Games: linear versus open world

[Art Blade]

OK, now I just need to fight the urge to play it all the time.

So, you kind of surrendered?   ^-^

You're lucky you didn't feel the urge to map that thing  ;D Keep enjoying that game, D_B :)

[mmosu]

...ultimate open (and infinite) world, but almost no story, or any at all, or character development...

That's a difference I have noticed - the more open a game is (usually) the more vague and undeveloped the plot has to be for the experience to have continuity and be emersive.  Think about FC2:  the plot and "big picture" has a lot of room for you to imagine and extrapolate, which also means that you can play it any way you want and not have things happen that are in direct contradiction to some part of an established plot.  I feel like developing (or underdeveloping) the plot this way allows more freedom of movement for the player without risking the development of inconsistencies that take said player out of the experience, even if it is just for a moment.  That's one of the things I loved about FC2 so much - no matter what I did it stayed believably within the game world that was developing in my head to fill in all those details, kind of like what you do when you read a good novel. 

[fragger]

Very good point there, mmosu :-X

[JRD]

That`s true guys... even a physically open world game would eventually bring the player to a bottleneck if the story requires so... even in FC2 (a common reference for us  ;) ) which is pretty much open world, apart for the mentioned invisible walls and unreachable areas, will have the player going to a given location to execute a given task so the story can go on - you only move on to Bowa once you kill the faction leader at the troop rally in Leboa, no matter what you do, that`s how the game plays.

IT IS a corridor, a bottleneck, not physically, of course, but necessary!

Still on FC2, all missions require you to steal, kill or blow up something. It`s a point of major complaints amongst UBI forum whiners as being too simple and not varied at all... but the more complex is the task assigned to players, the less freedom to execute it there is. FC2 HAS TO be simplistic in that way so you can accomplish the missions as you will, anytime, anyhow.

I don`t know about JC2... didn`t play it yet, but certainly you have story bottlenecks as well.

As D_B said, Minecraft = ultimate open (infinite) world... not story whatsoever, hence no bottlenecks at all!  ;)

[PZ]

...I don`t know about JC2... didn`t play it yet, but certainly you have story bottlenecks as well.

I think you'll be pleasantly surprised with JC2.  There aren't the invisible walls as you have in FC2 - in fact, because you can fly/grapple your way through the world, you can go anywhere and do anything in three dimensions without running into these invisible obstacles.  One huge map in which to immerse yourself.  As to story bottleneck - true - once you start a mission, you need to complete it ( you can abort at least some if not all the missions and return to them later).  Also, if you want to follow the story line to it's logical conclusion, you'll need to do the main missions.  However, you can intersperse the main missions by any number of side missions done in any sequence you like.

[fragger]

I'm wondering how game boundaries are handled in JC2, not having played it (yet). That is, how are you kept within the play area?

In some games, the boundaries are defined in cool ways. Such as in FC2 - if you venture too far out you'll start staggering blurry-eyed and groping air until you pass out, presumably from heat stroke, and "come to" back within the play area. In FC1, during the island missions, if you try to simply sail out to sea a chopper will appear and blow you out of the water. In Half-Life 2 if you try to swim out to sea from a beach during the coast road sequence, you'll be chewed by a swarm of piranha-like alien critters which will kill you if you don't get back into shallow water fast enough. These kinds of "out-of-bounds" prohibitive actions are more immersive and in keeping with their respective game themes than just running into an invisible wall of some sort.

I have JC2 btw, but I've had to sit on it until such times as I get around to upgrading my venerable hardware, which is almost old enough to be granted National Heritage status ;D It spat the dummy in a big way when I tried to run that game on it :D

[deadman1]

I'm wondering how game boundaries are handled in JC2, not having played it (yet). That is, how are you kept within the play area?

In some games, the boundaries are defined in cool ways. Such as in FC2 - if you venture too far out you'll start staggering blurry-eyed and groping air until you pass out, presumably from heat stroke, and "come to" back within the play area. In FC1, during the island missions, if you try to simply sail out to sea a chopper will appear and blow you out of the water. In Half-Life 2 if you try to swim out to sea from a beach during the coast road sequence, you'll be chewed by a swarm of piranha-like alien critters which will kill you if you don't get back into shallow water fast enough. These kinds of "out-of-bounds" prohibitive actions are more immersive and in keeping with their respective game themes than just running into an invisible wall of some sort.

