masterwahnon
31-07-2010, 01:00 PM
"Cinematic" is one the gaming industry's favorite buzzwords. It's meant to fill us with dreams of fully playable Hollywood blockbusters... but in reality, it usually means games laden with non-interactive cut-scenes created by folks whose filmmaking skills would barely qualify them for a spot on the direct-to-DVD rack between Snakes on a Train and Transmorphers.
But what if developers looked beyond cut-scenes and applied some valuable moviemaking lessons to their core game design? Things like...
http://media.gamespy.com/columns/image/line.gif
Get Out the Editing Scissors
Like most things in this world, videogames could benefit from being more like Rocky IV. For those who have never experienced this classic, Rocky IV was the king of the montage -- Sylvester Stallone couldn't take three consecutive steps in the movie without a song by Survivor or Kenny Loggins breaking out.
For good reason, too. Can you imagine being forced to endure every push-up, raw egg swallowed, every shot of Stallone injecting growth hormone into his ass?
459
Nobody wants to sit through every detail. Well, except for game developers, apparently -- who regularly take wading-pool-deep stories like "Princess gets kidnapped by giant pig-man" and stretch them into 40-hour marathons. The average role-playing game forces you to grind through hundreds of battles in their entirety, then sends you on a trip to the store to buy everything from swords and shields to socks and underwear. Did the original Rocky show us every detail of every single boxing match the protagonist fought up until that point? No. Did it contain lengthy sequences where Rocky weighed the pros and cons of different brands of boxing gloves and engaged in long discussions with Adrian about what color and fabric his trunks should be? Hell no.
460
It's would be one thing if we were having a ball doing all this, but when was the last time you breathlessly told your buddies about the three hours you spent grinding for experience in an RPG, or collecting all 100 glowing orbs in a platformer? Probably never. You told them about the big plot points, the exciting boss fights, the bits of particularly clever level design. You know, the stuff that actually matters. Developers: Trim this shit down. After we've done something once, we don't need to do it 100 more times; the point has been made.
While we're at it, let's cut down on travel times, too. As dull as doodad-collecting and level-grinding can be, at least you're actually achieving something -- spending hours making your way from one side of the map to the other over and over again in a Zelda game or Fallout 3 is the videogame equivalent of sitting on the freeway or waiting in line to go down the water slide. Imagine if, say, the Lord of the Rings took the same approach...
Makes the Bad Guys Actually Matter
Two of the most successful movies of the past few decades are Alien and Predator -- both of which spawned lucrative franchises that produced numerous sequels, spin-offs, and videogame adaptations. The original movies in these franchises are still generally considered the high watermark for both, though... and if you'll notice, neither of those titles are plurals. As in, both movies featured a single antagonist -- one Alien, one Predator. Both series would later try to up the stakes, but even Aliens only showed us maybe a half-dozen Aliens, and the new Predators movie now in theatres features a whopping three Predators.
By comparison, when the same creatures are tackled in a videogame such as the recent Aliens vs. Predator, the disc is packed with more Aliens and Predators than roaches in a Taco Bell kitchen. It turns out Ellen Ripley was actually kind of a wuss, since according to videogames, the Xenomorphs of the Aliens series aren't so much the killer scourge of the galaxy as bumbling bags of green goo wrapped in tissue paper.
Games are short on truly memorable villains, and the few that are remembered have mostly stuck in people's minds because they simply refuse to go away.
The videogame approach is to spam us with quantity, not quality -- tossing hundreds (if not thousands) of robots, goombas, zombies, or Nazis at us. Where's our Darth Vader, Joker, or Freddy Krueger? Where are our games of cat-and-mouse? Our villains that feel like real rivals as opposed to bosses who are just brainless targets that, aside from having a longer life bar, are no different than the dozens of other brainless targets we gunned down before them?
"But you can't do that," you say. "You'd have a game made up entirely of boss battles!"
"Well, sure you can," I reply. "In fact, some games have done it already."
Shadow of the Colossus and Punch-Out!! both went that route, resulting in two of the most beloved games of their respective generations. It's often said that a movie's only as good as its villains -- and that ought to apply to videogames, too.
