Bear with me, this is in context with this thread...
Recently, Eggo mentioned the very next-gen Project Offset:
I read through the technology page on their website, seems fairly clever stuff:
http://www.projectoffset.com/technology.php
but then I looked at the leaked HD footage on Gametrailers and it was running at about 1 frame per second.
This suggests that it will be one of those PC games that everyone aspires to run on maximum settings, but can't without cooking their CPUs.
Even so, I'm sceptical about the actual game. I know Crysis went silly at the end of its storyline, but the way it did 'flesh' was excellent. With that technology out there I don't think I can get excited about the graphics on any game that makes the skin of its characters look like metal or plastic. That said, the fantasy architecture looks wonderful. Yet, I would have more confidence in such an ambitious project if they were to work on the controls/gameplay/viewpoint first and worry about the graphics/physics/level-design/art-design/story/music/voice until they know what kind of a game experience their control system/viewpoint constrains them to.
I'm always reminded that Shigeru Miyamoto directed his programmers to work on the inertia of a 'ball' when he came to do Super Mario 64. Only when the scope of this prototypical avatar had yielded the empowerment one would expect of a Superhero plumber, did he let them replace the sphere with context-dependent transitional animations of a 3D Mario. Everything else followed this, so the doors to the levels were unlocked when the player had proved their proficiency with a shallow knowledge of what was an incredibly rich and precise control scheme. In a sense, the game was there at the very outset, he just had the sense not to stuff its complexity down the beginner's throat at the very outset of the adventure. Remember the manual?
Project Offset needs to think about how to make swordfighting work and add subtlety, skill and mastery without over-reliance on RPG stats.
It would also be sensible, given their dubious quest for 'a cinematic experience' to do something more varied than an over-the-shoulder, or chase-camera, or first-person viewpoint (which is awkward for sword combat against multiple targets - it is hard to say what they have picked from the trailer, they seem to be using a mix), but I feel that a game would appear a lot more Cinematic if it had edits between multiple-cameras.
Perhaps these edits could arise when you identify a particular assailant from a group of attackers. Then the camera could switch to show you from their point of view (has the advantage of being non-blocking in rooms with columns that might ordinary get in the way of an AI controlled camera which formerly baffled Lakitu), it would also show damage thereby removing the need for an atmosphere breaking HUD; sound-effects could also be used (especially, chordal tones for magic combos).
I think the easiest way to implement the controls is to look at Robotron, or its contemporary imitators, such as Geometry Wars. This means the Left Stick moves the character relative to the map whilst the Right Stick changes the direction in which they are facing - normally, in Robotron it would fire in the direction you were pushing the Right Stick into, but it wouldn't do that as there are no "run and gun" weapons in a fantasy FPS (the crossbow should be slow to reload and more of a sniper weapon...), unless you were going to implement magic and needed some rapid-fire some spell-casting mechanism (perhaps, hold one/more of the 4 face buttons to build up a mix of Elemental energy which you could cast and recast after auto-recharge, the performance of which depended upon RPG stats and collectible items).
In this default mode the game would use a Cinematic camera, attempting to show your character navigating the impressive architectural spaces and ensuring that you weren't staring at your feet when presented with an epic dawn over a fjord, or somesuch. You could enter a Goldeneye style 1st person floating-reticle 'Aim-mode' by holding down the Left Bumper, but the freedom to do the gamepad equivalent of "mouse-look" would be balanced by preventing you from moving from that position, the Left Stick would then be used to lean both left&right and forward&back, the Right Stick would only reorient the character's body when the reticle swept to the edge of the screen, either turning, or nosing the character forward&back. The apparent duplication in control is intentional as the lean is faster and self-centering on release. It is this 1st person mode that you would use for the crossbow, indeed it may dynamically equip that weapon on holding the Left Bumper. A small 'dot' reticle would only appear as the Right Trigger was partially squeezed and be 'red' if no target was in range. From this 1st person mode you could target a threat and "lock-on & track it" by also holding down the Right Bumper, at this point the camera would switch to show the assailant's point of view of you, etc. If they turned to flee it would be up to you to release the Right Bumper and return to 1st person, but as you had been "locked-on" you would find them more or less still in the centre of your view as your character had been automatically rotated around to face them as they had circled you in the fight.
