For me it depends on the game. Stalker had multiple weapons but it was ok because the game was hard and had a weight limit. Call of duty type of games with lots of guns would make it even more boring in my opinion.
Why do we have this system? (gun swapping)
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Having less guns forces you to develop a style and allows you to play a "class" even if the other game mechanics don't make it clear.
For instance, say you're playing gears of war (the shooter I play most often).. using a Lancer and Hammerburst feels a lot different then using a Longshot and Boomshot as your preferred weapon.. Any two combinations of weapons makes the gameplay feel totally different as you shuffle between them, depending on the circumstances.
For instance, say you're playing gears of war (the shooter I play most often).. using a Lancer and Hammerburst feels a lot different then using a Longshot and Boomshot as your preferred weapon.. Any two combinations of weapons makes the gameplay feel totally different as you shuffle between them, depending on the circumstances.
Tactical only works in my mind if I have 3 or 4 guns as I can then plan on a good build rather praying my 1 boss killer and 1 minion killer are the right ones for whatever the next boss is. Pray you don?t upgrade the wrong gun ect.The_Blue_Rider said:
Every game is different and there is no right number of guns in every game. Bioshock infinite would need 4 before I buy it.
See we can get more dakka and play smart. You could even make it slot based BFG, rifle, pistol. Do you take the minigun or the rocket launcher? Sniper or machine gun? Back up gun revolver or maybe a semi auto group killer?
I think the two gun setup is just easy to do so developers do it.
It's worth mentioning (don't know if someone beat me to it, sorry if they did) that there are those of us that are happy to have any number of guns available, so long as it can be explained where they're being stored. Metal Gear was a little goofy with their excuse, but essentially spare weapons were in the backpack (which couldn't be seen and also held a giant Alligator hat. Love that franchise) which is fine, they address it at least. In a science fiction setting you could claim weapons are constructed from a databank using nanobots whenever you select them. For a contemporary game you'll need to display on the character model where each weapon is being stored, pistols holstered at the belt, rifles hanging from a sling etc. So long as you can explain why I have eight guns in my inventory and the explanation fits with the setting, it's totally fine.
I don't know. Apart from being able to limit when players can use what weapons (for example by only supplying a grenade launcher and ammo for it when there are helicopters involved), I think it's much of a muchness. Whichever system the game happens to be designed around will of course be better for that game, but I would prefer weapon wheels for variety, and I'm generally a console player. Explains my liking of Ratchet and Clank and Resistance.
Realism isn't a concern for me, and frankly anyone who objects to weapon wheels but thinks it's perfectly fine for Skyrim characters to lug around half a Dwarven mine unhindered and a whole one if they don't mind crawling is being a tad unreasonable.
Realism isn't a concern for me, and frankly anyone who objects to weapon wheels but thinks it's perfectly fine for Skyrim characters to lug around half a Dwarven mine unhindered and a whole one if they don't mind crawling is being a tad unreasonable.
It requires you to be more tactical.
If have two light weapons such as a pistol and a sub-machine gun and come across a tank/armoured target, you need to rethink your tactics. If you had access to all weapons, you could breeze through the game being able to counter every enemy with ease.
It's like class based games. If TF2 gave every class the same weapons, there'd be no tactics at all would there. Everybody could do everything. Weapon limits provide something similar, they make you stronger in some areas, and weaker in others. They force you to decide how you are going to approach a situation, and require you to try and plan ahead.
If have two light weapons such as a pistol and a sub-machine gun and come across a tank/armoured target, you need to rethink your tactics. If you had access to all weapons, you could breeze through the game being able to counter every enemy with ease.
It's like class based games. If TF2 gave every class the same weapons, there'd be no tactics at all would there. Everybody could do everything. Weapon limits provide something similar, they make you stronger in some areas, and weaker in others. They force you to decide how you are going to approach a situation, and require you to try and plan ahead.
I don't hate it, don't love it, but for game design reason's I can see why it's done.
Personally I really liked Tomb Raiders (2013) 4 gun system. Not too many and each gun has it's place... except the pistol, nobody uses the pistol.
Personally I really liked Tomb Raiders (2013) 4 gun system. Not too many and each gun has it's place... except the pistol, nobody uses the pistol.
