What can a "smarted-up" CRPG look like?

I did clarify what I meant in a second post because I wasn't clear enough in that first one. Maybe you skipped over it in the rage induced by my first post?

I guess I should further clarify, that game mechanics is where most game designers perceive that the challenge of a game should come from. Adding in new ways to push different combinations of buttons is the standard.

I agree with you that challenge doesn't only reside in APM, I was pointing out that this is the standard practice in games. They turn challenge into memorizing certain sets of keystrokes to defeat encounters. Ie. encounter Monster A, cast spell B and swing weapon X to defeat in the most optimal way. There is no variation or intelligence as others have pointed out.

Turn Based games of the past didn't have as much of the APM problem but a lot of them still weren't smart and only required the memorization of certain button combinations. Modern games try to mask this retardedness by going the APM rout.

I would love for more intelligent, strategic , and thought provoking rpg's. I'm just not certain it's possible to design a single player RPG game like that or it would have been done by now. For me, a true intelligent challenge comes from playing against another person and that leads to a whole new set of issues pertaining to online games especially with the crap fest they have become lately.

INB4 somebody quotes my first post again and I just requote myself here.

 

Talking about APM or button sequences is still a bad way to elaborate yourself. You're not actually figuring out sets of keystrokes, what you're figuring out is the ruleset of the game.

And I don't think I've ever played an RPG where it was mechanically challenging to execute what you wanted to do. Maybe in some FPS-RPGs that is the case, but that isn't about APM either.


Yes, most RPGs are easy and pretty rote to play once you've figured out the game mechanics. But when it's a single player game of limited length, it's not necessarily a problem. Sure, I'd prefer the AIs to be better, encounters be more thought out, sure... But that doesn't have a lot to do with your statements about gameplay being essentially about memorizing keystroke sequences.

 

Sure it does. If AI was better, in theory you wouldn't be able to memorize the optimal set of keystrokes to defeat an encounter.

Adaptive game play is kind of hard to imagine though. Whats the technical word, emergent gameplay?

 

There's clear memorizable patterns in multiplayer games as well.

 

There certainly is, the question then becomes how do we make games "smart".

 

Emergent gameplay is when players come up with solutions the designers didn't specifically think of or implement.

 

ahh, I was thinking more of an emergent challenge in a game. Your actions cause events or challenges to emerge that aren't necessarily static or hard wired into the game. I guess non-linear in a sense.

How a game could be designed to have that sort of randomness is beyond me. I doubt there is an AI smart enough to create properly challenging and random scenarios on it's own. I imagine it would be limited by whatever pre-made quests/missions/objectives have been programmed in for the AI to pick at random.


Luckily enough, there are ton's of "intelligent" game designers constantly pushing out new content so you don't have to worry about a games AI adapting to your skill level. The only problem being that many game developers don't make games with new "smart" challenges in them so it feels repetitive after a while especially with all the APM focused games coming out lately. The only redeeming part to me is playing for new stories, but even many of those are lacking.

I've been finding lately that the games I enjoy the most are heavily modded to increase challenge. Although, even those are limited in how much of the game they are legally allowed to change.


How to make games smart!! At this point in time, I think the only option when you reach a certain skill level in a game is to play against other flesh and blood players.

 

I'm confused by what you mean by smart. I would consider Planescape Torment to be smart, but it's not very hard at all.

If you mean dynamically adjusting to the player's skill level to always provide the exact right amount of challenge, I don't think that will ever happen. If it does happen, then it means game development as we know it is done. Computers will just be designing games for us.

 

You're right lol, I have been talking about two different versions of "smart".

Smart in regards to AI won't happen any time soon (if ever).

There are still games that can make you think like Planescape: Torment, they just don't seem to come out that often.

There doesn't seem to be much financial reward for coming up with novel, intricate, and thought provoking puzzles or mysteries in a game when you can just add in a few new character models, some new armor sets, and a few new weapon swing animations, and keep the same basic puzzles / challenges / story in an existing game concept for the same amount of game sales.

True game design artists must exist out there trying to make a great game, I just haven't seen found them lately.