Having the thumbsticks do something entirely different again in this "lock-on" mode may be a mistake. It would probably be okay to keep the Left Stick as multi-directional lean and keep your character standing in one place whilst defending themselves - i.e. "let them come to you". The Right Stick could explore the peripheral vision of the assailant so as they looked away from you, the camera could be "finessed" to keep you partially 'in shot' - this would also add dramatic shakiness to the camera work, making you the director and similar to the way you can 'choose where to look' within constraints in the cutscenes of Far Cry 2. The Right Stick wouldn't control where you're character was looking. The area of the body to attack would be 'queued-up' in a sequence on the face buttons then the Right Trigger would perform an aggressive move and the Left Trigger a defensive parry. It would be important to meet equivalent force with force, hence the use of the pressure-sensitive Triggers. Stance would also be an issue as certain moves could make you lose your balance if you over-swung whilst leaning. Crouching would help lower the centre of gravity and dodge some head slice-attacks and you could hold the Left Thumbstick in to do this and release to stand-up straight. The Right Thumbstick could either be clicked to jump, or released after being held to jump - the difference being that in the latter you would jump higher the longer you 'prepared'; this may prevent characters hopping around like rabbits on amphetamines as often happens in FPS games.
Boss fights are risk-reward and can be avoided completely if, like me, you are totally useless at them at get stuck at that point in the game and can't get any further. The point-of-view changes again for these fights and becomes boss-centric, essentially like Shadow of the Colossus. The camera keeps moving around the body of the huge dragon, etc. that you are climbing about on in order to keep you in picture, whilst moving in and out to keep the monster within frame. Once its weak spot has been reached and the beast brought to the ground you will be free to look through the treasure it guards, collect a reward from the formerly terrorised neighboring villages, or in the case of the game's 4 dragon's simply scavenge its magic teeth.
You see, the magic system works off the power of Elemental Dragons. Without going into too much detail, this is based upon the Xbox 360's color-coded face buttons:
Earth = Green - creates earthquakes, panicking hordes; or will 'Earth' any lightning based attack provided the player isn't standing in water
Air = Yellow - creates sunlight, useful in dark dungeons; or allows player to glide when direct sunlight, mitigating high-falls
Fire= Red - creates fireballs; or a ring of defensive fire
Water = Blue - creates freeze-lightning; or heals the player
Acquisition of teeth is a major part of the game as the player is required to travel to the "four corners of the world" to collect them from the respective dragons.
North = Air Dragon, 'Norwegian/Viking' Mountain theme = Yellow
East = Fire Dragon, 'Ancient Imperial Chinese' theme = Red
West = Water Dragon, 'Native American' Great Lakes theme = Blue
South = Earth Dragon, 'Frank Herbert/Tremors' Desert theme = Green
These can be combined to cast mixed spells, e.g. Hold Blue then Yellow to create a mist of vapor all the better to disguise your stealthy approach, or combine Earth and Fire to crack the landscape asunder and bring forth lava. Obviously, you can't create earthquakes and lava when you begin as you will need to 'rank-up'. Dragons teeth in powdered form are available in Apothecary shops in major towns although they are 'cut' with large quantities of chalk and only have limited effects. Basically, you are better off acquiring your own fresh Phoenix feathers and Minotaur horn even if this is the more dangerous course.
