What happened to Varied enemies?

[Palfreyfish]

Christ, you people are hypocrites. You know what games have varied enemies? Halo. Gears of War. Resistance. You know, all those "Brown and Grey shooters" you can't be bothered to play.

On a not-really-related note, all of those series feature varied and colorful environments as well. And none of them are pretending to be realistic. At all. Which you would know if you'd played them.

Y'know what has really varied enemies? Deus Ex: Human Revolution. They are ALL reskins of the same thing, a man with a gun. You eventually get beefier enemies to fight, but really the only upgrade they get is a costume change and a slightly more lethal gun. They're all pretty similar. Yeah, I love the game don't get me wrong, but still, there could have been more variety than guys with guns. Yes there are a few robots and such, but nothing especially different. Yes, there are the crap boss fights but still, there's not much that you have to change up when you're fighting different enemies.

Sneak up and KO, cover shoot, or sneak past. That's it really. If you're detected you pretty much have to kill your way out or restart from an auto save.

I guess I wanted hovering attack drones and enemies that can't be KO'd or something like that. Bit of change...

Uh...That's great and all, but I'm a little confused about why you felt the need to quote me. Since I was talking about games with varied enemies and you're talking about a completely different game WITHOUT varied enemies. You know I wasn't being sarcastic in my first post, right?

I guess I was quoting you because DE:HR has the characteristics of the games you mentioned, i.e. it's not brown and grey, and it has detailed and well thought out environments like Halo and GOW, but then it doesn't have varied enemies. I also got that it wasn't sarcasm. Though I'm starting to wonder why I quoted you...

Trying to write an analysis of art sales websites and post on here whilst very tired is hard...

 

[josemlopes]

Corpser/berserker was never a boss fight, the only boss fight in gears 1 was RAAM
Tickers are those little ant like things that run up to you and that explode on you, games like space marine blatantly ripped this off
in gears each dude in the enemy line had his own look aquitted to his weapons
Boltok pistol? the guy with brown pants and white scaley skin
Hammerburst?white guy in power armour
Torque bow? those big brown bastards
Semi automatic pistol/gas grenades/stunning screams? Kantus
Chainsaw sword/duel fandango? the guys summoned/controlled by locust priests/specific white locust who happen to own the weapon.
died in the shadows? kraven
Big dinosaur with rocket launchers mounted on him? Brumak
trust me there's variation

Oh sure, they look different and have different attacks, but when you're in cover-based shooting with 2 weapons, there is very little variety in how you fight them.

Still, he has a point, Gears does have some variety, and if you play on harder difficulties you will have to take diferent enemies diferently. They arent as varied as in Doom but they do vary.

OT: For me the game that defines good enemy variety is Serious Sam, every enemy is best killed in a specific way and all of them produce specific sounds that let the player know what is coming behind him.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

variation is variation

You can't just say "THAT'S NOT VARIED" because you feel that gameplay wise you're tactics don't end up giving you much variation

The enemy and weapon types in gears of war are varied, you just can't deny that

For a gritty coverbased shooter they're even overqualified with their variation
you're not looking at the game as what it is, you're just looking at it as "game" instead of " gritty cover based shooting game"

Well, sure they may be varied, I guess you can't deny that. But when you're in cover-based shooting, you're very limited in what you can do. In the end, it just comes down to different particle effect coming out of your gun and different ones coming back. So I guess it's that which causes the problem, not a lack of enemy variety. I'm sure if there options beside cover-based shooting, it would be very varied.

Christ, you people are hypocrites. You know what games have varied enemies? Halo. Gears of War. Resistance. You know, all those "Brown and Grey shooters" you can't be bothered to play.

On a not-really-related note, all of those series feature varied and colorful environments as well. And none of them are pretending to be realistic. At all. Which you would know if you'd played them.

Yep, these games are all varied. Because, and only because, you say so. And they're also doing a lot of other things, only because you say so. Y'know there's this wonderful concept called "evidence". Please use it if you want things you say to be taken seriously.

People already gave plenty of evidence. Hell, take a look at Gears of War 3. In addition to all the enemy types mentioned before (which he didn't mention the 4 different types of Boomer that all require different tactics), there are now lambent drones which explode if you kill them up close, Drudges which mutate into different forms that require a different killing strategy, Screechers which are basically a freaking DOOM enemy (little buggers that fly around ignoring cover and shoot at you). Not to mention boss fights. Oh, and they are called the Kryll, not the Kraven. That was getting on my nerves.

