Remember when everything that Telltale games did wasn't Walking Dead? I'm still waiting for a new Superbad, Sam 'n' Max, or Monkey Island... I want my genre back... I want the "I can't die, point and click" hilarity that I LOVE!!! Challenge my mind, not my patience for re-spawning and repeating everything... Someday? Maybe? Please?
Remember when everything that Telltale games did wasn't Walking Dead? I'm still waiting for a new Superbad, Sam 'n' Max, or Monkey Island... I want my genre back... I want the "I can't die, point and click" hilarity that I LOVE!!! Challenge my mind, not my patience for re-spawning and repeating everything... Someday? Maybe? Please?
So sad,
Lokistarr
Never. TTG are too well fed from the money The Walking Dead made. You can buy a ton of babies from that.
Remember when everything that Telltale games did wasn't Walking Dead? I'm still waiting for a new Superbad, Sam 'n' Max, or Monkey Island... I want my genre back... I want the "I can't die, point and click" hilarity that I LOVE!!! Challenge my mind, not my patience for re-spawning and repeating everything... Someday? Maybe? Please?
So sad,
Lokistarr
Yeahhhhh they've made one Walking Dead Game vs three Sam and Max games. You're okay.
Remember when everything that Telltale games did wasn't Walking Dead? I'm still waiting for a new Superbad, Sam 'n' Max, or Monkey Island... I want my genre back... I want the "I can't die, point and click" hilarity that I LOVE!!! Challenge my mind, not my patience for re-spawning and repeating everything... Someday? Maybe? Please?
That's not Walking Dead, that's "Hard Candy". And it's not TTG, it's "Madonna".
It's both.
Let's just say it's a shame that Madonna became a big joke. I'd really want her to release another great album. But Hard Candy was not that and MDNE was as far from it as it could be.
And now I wonder how many puzzles in Scribblenauts Unlimited can be solved with a "dead frozen baby".
We got some pretty heavy snow here today. So heavy it knocked down some fairly large branches from trees in the back yard. Fortunately, they didn't hit anything important. It's still snowing, though. There will be cleanup work to do when it all melts.
So according to Adventure Gamers, the SCUMM interface is bad and "archaic" and will probably net my game a low score there. Got it.
"retro doesn't always mean good" at the top of that review should be something all game makers should remember, i dont care what you liked as a kid most of us have moved on, in fact "retro usually isn't good" would be better
Honestly I still like the Scumm verb interface. When I finally finished The Secret of Monkey Island I played the Special Edition. There were a couple of times that I switched to classic mode because I couldn't do the puzzle without it.
It's a $50 run no matter how you buy it. I'd suggest either "Add all issues to cart" and read the whole thing, or grab the first "trade"(Legacy) for $11 and start reading.
The end of this run is a tie-in to the Thanos Imparitive event. It's very likely that elements of this Guardians run and Thanos Imperative will be referenced or lifted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
After that, you'll want to start picking up the Marvel Now! run, which hasn't really started yet.
Can I punch the person who thought that Evil Dead YouTube ad was a good idea? That thing scares the hell out of me before the Skip button works and I find myself rapidly clicking skip
It's a $50 run no matter how you buy it. I'd suggest either "Add all issues to cart" and read the whole thing, or grab the first "trade"(Legacy) for $11 and start reading.
The end of this run is a tie-in to the Thanos Imparitive event. It's very likely that elements of this Guardians run and Thanos Imperative will be referenced or lifted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
After that, you'll want to start picking up the Marvel Now! run, which hasn't really started yet.
Thanks I'll try the legacy one first and then the rest later cos Il wana buy other comics (like Planet
Hulk) and stuff in the meantime.
They need to get one of these 2 lines in the movie.
Same reason we don't use rotating nobs to turn directions anymore.
Can someone give me a good reason why a streamlined SCUMM interface is worse than a single mouse cursor that traditionally doesn't tell you what interaction it's about to do? Also I am taking into account a single mouse cursor that comes with a bar that tells you what you're about to do.
It sounds strange, but my mom (who is 63 years old) will be excited to hear that Might and Magic X: Legacy is coming out soon. She's played completed all the others in the core series.
Can someone give me a good reason why a streamlined SCUMM interface is worse than a single mouse cursor that traditionally doesn't tell you what interaction it's about to do? Also I am taking into account a single mouse cursor that comes with a bar that tells you what you're about to do.
