Preview Restricted Area Peek of the Week #6 at RPGVault

[Spazmo]

Tags: Jan Beuck; Restricted Area

<A HREF="http://rpgvault.ign.com" target="_blank">RPG Vault</a> have put up their <a href=http://rpgvault.ign.com/articles/434/434365p1.html>sixth installment</a> of their series on <a href=http://www.master-creating.de>master creating</a>'s upcoming action CRPG, <a href=http://www.ra2083.com>Restricted Area</a>. This one discusses the very first mission of the game.
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<blockquote>All four characters start in a dirty, downtown part of Megacity, a metropolis that covers a large part of the Earth's surface. They have to hide in this ugly area, each for their own personal reasons, and they meet during the game's storyline. Each one perceives the story from a different point of view, and with each character, you can learn more about the other ones that you can't know from the other points of view. The story is also non-linear, so it's not possible to write down the entire storyline, but the first main story mission will provide you an idea of it.</blockquote>
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Non-linear? Music to my ears! Go <b>Jan Beuck</b>!
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Spotted at <a href="http://www.rpgdot.com">RPGDot</a>

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

hey

Spazmo don't kid yourself, you know the game is going to suck.

 

[Spazmo]

Re: hey

Spazmo don't kid yourself, you know the game is going to suck.

Care to elaborate? Action RPGs are fun, and the cyberpunky setting looks good, too.

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

Re: hey

Spazmo don't kid yourself, you know the game is going to suck.

Care to elaborate? Action RPGs are fun, and the cyberpunky setting looks good, too.

Go play harbringer then.

 

[Jed]

Re: hey

Go play harbringer then.

Harbinger has nothing to do with cyberpunk.

 

[Spazmo]

Likewise, Pooperscooper has nothing to do with pesky things like rationailty, logic, coherence or--my personal favorite--objective critical thinking!

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

hey

Likewise, Pooperscooper has nothing to do with pesky things like rationailty, logic, coherence or--my personal favorite--objective critical thinking!

Still not going to change the fact that the game is going to suck.

 

[EEVIAC]

I appreciate that as an "action rpg" title, Restricted Area is promising to have more action elements to it than just mindless clicking. I think it was in one of the dev diaries where Jan mentioned more controll over player movements than just merely point-and-click, which I interpreted to mean independant character and aim movements. If they go further than RT=ACTION then the game should be good, at least as a cyberpunk action title in a good looking isometric engine.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Controls will be more similar to Diablo 2 than anything else.

Harbinger failed in nearly every area. The controls were awful because of the pathfinding, clipping, and organization of them. Through the whole game, you only had two attacks period, just a generic melee and a ranged attack with the same basic type of weapons you started with. This as opposed to Diablo 2, where a melee character like the Barbarian might have dual wield attacks, leap attacks, battlecries that did different things, whirlwind attacks, and so on. Harbinger didn't really have a character system, and Diablo 2 did..

Harbinger wasn't bad because it was an action CRPG, it was bad because the action was bad and there was no CRPG to it.

 

[Sol Invictus]

It honestly baffles me why some people decide to choose game design as the profession that puts the food on their tables. These people I refer to simply have no understanding of game mechanics, or more importantly - what makes games fun. Blizzard understood these two concepts and produced an award-winning series of intelligent, exciting games with a massive following of fanboys everywhere.

In retrospect, most of these 'other' game designers (*cough*Harbinger's designers*cough) should have been able to use Diablo II as the template of Harbinger and even if they merely improved on it, it'd still have been considered a very good game if not a better game than Diablo II itself. Had they actually done that, I'm rather certain that we'd all be playing it now. So, quite simply - it baffles me how they managed to take the worst qualities of Diablo II and offer none of its good qualities.

It's the same with a lot of other game designers, really. We had NOX in 2000 which was very good, and offered a multitude of combat features which you wouldn't even find in today's games, because designers today relegate themselves to poor design with the excuse that implementation of such features requires 'time', 'manpower' and 'money'. In my opinion, people who say these things just lack the talent.

 

[Jan]

RE

Well said, Exitium. Now it is hard to make a game as good as Diablo 2, but it seems even harder to me to create one as bad as Hxxxxxxxx...

