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Lucien21 · 03-21-2010, 07:06 AM

To determine whether it is an adventure game or not will come down to personl opinion and your own personal definitions.

Why are people so keen to pidgeon hole things in to neat little categories and get hot under the collor if something stretches the boundaries?

I would say that the comparisons to Dragon's Lair are lazy and only superficial. Dragon's Lair used a series of QTE's with only one possible path.If you choose the wrong option it was game over. The game played the exact same with every playthrough. In fact normal QTE's, that people keep saying this game has in spades, all have fail states like Dragon's Lair, this game doesn't. (I.e Fail to hit X and you die or have to start again. in Heavy Rain Fail to hit X and you get a different outcome and the story continues.)

Most of the controller movements in the game make sense in context and had it used the Playstation Move controller rather than a Dual Shock would have felt perfectly natural to strike a match by replicating the motion. It takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural very quickly.

If you want to compare the game to the official AG definition then Adventure Games are made up of 3 parts..

Narrative - Something this game has in abundance.

Exploration - Each scene has an area to explore to find new interaction, new ways to "play" the story. For example the store robbery. You can explore the store, walk up and down the aisles, hide in the back and let the guy die; talk the guy down until he leaves; sneak up and hit him with a bottle; Talk to him and then jump him or you can get shot and die yourself.

Puzzles - This one is the most obscure, but the definition states different type of puzzles. Inventory (Very limited in this game, but then so does Myst), Dialogue (There are dialogue trees with different outcomes), Environmental (This probably fits best in that altering the scenes and situations will have an effect on the ending), Non Contextual (none of these Mystish puzzles).

I think IMO it fits the definition as an series of dialogue and environmental puzzles strung together in a narrative that allows exploration of the narrative and it's surroundings to achieve one of the 22 seperate endings.

03-21-2010, 07:06 AM	#12
Lucien21 Psychonaut Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Edinburgh Posts: 5,114	To determine whether it is an adventure game or not will come down to personl opinion and your own personal definitions. Why are people so keen to pidgeon hole things in to neat little categories and get hot under the collor if something stretches the boundaries? I would say that the comparisons to Dragon's Lair are lazy and only superficial. Dragon's Lair used a series of QTE's with only one possible path.If you choose the wrong option it was game over. The game played the exact same with every playthrough. In fact normal QTE's, that people keep saying this game has in spades, all have fail states like Dragon's Lair, this game doesn't. (I.e Fail to hit X and you die or have to start again. in Heavy Rain Fail to hit X and you get a different outcome and the story continues.) Most of the controller movements in the game make sense in context and had it used the Playstation Move controller rather than a Dual Shock would have felt perfectly natural to strike a match by replicating the motion. It takes a little getting used to, but feels pretty natural very quickly. If you want to compare the game to the official AG definition then Adventure Games are made up of 3 parts.. Narrative - Something this game has in abundance. Exploration - Each scene has an area to explore to find new interaction, new ways to "play" the story. For example the store robbery. You can explore the store, walk up and down the aisles, hide in the back and let the guy die; talk the guy down until he leaves; sneak up and hit him with a bottle; Talk to him and then jump him or you can get shot and die yourself. Puzzles - This one is the most obscure, but the definition states different type of puzzles. Inventory (Very limited in this game, but then so does Myst), Dialogue (There are dialogue trees with different outcomes), Environmental (This probably fits best in that altering the scenes and situations will have an effect on the ending), Non Contextual (none of these Mystish puzzles). I think IMO it fits the definition as an series of dialogue and environmental puzzles strung together in a narrative that allows exploration of the narrative and it's surroundings to achieve one of the 22 seperate endings. __________________ I'm not insane, my mother had me tested!