Theres that, but its never really an issue in Infinite to be honest, what with the accessories you can get to boost certain traits, and the vigors you can use, theres never really a situation that you cant handle, even with punier weapons. Especially later in the game when you upgrade charge so that you have brief invincibilty afterwards, then coupled with the piece of gear that causes melee'd enemies to take 2x damage (Charge counts as a melee hit). It makes every enemy rather trivial.2fish said:
Although I will agree maybe carrying around even just one more weapon would've made things more interesting. Since I stuck with the Carbine/Shotgun setup throughout the whole game essentially
It's unrealistic, but I liked the fact that you could carry all the guns you would want. For example, my favourite shooter is Metal Arms: Glitch in the System, in which you had 9 or so guns. Sure, usually you stuck to one or two guns, but if you wanted to you could blast your way through with any other gun. Weapon selection was pretty easy: hold down the reload button and a menu pops up. Both trigger buttons cycle through your inventory, you usually had your change of weapon within a second or two. And as long as you don't switch out too often, this never breaks the flow of the game. They made it even better in multiplayer, where opening the menu doesn't pause the game (as it does in singleplayer), so you could still run around, so there's never any downtime (you couldn't shoot, as the shoot buttons were used to navigate the menu screen).
The game switched gears enough that you basically had to switch weapons repeatedly, as there wasn't a gun that was better in every situation. I get that having only two or three guns is more realistic, and I see the appeal to it, but I love the fact that at any time, you could change strategy halfway through and go nuts.
Dang, I've just realised how long it's been since I played that game, now I wanna play it again.
The game switched gears enough that you basically had to switch weapons repeatedly, as there wasn't a gun that was better in every situation. I get that having only two or three guns is more realistic, and I see the appeal to it, but I love the fact that at any time, you could change strategy halfway through and go nuts.
Dang, I've just realised how long it's been since I played that game, now I wanna play it again.
I can't believe so many people are upset by the mere proposition of a shooter doing things a tiny bit differently, and *GASP* giving you choices.
It only breaks immersion in the same way regenerating health / magic health packs and re-spawning do; if it's built into the game from get go, and allowed to become second nature, or taken for granted, I really don't think it'll ruin it for you.
I don't think the OP is advocating just getting rid of all games where you are locked into the choice to weapon swap 2 or 3 games. They're wondering where the CHOICE has gone; why more games don't give you choice. Why is it so wrong to ask that? Are you really that scared that if someone perceives a flaw in a game that the game will disappear in a puff of logic?
OT: It exists because of one dev finding a way to make switching easier (for our sake), and further devs reducing the number of guns to make their lives easier. Doom may have hotkey'd a whole score of guns, but it's easier to program 2 or 3. Now its become a habit and or the norm, and so its more prevalent. This will one day change, and the norm will go back to more guns when devs and publishers feel like that's what we want, even if its just for niche games with a smaller individual chunk of the shooter market.
This is why I like PC, more hotkeys to attach things to, or just using the scroll wheel to get to another gun, if a bit clumsily so. However if the gun choices are samey or there are only 4ish types I don't mind just having the option to switch between 2 or 3, but when I do it has to be a quick change with no fumbling, or I get bored (Mass effect 2 and the wheel). I wish there was a quick change thing for weapons in fallout 3, getting really sick of seeing my pip boy screen. (If there is, tell me how!)
It only breaks immersion in the same way regenerating health / magic health packs and re-spawning do; if it's built into the game from get go, and allowed to become second nature, or taken for granted, I really don't think it'll ruin it for you.
I don't think the OP is advocating just getting rid of all games where you are locked into the choice to weapon swap 2 or 3 games. They're wondering where the CHOICE has gone; why more games don't give you choice. Why is it so wrong to ask that? Are you really that scared that if someone perceives a flaw in a game that the game will disappear in a puff of logic?
OT: It exists because of one dev finding a way to make switching easier (for our sake), and further devs reducing the number of guns to make their lives easier. Doom may have hotkey'd a whole score of guns, but it's easier to program 2 or 3. Now its become a habit and or the norm, and so its more prevalent. This will one day change, and the norm will go back to more guns when devs and publishers feel like that's what we want, even if its just for niche games with a smaller individual chunk of the shooter market.
This is why I like PC, more hotkeys to attach things to, or just using the scroll wheel to get to another gun, if a bit clumsily so. However if the gun choices are samey or there are only 4ish types I don't mind just having the option to switch between 2 or 3, but when I do it has to be a quick change with no fumbling, or I get bored (Mass effect 2 and the wheel). I wish there was a quick change thing for weapons in fallout 3, getting really sick of seeing my pip boy screen. (If there is, tell me how!)
Well that "more tactical" excuse is invalid, simply because you never know what enemies you will be facing in 2 minutes. You may unwittingly bring a sword to gunfight, so to say. The only real explanation for having 2-weapons limit I see is HURR DURR COD DID IT HURR DURR BATTLFIELD TOO
Except I already explained this. Since you can generally pick up your enemy's weapon's in such shooters this really isn't an excuse. Also, competant designers will give you ample opportunity to get ahold of the right weapon. It's more to design for a wide variety of engagements though.Hawkeye21 said:
I'm not an expert, but wasn't Halo the one to make this a popular thing?