Give us Some Variety
If most action movies were anything like videogames, we'd all probably fall asleep within the first 20 minutes. Your average videogame protagonist has a very limited skill set -- they can kill enemies either with guns or their fists and feet, and maybe if you're lucky they'll have one other major non-killing-things-ability, but that's usually it.
Film's most memorable heroes aren't one-trick ponies, though. Indiana Jones fights and shoots, sure... but he also solves ancient puzzles, escapes impossible traps, jumps out of planes in inflatable rafts, and has a great eye for radiation-proof refrigerators. Besides shooting and driving fast cars, James Bond plays with gadgets of all types, mixes a mean vodka martini, has been to outer space, and is a master at pumping female Russian agents for information. Why must our videogame heroes be such single-minded machines?
"But it's too much to ask of developers to include all these different play types in a single game," you say. But is it really? If all their resources weren't consumed coming up with 101 ways for Nathan Drake to use his goofy wall-hanging abilities, or covering every surface in pipes and rails for Samus Aran's morph ball, developers might have the time to fit in some more diverse gameplay.
Variety doesn't always mean having to design a bunch of a fancy new mechanics, either. The quiet scenes in movies are often just as important as the action. Where would Star Wars be without the mostly action-free first half of the movie, where you're introduced to the world and characters? If videogame designers had created Star Wars, the opening shot of the Star Destroyer firing on the Rebel ship would have continued on for the entire length of the movie
457
Developers can vary the pace and mood in a game without having to design a single new mechanic. Imagine, for instance, an RPG where you don't fight your first enemy until halfway through the game, with players spending the first half truly getting to know the world and its inhabitants. Would you not care more once the baddies finally show up to do their standard "burn down your home village" thing?
Bottom line: Give us real variety, not just the same tired scenarios over and over in front of different backdrops.
Try Out Some New Genres
While we're talking variety, why can the vast majority of big triple-A titles be categorized under only one or two genres?
"But there are tons of different videogame genres!" you reply. "RPGs, platformers, shooters..."
Well, first off, stop contradicting me, dammit. And secondly, while game developers love to split hairs and create new genres for marketing purposes, almost all of them can be placed under the larger action and/or adventure umbrella.
But where, for instance, are the videogame comedies? No, not adventure or action games with a few jokes tossed in -- but games whose primary goal is to makes us laugh? The closest thing I can think of is the WarioWare series, and they still haven't quite evolved beyond the "farts and snot are hilarious" stage. Granted, farts and snot are hilarious, but we can aspire to greater things.
really have it made.
Where are the romances (and no, Japanese dating sims should not count as romantic to any sane individual)? Where are the straight-up dramas? Where are the historical biopics? Who wouldn't want to play as Teddy Roosevelt punching out bears or Abe Lincoln freeing the slaves with his championship wrestling skills?
In other words, yes, it is possible to entertain people with stories that don't involve explosions, zombies, or bald space marines. Sometimes, not even a single one of those things! Maybe more videogames should give it a shot.
http://media.gamespy.com/columns/image/line.gif
But Wait a Minute...
If you were to skip the dull parts, feature only meaningful enemy encounters, and cut the padding to focus on variety, you'd end up with a game that was... well, about as long as a movie. But real games have to be 30 hours long and cost $60!
But do they? As much as the videogame industry likes to crow about the Scrooge McDuck levels of cash they take in each year, the reality is that games still don't have the cultural reach of movies. You'd be hard-pressed to find a person who hasn't watched at least one movie in the past year, but a decent chunk of the population still completely avoids games. Why? Well, partly because the movie industry is better at targeting every possible social niche, and partly because movies are quick, relatively inexpensive entertainment.
I'm not saying we've run out of room for Diablo-style loot-glomming RPGs that you can sink hundreds of hours into, or World War II shooters, or any other popular style of game. They could coexist alongside a new breed of shorter, cheaper, more movie-like games. Taking a more cinematic approach to some titles may provide the final push videogames need to pass what I've dubbed the first-date test.
At the very least, all those game designers who wish they were movie directors will no longer have to drown their stories in unnecessary amounts of gaminess. You can't tell me Final Fantasy XIII wouldn't have been a more focused, entertaining experience if it wasn't forced to be a 40-hour RPG.