Like more than seven million other customers we played Blizzard’s Diablo 2 for hundreds of hours and became addicted to it’s simple but surprisingly enjoyable concept. Others tried to make similar games; the first one was Nox (Westwood), the latest Harbinger (Dreamcatcher) and Dungeon Siege (Gas Powered Games). But instead of enhancing the fantastic gameplay, they didn’t keep the important key elements that make the game work. Someone wrote in a website forum (I think it was here): “Diablo 2 was a very well done game, while Dungeon Siege was an empty excuse to flash 3d graphics. In my opinion, the majority of Diablo 2-like games failed because they were trying to replicate the simplicity of the gameplay without understanding the complexity behind it”.

These words are true.

We create Restricted Area to bring action-RPG gameplay to the next level. It certainly won´t be a revolution, but even if it´s only slightly better - or at least different - as Diablo 2 many people will love it because it offers a fresh scenario, a great engine, many gameplay and interface innovations (and I don´t mean DS-like automatisation) and a dialog-driven story. Now pray that I´m right and that we´ll ever get it finsihed...

:wink: , Jan

BTW: If you don´t like action-RPGs but only "hardcore" CRPGs I suggest you NOT to buy it. We create games to entertain you, not to make you buy them.

 

[chrisbeddoes]

Fact : People like to play original games.

Diablo 2 sold so much because very simply when it was released it was totally original.

People like originality.

Nomatter how many copies are made there is only 1 original.

Fact Blizzard releases Diablo 2 and sells 7 million.

Fact 40 companies try to copy Blizzard succcess by making Diablo clones.

But Blizzard was first in the market . All the people that the next follish companies targeted keep forgetting that
a) All the people that minght wanted to play a Diablo clone have already played the original to death and they do not need a Diablo clone imitation.

b) All those customers that the foolish companies are now targeting have to be shared among the 40 companies that now wish to make Diablo clones.

(7 million - Fed up with the genre Diablo 2 players)/40 + a few customers that are attracted by the
ORIGINAL CONTENT does not make for a commercial sucess now does it ?

And the more foolish companies that try to copy Blizzard the less those companies sell.

It is fools gold trying to copy Blizzard sucess.

Blizzard was FIRST in the market with then a TOTALLY ORIGINAL package.

Copying others is not a way to sucess.

Software games are not like Gilette razors.

They are like stories and books.

Customers demand new content.

Only the first in the market with new original content will win.

Because people are getting bored with rebranded content and besides the fools that try to immitate the original will always be many and all sales will have to be divided among them.

My 2 eurocents.

Chris.

 

[Jan]

RE

I totally agree with you - it wouldn´t make much sense to create a game that looks like Diablo 2 and feels like Diablo 2. A lot of people tried this (I don´t know if they would have been successful as they didn´t get it done) and most people didn´t like their games. And therefore that´s not what we do (well, you didn´t say this and I hope you didn´t mean this).

However, there are some mistakes. Like it or not, most people want to see the same BASICS again and again. Most succesful movies have exactly the same plot, more or less the same characters that do the same stuff and make the same jokes. Sad but true.
Take Disney films - one is like the other. Super-hero comics. Take TV series. People watch the same stuff 100s and 100s of times - and then the next series starts that is nearly exactly like the last. If you would be 100% right nobody would have bought Diablo 2 - as everybody would have stayed with Diablo 1! As you said, there´s only ONE original, and this is never a sequel...

If you take a deep look (really deep) you may even start to think Warcraft 3´s story is somehow very similar to Starcraft - not to talk about the game mechanics. Nobody would ever play as it´s just a Starcraft clone. But wait - Starcraft is a Warcraft 2 clone. And Warcraft 2 wasn´t the first either, Dune 2 was the first RTS. You see: It´s not always about reinventing the wheel, it´s about creating something that´s is at least partly new but even more important is that it´s interesting and fun and - if not 100% original (last game that was is maybe Tetris) IMPROVED (do bold words count twice?).

 

[EEVIAC]

I think its simplistic to rationalize sales into a product of originality (even though the Sims and Diablo and Myst were all original and sold really well, so was Fallout and it didn't.) You have to make a distinction between hit games that sell millions (which are always flukes), and games that sell enough that the dev has enough money to pay all their bills with enough left over in the kitty to think about reitterations.

but it seems even harder to me to create one as bad as Hxxxxxxxx...

I know its not the done thing in the games industry, mainly because you never know who you'll end up working for or with, but knowing what you want your game NOT to be is a good start.