I have JC2 btw, but I've had to sit on it until such times as I get around to upgrading my venerable hardware, which is almost old enough to be granted National Heritage status ;D It spat the dummy in a big way when I tried to run that game on it :D

If you check out the interactive map on the JC2 page you´ll see that the boundaries are all way out in the ocean, so during normal play you really aren´t affected by them. I haven´t tried to fly or use a boat to get "out of bounds" yet so I don´t really know what would happen ????

[spaceboy]

yeah I haven't tried either.  The promise of nothing but water beneath you has deterred me from going to far "out to sea".  This is actually a great way because you never feel compelled to leave the playable area really.  inFamous had something similar - the city was on an island and Cole, being infused with electricity, didn't too well in the water  :o

Regarding JC2 there is virtually no ceiling either (it's there but VERY high) so take that jet up into the clouds and jump out and freefall to your hearts delight. 

fragger - I think you'll really like JC2 once you get it up and running.

[Art Blade]

Of course I tried that. Takes quite a while until you actually get to the end of the map out there, so I only did it once. I don't exactly recall what happened, I think "nothing" (at least nothing spectacular). Same goes for FUEL, you either ended up on a rocky dead end or in the ocean realising you can't go further.

[spaceboy]

with FUEL you could pass the line of the boundary on the map but the world kept going awhile.  But eventually it would reset you just as if you crashed and put you back across the line.

[Art Blade]

FUEL: I remember I once thought I'd be going "out" forever, but I didn't - lol ^+-+

[spaceboy]

What's interesting is that that area was not just background but truly driveable - all that you could see.  I know someone on the PC version modded it so you could keep going.  The system was generating the world from algorythms right?  so it kept going.  But of course they had to put the boundaries in.

Regarding open areas to explore in upcoming game engines check out this discussion we were having.  There are some interesting links in there

http://mygamepages.com/index.php?topic=756.0

[Art Blade]

Nice read, space, apparently some game engine that is capable of creating massive game worlds got you guys hooked :) We'll have to wait until someone actually uses that once it's finished.

[B33 ENN]

Advisory note: make lots of coffee, long post ahead!  :-()

Just discovered this area of the forum... interesting discussion this and I broadly agree with all the points contributed. However, I have some views of my own regarding the industry trends of openworld vs scripted (linear) gameplay, which I thought I should share:

Back many moons ago, when I was learning to program BASIC and Assembly language on the 8bit platforms, I was doing the usual thing of copying code from monthly magazines which were published for the BBC Micro computers. My interest was in games and these articles would essentially produce a finished game. (Later, one was spared the laborious task of copying the code from the article by the inclusion of cover discs.)

Anyway, the games produced were "simple" 2D ladders and levels, pacman/scroller mechanics. When I say simple though (for those of you that have never written programs) don't misunderstand the amount of w@&k and understanding that goes into just making a pacman character move across the screen and detect it has hit something etc! It is a lot more than meets the eye!

So, when I got to a level where I was past modifying example code and writing my own games, I tried to emulate the mechanics that inspired me most. One of those was the 3D (wireframe) space trading game ELITE. For those of you that don't know it, it is essentially a limitless universe which you traverse fighting and trading cargo to survive and accumulate reputation to acheve the coveted "Elite" designation. There are preconcieved missions that help build ratings faster but not essential that you have to follow them. To understand it, think of it as basically the forerunner of the Far Cry 2/Just Cause 2 or X series type games.

In doing that project, I learned that essentially how open the game feels to the player is determined by the base game mechanic and it's governing rules. Get that right, and the game will basically either never end or end anytime, depending on the whether a predefined condition is met. It's not so much about the presentation (graphical excellence) but more about the logic beneath (maths).

Chess and Draughts are probably the best examples of openworld games that illustrate this concept well, even though they exist on a 64 square grid with set rules of movement. All worlds have limits, even our own planet is not endless. So in a computer simulation (game) of a world, you accept that it doesn't really go on infinitely, there is an bounded area where the action takes place. But that bounding doesn't define the "open" nature of the world. What defines it is the lifecycle of the player within the game, and the limits imposed on that life by the conditions of "death" or "victory".

