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Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
908
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Posted - 2014.07.20 16:13:00 -
[1] - Quote
Having played through the Destiny Beta on a couple characters now I find that it does not scratch all the itches that I expected it to. It probably won't.
There is still much that project legion can offer players in the FPS genre.
Just do not, for any reason, create a game designed for this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk8XlA_HfvU&feature=youtu.be
Loot chests? Loot chests that re-spawn in the same few locations over and over and over again? That encourage farm routes?
So, maybe the fallen are gathering the loot and putting it into the chests and aren't very creative with where they put those chests. But you would think that they would figure out that someone is farming them after a while. And move their bootyGǪ
When making legion, it will be worthwhile to always question your booty. Why is it there? How did it get there? How easily can it be farmed? Do we really want to have booty chests? |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
909
|
Posted - 2014.07.21 13:59:00 -
[2] - Quote
Games Haven wrote:This is all assuming that Legion will launch with a free roam exploration system that actually works.
Or that it will launch with that at all.
Or that it will launch, period.
By new hope, what I meant was:
Destiny was going to be the game that did everything Legion could ever hope to do. And do it better, on console, before Legion ever even got the greenlight.
But Destiny is not that game.
So it is worth making Legion, worth putting effort into the game to make sure that it does launch. Because Legion can be something more than just another "free roam exploration system."
If CCP were to put just a little effort into building simulation into Legion so that the things you find when you go to the planets and the things you do are part of a dynamic and living game world that would be a big step in the right direction. Giving players themselves the tools to interact with and change what other players might potentially find or encounter during a "free roam" would be another step in the right direction for project legion.
It doesn't have to be overly elaborate or complex. CCP do not need to create a unique drone language for rogue drones that players can learn so that they can make treasure maps when they intercept and translate rogue drone communications. Even introducing something like random enemy spawns with random loot locations would be a start. Or, if there is a static source that you can reliably go to to find some resource, there should be a damn good and well thought out reason for it to be like that. Something other than, "Well, it is a game and video games always just have loot chests. That is how we've always done it."
In Destiny all of the enemies re-spawn in the same places in the same numbers every time. And loot chests appear in the same few locations over and over again. It is a fine game mechanic and I have nothing against dungeon crawling or grinding loot or even farming. But it is a game mechanic that is as old as dirt. And Legion can offer players something more dynamic and engaging to do in the sandbox portion of the game that farm treasure chest routes. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
911
|
Posted - 2014.07.25 14:14:00 -
[3] - Quote
Vrain Matari wrote:
DUST has failed dismally as a shooter. The core mechanics are disfunctional on so many levels that it's embarrassing. DUST failed so hard as a shooter that it never even had a chance to implement itself as an MMO set in New Eden. The challenge CCP set themselves was beyond CCP's capabilities/resources/ability to deliver.
Destiny, in it's current state, has failed, even as a semi-MMO. They have not created the right combination of tools/systems to bring their playerbase together and thereby give some meaning to their shooter. As things stand now, what is left after the level grind? Even with great mechanics, we've all been to the Crucible, or something like it, before - it was meaningless then and it's meaningless now. On the core FPS mechanics, however, Bungie has executed flawlessly.
I wouldn't go so far. With either game. Both in terms of their failings and Destiny's flawless execution. But yeah, in general, Bungie gets a free pass because they know how to make a shooter and CCP? Not so much.
There are a lot of core FPS mechanics in Destiny that were present in Dust 514 that caused endless howling an gnashing of teeth here on the Dust forums. There isn't anything like stamina management in Destiny and you can jump all you want but here in the world of Dust 514/ Project Legion we are still getting our knickers in a twist over "bunny hopping." Destiny has that weird acceleration curve / dead zone on a lot of the guns (at least for me) where the reticle won't budge, won't budge, then goes flying. Destiny has stunlock! But it all still works. The guns are more satisfying to shoot, character movement is never insanely frustrating (you can even see your feet) and even the special abilities (though they looked out of place for an fps in all the vids I watched before actually playing, especially with the shift to 3rd person pov) are a blast and seamlessly integrated into combat.
Finally, in the last few days especially, organized fire teams in the Crucible have been rolling randoms and totally curb stomping players who aren't on fire teams or playing with mics. The fire teams will get an early lead and players on the opposing team will start quitting out of matches. You get 6 v 4 or even 6 v 3 for a while and the matchmaking will start dropping in new players on the losing, undermanned teams toward the end of the match when there is not even a slight chance that they can make up the point deficit. A multiplayer experience we here should all be intimately familiar with.
In the end, though, when it comes to core FPS mechanics, Dust 514 is ok, with occasional gratifying moments that lift the game far above its usual drudgery. And Destiny is just a great game with a few minor imperfections. They could all be easily ironed out by full release, or the may become more glaring as people play the game over the course of weeks and months.
