Yes, roles model. That's not a typo.
MMOs and other multiplayer games could learn a great deal from Left 4 Dead, particularly in regard to combat roles. In Left 4 Dead, no person in the group is mysteriously regarded by all enemies as the tank, so all players have to keep an eye on each other.
"Grouping" hardly describes it. This is as close to real soldier camaraderie as I've ever experienced in a game. You have to constantly watch the backs of your buddies. They rely on you completely; they pay for your mistakes... not with minor injuries, but with their lives. You're sharing resources -- whoever needs a healthpack most gets it, regardless of who happens to be carrying one. You can only carry one at a time, so giving is always a sacrifice.
And perhaps that's the key component. More than any game to date, Left 4 Dead enables and encourages sacrifices for the sake of teammates. Sometimes you sacrifice pills or healthpacks. Sometimes you sacrifice your life.
I'm not stretching the truth. Among my friends in Left 4 Dead, it's not uncommon to see true sacrifices -- selfless acceptance of hardship for the sake of another. One person will speak into his headset, "Don't come get me", because he knows the rest of us stand a better chance of surviving if we don't chase his captured and pinned character into the middle of an unmanageable horde. Death means he is only a spectator for minutes at a time... possily a long time. Sometimes the player healing another with his healthpack is down to half-health himself, but he's chosen to help the person with the most need.
It's honestly pretty touching, and a phenomenon all game developers should take note of. With the unlikeliest of settings, a zombie infestation, a game has managed to contribute a deep and lasting lesson to gamers. People can learn more about being a soldier from playing Left 4 Dead than from most war games, and even many documentaries.
Showing posts with label death. Show all posts
Showing posts with label death. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Permadeath and sacrifice
Brian made an interesting comment to his blog about the nature of evil:
I've written before about heroism and sacrifice in games, but it's interesting to consider specific sacrifices being directly designed as possibilities.
For example, in a permadeath game, it would be possible to offer players specific skills/abilities which would be powerful enough to save one's teammates (or other entities) but ensure permanent death to that character. In other words... a true sacrifice.
Our whole group is near death and a new horde of enemies is just arriving to finish us off, so I call upon my Divine Charge ability... which I earned through a quest or some other trial. My character sprints toward the horde as I'm gradually surrounded in a blinding white light. When I hit the horde, there's an explosive flash of light and smoke. As the smoke clears, the enemies lie dead in a circle, and my character is gone forever. My groupmates, on the other hand, are saved.
How can sacrifice be designed for in a game without permadeath?
I'll try to come back with some ideas later, but I want to throw that question out there for now.
edit: Cameron's comment reminded me an example of non-permadeath sacrifice I proposed in a previous post:
Does this scenario represent a player's opportunity for true sacrifice?
"One problem is that games don't provide real opportunities for heroism, because there are no opporunties for sacrifice. Throwing yourself at an enemy in an act that guarantees your death is meaningless, because you're only "wasting" a few minutes of your time. This is one of the reasons I don't ignore permadeath arguments, because I think it gives people more opportunities for heroism and truly noble acts."
I've written before about heroism and sacrifice in games, but it's interesting to consider specific sacrifices being directly designed as possibilities.
For example, in a permadeath game, it would be possible to offer players specific skills/abilities which would be powerful enough to save one's teammates (or other entities) but ensure permanent death to that character. In other words... a true sacrifice.
Our whole group is near death and a new horde of enemies is just arriving to finish us off, so I call upon my Divine Charge ability... which I earned through a quest or some other trial. My character sprints toward the horde as I'm gradually surrounded in a blinding white light. When I hit the horde, there's an explosive flash of light and smoke. As the smoke clears, the enemies lie dead in a circle, and my character is gone forever. My groupmates, on the other hand, are saved.
How can sacrifice be designed for in a game without permadeath?
I'll try to come back with some ideas later, but I want to throw that question out there for now.
edit: Cameron's comment reminded me an example of non-permadeath sacrifice I proposed in a previous post:
"You've discovered an epic weapon which belonged to a great hero of the city Stoneridge. By removing the weapon from his bones, you have upset the hero's spirit. As long as the weapon is parted from the hero's tomb, his angry spirit haunts the city. Stoneridge citizens are angry with you for dishonoring their hero and causing the haunting. Do you return the weapon, despite its great stats? Do you abandon the town, ignoring the NPCs' troubles and the complaints of other players that some of the Stoneridge merchants are charging higher prices to people of your faction and/or guild? Do you seek out the ghost, and make a compact that allows you to keep the weapon if you'll use it to follow in the hero's footsteps as long as you possess it (such as keeping the city's surrounding population of bandits down to a particular level, perhaps with the aid of friends)?"
Does this scenario represent a player's opportunity for true sacrifice?
Monday, July 30, 2007
Ding! = extra life
Remember how, in classic arcade games (Galaga, Pac-Man, even Mario Bros.), "levelling up" meant racking up enough points that you win an extra life?
This is an option for MMOs.
Trials of Ascension (which never made it to release, but had some good basic ideas) is the first MMO design I'm aware of to use a life-counter system. Delayed permadeath, you might call it. Characters would be allowed as many as 100 deaths before finally experiencing permadeath (which ToA helped to offset with lasting character impact on the gameworld and character artifacts).
What if the player started out with fewer lives, but could also gain extra lives through racking up points? The player's "score" would take the form of his or her character level, thereby acting like a "high score" ranking table. A high level could be considered a genuine accomplishment to be proud of.