While I prefer the magic Marry-Poppins-style-bag with guns and rockets in it, I can see where something like limited weapon pick up can fit into. Ironically, I'd say that it actually fits in better with less tactical/strategic style games where you could get through just about any situation using any weapon, leaving it down to preference rather than overwhelming the player with a big bag full of options that they don't really need. In a game like this it's more organic to have a quick button press to switch between 2-3 weapons, whereas a more intense (for lack of a better word) game would be better letting you switch 'tween your trusty SMG, reliable shotgun, supportive sniper, dependable rocket launcher, and your "wild card" weapon. Kinda like in the Half Life series.
While I prefer the magic Marry-Poppins-style-bag with guns and rockets in it, I can see where something like limited weapon pick up can fit into. Ironically, I'd say that it actually fits in better with less tactical/strategic style games where you could get through just about any situation using any weapon, leaving it down to preference rather than overwhelming the player with a big bag full of options that they don't really need. In a game like this it's more organic to have a quick button press to switch between 2-3 weapons, whereas a more intense (for lack of a better word) game would be better letting you switch 'tween your trusty SMG, reliable shotgun, supportive sniper, dependable rocket launcher, and your "wild card" weapon. Kinda like in the Half Life series.
I really like having many different guns. Bioshock did well in this regard, and I used all the guns for different enemies. Having three different ammo types for each gun was perhaps a bit overkill, but I thought it was neat. It gave me more choices.
Sometimes I'm not that fond of being able to carry every single gun in the game. There have been a few instances where I completely forget that a weapon exists until it appears after I scroll my inventory. With a weapon limit I can experiment with each weapon and find out the strengths and weaknesses of them, instead of being surprised that I have a Chemical Thrower that I forgot I picked up several levels ago.
I will admit though that sometimes the two-weapon limit can be a bit stingy. I liked Bulletstorm's three weapon limit (although being stuck with the PMC technically makes it two) or the four weapon limit from Borderlands. It allows you to keep track of which guns you're using while giving you some room to choose which one to unleash.
I will admit though that sometimes the two-weapon limit can be a bit stingy. I liked Bulletstorm's three weapon limit (although being stuck with the PMC technically makes it two) or the four weapon limit from Borderlands. It allows you to keep track of which guns you're using while giving you some room to choose which one to unleash.
I'm pretty sure this makes up about 0% of the actual reason. Here in console land, we actually can count just as high as other people and like more guns if it works well, no different to PC gaming.Auron said:
Personally... I don't really want more than 2 guns! 1 for my main weapon, 1 for if that runs out and I can't be bothered to reload. Any more and there will inevitably be one that I don't use.
I wouldn't automatically say they're copying COD all day long. It's not like all of these games are employing the loadout system that unlocks weapons as you level up. Bioshock Infinite gives you all of your guns straight up, Left 4 Dead limits you to a primary and some pistol choices. In Orion: Dino Horde you use credits to buy new, stronger weapons.DVS BSTrD said:
Hell, RAGE gave you all of your weapons straight up Half Life 2 style. It wasn't even a great game. I don't think weapon choice is the biggest complaint, considering it's what all level design is based on.
I don't judge a game based on how they give me my guns; I judge a game based on how artistic and fun it is. If the game can pull of two weapons, fantastic.
It always throws me out of the game... hard to suspend realism when you're carrying around a longarm with another somewhere in Hammerspace... so every time you have to swap, you wonder where you put the other one. If it's strapped to your back, there's no way in hell you'd be able to move as well as an FPS protagonist does. Trust me, I've done it in real life.
You want realism? You should be allowed one longarm and one sidearm. If your longarm is slung, you move more slowly and have a chance of tripping if you try anything fancy... and swapping for a different weapon should take a long time... universal mag pouches aren't actually very universal. Oh yes, and magazines themselves... they don't always come full, and if you retrieve them from the ground they're often full of mud or sand... I could go on for days...
We were better off running 60MPH and carrying 10 gigantic rocket launchers. Then there was nothing to suspend, we were just goofing off and having fun.
You want realism? You should be allowed one longarm and one sidearm. If your longarm is slung, you move more slowly and have a chance of tripping if you try anything fancy... and swapping for a different weapon should take a long time... universal mag pouches aren't actually very universal. Oh yes, and magazines themselves... they don't always come full, and if you retrieve them from the ground they're often full of mud or sand... I could go on for days...
We were better off running 60MPH and carrying 10 gigantic rocket launchers. Then there was nothing to suspend, we were just goofing off and having fun.