[insane_cobra]

While I was playing The Incredibles the other day, I came to realize something. Sands of Time was a short game because it was brilliantly designed, it was short because it was good. It did its best to remain accessible to the player and didn't do anything to artificially increase its length. What does this have to do with The Incredibles and the title of this thread? To answer that question, I'll have to quote... Myself!

Originally Posted by me, speaking of The Incredibles

Another problem is the design of some platforming levels. There's a distinct possibility that you'll spend some 10 to 15 minutes traversing a certain level section only to make a single poorly judged jump mere inches away from the next checkpoint and poof! - you're back at the beginning. Yes, Mr. Incredible will survive the fall, but you'll still have to replay that whole portion which is sometimes both time consuming and difficult.

The Incredibles is not the only game with that problem, in fact, a great deal of platformers share it. But it's not limited to platformers. How many times did you play a game and suddenly make that one fatal mistake only to realize you last saved your game maybe half an hour ago? Sands of Time dealt with that problem elegantly, you were able to simply turn back the clock. It was cleverly incorporated into its story, but I firmly believe every action(-ish) game should have such a rewinding feature. Why not? If we can accept it takes a dozen of bullets to kill someone, if it's possible for someone to carry numerous large objects in his pockets, if we accept that we can freeze the moment in time and call it a savegame, than why not rewinding? Sure, we'd need some clever mechanisms to keep the games from becoming too easy, but then again, do we really need them? If you don't feel like using the feature, then by all means, don't use it! Many people avoid twitchy games because they find them too frustrating. Maybe this could help some of them enjoy such games more without feeling like cheaters? And for those who prefer not to use it, it could be disabled in the harder difficulties. Or better yet, every time you lose a life, you get the right to one rewind. You could then choose to use them often or save them all for boss encounters or even not use them at all. I believe what matters the most is the quality and intensity of experience, not its length. And besides, constant reloading breaks the flow. What do you think?

What are some other features you believe every game could substantially benefit from? Maybe not every game, but every game of a certain genre or style. Let's hear some ideas.

And no, Trepsie, Sam Fisher's ass doesn't qualify as an essential feature.

[Dark Veil]

Essantial features huh, ehm....

BULLET TIME!

Veilie

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Autosave and the option to save anywhere at anytime.

[simpson_yellow]

Whilst I like 'save-anywhere' functionality, I'd actually like to see a little less of it in the FPS genre. I just played Far Cry and I loved the save system (although I suspect I'm the only person who did). The checkpoint system was awesome for increasing anxiety and encouraging cautious play.

As for the rewind feature in Sands of Time, I thought that was brilliant, and I have to agree that I'd like to see it used more. However, it'd be nice to see developers innovate/improve on it, rather than just saturate the market with the exact same thing.

[SoccerDude28]

I definitely say checkpoint save, quicksave and save anywhere. Basically Half Life 2's save system. The problem with console games historically was that there was not enough flash memory to have a snapshot save anywhere, and its not helping that the 360 dropped the hard drive in their cheaper model, and asked the developers to program for the lowest denominator. I'm hoping that developers would provide the people with hard drives the ability to save anywhere, and everybody else a check point save. If you want to make your game challenging, try to rely on gameplay mechanics rather than forcing people to repeat the same sequence 200 times.

As far as Rewind goes, it is a brilliant idea to counter saves anywheres in SOT, but I can tell you from an engineering perspective, it's a lot more work than just providing a single save anywhere.

[SoccerDude28]

One feature I would like to see more of is:

Skip cutscene that I have already scene with a button press

Culprits I can think of: ICO. Again, it augments to the save anywhere, but nothing sucks more than dying frequently and having to watch the same cutscene 10 times. Good ways to fix that is to let people skip cutscenes, and provide them in the menu with all the cutscenes accessible to viewing (like Psychonauts did).

[seebaruk]

Originally Posted by simpson_yellow

I just played Far Cry and I loved the save system (although I suspect I'm the only person who did).