In Chess, you must captivate the other players king piece before he does yours. In Draughts, it's the last man standing with only his pieces left on the board. There is no time limit on the game, no set number of moves or perfect strategy that will guarantee victory or survival. It depends soley on how you play the game.

To me, that is "openworld" game mechanics.


So, inspired by Elite, in my quest to create my own game in those early days, I attempted to create such a mechanism for a 2D game (3D was way beyond me, maths was too hard...) The game I ended up making was basically a glorified Battleships meets Asteroids construction. You existed on the screen (640x512 pixels in 4 colour mode) which represented the ocean, and your character (or avatar) was a warship sprite. You'd issue commands to "sail" it around via grid coordinates (screen mappings). If you "sailed" off the edge of the screen, you'd reappear on the opposite side. In the game this just meant the ocean was endless. I introduced randomly generated points of interest like islands or non-enemy ships on a per game session basis. Your task was to hunt down and destroy enemy vessels as you encountered them. Your overarching goal was to hunt down and destroy one particular enemy warship (think WW2 Bismark/Graf Spee type deal) which represented the "boss" of the game.

The twist was that the main enemy ship was invisible to you in a fog of war type reasoning. A bit like Age of Empires/Civilization maps. (Or, if you've seen films like  Run Silent, Run Deep, The Hunt for Red October, Master & Commander, you'll get the idea...)

For every smaller common enemy ship you killed, you'd be awarded a bonus of a clue in the shape of the general heading to the "boss" ship. In contrast, the boss ship would lose some accuracy in "knowing" your position, therefore be less able to elude you and more vulnerable.

For every neutral ship that got sunk in a crossfire, you'd lose a degree of accuracy in the "intelligence" provided, and conversely, the boss ship would gain accuracy on your position.

The battle mechanic was simple in the sense that eventually if you got within a certain (screen) range of the enemy ship, one of you would have the advantage of first sight depending on how many points you gained or lost according to the above conditions. This would effect your fog of war distance and so give one or the other the advantage of firing the first shots. (Think the classic battle tanks game on the Atari back in the 80's.) The computer controlled enemy ship was limited to the same mechanics and information as you so it was a fair fight, except that he didn't have to kill any ships to find you. He was evading, you were hunting. His success/loss depended on how well you played in gaining/losing points.

(If I haven't lost you or bored you stupid by now... we are almost there stick with me...)

Theoretically this game could go on forever as the "sea" was infinite, like a 2D treadmill. The game would end only if he got you first, or you got him and won. It could end in an hour of play, or 6 hours, or a week... All depending on how you played.

I think this is what Far Cry 2 lacked:

The Jackal should have been a real, constantly available target, somewhere in the gameworld. He should also have been constantly moving around at intervals (delivering weapons maybe) so he was never in the same place too long, or predictable. He should have been well defended by an entourage of highly trained combatants and sophisticated weapons, like some columbian drug lord in his armoured SUV and heavy escorts malitia and a helicopter gunship or two... (just to make sure you didn't finish the game too easily, should you bump into him!)

If you happened upon him too early in the game, he'd wipe you out before you got within a Sunday lunch of his gang - that's if you even recognised them as the Jackal Massive in the first place!

Progression and side mission incentives would be worthwhile in order to eventually locate and kill him. However, you aren't obliged to do them, it's your choice, take him on without them if you like, or don't take him on at all...

The reason you'd want to accept and complete the Faction and Underground missions is in order to unlock weapons, helpers (buddies), and vitaly, a clue to his possible location in the form of a simple square marked on your map like when you had an active mission, but...

The accuracy of the location would depend on the size of the square. A square half the size of your map wouldn't be of much use, but would at least mean you were in the right part of the country!  How small this square eventually becomes would depend on how many missions along you were, and who you did them for. Dangerous faction missions would yield the most accurate indication in the shape of a smaller more localised square, and unlock better weapons and vehicles. Easier underground missions would award a larger, less accurate square, but win you more buddies.

Twist? You need a lot of both successfully kill him. You must have the heavy artillery unlocked to take down his defnses. You must have a set minimum number of loyal buddies by the endgame to attack as a group. And, of course, you must have the most accurate location zeroed down to the village/house he's actually going to be at so you can plan your assault in advance, lie in wait, whatever...