 

[chrisbeddoes]

Like it or not, most people want to see the same BASICS again and again.

Ok that is true .
So mayby people want the same combat rules(like the D&D system)
Same interface
Same keys for say attact.

But people certaintly want this

Original story(Planscape)
Original setting (Original world)(Lionheart,Planescape,Arcanum)
Original Dialogue.(Arcanum)
Original Quests.(Fallout)
Original kick ass items (ha ha !)(Diablo)
Original bad guys.(Fallout)
Original new ways to kill enemies.(Remember Fallout death animations ?)


Of course the problem is that original content need very hard work and it is very risky.


As for Blizzard ,Blizzard is indeed a special case.
The consisntently build great products they are marketing those products with skill and imagination they are looking looking after their customers, and they have build a brand and a reputation that stands for quality and customer service.And yes I consider Battlenet to be very good customer service for the price $0

However, there are some mistakes. Like it or not, most people want to see the same BASICS again and again. Most succesful movies have exactly the same plot, more or less the same characters that do the same stuff and make the same jokes. Sad but true.
Take Disney films - one is like the other. Super-hero comics. Take TV series. People watch the same stuff 100s and 100s of times .

The fact is that TV and cinema is something that is totally controled from upstairs .
Lowest common denominator is what comes to my mind about movies and TV.
And TV is free (with ads so it cannot really be compared to games)
As for movies well all big studios force us to watch their crap by simply booking what 95 % of the cinemas.Good luck trying to show and independent movie.

Unforunately their is a parralel situation in the games industry
Publishers buying stands in big shops for pc games but at least in the pc games it is not that bad yet .

My point is that it is not what people want it is what people upstairs think that people want and trying to bend people taste with marketing campains.


Finally do not forget that in adbased TV people are NOT the tv stations customers . The corporations that advertise are the tv stations customers.
People are just sheep ready to be forcefed with the latest crap as far as TV stations are concerned.

So in TV it is not what people want to see at all.
TV is not about culture. Tv is about YOU need to consume
YOU need to reproduce You need to work harder
YOU need to trust your banks, your politicians
YOU need to eat crap food
YOU need to buy a diamond ring to your fiance otherwise you do not love her.

 

[Jan]

RE

That´s true for sure. Well, it´s important to know what you want and what you don´t want. As a game played with mouse and from isometric view, people compared RA with Diablo right from the beginning - although similar aspects maybe end here. The scenario, the dialoges, the story, the range combat-based fighting, the class-less character system - everything is totally different. Maybe because we wrote the concept in 1999, one year before D2 was released... Anyway, we are aware of this since a year or so and it´s no big suprise now. Restricted Area won´t sell millions of units (simply because we won´t spend millions for fantastic trailers that don´t have to do much with the game - or TV spots - not because we don´t want it, of course we can´t) and so it doesn´t aim to. When we made the concept we created the game WE want to play, and this still didn´t change. Of course we try to make it suitable for as many people as possible, but I would never agree to something I don´t like myself just because guy X of our publisher or guy Y at www.myideasforgreatrpgs.com wants it - except if it isn´t bad (in my opinion) either. Games were much better in times were developers talked about their "games", not about their "product" - and we want to bring this back. In my (very rare) spare time I already work on the next concept - it will be ground breaking and therefore more risky. And totally different than RA. I hate this games with a 5, a 10 or even a 12 behind their titles. A sequal is okay if there are new ideas, but more than two sequals usually show a great lack of fresh ideas.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Others tried to make similar games; the first one was Nox (Westwood)

Nox was about the best of them. I think what killed it was the lack of straight up co-op multiplayer and difficulty level. I know that's why I didn't buy it when it came out.

I think its simplistic to rationalize sales into a product of originality (even though the Sims and Diablo and Myst were all original and sold really well, so was Fallout and it didn't.) You have to make a distinction between hit games that sell millions (which are always flukes), and games that sell enough that the dev has enough money to pay all their bills with enough left over in the kitty to think about reitterations.

Fallout is actually a steady seller, even to this day. If I were going to make a sci-fi CRPG, I think I'd start with looking at why Fallout is still doing well.

 

[DrattedTin]

I think a lot of why Fallout sells so well is its style, and not its open-endedness and so on.

 

[Jan]

RE

Well, I HOPE it´s the scenario and not the gfx :wink:

And yes, Nox was maybe the best - and the most innovative.