I'm pretty impatient and hate replaying segments again and again, so I hated it. I spent about half an hour sneaking around outside a base, taking down guards using the sniper rifle (this was about my 10th attempt), and then a chopper turned up. I took out the gunner and then, due to some weird bug, I spawned inside the chopper and promptly fell to my death. Another keyboard bites the dust.

Every game should have a crazy talking rabbit in it.

[bigjko]

Originally Posted by seebaruk

Every game should have a crazy talking rabbit in it.

Agreed.

On the topic of save-systems. Scrap them. I hate having to press buttons, or go through menus to save my progress. I mean, what the hell? Are we playing Excel, here? Nothing makes me feel less like I'm playing a game, and more like I'm manipulating images in Photoshop, than seeing "Saving.." floating on my screen. Call me crazy, or whatever, but I'm more interested in playing games than quick saving/loading all the time.

Essential feature of the day: Gameplay Designed To Avoid Bothering Player With Saves.

[Jayel]

Widescreen support.
I don't have a wide screen monitor, but it's the wave of the future

[RLacey]

Originally Posted by Jayel

Widescreen support.
I don't have a wide screen monitor, but it's the wave of the future

As someone with a widescreen monitor, I wholeheartedly endorse this one.

As for save games, the Far Cry system annoyed me. For people wanting the system as a challenge I have no problem, but I like to be able to save whenever I like, and I was annoyed that a quicksave option wasn't even available on the (laughably titled) "Easy" mode. I ended up hacking the game to enable quicksave .

I'd also like most games to rename their "Easy" mode as "Normal", "Normal" as "Hard" and so on. When I read the word "Easy" I expect it to be just that - easy - and I get incredibly annoyed when I find myself unable to progress after about two-thirds of the game. I know that I'm hardly great at FPS games, but I'm also not atrocious, and games like Far Cry were seriously taking the piss with their "Easy" mode. The Thief games had the right idea here - if the easiest difficulty mode isn't easy, don't call it "Easy"...

[/rant]

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Originally Posted by bigjko

Agreed.

On the topic of save-systems. Scrap them. I hate having to press buttons, or go through menus to save my progress. I mean, what the hell? Are we playing Excel, here? Nothing makes me feel less like I'm playing a game, and more like I'm manipulating images in Photoshop, than seeing "Saving.." floating on my screen. Call me crazy, or whatever, but I'm more interested in playing games than quick saving/loading all the time.

Essential feature of the day: Gameplay Designed To Avoid Bothering Player With Saves.

As long as the player still has the option to tell the game to autosave or not.
Otherwise

bigjko

And yeah, you deserve it! You weren't the one who'd have to start from the beginning of a mission in Splinter Cell: PT if you got 3/4 in and goofed up.

[RLacey]

Originally Posted by Intrepid Homoludens

And yeah, you deserve it! You weren't the one who'd have to start from the beginning of a mission in Splinter Cell: PT if you got 3/4 in and goofed up.

*cough* *cough* Hitman: Codename 47 *cough*

One day I may succesfully complete the first level. Possibly.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Tell you what. Let's show up at bigjko's front door with a copy of Hitman: Codename 47 and force the beeyatch to play it at gunpoint.

[simpson_yellow]

Originally Posted by Trep

Tell you what. Let's show up at bigjko's front door with a copy of Hitman: Codename 47 and force the beeyatch to play it at gunpoint.

Bet you quicksave before you knock on his front door.

Originally Posted by RLacey

if the easiest difficulty mode isn't easy, don't call it "Easy"...

Agreed. Far Cry was inordinately difficult on the easier settings - an FPS with a checkpoint save system really needs to have a genuinely easy difficulty.

Originally Posted by seebaruk

Another keyboard bites the dust.

Hehehe

@SD: Yeah, there should be some kind of law against unskippable cutscenes. Along the same lines, unskippable dialogue (once you've already heard it) is a pet peeve of mine.