But hey, if you're still not convinced games have something to learn from movies, allow me to submit my final argument...
458
In some ways, we still have a long way to go.
Source Gamespy (http://uk.gamespy.com/articles/110/1109681p1.html)
But what if developers looked beyond cut-scenes and applied some valuable moviemaking lessons to their core game design? Things like...
http://media.gamespy.com/columns/image/line.gif
Get Out the Editing Scissors
Like most things in this world, videogames could benefit from being more like Rocky IV. For those who have never experienced this classic, Rocky IV was the king of the montage -- Sylvester Stallone couldn't take three consecutive steps in the movie without a song by Survivor or Kenny Loggins breaking out.
For good reason, too. Can you imagine being forced to endure every push-up, raw egg swallowed, every shot of Stallone injecting growth hormone into his ass?
459
Nobody wants to sit through every detail. Well, except for game developers, apparently -- who regularly take wading-pool-deep stories like "Princess gets kidnapped by giant pig-man" and stretch them into 40-hour marathons. The average role-playing game forces you to grind through hundreds of battles in their entirety, then sends you on a trip to the store to buy everything from swords and shields to socks and underwear. Did the original Rocky show us every detail of every single boxing match the protagonist fought up until that point? No. Did it contain lengthy sequences where Rocky weighed the pros and cons of different brands of boxing gloves and engaged in long discussions with Adrian about what color and fabric his trunks should be? Hell no.
460
It's would be one thing if we were having a ball doing all this, but when was the last time you breathlessly told your buddies about the three hours you spent grinding for experience in an RPG, or collecting all 100 glowing orbs in a platformer? Probably never. You told them about the big plot points, the exciting boss fights, the bits of particularly clever level design. You know, the stuff that actually matters. Developers: Trim this shit down. After we've done something once, we don't need to do it 100 more times; the point has been made.
While we're at it, let's cut down on travel times, too. As dull as doodad-collecting and level-grinding can be, at least you're actually achieving something -- spending hours making your way from one side of the map to the other over and over again in a Zelda game or Fallout 3 is the videogame equivalent of sitting on the freeway or waiting in line to go down the water slide. Imagine if, say, the Lord of the Rings took the same approach...
Makes the Bad Guys Actually Matter
Two of the most successful movies of the past few decades are Alien and Predator -- both of which spawned lucrative franchises that produced numerous sequels, spin-offs, and videogame adaptations. The original movies in these franchises are still generally considered the high watermark for both, though... and if you'll notice, neither of those titles are plurals. As in, both movies featured a single antagonist -- one Alien, one Predator. Both series would later try to up the stakes, but even Aliens only showed us maybe a half-dozen Aliens, and the new Predators movie now in theatres features a whopping three Predators.
By comparison, when the same creatures are tackled in a videogame such as the recent Aliens vs. Predator, the disc is packed with more Aliens and Predators than roaches in a Taco Bell kitchen. It turns out Ellen Ripley was actually kind of a wuss, since according to videogames, the Xenomorphs of the Aliens series aren't so much the killer scourge of the galaxy as bumbling bags of green goo wrapped in tissue paper.
Games are short on truly memorable villains, and the few that are remembered have mostly stuck in people's minds because they simply refuse to go away.
The videogame approach is to spam us with quantity, not quality -- tossing hundreds (if not thousands) of robots, goombas, zombies, or Nazis at us. Where's our Darth Vader, Joker, or Freddy Krueger? Where are our games of cat-and-mouse? Our villains that feel like real rivals as opposed to bosses who are just brainless targets that, aside from having a longer life bar, are no different than the dozens of other brainless targets we gunned down before them?
"But you can't do that," you say. "You'd have a game made up entirely of boss battles!"
"Well, sure you can," I reply. "In fact, some games have done it already."
Shadow of the Colossus and Punch-Out!! both went that route, resulting in two of the most beloved games of their respective generations. It's often said that a movie's only as good as its villains -- and that ought to apply to videogames, too.
Give us Some Variety
If most action movies were anything like videogames, we'd all probably fall asleep within the first 20 minutes. Your average videogame protagonist has a very limited skill set -- they can kill enemies either with guns or their fists and feet, and maybe if you're lucky they'll have one other major non-killing-things-ability, but that's usually it.
