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Old 02-16-2006, 08:44 AM   #29
AFGNCAAP
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Join Date: Nov 2003
Location: Poland
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fov
I haven't played DOTT, so I can't speak to how it's used in that game, but what's interesting to me about switching characters in this one is that for the most part it's not puzzle-dependent. Yeah, in GK2 and BS3 you can occasionally switch from one character to the other at will, but it's always driven by the puzzle you're trying to solve and the need to get at it from the other character's perspective.

In Cow Race, you can just decide to switch at many points in the game. I did it because I wasn't sure what to do next with one guy so I moved to another. It kept the game moving when I might have ended up in need of a hint if I only had the one character to control. It also has a neat effect on linearity... the game feels a lot less linear because you can move from character to character at will, but you still have narrative structure -- not one, but three. Usually in an adventure game it's one or the other, either you have a strong narrative or you have open-ended gameplay. Telltale has found a way to make the game non-linear and to follow a narrative at the same time.
Yes, GK2 or BS3 had this option turned on in predetermined places only, but other games mentioned by Udvarnoky and me, like Maniac Mansion or Gobliiins, were built entirely around this idea (and Fahrenheit probably sits somewhere in the middle, because there are not many moments when you can choose a character, but the feature is an important part of the game's identity). Yes, often the collaboration between the characters was necessary to make progress. But the way you describe it (ie. the cousins' subplots are almost independent), I'm not sure how it's different (in terms of linearity or getting stuck) from having one character and three independent goals to pursue. EDIT: I see how it allows tighter narrative(s), though.
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