But you don't know that, the game does... At which point you stop doing missions and attempt a hit on the Jackal is totally up to you. Do you wait to do all the side missions, or only enough until you think you are well enough equiped? That's the challenge.

The experience you gained doing missions should have given you clues and lessons as to how to take him and his crew down in the game's ultimate boss fight. The fact is, for every different player, and playthrough, the boss fight would never take place in the same place, or the same way. His location would be randomly generated each time and depend on when you finally accumulated the acheivements necessary to mount an assault. Do it too early with to few advanced weapons, not enough buddies, and a vague location, and you get trounced.

Malaria should have been replaced with food and drink. You have to eat regularly to have the energy to carry on. Medical kits to cure injuries and wounds could have only been available from the Underground, not scattered about in first aid tins. Gunshops and diamonds hunts should have been dropped in favour of those only being available through the Factions (who get them from the Jackal). Apart from that, poaching the weapons and ammo from the dead mercs was fine.

We could go on adding details but that isn't the point of the post. The point is, for people that can create the Dunia engine, I don't think that game mechanic I described here is so hard to program. I think the reason they don't is because most games today rely too much on cinematic cut scenes with cool voice acting to tell a story and spend most of the budget on that and advertising. Or maybe they think freedom of choice is not what the masses want when investing in entertainment?

[spaceboy]

holy cow - I WANT THAT GAME!

-not the battleship one, though props on programming it.  I appreciate the fact that it is really so hard to program games that is why I'm still amazed at what we play today.

-but yeah, your version of Far Cry 2 is incredible.  I never thought of that, but that relativily simple twist on the game improves it tenfold.   Nice brain you got there!

[B33 ENN]

holy cow - I WANT THAT GAME! ...Nice brain you got there!

:-() Cheers, now all I have to do is program it... ???

8-X ooops, erm... oh, is that the time? :)

[JRD]

B33 ENN... I can only hope that our site got the attention of the guys developing the next FarCry and that they actually read your post.

THAT'S AN AMAZING IDEA, MATE!!!!  :-X

And very well put I must say. You made your point clearly... kudos to you and a slap on the back for that!  :-X :-X

[PZ]

Talk about open world - excellent read  :-X

[Art Blade]

I slap you too (on the back), Ben  ^-^ :-X

Excellent read, easy to follow and consistent. And a jump back in time at the beginning of your post which I can follow (programmed myself a bit and also remember typing in code hehe) :)

Considering that the gaming industry spends billions for one product these days it should indeed be possible to create something like that. Then again, I believe that they believe that the common gamer needs to be led around and won't play true open world games (too stupid or too lazy).

Keep it coming, mate  ;D

[PZ]

Of course, one thing to consider is that the largest portion of the gaming public consists of the trolls that we see frequenting other gaming sites while OWG remains relatively small.  Game developers clearly know this, so likely design and market their games to the largest segment of the gaming world, which unfortunately is not what many of us truly appreciate.

I recall many comments on some of the FC2 sites the content of which indicated that those gamers were unwilling (or too stupid  :-() ) to patiently explore the FC2 world.  We've unfortunately become an "instant gratification" type of world.

[JRD]

Considering that the gaming industry spends billions for one product these days it should indeed be possible to create something like that.

Of course, one thing to consider is that the largest portion of the gaming public consists of the trolls that we see frequenting other gaming sites

So imagine that. A game developer (say Ubi, EA, Rockstar, Bethesda, Valve or any other) is willing to spend a few million bucks into a product to be released on the market by christmas. First thing they do is to commision a market research with the target public, namely, the trolls.  :D :D

Easy to see what's next: non gamers asking questions to the wrong people in order to come up with a product that satisfy the masses.  :'(  questions we know won't give them the right picture of something like what B33 ENN brilliantly described.

Instead of proposing something new, they try to hit the nail in the head by giving people what they want... bullshit I say!