Which brings us to "Even with great mechanics, we've all been to the Crucible, or something like it, before - it was meaningless then and it's meaningless now."
Even if CCP had been able to release Dust 514 with flawless core FPS mechanics, the game never stood a chance. Dust 514 is nothing more or less than the Crucible. From the Academy to Planetary Conquest. There are minor embellishments: more than twice the number of players in a given match, timers, voice chat channels, but at its core Dust 514 is the Crucible, all the way down.
It is encouraging that with legion CCP seems to be (hopefully?) taking a slightly different approach. Instead of taking that most well worn aspect of the FPS genre, point control multiplayer, and attempting to build an entire game world out of it, they are instead attempting to build a game world first. One that allows for player v. player conflict, sure. But I believe that if CCP can build a great game world first and foremost, that will give them some breathing room to continue to refine and improve the FPS core.
And I guess part of why I am still here, and still hopeful, despite the last 2 years, is that very few developers are even talking about making anything close to "that game." Heck, most of the time CCP aren't even talking about making "that game", the one in my fevered imaginings that I have dreamed about possibly playing since seeing the Dust 514 reveal trailer in 2009. But when CCP talk about Legion, they still somehow manage to get closer than anyone else. For a half a second it looked like Destiny was going to be "that game" but it isn't even close. Don't get me wrong, it is a blast, so far in Beta. Basically Destiny is Phantasy Star Online with more guns, less multiplayer and a PvP arena. And that's fine by me.
But "that game" is something else entirely. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
911
|
Posted - 2014.07.28 15:14:00 -
[4] - Quote
Vrain Matari wrote:
We have very different definitions of core mechanics.
For me core mechanics are very simple and don't involve things like stamina or even bunny hopping., which are second-order game design considerations. Two different games, one with bunny hopping and and one without, could still both have great core mechanics. Those would be:
-aiming
-movement
-controls
-animations/timing
-interaction with environment
That's it. In one simple sentence good mechanics means the faithful, reliable, predictable translation of player input to the avatar's actions in the games.
Good mechanics do that. Great mechanics do that and make it feel good. I call that kinesthetic aesthetics.
By that measure CCP has failed with DUST and Bungie has turned in a masterful performance with Destiny.
To date, i have not heard one CCP employee, Rouge included, place any importance at all on core mechanics. Have you?
I don't think we have very different definitions of core mechanics. I agree with your list. I included the ability to jump and stamina management in movement because they both have an impact on how your character moves. But agreed, they aren't necessary. Tanks don't jump or have stamina. But they still move.
My point is almost exactly that two different games (Dust and Destiny) had some shared mechanics and that those same mechanics are very well executed in Destiny, but were complained about at great length in Dust 514.
When it came to character movement so much time and effort went into trying to solve a problem in Dust 514 that does not exist. That so much effort was put into complaining about and fixing "bunny hopping" when basic character movement over terrain was always fairly terrible.
Basically that being able to jump repeatedly is not a problem if character movement , aiming and shooting in general works well.
What I was trying to say is that with Dust the problems with the core mechanics were mistakenly identified.
Anyway, CCP Wolfman has written that in terms of character movement, "GǪ we've definitely got some improvements to do in that area."
https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=164762&find=unread#post2202587
So let's accept that there are a lot of improvements that need to be made in core mechanics (going from Dust 514 to Project Legion) for legion to have a chance at success. Let's also accept that the core will never achieve what Bungie has with Destiny in terms of, call it kinesthetic aesthetics. And yeah, I would have to say that when it comes to aiming and shooting Destiny has the best feel of any console shooter I have played. If that was all that I was looking for in a sci-fi shooter, I'd be all set.
The core FPS mechanics aren't what keep me coming back to CCP or now, project Legion. I already have a ton of different games to chose from that do those things very well. The thing that I was looking for in Destiny (always just kind of assumed that Bungie would get FPS things right) was something more than that. Destiny just doesn't have what I was hoping to find in an open world, science fiction game about exploration and combat.
Looking back I think Dust 514 became bogged down in core mechanics, and CCP just ended up driving in circles pushing things around without making huge improvements. They really didn't have any choice since the only thing they offered players were 16 v 16 multiplayer matches. Even if Legion's core is only a slight improvement over Dust 514, if Legion can bring players something beyond just acceptable FPS core mechanics and 16 v 16 multiplayer matches, it is worth making. Obviously, the more poorly implemented the basic core, the more compelling and engaging the rest of the game will need to be. But the core mechanics are just a means to an end. Not the end itself.
But the question of what, exactly that end is going to be is probably topic for another thread. |
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