Consequently, some form of balanced questing party/squad-combat is required, where you can choose to focus of being a stealthy thief/assassin, or an armored warrior or a wizard, etc. (or any combination of the above; as what you do in the game determines your class, rather than some "menu choice" when you first start the game). This is where the D-pad comes in to effect as it can be used to direct other members of your party. Sure, you can play Cooperatively with up to 3 others of mixed classes to better tackle each quest, but as games can take a long time to finish it is only reasonable to adopt the Gauntlet method of jump-in/drop-out play where the sudden exit of your warrior just leaves you with an AI controlled character. Whether or not members of your team are "real" doesn't even need to be apparent as you don't talk to them to direct a strategy, but use the D-pad to control their advances, flanking, and holding position - whilst the Back button issues an organised retreat to your current position. Therefore, look at a place you want to send your teammates, or a target you want them to attack from where they currently are and press:
Up = to get them to head straight there
Right = to circle anticlockwise around to the location/target's left flank using all available intervening cover
Left = to circle clockwise around to the location/target's right flank using all available intervening cover
Down = to hold their current position, making use of nearby cover if attacked
Back = to retreat to just behind your current position, defensively flanking you
The 'rules of engagement' could be defined at the same time by Holding the D-pad and then tapping one of the face buttons before the D-pad was released:
Red = Red Alert - "belligerent, attack first"
Yellow = Yellow Alert - "passive, only fight back"
Green = All Clear - "healing, rest & restore from fatigue phase"
Blue = Sneak - "stealth approach, avoiding combat as it discloses position"
Obviously, this is a very long post and I am well aware that few of you will take the time to read/comment on it. I don't actually care. The reason I like to go into all of this detail is that I don't think it is fair of all of us to bleat on about game X or Y being rubbish without saying why. What do we want? What would work? What are publishers getting wrong? Are the priorities of developer's correct in this gen?
When a game as interesting as Project Offset is glimpsed whilst still in development I feel we have an opportunity to influence its design.
After all, publishers are driven by marketing departments and marketing departments listen closely to focus groups.
I don't mean to be impertinent in my detailed suggestions. I mean to help.
I don't like to be sceptical of aspirations to Cinematic swordplay without making what I feel is a constructive technical criticism.
Anyway, enough of me being boring... just be relieved I didn't tell you about the game I'm actually working on:
Universe.
Recently, Eggo mentioned the very next-gen Project Offset:
I read through the technology page on their website, seems fairly clever stuff:
http://www.projectoffset.com/technology.php
but then I looked at the leaked HD footage on Gametrailers and it was running at about 1 frame per second.
This suggests that it will be one of those PC games that everyone aspires to run on maximum settings, but can't without cooking their CPUs.
Even so, I'm sceptical about the actual game. I know Crysis went silly at the end of its storyline, but the way it did 'flesh' was excellent. With that technology out there I don't think I can get excited about the graphics on any game that makes the skin of its characters look like metal or plastic. That said, the fantasy architecture looks wonderful. Yet, I would have more confidence in such an ambitious project if they were to work on the controls/gameplay/viewpoint first and worry about the graphics/physics/level-design/art-design/story/music/voice until they know what kind of a game experience their control system/viewpoint constrains them to.
I'm always reminded that Shigeru Miyamoto directed his programmers to work on the inertia of a 'ball' when he came to do Super Mario 64. Only when the scope of this prototypical avatar had yielded the empowerment one would expect of a Superhero plumber, did he let them replace the sphere with context-dependent transitional animations of a 3D Mario. Everything else followed this, so the doors to the levels were unlocked when the player had proved their proficiency with a shallow knowledge of what was an incredibly rich and precise control scheme. In a sense, the game was there at the very outset, he just had the sense not to stuff its complexity down the beginner's throat at the very outset of the adventure. Remember the manual?
Project Offset needs to think about how to make swordfighting work and add subtlety, skill and mastery without over-reliance on RPG stats.
It would also be sensible, given their dubious quest for 'a cinematic experience' to do something more varied than an over-the-shoulder, or chase-camera, or first-person viewpoint (which is awkward for sword combat against multiple targets - it is hard to say what they have picked from the trailer, they seem to be using a mix), but I feel that a game would appear a lot more Cinematic if it had edits between multiple-cameras.