In the end, whatever comes out of that crappy initial market research will guide the development of the new game. I doubt that programmers and devs, I mean people actively involved in making the game, can actually put their ideas forward and have them implemented freely. There will ALWAYS be a guy on a suit thinking about profit based on that market poll... and turns out he calls the shots around gameland so oompa loompas will only do as they are told and that's it!  :-(

That's buziness mate, buziness... as long as trolls are buying it, that's what the industry will feed us  :'(

[PZ]

That's buziness mate, buziness... as long as trolls are buying it, that's what the industry will feed us  :'(

I completely agree - unfortunately the masses rule what is to be.

[deadman1]

holy cow - I WANT THAT GAME!

So do I and a slap on the back from me aswell. I wonder how haerd it would be to program that as a total conversion of FC2 using the editor  ????, and before you ask I have not nearly enough skill  to even contemplate doing that at the moment  :-\ (wish I was 20 again then I would have relished the idea of trying)

[fragger]

Excellent treatise on the subject, B33 ENN :-X :-X Here's a kudo from me, too :)

[B33 ENN]

Thanks for the supportive comments, chaps. Good to know it made sense and was appreciated.  :) After reading your responses, whilst reading some analysis of PC gaming elswhere, something occurred to me.

Now, I'm relatively new to the wider PC gaming scene when it comes to FPS and so have only a few examples so far to make the argument. I have noticed a trend, which I wonder if it is connected to the "troll masses" arguments above.

(Before I go on, let me make it clear I'm no console basher, I like all computers and tech. and respect dedicated gamers everywhere. This is more a comment about developers and publishers.)

Consider the original Far Cry 1, and Crysis and FEAR. All three are renowned for having brought some innovation which broke new ground in modern game design. (I suppose like Quake and Doom or Half Life did in the 90's not that I ever played them.) Well, as soon as these games made a big impression on the market, they were franchised by the publishers.

Nothing intrinsicly wrong with that, been done before to good effect often enough. However, I noticed that the next games were immediately planned around for the consoles (and therefore within their inherent liimitations) rather than first for the PC where they began, then cut down and ported over.

In the case of Far cry 2, a great game was developed on graphics and immersion, but it's gamepley was limited in ways already discussed. The PC version brought very little extra in the way of features or extended gameplay, such as a modding SDK, which is often expected by PC gamers.

Similarly, FEAR before it, was an outstanding display of advancement in AI and, graphics and cinematic horror themes mixed with interactive gameplay. It was designed on the PC and ported elesewhere after proving popular. But FEAR 2 was planned as primarily a console game, to be ported back to the PC. The game featured improvements in visual effects and variety, but cut back on the pioneering story line elements of the first.

Now comes the awaited Crysis 2. The first broke the back of hardware and is still not effective on the latest technology (mainly due to inefficient engine design). Crysis 2 has been designed to improve on these areas, and rightly so, but has been cut back in terms of the setting so that graphically it can primarily fit the console hardware. The PC version is just going to be a port back.

Modern multicore PC's with 3rd World War ready GPU's can easily do a lot more than this in terms of gameplay depth and campaign complexity. However, the developers and publishers seem to have decided that making money from the widest possible release is all that is required.

The result appears to be that we on the PC get original pioneering games once in a blue moon only to lose them if they turn out to be good. If anyone makes a fuss, we are told then PC gaming is in decline.

What they seem to forget is that a console is essentially optimised PC technology of the period it came out in. The original xBox was a Pentium III with an Nvidia GPU, if I recall correctly. The 360 I think is based on PowerPC/ATI... No doubt, the next generation consoles will be equivalent to standard multicore PC's.

I'm not sure where this attitude came from with developers who, after all, cut their teeth on PC's and still use them to code the consoles anyway.

I hear now that the creators of STALKER are planning their next version of the game to be a console release as well. So now they have cleared up the bugs and optimised the game engine after years of beta testing with the PC user, they are jumping ship. No doubt they will give us a port over of that game rather than a product that utilises the greater power of the PC.

Having said all this, I can see that there may be an argument from their point of view that the PC doesn't pay the wages or produce the profit necessary to grow the company in today's cut throat game engine wars. And, perhaps, once you have done the required amount of w@&k to produce something acceptable for a console, why do more to make an enhanced version for the PC? Where is the profit in that to justify the man hours? Will the PC user be prepared to pay a bit more for the better version, or will he complain that he is being ripped off?