[Huz]

Originally Posted by simpson_yellow

@SD: Yeah, there should be some kind of law against unskippable cutscenes. Along the same lines, unskippable dialogue (once you've already heard it) is a pet peeve of mine.

The latest Consolevania showcases two features a game should definitely not have: cutscenes that are not skippable, but are pausable! And dialogue that is not only unskippable, but goes on for hours.

Well done Overblood 2.

[Karmillo]

Not just multiple endings but multiple paths, always good for replayability


And jumping, i just hate it when a game gives you direct controll of a character but for some reason they refuse to jump.

[insane_cobra]

Originally Posted by simpson_yellow

As for the rewind feature in Sands of Time, I thought that was brilliant, and I have to agree that I'd like to see it used more. However, it'd be nice to see developers innovate/improve on it, rather than just saturate the market with the exact same thing.

It would be nice, but having it in its basic form should be the bare minimum.

Originally Posted by SoccerDude28

As far as Rewind goes, it is a brilliant idea to counter saves anywheres in SOT, but I can tell you from an engineering perspective, it's a lot more work than just providing a single save anywhere.

I figured that much, but what it offers in return is more than worth it. Besides, if the games were more friendly towards players (not necessarily easier), more people would've played them.

Originally Posted by bigjko

Essential feature of the day: Gameplay Designed To Avoid Bothering Player With Saves.

Fair enough, but what do you suggest as an alternative? Autosave? Checkpoints? Infinite rewind capabilities? Dare I say it, level passwords? How would it all work for players who like being able to save their game in any given moment?

Originally Posted by Karmillo

And jumping, i just hate it when a game gives you direct controll of a character but for some reason they refuse to jump.

Agreed. Or at least design your levels so that the player never ever encounters an elevated platform he cannot climb.

[Orange Brat]

Fair enough, but what do you suggest as an alternative? Autosave? Checkpoints? Infinite rewind capabilities? Dare I say it, level passwords? How would it all work for players who like being able to save their game in any given moment?

There could be a user defined timed autosave. Every "n" minutes the game saves itself. A few checks would need to happen so it doesn't save itself while the game is running in certain states like cutscenes or pause mode. If the player wishes to quit, then it'll save on exit whether the next timed save has occurred or not.

Pausible cutscenes is a good idea...I think I recently played something that had this feature, but I can't recall. Fahrenheit? Realtime rewindable cutscenes would be nice for those times when you miss something or want to see something you thought was cool while still playing the game.

[insane_cobra]

Originally Posted by Orange Brat

There could be a user defined timed autosave. Every "n" minutes the game saves itself. A few checks would need to happen so it doesn't save itself while the game is running in certain states like cutscenes or pause mode. If the player wishes to quit, then it'll save on exit whether the next timed save has occurred or not.

So if you'd want to avoid replaying the large sections of the game, you shoud probably set the "n" value to 1 or 2 minutes. It would generate a huge pile of savegames and each of them could take a few megs of disk space. That aside, what if you wanted to restart from a much earlier point? You'd have to browse through a couple of hundreds of savegames to find the one you want.

True, you could make the game use a limited number of slots for cyclic periodic saving and also autosave at the start of each level. Serious Sam games do something like that, only with quicksaves instead of periodic saves. Still, I think every game should offer at least quicksaving in addition to autosave. But intelligent autosaving systems are always welcome.

[Orange Brat]

I think limiting the autosaves to a limited number of slots would fix the huge savegame problem. Of course a traditional quicksave option and a beginning of level save should be included for those who want it or need to start over from a very early spot(or a favorite spot). The size of the savegame file is dependent on each game/engine, so they aren't necessarily going to be several megs each. It just depends on how much crap there is to save. The SAV files in my Disenfranchised title are coming in at under 40KB, but there isn't much getting saved, at the moment. Still, it's a long way from a single MB(knock on wood).

These ideas are just a couple ways to eliminate having to cycle through menus/panels to save...it's a potential path to keep the player in the game.