Perhaps these edits could arise when you identify a particular assailant from a group of attackers. Then the camera could switch to show you from their point of view (has the advantage of being non-blocking in rooms with columns that might ordinary get in the way of an AI controlled camera which formerly baffled Lakitu), it would also show damage thereby removing the need for an atmosphere breaking HUD; sound-effects could also be used (especially, chordal tones for magic combos).
I think the easiest way to implement the controls is to look at Robotron, or its contemporary imitators, such as Geometry Wars. This means the Left Stick moves the character relative to the map whilst the Right Stick changes the direction in which they are facing - normally, in Robotron it would fire in the direction you were pushing the Right Stick into, but it wouldn't do that as there are no "run and gun" weapons in a fantasy FPS (the crossbow should be slow to reload and more of a sniper weapon...), unless you were going to implement magic and needed some rapid-fire some spell-casting mechanism (perhaps, hold one/more of the 4 face buttons to build up a mix of Elemental energy which you could cast and recast after auto-recharge, the performance of which depended upon RPG stats and collectible items).
In this default mode the game would use a Cinematic camera, attempting to show your character navigating the impressive architectural spaces and ensuring that you weren't staring at your feet when presented with an epic dawn over a fjord, or somesuch. You could enter a Goldeneye style 1st person floating-reticle 'Aim-mode' by holding down the Left Bumper, but the freedom to do the gamepad equivalent of "mouse-look" would be balanced by preventing you from moving from that position, the Left Stick would then be used to lean both left&right and forward&back, the Right Stick would only reorient the character's body when the reticle swept to the edge of the screen, either turning, or nosing the character forward&back. The apparent duplication in control is intentional as the lean is faster and self-centering on release. It is this 1st person mode that you would use for the crossbow, indeed it may dynamically equip that weapon on holding the Left Bumper. A small 'dot' reticle would only appear as the Right Trigger was partially squeezed and be 'red' if no target was in range. From this 1st person mode you could target a threat and "lock-on & track it" by also holding down the Right Bumper, at this point the camera would switch to show the assailant's point of view of you, etc. If they turned to flee it would be up to you to release the Right Bumper and return to 1st person, but as you had been "locked-on" you would find them more or less still in the centre of your view as your character had been automatically rotated around to face them as they had circled you in the fight.
Having the thumbsticks do something entirely different again in this "lock-on" mode may be a mistake. It would probably be okay to keep the Left Stick as multi-directional lean and keep your character standing in one place whilst defending themselves - i.e. "let them come to you". The Right Stick could explore the peripheral vision of the assailant so as they looked away from you, the camera could be "finessed" to keep you partially 'in shot' - this would also add dramatic shakiness to the camera work, making you the director and similar to the way you can 'choose where to look' within constraints in the cutscenes of Far Cry 2. The Right Stick wouldn't control where you're character was looking. The area of the body to attack would be 'queued-up' in a sequence on the face buttons then the Right Trigger would perform an aggressive move and the Left Trigger a defensive parry. It would be important to meet equivalent force with force, hence the use of the pressure-sensitive Triggers. Stance would also be an issue as certain moves could make you lose your balance if you over-swung whilst leaning. Crouching would help lower the centre of gravity and dodge some head slice-attacks and you could hold the Left Thumbstick in to do this and release to stand-up straight. The Right Thumbstick could either be clicked to jump, or released after being held to jump - the difference being that in the latter you would jump higher the longer you 'prepared'; this may prevent characters hopping around like rabbits on amphetamines as often happens in FPS games.
Boss fights are risk-reward and can be avoided completely if, like me, you are totally useless at them at get stuck at that point in the game and can't get any further. The point-of-view changes again for these fights and becomes boss-centric, essentially like Shadow of the Colossus. The camera keeps moving around the body of the huge dragon, etc. that you are climbing about on in order to keep you in picture, whilst moving in and out to keep the monster within frame. Once its weak spot has been reached and the beast brought to the ground you will be free to look through the treasure it guards, collect a reward from the formerly terrorised neighboring villages, or in the case of the game's 4 dragon's simply scavenge its magic teeth.