In fact, what if character levels had nothing to do with skills and hp (at least, past a particular level)? What if levels were only about score and extra lives?
GIVING UP CONTROL
Of course, there's a notable difference between MMOs and arcade games that prevents current MMO models from making character levels more like player scores. Some might say levels are already used that way to some degree, but I think most players are more proud of the increased combat power that's associated with new levels than proud of the levels themselves. The troublesome difference between arcade games and MMOs is the player's degree of control over the game encounters.
In a classic arcade game, gameplay is about reaction. Sure, you might be making meaningful choices (like whether to pick up the Splash weapon or Laser in Contra), but you're limited to choosing between things that come to you... not you to them. The player is funneled down a particular path, encountering objects and events that the developer chose for the player to experience at that particular time. The player can only continue pushing forward, overcoming whatever obstacles present themselves, with no expectation of control over where the adventure will lead.
Because MMOs traditionally offer players much greater control over their adventures, the difficulty of levelling up can be determined largely by the player. I could challenge tough enemies, risking death but accruing greater experience-per-kill. Or I could take the easy road, levelling up slowly but safely by killing weaker enemies.
If we wanted levelling to act as a scoring system, we wouldn't want to reward people for tip-toeing their way to the highest scores. A fundamental change would have to be made to the traditional MMO model.
What comes to you
The change is one I would probably make even without this sort of scoring system: take control out of the player's hands.
I would offer some predictable content for a predictable length of playtime. But overall, let players experience adventure as it is in epic stories and all of the great novels they've read. Let them be faced with encounters they didn't choose or expect. Make it more like those classic arcade games in that your (the player's) control is more over what you do with the events thrown your way than over what events you experience.
I love open worlds. It's one of the main features that attracts me to the MMO genre. But being able to journey in any direction and not being bound to one storyline don't mean players must be able to select their game experiences as if from a fast-food menu.
In a less predictable world, players could still choose genres of adventure to suit their moods: urban market, jungle, horror, open sea, mountain trails, etc. They could also be aware of the general range of possible events which might occur in those places, like knowing what creatures inhabit the area. They just wouldn't be able to schedule encounters like they're boxing matches.
Anyway. Obviously, I could go on forever about making MMO worlds dynamic and unpredictable. But the point here is that it would be a necessary step if a developer was to make levels less about skills and power, more about longevity and prestige. I don't think such a system would always be the best way, but it seems like a good option.
This is an option for MMOs.
Trials of Ascension (which never made it to release, but had some good basic ideas) is the first MMO design I'm aware of to use a life-counter system. Delayed permadeath, you might call it. Characters would be allowed as many as 100 deaths before finally experiencing permadeath (which ToA helped to offset with lasting character impact on the gameworld and character artifacts).
What if the player started out with fewer lives, but could also gain extra lives through racking up points? The player's "score" would take the form of his or her character level, thereby acting like a "high score" ranking table. A high level could be considered a genuine accomplishment to be proud of.
In fact, what if character levels had nothing to do with skills and hp (at least, past a particular level)? What if levels were only about score and extra lives?
GIVING UP CONTROL
Of course, there's a notable difference between MMOs and arcade games that prevents current MMO models from making character levels more like player scores. Some might say levels are already used that way to some degree, but I think most players are more proud of the increased combat power that's associated with new levels than proud of the levels themselves. The troublesome difference between arcade games and MMOs is the player's degree of control over the game encounters.
In a classic arcade game, gameplay is about reaction. Sure, you might be making meaningful choices (like whether to pick up the Splash weapon or Laser in Contra), but you're limited to choosing between things that come to you... not you to them. The player is funneled down a particular path, encountering objects and events that the developer chose for the player to experience at that particular time. The player can only continue pushing forward, overcoming whatever obstacles present themselves, with no expectation of control over where the adventure will lead.
Because MMOs traditionally offer players much greater control over their adventures, the difficulty of levelling up can be determined largely by the player. I could challenge tough enemies, risking death but accruing greater experience-per-kill. Or I could take the easy road, levelling up slowly but safely by killing weaker enemies.
If we wanted levelling to act as a scoring system, we wouldn't want to reward people for tip-toeing their way to the highest scores. A fundamental change would have to be made to the traditional MMO model.
What comes to you
The change is one I would probably make even without this sort of scoring system: take control out of the player's hands.
I would offer some predictable content for a predictable length of playtime. But overall, let players experience adventure as it is in epic stories and all of the great novels they've read. Let them be faced with encounters they didn't choose or expect. Make it more like those classic arcade games in that your (the player's) control is more over what you do with the events thrown your way than over what events you experience.
I love open worlds. It's one of the main features that attracts me to the MMO genre. But being able to journey in any direction and not being bound to one storyline don't mean players must be able to select their game experiences as if from a fast-food menu.
In a less predictable world, players could still choose genres of adventure to suit their moods: urban market, jungle, horror, open sea, mountain trails, etc. They could also be aware of the general range of possible events which might occur in those places, like knowing what creatures inhabit the area. They just wouldn't be able to schedule encounters like they're boxing matches.
Anyway. Obviously, I could go on forever about making MMO worlds dynamic and unpredictable. But the point here is that it would be a necessary step if a developer was to make levels less about skills and power, more about longevity and prestige. I don't think such a system would always be the best way, but it seems like a good option.
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