waaghpowa]

Yes yes realism, "noone could carry all that" FFS, I'm a supersoldier in a nanosuit shooting aliens and giant robots, it doesn't get more fictional!

As much as I agree with the OP, I had a thought. Some Sci fi shooters could actually be portraying a reasonably realistic future. I use Killzone as an example because despite being a sci, it looks and feels real to a certain degree and the absence of energy based weapons coincides with the realism behind such a concept. Being that an enormous amount of energy is required to fire them making them impracticable to the conventional projectile based weapon i.e. bullets. Basically the reason why I like sci fi so much, you can't say for certain it wont happen 100 years from now.

Kinda off topic, but that's what I was thinking.

 

[SilentVirus]

I think the purpose is for it to balance out the game for other players. I guess it promotes checks and balances like "Kill guy with sniper at long range, he comes to kill you with SMG at short range"

 

[ikoian]

This makes me think of Jak 3's approach on controlling 12 different guns. It was genious, allowed a variety of different shooting styles, and was still simple to understand.

 

[ReaperzXIII]

Considering that I mostly stick to two weapons anyway (Sniper and an automatic weapon/shotgun, or an automatic and a side-arm/shotgun or in those really rare situations a BFG and an automatic weapon), I rarely use more than 1 gun even when given the choice so I prefer the 2 weapons saves me inventory wading. In Half Life the only time I would use a gun other than the assault rifle or the shotgun was because I ran out of bullets, in Borderlands the only reason I used other guns was because there are achievements for using other guns and sometimes I got bored.

I don't see the problem, normally in games if you are in a situation when you need a specific gun they give it to you, only problem I find is when sniper/BFG ammo is in such short supply

Some games benefit from them some don't, but either way I don't see a big problem

 

[Zantos]

I far prefer the two weapon system in Battlefield (oppertunity to change at various points in the level) to systems where you carry everything (I'm looking at you Half Life 2). I at least get to think about the tactics I'm going to use to make an attack rather than just throw everything at them. Also with multiplayer focus to modern FPS it would make carrying more than one shit hard to balance. Look at the effort that's had to go into Gears of War just to balence a three gun with map pickups system.

 

[Anchupom]

I like how Ratchet and Clank do it... Foldy-outy techno weapons. Keeps space for about 30 guns in your back pocket all the time.
But Vanquish went for only a few weapons, didn't it? And that did the foldy-outy techno weapon trick too... (Played the demo a fair few times, but don't remember the weapons much)

I guess it's to try and encourage more skillful gaming by the player? But if that's the case, why don't they put that as an increased difficulty and leave me and my arsenal to blow apart the entire planet?

 

[Duskflamer]

fun fact: the whole "regenerating health" mechanic also seems to be a staple of realistic games despite being far less realistic than a health bar.

Tell you what, before you make that argument again, walk out in the street and ask the first person you meet to kick you really hard in the balls, then come back and tell us how much your health bar went down.

A kick to the balls hurts but it's superficial damage. If three bullet wounds in a row is going to kill you, then one bullet wound, then a second 10 minutes later, then a third an hour later, with no medical treatment between them *cough*medkits*cough* is still going to kill you.

Well, actually no, real life does not work that way it depends where the bullets hit and how your body reacts. You might survive all three, you might die from one, you might die all but instantly, you might bleed out for minutes, or you might last for hours, the physical trauma itself might not kill you, going into shock might kill you. Health bars are just as unrealistic as regenerating health, but it turns out that they're also a good deal less fun, because they mean that the designer never knows even a ballpark of how much health the player has unless, like pretty much the last holdout of the Old Ways Half-Life 2 they shower the player in medkits every three seconds.

Regenerating health means that the designer always knows how much health the player has when they enter a given encounter, so the challenge level of the encounters can be finely balanced to match the progression of the game.

Fair point, neither one is realistic, but at least touching (with the implication of somehow using) a health kit implies that the player is not Wolverine and just healing-factoring the wounds away.

Also, people playing pre-halo FPS' never had a problem having fun with those health bars. Developers back then would know that the player enters the level with X amount of health and can plan accordingly, balancing the encounters in the context of the entire level as opposed to balancing each individual encounter within a level.

To those arguing that the 2-weapon system encourages thought and tactics, note that the health bar system also encourages thought and tactics, as the player has to be aware of how much health they have and plan their movements to make sure to hold on to as much health as possible, as opposed to just being able to hide in a corner for a few seconds to make all their bullet wounds magically disappear.

 

[The_Blue_Rider]

I really dont mind the limit to be honest. It forces me to think about which weapons would work out for me best in the level, and if i get to a part where its difficult with the weapons i chose, then i just suck it up and deal with it. Games with a two weapon limit never give you an impossible situation, if you need that rocket launcher, there will be a rocket launcher around your area.