The core idea goes like this:
The SCUMM interface was developed largely to solve the core problems of Sierra's parser interfaces, which it did, but ultimately introduced new interface problems to be solved.
Let's look at a history of the three major types of adventure game interface for the period: Text with text parser, graphics with text parser, and SCUMM.
What does the Sierra system change about its predecessors? It adds graphics, of course, but there are a lot of other smaller changes, including:
-Movement is handled with keys mapped to directions and occurs within a screen, allowing characters to move within a scene rather than being a command to enter another scene.
-Text descriptions are now largely limited to text boxes that pop up over graphics.
This system added a new problem:
-With text adventures, the words for items were in the body text. The Sierra sytem used graphics, so it was hard to tell if you simply couldn't interface with the rock, or if the developer thought the rock should be called a boulder, a pebble, or a burlap sack because you have really poor vision or the art is unclear and what you think is a rock happens to be something else entirely. This is largely "solved" inelegantly though the familiar "look" command.
And retained old problems:
-"Verb guessing"
-What can I interact with? This problem was exacerbated by drawing environments, generally while the written word can outright "ignore" elements in a frame as long as it gives the player a rough idea to build a picture on, the Sierra interface requires drawing graphics, which may contain visual elements with which you can't interact. The problem then becomes "I can see it, but how do I know if it's important?"
What does the LucasArts system change about the Sierra system?
The MOUSE.
Everything important about the SCUMM interface involves how it bounded half of the interface to the mouse. Let's look at a series of problems and how they're solved differently in both interfaces:
How do I know what to interact with?
Previously: Type "Look", try to find keywords.
SCUMM: Hover over an item. If the cursor doesn't activate, it's not important. The player can now "scan" the room with the cursor and create a mental image of important details by noting each interactive object.
What can I do?
Previously: Memorize or consult a list of valid commands.
SCUMM: There they are, as a list at the bottom of the screen!
I want to do something!
Previously: Type it.
SCUMM:
1. Select verb from bank.
2. [OPTIONAL] Click inventory item.
3. Click item.
I did the wrong thing!
Previously: Type another thing.
SCUMM:
1. Drag cursor back to verb bank. Pick another verb or, if using step 2, possibly the same verb with a different item.
2. [OPTIONAL] Drag cursor back over to inventory, possibly selecting the same item but with a different verb.
3. Drag cursor back into the frame, possibly with either the same verb or the same item, or the same combination on a different interactive element in the frame.
Do you see the new problem? Because there are a few.
They bounded the interface to the mouse cursor! The problem is that, unlike a text parser at the bottom of a screen, the mouse cursor is a thing that moves around within a frame, that a player has to follow and keep track of. When your cursor leaves the inventory or the verb bank, the mobile part of your interface is leaving the static part, and there's a lot of dragging into and out of the game's frame.
Also, the space! Woo, look at how much space the box at the bottom of Monkey Island takes up! Previous games had most of the screen space taken up by the world, but now a good chunk is taken up by static interface, even though Monkey Island drops Sierra's concept of "points" and makes timers invisible to the player, actualized by in-game graphics.
Modern interfaces, with two-click, verb coin, or scroll wheel interfaces largely try to solve these by bounding the ENTIRE interface to the mouse. All verbs travel with the mouse through a now full screen pane. Verbs being bounded to the mouse means that there's no "Drag down to verb bank, then drag up to the game world, then back down to the verb bank" rigmarole. Further, by bounding the interface to the mouse, the player is able to focus entirely on the space they're supposed to be looking for clues, not looking at it, dragging down, dragging up, and trying something. There is a more immediate language and less lag time between the player going "Let's do a thing" and that thing being tried.
The argument for a wider verb base in the SCUMM games has the core problem of trying to justify itself.
In the screenshot above, Monkey Island has 9 verbs, right? Curse used a Verb Coin with three verbs, nine is a lot more than 3!
Except, in practice, that's not how the verbs end up working inside a player's head. Your average LucasArts-style adventure game ends up looking like this:
(graphic blatantly stolen from this old blog post about adventure game interface design)
To the player, SCUMM has effectively five verbs, and it's not generally hard to tell which to use. You're unlikely to confuse a person for a thing you need to "pull" or "open", nor are you likely to try and "talk" to a door.