Film's most memorable heroes aren't one-trick ponies, though. Indiana Jones fights and shoots, sure... but he also solves ancient puzzles, escapes impossible traps, jumps out of planes in inflatable rafts, and has a great eye for radiation-proof refrigerators. Besides shooting and driving fast cars, James Bond plays with gadgets of all types, mixes a mean vodka martini, has been to outer space, and is a master at pumping female Russian agents for information. Why must our videogame heroes be such single-minded machines?
"But it's too much to ask of developers to include all these different play types in a single game," you say. But is it really? If all their resources weren't consumed coming up with 101 ways for Nathan Drake to use his goofy wall-hanging abilities, or covering every surface in pipes and rails for Samus Aran's morph ball, developers might have the time to fit in some more diverse gameplay.
Variety doesn't always mean having to design a bunch of a fancy new mechanics, either. The quiet scenes in movies are often just as important as the action. Where would Star Wars be without the mostly action-free first half of the movie, where you're introduced to the world and characters? If videogame designers had created Star Wars, the opening shot of the Star Destroyer firing on the Rebel ship would have continued on for the entire length of the movie
457
Developers can vary the pace and mood in a game without having to design a single new mechanic. Imagine, for instance, an RPG where you don't fight your first enemy until halfway through the game, with players spending the first half truly getting to know the world and its inhabitants. Would you not care more once the baddies finally show up to do their standard "burn down your home village" thing?
Bottom line: Give us real variety, not just the same tired scenarios over and over in front of different backdrops.
Try Out Some New Genres
While we're talking variety, why can the vast majority of big triple-A titles be categorized under only one or two genres?
"But there are tons of different videogame genres!" you reply. "RPGs, platformers, shooters..."
Well, first off, stop contradicting me, dammit. And secondly, while game developers love to split hairs and create new genres for marketing purposes, almost all of them can be placed under the larger action and/or adventure umbrella.
But where, for instance, are the videogame comedies? No, not adventure or action games with a few jokes tossed in -- but games whose primary goal is to makes us laugh? The closest thing I can think of is the WarioWare series, and they still haven't quite evolved beyond the "farts and snot are hilarious" stage. Granted, farts and snot are hilarious, but we can aspire to greater things.
really have it made.
Where are the romances (and no, Japanese dating sims should not count as romantic to any sane individual)? Where are the straight-up dramas? Where are the historical biopics? Who wouldn't want to play as Teddy Roosevelt punching out bears or Abe Lincoln freeing the slaves with his championship wrestling skills?
In other words, yes, it is possible to entertain people with stories that don't involve explosions, zombies, or bald space marines. Sometimes, not even a single one of those things! Maybe more videogames should give it a shot.
http://media.gamespy.com/columns/image/line.gif
But Wait a Minute...
If you were to skip the dull parts, feature only meaningful enemy encounters, and cut the padding to focus on variety, you'd end up with a game that was... well, about as long as a movie. But real games have to be 30 hours long and cost $60!
But do they? As much as the videogame industry likes to crow about the Scrooge McDuck levels of cash they take in each year, the reality is that games still don't have the cultural reach of movies. You'd be hard-pressed to find a person who hasn't watched at least one movie in the past year, but a decent chunk of the population still completely avoids games. Why? Well, partly because the movie industry is better at targeting every possible social niche, and partly because movies are quick, relatively inexpensive entertainment.
I'm not saying we've run out of room for Diablo-style loot-glomming RPGs that you can sink hundreds of hours into, or World War II shooters, or any other popular style of game. They could coexist alongside a new breed of shorter, cheaper, more movie-like games. Taking a more cinematic approach to some titles may provide the final push videogames need to pass what I've dubbed the first-date test.
At the very least, all those game designers who wish they were movie directors will no longer have to drown their stories in unnecessary amounts of gaminess. You can't tell me Final Fantasy XIII wouldn't have been a more focused, entertaining experience if it wasn't forced to be a 40-hour RPG.
But hey, if you're still not convinced games have something to learn from movies, allow me to submit my final argument...
458
In some ways, we still have a long way to go.
Source Gamespy (http://uk.gamespy.com/articles/110/1109681p1.html)