You see, the magic system works off the power of Elemental Dragons. Without going into too much detail, this is based upon the Xbox 360's color-coded face buttons:
Earth = Green - creates earthquakes, panicking hordes; or will 'Earth' any lightning based attack provided the player isn't standing in water
Air = Yellow - creates sunlight, useful in dark dungeons; or allows player to glide when direct sunlight, mitigating high-falls
Fire= Red - creates fireballs; or a ring of defensive fire
Water = Blue - creates freeze-lightning; or heals the player
Acquisition of teeth is a major part of the game as the player is required to travel to the "four corners of the world" to collect them from the respective dragons.
North = Air Dragon, 'Norwegian/Viking' Mountain theme = Yellow
East = Fire Dragon, 'Ancient Imperial Chinese' theme = Red
West = Water Dragon, 'Native American' Great Lakes theme = Blue
South = Earth Dragon, 'Frank Herbert/Tremors' Desert theme = Green
These can be combined to cast mixed spells, e.g. Hold Blue then Yellow to create a mist of vapor all the better to disguise your stealthy approach, or combine Earth and Fire to crack the landscape asunder and bring forth lava. Obviously, you can't create earthquakes and lava when you begin as you will need to 'rank-up'. Dragons teeth in powdered form are available in Apothecary shops in major towns although they are 'cut' with large quantities of chalk and only have limited effects. Basically, you are better off acquiring your own fresh Phoenix feathers and Minotaur horn even if this is the more dangerous course.
Consequently, some form of balanced questing party/squad-combat is required, where you can choose to focus of being a stealthy thief/assassin, or an armored warrior or a wizard, etc. (or any combination of the above; as what you do in the game determines your class, rather than some "menu choice" when you first start the game). This is where the D-pad comes in to effect as it can be used to direct other members of your party. Sure, you can play Cooperatively with up to 3 others of mixed classes to better tackle each quest, but as games can take a long time to finish it is only reasonable to adopt the Gauntlet method of jump-in/drop-out play where the sudden exit of your warrior just leaves you with an AI controlled character. Whether or not members of your team are "real" doesn't even need to be apparent as you don't talk to them to direct a strategy, but use the D-pad to control their advances, flanking, and holding position - whilst the Back button issues an organised retreat to your current position. Therefore, look at a place you want to send your teammates, or a target you want them to attack from where they currently are and press:
Up = to get them to head straight there
Right = to circle anticlockwise around to the location/target's left flank using all available intervening cover
Left = to circle clockwise around to the location/target's right flank using all available intervening cover
Down = to hold their current position, making use of nearby cover if attacked
Back = to retreat to just behind your current position, defensively flanking you
The 'rules of engagement' could be defined at the same time by Holding the D-pad and then tapping one of the face buttons before the D-pad was released:
Red = Red Alert - "belligerent, attack first"
Yellow = Yellow Alert - "passive, only fight back"
Green = All Clear - "healing, rest & restore from fatigue phase"
Blue = Sneak - "stealth approach, avoiding combat as it discloses position"
Obviously, this is a very long post and I am well aware that few of you will take the time to read/comment on it. I don't actually care. The reason I like to go into all of this detail is that I don't think it is fair of all of us to bleat on about game X or Y being rubbish without saying why. What do we want? What would work? What are publishers getting wrong? Are the priorities of developer's correct in this gen?
When a game as interesting as Project Offset is glimpsed whilst still in development I feel we have an opportunity to influence its design.
After all, publishers are driven by marketing departments and marketing departments listen closely to focus groups.
I don't mean to be impertinent in my detailed suggestions. I mean to help.
I don't like to be sceptical of aspirations to Cinematic swordplay without making what I feel is a constructive technical criticism.
Anyway, enough of me being boring... just be relieved I didn't tell you about the game I'm actually working on:
Universe.