The idea behind disliking the SCUMM sytem then comes down to "Why do we need these extra verbs, if there is rarely a point when choosing between them is significant for the player? Are the benefits of the verb bank worth more than the benefits gained by excising it? Is three verbs that much more valuable than what are effectively five verbs?"
Can someone give me a good reason why a streamlined SCUMM interface is worse than a single mouse cursor that traditionally doesn't tell you what interaction it's about to do? Also I am taking into account a single mouse cursor that comes with a bar that tells you what you're about to do.
Also give me examples of GUIs you love.
Rather Dashing gave a good breakdown of the pointlessness of clicking on words then the interaction, but a game that does the interaction part well is the broken sword games, it still has the problem of trial and error item combination and usage but it proved how unnecessary the words at the bottom of the screen are, i cant really think of a great solution to the problem of all the items in the inventory except maybe having less items and loosing items you don't need and for combinations maybe they could highlight the one it can combine with, considering there is only one solution and basically only the player character (not the player without just an educated guess) can know what that is because potentially they could all combine it is just annoying to try all the combinations out, unless it was maybe a physics based puzzle game (think garrys mod puzzle game) or there were multiple ways of combining things, they might as well just tell you which items to combine.
Comments
So sad,
Lokistarr
Never. TTG are too well fed from the money The Walking Dead made. You can buy a ton of babies from that.
Yeahhhhh they've made one Walking Dead Game vs three Sam and Max games. You're okay.
Wow, clearly you aren't waiting if you don't even know the main characters name.
STRONG BAD
VS
MCLOVIN
BEGIN!
Seriously, though, they should make that one happen.
Registered before all of you... and first post ever. Welcome!
And you're certainly not alone.
That's not Walking Dead, that's "Hard Candy". And it's not TTG, it's "Madonna".
It's both.
Let's just say it's a shame that Madonna became a big joke. I'd really want her to release another great album. But Hard Candy was not that and MDNE was as far from it as it could be.
And now I wonder how many puzzles in Scribblenauts Unlimited can be solved with a "dead frozen baby".
Ha, I got him/her beat by a month.
I fully agree, though. Maybe there'll be another fun/silly game some day.
Don't wait five years before your next post!
And hes on DLC!
that is all
SCIENCE.
I was so fucking happy happy when I beat Monsoon and
No-one ever answered this question.
It was at times a EFFING BRILLIANT show. Then it got put down by corporate suits and is running as a pathetic shell of its former self.
Same reason we don't use rotating nobs to turn directions anymore.
"retro doesn't always mean good" at the top of that review should be something all game makers should remember, i dont care what you liked as a kid most of us have moved on, in fact "retro usually isn't good" would be better
I'd suggest starting here.
It's a $50 run no matter how you buy it. I'd suggest either "Add all issues to cart" and read the whole thing, or grab the first "trade"(Legacy) for $11 and start reading.
The end of this run is a tie-in to the Thanos Imparitive event. It's very likely that elements of this Guardians run and Thanos Imperative will be referenced or lifted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
After that, you'll want to start picking up the Marvel Now! run, which hasn't really started yet.
I concur with der_ketzer.
Adblock Plus, for the win.
Thanks I'll try the legacy one first and then the rest later cos Il wana buy other comics (like Planet
Hulk) and stuff in the meantime.
They need to get one of these 2 lines in the movie.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=Q5QU0uqgwuA&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCt-HUn0AAU
Can someone give me a good reason why a streamlined SCUMM interface is worse than a single mouse cursor that traditionally doesn't tell you what interaction it's about to do? Also I am taking into account a single mouse cursor that comes with a bar that tells you what you're about to do.
Also give me examples of GUIs you love.
The SCUMM interface was developed largely to solve the core problems of Sierra's parser interfaces, which it did, but ultimately introduced new interface problems to be solved.
Let's look at a history of the three major types of adventure game interface for the period: Text with text parser, graphics with text parser, and SCUMM.
What does the Sierra system change about its predecessors? It adds graphics, of course, but there are a lot of other smaller changes, including:
-Movement is handled with keys mapped to directions and occurs within a screen, allowing characters to move within a scene rather than being a command to enter another scene.
-Text descriptions are now largely limited to text boxes that pop up over graphics.
This system added a new problem:
-With text adventures, the words for items were in the body text. The Sierra sytem used graphics, so it was hard to tell if you simply couldn't interface with the rock, or if the developer thought the rock should be called a boulder, a pebble, or a burlap sack because you have really poor vision or the art is unclear and what you think is a rock happens to be something else entirely. This is largely "solved" inelegantly though the familiar "look" command.
