Why aren't their any FPS's in the industrial period?

[Twilight_guy]

Why not go make one then? Better yet, since time period is asset driven, why not reskin a game to make it into another period? Put the idea forth in a mod community, organize things and watch it get done. Developers don't have the time or financial resources to make everything so if you make it and it gets big you can start a trend and change things.

 

[Norix596]

Because few gamers would enjoy lots of bolt/lever action gunplay.

 

[Zaik]

I always thought a WW one shooter relying on teamwork due to the slow weapons fire, slow vehicles, and brutal battle entry points would be cool. Considering then we had lever and bolt action rifles plus the machine gun emplacement it would mean you stick with others and you fight. Fight to win and to survive long enough to get a shot off because in this world if you get startled by someone when they jump in front of you you can't just spray like a mad man and hope to kill them first. No in that WWi era game you will try to bayonet the mother fucker or you will die.

Trenches and no-mans-land could make for some AWESOME conflicts if the right dev got into the idea.

World war one was the bloodiest combat seen by the world(WW 2 had the highest body count maybe but was not as brutal fighting in a giant fucking stalemate along trenches) so if the right devs with the proper imagination got into it they could make a brilliant game. With those weapons it would be much more of a brutal survival type combat than we have today. Yeah lacks the rapid fire dickery we apparently love so much but if they do it right they can go past that.

Funny story, the other 40% of Darkest of Days is actually during WW1, battles specifically involving Germany and Russia. The goal still has nothing to do with the war at all, but you end up playing on both sides and at one point switching sides to shoot artillery at yourself. I thought that was neat.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

I have been wondering this for years why any major developer hasn't made a major release of the american revolution? or maybe the civil war, or the siege of Vienna, or of Napoleon's campaigns? These seem like excellent story lines for a FPS game, it seems weird no one has even scratched the surface of the genre. It seems promising for a great multilayer experience as well. I think it would be a nice refreshing FPS instead of the flood of ww2 games and modern warfare games.

So Escapist, how you like A FPS like that?

Well all of those confilcts you mentioned took place before the invention of the bolt-action rifle (EDIT - except the American Cival War), and so I am assuming you are envisaging an FPS game with muskets and the like? There is one sticking point with a musket-based shooter, however: the 20-30 second reload time.

So no, I wouldn't play an FPS set in that era. A turn based strategy, yes. An FPS, no.

 

[Chemical Alia]

I'm sure it could be pulled off somehow. Just no stupid steampunk shit.

 

[ace_of_something]

I'm very confused why people are saying the guns of the industrial era suck and take forever to reload?
Isn't the industrial era like the 1880's-1910's? In which guns were pretty much the ones we associate with cowboys?

Unless they're referring to your other examples.

 

[Guido656]

I feel like this topic has been done before. The reason nobody has made any FPSs in that era is that there is exactly 0 variety in the weapons, not to mention that they would be incredibly inaccurate and take forever to reload. The maps would mostly be the same, as they would usually be varieties on "open field #3".

In short, any shooter made in that era would be boring and repetitive, and not very fun. Good story concept does not equal good game concept.

I gotta say, I disagree. I think the lack of variety in weapons, reloading times and maps are all trivial things, that with good story telling and design ideas, can be easily overcome.

You could just make the player-character reload faster, think up weapons that are not the standard pistol, shotgun, machinegun fare. And the maps? There are many places/buildings you could choose to set a game level in that era rather than a field.

I think even with a slightly open mind the kind of 'limitations' you are talking about could actually inspire some serious creative thinking and potentially, with the right team behind it, a really great game.

 

[Thespian]

IMHO, Futuristic shooters are the best ones... If it's not futuristic, steampunk with some sort of magic element works too. But old, clunky, slow guns don't make for a fun game.

 

[majes]

This is why steampunk exists. You can get the aesthetics of the time period, but you don't need the trade-off between historical accuracy and good game play.

 

[Croaker42]

Or perhaps other historical situations that were interesting.
Or theoretical wars that will most likely never happen.
Or throw in a dash of sci-fi.
- Canada invades America and kicks its ass. (Well it kind of did that once)
- The Dutch invade the rest of continental Europe.
- The welsh take over England
- A portal in time rips open the old Roman Empire invades modern times. (They pick up new things so well)
- You play a plain clothes police officer during the Velvet Revolution.
- Make a political statement on June 4th in Tiananmen Square. (While finding out that Aliens are in control of the Chinese gov?t.)

 

[Dorian]

Because Reloading: Longer, Harder, More Annoying Than Ever makes for a shitty game title.

Really, that'd be 60% of the gameplay right there. Reloading. No possible way to get around it believably.

So either you're bored to death from watching a scripted event for 30 seconds after about 5 second intervals of aiming, or you play a LOATHESOME mini-game each and every time.

Lose-lose.

 

[DustyDrB]

Because Reloading: Longer, Harder, More Annoying Than Ever makes for a shitty game title.

Really, that'd be 60% of the gameplay right there. Reloading. No possible way to get around it believably.

So either you're bored to death from watching a scripted event for 30 seconds after about 5 second intervals of aiming, or you play a LOATHESOME mini-game each and every time.

Lose-lose.

Why would it have to be realistic? Wouldn't it be worth it to take creative liberties in order to experience a different setting?

 

[Atmos Duality]

So anyways, yeah, just look for mods, the modding community is overlooked far too much in all the rhetoric about 'the medium moving forward.'

While this is true in practice (and I highly encourage looking into mods for your games if possible), most Publishers have been trying very hard to quash all external modding for their games in the last 4-5 years.
Why? Because mods might interfere with DLC sales.

 

[Pedro The Hutt]

Because Reloading: Longer, Harder, More Annoying Than Ever makes for a shitty game title.

Really, that'd be 60% of the gameplay right there. Reloading. No possible way to get around it believably.

So either you're bored to death from watching a scripted event for 30 seconds after about 5 second intervals of aiming, or you play a LOATHESOME mini-game each and every time.

Lose-lose.

Why would it have to be realistic? Wouldn't it be worth it to take creative liberties in order to experience a different setting?

That would defeat the purpose of making it a period game though if your good old circle strafing tactics work there like in any other FPS that takes place after the invention of the SMG.