Honestly, if you find an FPS game that doesn't have a realistic setting (Gears, Halo, Resistance, etc), its likely to have pretty good enemy variety. So what if the end result is "shoot them in the head", its how you go about doing it and, more importantly, how to keep them from doing it to you that is key. In Gears you can't just stay behind cover, because there are enemies made who are impossible to take down without flanking (Grinders, Maulers, Troika turrets, etc) and enemies who are designed to flush you out of cover and kill you if you stay put (Bloodmounts, Tickers, Butchers, Screechers). Hell, in addition you also have melee enemies who encourage a run and gun style (wretches, savage theron, former), and snipers who sit outside your range and pick at you while all of the above are doing their job. Yes, the game has chest-high walls. But Doom had strafing. If its your primary tool to avoid death, you use it. But its not your only method, nor is it always the most effective.

 

[Cipher1]

Theres always Serious Sam lots of brightly colored enemies to murder with lots of different weapons.

 

[O maestre]

variety in enemies was a rarity even back in the day of the ps one, there is nothing new on that front, only a select few games had enemy variety and oddly enough they are amongst those we remember fondly

 

[Auninteligentname]

Metroid Prime does rather well in the varied enemies section. Or at least so I remember it.

 

[Not G. Ivingname]

I was looking at my game shelf, and I remembered games like DOOM3, fire warrior and the like. And I wondered, what happened in modern games to different enemies?

Its not paint-palette swaps I'm talking about, I mean having to develop stratigies e.t.c. for each enemy.
For example DOOM3, Dodging lost souls and revving the chainsaw was always my strategy, while running while shotgunning for cherubs and Plasma gun and hiding was what I used for Hell Knights, tactics like that are what I miss.

And I was just wondering, Do you know any recent games with quite varied enemies that require a some use of tactics?

Well, in the olden days, making different kind of enemies was easy. Making several sprites wasn't that hard, and their was only a few needed AI behaviors: Charge mindlessly at player character and move around and randomly shoot player character. However, the more expensive a game is to make, the less and less money that goes into AI developement and monster veriety.

 

[josemlopes]

Halo 3
Grunts, Jackals, Brutes, Hunters, Buggers, Flood mini-things, Flood Snipers, Flood Carrier Pods, Flood Mammoths, Sentinels.
As for strategy, every enemy can eventually be killed by filling them with enough bullets, but there are more effective ways to kill each of them.

That is actually about half the number of enemies in Doom 2, which is from 1994. Lets see if I can remember them all: Zombieman, Shotgun Guy, Heavy Weapons Dude, Imp, Pinky Demon, Cacoademon, Pain Elemental, Lost Soul, Archvile (I HATE archviles), spectre, Hell Baron, Hell Knight, Revenant, Mancubus, Arachnotron, Cyberdemon, Wolfenstein SS (on the bonus level) and Spidermastermind. There is also the final boss and the Commander Keen things you kill in the bonus level (though you don't directly fight them).

You do know that making enemies now is way harder then in 1994, right? Enemie AI in 1994 was a lot more simple then the enemy AI that you see in recent games.

Its the same as maps, its way harder to make a map now then it was in 1994.

 

[demoman_chaos]

You do know that making enemies now is way harder then in 1994, right? Enemie AI in 1994 was a lot more simple then the enemy AI that you see in recent games.

Its the same as maps, its way harder to make a map now then it was in 1994.

You also have a lot more people working on a project (the original MK only had 4 or 5 guys) and much more processing power at your disposal.

CAPTHCA: "Promoted, donowse"
That Donowse is a brown nose. I did much better this quarter and still HE gets promoted.

 

[The_ModeRazor]

STALKER. Every enemy type has different tactics. And humans kill you just as fast as you kill them. But it's not for the faint of heart. Being constantly flanked by a super-resilient invisible and very fast monster in a swamp in the middle of the night, is not for the faint of heart. And of course there are... shenanigans like this:

Spoiler: Warning, the video WILL make you jump. Don't watch if you have heart problems.

<youtube=_81pngrgDRg>

I'm not sure this type of thing is for everyone.

 

[Hugga_Bear]

Seriously OP? Most games never had it, for one, if by variation you mean have to use a different tactic that is. It was just enemies in different skins, hardly innovative stuff. Very, very few games actually brought multiple approaches way back when.

Nowadays many do, part of the charm of a game is in allowing for multiple pathways now and in an FPS that can basically revolve around enemies. You wanna know why you're thinking they aren't varied? Cos you need to get off CoD. Enemies in 'realistic' games, ones set in this world, are unlikely to provide variation, that's just a given. I mean what can they do? Beyond the odd vehicle, turret and a change of weaponry it's just not viable to produce a dozen different enemies, people are too lame.

Go play Resistance, Bioshock, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Ratchet and Clank etc. The majority of modern games where the option for variation is there tend to take it, at least the good ones do. But for many games, CoD, Battlefield etc it just isn't an option, they are restricted by the ingame world.

 

[Irridium]

Yeah, it sucks. If only there was a game coming out that offered varied enemies...

Oh, why hello there, Serious Sam 3.

 

[Duruznik]

Well, you got slow zombies, fast zombies, hiding zombies, tough zombies and shooting something zombies. Isn't that enough? /sarcasm

... Is that a dick?