 

What inspired this thread, as a few of you wondered, was mainly this:

http://videogametourism.at/node/1663

I wondered if you could take that old value of 'intellectual effort investment' in CRPGs and make it just as good with some modern tweaks- conveniences that make the process less awkward for me to take notes/ draw maps, have permadeath but also be able to do the save/reload anytime to try something different ability that many say all computer games should have (plus I always kind of liked finding rare one-ups to extend my retries), etc. So, yeah, I have selfish reasons for this thread.

I also made the thread title a fairly open question. A lot of people have views on what is dumbed-down (though this seems to have different meanings for different people), and I wanted to know if our ideas about what would be "smarted-up" would be more homogeneous (hopefully not at the expense of decreassing gameplay and writing variation, I meant more like coming to agreements on general precepts of game mechanics).

I am sincere in my desire to read your thoughts on what "smarted-up" CRPGs could look like and wherever this conversation goes (even if my inability to convey my own ideas is rather disheartening).

 

What are all these APM focused RPGs ? I can't really think of a single one.

 

more like Active Pause Per Minute amirite?

 

Kingdoms of Amalur or Dragon Age II would be an example or 99% of multiplayer rpg's. I'm not sure why you focus so much on APM though. APM isn't what makes a game not "smart". I'm sorry if I have insulted your favored game mechanic.

Being Turn based doesn't make a game smart either. It's just a mechanic is what I have been trying to point out.

Moving back to opinions of what a "smart" rpg is....

Combat mechanics should help build the atmosphere of a game and not be the entire purpose of a smart RPG imo.

Having well thought out quests or mysteries to investigate outside of the combat system would help make a game smart. If the main focus of a game is on combat it tends to become more about button mashing for real time games, or for turn based games acquiring new spell X and Uber Sword Z to hack n slash Goblin001 faster. However, working combat scenarios into puzzles or abstract problems would make it not feel repetitive.


I'm not trying to debate which is superior, Real Time or Turn Based games. I'm just tossing out some ideas of what I consider smart. If you have any ideas on what makes a smart rpg I'd be happy to hear them. However, if your only purpose here is to be disagreeable, then I don't see the point in responding further to you.

 

The game's challenge should not come from overcoming the game's shitty interface, incoherent narrative, or missing features.

 

lol well put shihonage
back to 'smart games':

I think a lot of ppl highlighted this many times before, but a lot of games are giving things away too easily to the player. It really takes the enjoyment out of players to be treated like a complete retard.

Case in point:
Far cry 3 - Help me find my ancestral relics.
3 pieces needed.
Guess what - the game doesn't even narrate directions.
Nothing. The NPC just tell you to find tablets, and magically three quest markers appear 200 m away from where you stand. I pick em up within 5 mins , and the tribal went THANK U THANK U WHITE MAN - MY ANCESTORS CAN PASS ON THEIR KNOWLEDGE TO THE FUTURE GENERATIONS ! HERE, U DESERVE IT!

+$500.00

 

Honestly, I wouldn't play a CRPG any other way. I'm a little more radical (?) than most. I'll post what I think later.

 

Without bringing in the usual 'retarded board room of gamedevs scenario,' I do wonder what is with the reasoning behind this rediculous amount of navigation markers many modern games seem to have added. Has Crooked Bee ever seriously addressed this oddball use of navmarkers or related topics in one of her interviews?

 

Such quality posts, as seldom as they might come nowadays, renew my faith in humanity.

 

A lot of great suggestions in this thread. I agree with most of them.

I've always wondered when this would be implemented. It seems so simple and very realistic, but no one has ever tried it.

Sincerely,
The Vault Dweller

 

It's not that simple actually.

 

What explains that it's not that simple ?

Are you saying that what I underlined above couldn't be done in modern games ?

 

Despite all of DA:O's flaws there were several optional, non-marked quests that had little logic puzzles and tests of observation skill. They had next to no journal description and absolutely no map markers or compass indicators. RPGs need more of those, but having some quests spelled out doesn't hurt as long as there are unmentioned options and alternatives to them. Games really need more of that shit.

 

And to think DA:O was actually a RETURN to those things...

 

Uh oh.

Dude.

They haven't done the IE games braindead AI correctly yet. Let that be fixed first.