And retained old problems:
-"Verb guessing"
-What can I interact with? This problem was exacerbated by drawing environments, generally while the written word can outright "ignore" elements in a frame as long as it gives the player a rough idea to build a picture on, the Sierra interface requires drawing graphics, which may contain visual elements with which you can't interact. The problem then becomes "I can see it, but how do I know if it's important?"
What does the LucasArts system change about the Sierra system?
The MOUSE.
Everything important about the SCUMM interface involves how it bounded half of the interface to the mouse. Let's look at a series of problems and how they're solved differently in both interfaces:
How do I know what to interact with?
Previously: Type "Look", try to find keywords.
SCUMM: Hover over an item. If the cursor doesn't activate, it's not important. The player can now "scan" the room with the cursor and create a mental image of important details by noting each interactive object.
What can I do?
Previously: Memorize or consult a list of valid commands.
SCUMM: There they are, as a list at the bottom of the screen!
I want to do something!
Previously: Type it.
SCUMM:
1. Select verb from bank.
2. [OPTIONAL] Click inventory item.
3. Click item.
I did the wrong thing!
Previously: Type another thing.
SCUMM:
1. Drag cursor back to verb bank. Pick another verb or, if using step 2, possibly the same verb with a different item.
2. [OPTIONAL] Drag cursor back over to inventory, possibly selecting the same item but with a different verb.
3. Drag cursor back into the frame, possibly with either the same verb or the same item, or the same combination on a different interactive element in the frame.
Do you see the new problem? Because there are a few.
They bounded the interface to the mouse cursor! The problem is that, unlike a text parser at the bottom of a screen, the mouse cursor is a thing that moves around within a frame, that a player has to follow and keep track of. When your cursor leaves the inventory or the verb bank, the mobile part of your interface is leaving the static part, and there's a lot of dragging into and out of the game's frame.
Also, the space! Woo, look at how much space the box at the bottom of Monkey Island takes up! Previous games had most of the screen space taken up by the world, but now a good chunk is taken up by static interface, even though Monkey Island drops Sierra's concept of "points" and makes timers invisible to the player, actualized by in-game graphics.
Modern interfaces, with two-click, verb coin, or scroll wheel interfaces largely try to solve these by bounding the ENTIRE interface to the mouse. All verbs travel with the mouse through a now full screen pane. Verbs being bounded to the mouse means that there's no "Drag down to verb bank, then drag up to the game world, then back down to the verb bank" rigmarole. Further, by bounding the interface to the mouse, the player is able to focus entirely on the space they're supposed to be looking for clues, not looking at it, dragging down, dragging up, and trying something. There is a more immediate language and less lag time between the player going "Let's do a thing" and that thing being tried.
The argument for a wider verb base in the SCUMM games has the core problem of trying to justify itself.
In the screenshot above, Monkey Island has 9 verbs, right? Curse used a Verb Coin with three verbs, nine is a lot more than 3!
Except, in practice, that's not how the verbs end up working inside a player's head. Your average LucasArts-style adventure game ends up looking like this:
(graphic blatantly stolen from this old blog post about adventure game interface design)
To the player, SCUMM has effectively five verbs, and it's not generally hard to tell which to use. You're unlikely to confuse a person for a thing you need to "pull" or "open", nor are you likely to try and "talk" to a door.
The idea behind disliking the SCUMM sytem then comes down to "Why do we need these extra verbs, if there is rarely a point when choosing between them is significant for the player? Are the benefits of the verb bank worth more than the benefits gained by excising it? Is three verbs that much more valuable than what are effectively five verbs?"
Rather Dashing gave a good breakdown of the pointlessness of clicking on words then the interaction, but a game that does the interaction part well is the broken sword games, it still has the problem of trial and error item combination and usage but it proved how unnecessary the words at the bottom of the screen are, i cant really think of a great solution to the problem of all the items in the inventory except maybe having less items and loosing items you don't need and for combinations maybe they could highlight the one it can combine with, considering there is only one solution and basically only the player character (not the player without just an educated guess) can know what that is because potentially they could all combine it is just annoying to try all the combinations out, unless it was maybe a physics based puzzle game (think garrys mod puzzle game) or there were multiple ways of combining things, they might as well just tell you which items to combine.