 

[drosalion]

There are many games where a 2-weapon system is quite suitable, and many games where it isnt. There is no golden rule (or shouldnt be) when it comes to this imo

 

[Bravo 21]

Well, I was thinking about this for a while, and I think that it would be interesting if a game had a weapon slot system, where you could have a holster for a pistol then a sheath for a knife, and a weapon slung over the shoulder, and one in your hands. Then if you want to pick up a new weapon, you have to give up one similar weapon in order to carry it, for instance, you can't carry 3 rocket launchers, but you could carry 1 rocket launcher, a handgun and then something that you are carrying at that moment

 

[KILGAZOR]

I would like to see a system where how many weapons you could carry at once depended on the weight of the weapons and what equipment you had available to carry them with.

 

[CrystalShadow]

It made sense in context of realism, because how many weapons can one soldier really carry anyway?

Although I've been playing Crysis recently, (The original - It was cheap, and I finally have a PC that can run it.), and they seem to have created a bizarre variant...
(OK, so the suit makes you a supersoldier presumably capable of carrying more weapons than average, but it's still weird.)

So... I don't get how they worked this one out:

So far, I've noticed:

You can carry 2 pistols (dual-wielding. Don't know yet if there's multiple types)

Two rifles. This includes shotguns, and anything like a sub-machine gun or the like.
This is altered a little by the number of attachments which you can use on most of the guns as soon as you find them. (Laser pointer, flashlight. Iron Sights, reflex scope, optical (sniper) scope - It's actually quite amusing to put a laser pointer and a sniper scope... On a shotgun. XD - Aside from that there's also a 'tactical' attachment, which fires some kind of dart, and a grenade launcher attachment.)

Now, on top of this, you can carry satchel charges, and a rocket launcher. But, only one rocket launcher.

Oh, and grenades. Of at least 3 different types.

now, considering, fully loaded, that means I'm carrying 2 rifles, 2 pistols, a rocket launcher, 36 grenades (with an arbitrary limit of 12 of each kind), 3 rockets (for the rocket launcher), about 10 explosive charges, 330 rounds of rifle ammunition (or about 100 shotgun shells) for each type of rifle I'm carrying, and maybe 200 rounds of pistol ammo...
(As well as a handful of weapon attachments...)

Well, clearly, realism wasn't the aim here. Because regardless of how strong the nano-suit makes you, I'd have a hard time seeing where you'd even put all of that stuff, especially all the grenades, rockets, and ammo.
(Although interestingly, I can see the rifles and grenade launcher strapped to my back in the shadow of the character you play as.)

But, given that realism wasn't the issue, the limits seem kind of arbitrary?

Why can I only carry 1 rocket launcher? Why exactly 2 rifles? If I want a third, I have to drop one of the other two. Why, for that matter, can't I drop a rocket launcher and carry a third rifle?

Why can I carry 12 of each type of grenade, instead of some combination of 36 of any kind? After all, while a frag grenade and a smoke grenade have different functions, they're about the same size...

On the whole, from a realism perspective, none of it makes much sense. But, from a gameplay perspective, it does I guess alleviate the need to actively manage your ammo inventory.

But despite this weird and arbitrary arrangement, You still find that if a tank or helicopter shows up, there just happens to be a rocket launcher nearby...
How... Convenient.

Look, in the real world, this problem is, to my knowledge solved by the existence of combat squads.
Different people in the squad carry different weapons, so that collectively, you have the right tool for the situation.

But, this brings us to the problem this has created in games;

Very few shooters are squad-based. You're usually a lone fighter. One man army.
But... To be a one man army in any practical sense, you have to carry the tools to be able to take on any situation.
Or... The game has to contrive a way to give you certain tools as and when you need them.

What this all comes to of course, is how did we end up in a situation where even games that don't give a damn about any kind of realism still feel the need to adhere to the 2 weapon system?

Why does Duke Nukem do it, when that doesn't even fit with the mentality of the game?

Oh well. Hopefully we'll get past this particular design quirk eventually...

 

[SteewpidZombie]

I'd say it's because I'd rather feel the realism of carrying 2 guns...vs trying to waddle around as my 50 rifles, 70 bazookas, 18 machineguns, and MILLION GRENADES, clunk around on my back.

 

[spiritslayr]

Personally I think the more linear the game, the more restrictive it should be. RPGs should let you carry as many weapons as you want but in Halo I'm quite happy to be stuck with two weapons since I'll probably only need those two.

 

[Luthir Fontaine]

it was bull duke only has 2 weapons yeah i understand the cod or halo but come on...

 

[Weaver]

Why the fuck are people saying "It's unrealistic".
It's god damn DUKE NUKEM, there's not a single iota of realism in the bloody game.