Close, it's a creeper. [http://www.minecraftwiki.net/wiki/Creeper]

 

[JDLY]

Christ, you people are hypocrites. You know what games have varied enemies? Halo. Gears of War. Resistance...

Finally. I was wondering if anyone else on here was going to mention Resistance. That series gets far to little attention in my opinion.

In the first one we have several things
-Menial- slow humanoid things, easy enough just to hit, kinda an issue if they sneak up on you in groups
-Leaper- a insectoid that attacks in large groups, easiest to take out with a shotgun
-Roller- basically an upgraded Leaper that rolls, making it harder to take out multiple with one shotgun shot. Also they spit acid at you from a fair distance away, so shotgun or automatic, your choice
-Hybrid- The basic enemy, lots of them, they use a Bullseye rifle. The issue is that with said rifle they can tag you and then shoot you around corners. Best taken out with one of their own rifles
-Gray Jack- an old decrepit hybrid that is about 10ft tall. It rushes you very fast and swings it's claws at you, which, because it's decrepit, are full of bacteria that cause "infections" so it does extra damage. Best taken out from a distance, but there are several times where you have to take on a group in an enclosed room, where a shotgun is preferable
-Howler- a canine sort of thing that charges you and swings it's claws, it is very hard to dodge, however. the only issue is when you must face two or three of them, strategy is similar to what is used against gray jacks
-Slipskull- they jump along the walls and shoot at you with dual full auto pistols. Not to much of a hassle to take out with a sniper, but when there are other chimera shooting you it becomes an issue
-Hardfang- a heavy built humaniod that rushes you with an electric gun, very hard to kill, and if they get close enough they will hit you, nearly killing you even on the easiest difficulty
-Titan- basically a giant wielding a weapon usually seen mounted on vehicles that shoots giant homing fireballs at you. Best taken on from a distance with an RPG, if not, use a bullseye tag and shoot while running serpentine
-Advanced Hybrid- just like the regular one only much harder to kill and armed with a deadlier gun, best taken out from far with a sniper
-Steelhead- also a humanoid, the difference is that it is extremely tough to kill and has a gun that shoots through walls, best taken out with it's own gun while running serpentine
-Widowmaker- a giant spider-like thing that stomps around the battle field killing things like that, but also spits poisonous goo-balls nearly non-stop. You must always be in some sort of cover to not die, best taken on with RPG's
-Angel- giant flying things that throw spikes at you that emit clouds of poisonous gas. best taken out with an RPG, but that is hard enough because it stays in the air quite far away and rarely stops moving, so many rounds will be wasted. It wouldn't be to much of a hassle, but you only see them when you're already in a huge battle

And that's just the first one. Granted, on the easy difficulty, you can take most of these out with one or two guns. However, on normal you will quickly run out of ammo, and on the hard and hardest difficulty you must adopt different strategies for each enemy or you will get your shit messed up.

 

[josemlopes]

You do know that making enemies now is way harder then in 1994, right? Enemie AI in 1994 was a lot more simple then the enemy AI that you see in recent games.

Its the same as maps, its way harder to make a map now then it was in 1994.

You also have a lot more people working on a project (the original MK only had 4 or 5 guys) and much more processing power at your disposal.

CAPTHCA: "Promoted, donowse"
That Donowse is a brown nose. I did much better this quarter and still HE gets promoted.

It takes a LOT of time to make an AI like the ones we see now, a shit load of time. Scripting an AI that simply moves to the last known player position and shoots at the player when on sight isnt hard, then having a guy create sprites isnt hard too. Now you have to create 3d models and animations, you have to script when the enemie retreats, when he attacks, when he calls backup, when he goes to cover, where he goes to cover, where does he move, etc.

Its just like creating levels, one guy could do a single level of Doom in less then 3 days (the actual doing, not planning) but now it takes 3 days for a good looking room

Old games didnt had details, now they do. There is more things to take care of and that is why there are more people taking care of those things, dont think that people just got lazy.

 

[Frozen Donkey Wheel2]

Yep, these games are all varied. Because, and only because, you say so. And they're also doing a lot of other things, only because you say so. Y'know there's this wonderful concept called "evidence". Please use it if you want things you say to be taken seriously.

Alright, you asked for it..

Spoiler: Enemies in Halo:

Grunts

Jackals

Elites

Brutes

Hunters

Drones

Flood Combat Forms

Flood Infection Forms

Flood Carrier Forms

Spoiler: Resistance

Hybrids

Leapers

Grims

Chameleons

Titans

Furies

Patrol Drone

Hunter Drone

Attack Drone

Spoiler: Gears of War

Kryll

Wretches

Drones

Berserkers

Seeders

Nemacyst

Corpsers

Reavers

Brumaks

Bloodmounts

Tickers

PS: Some advice for the future: It is actually possible to disagree with someone WITHOUT being as ass about it. You may want to try it out sometime.