Multiple Paths through the game?
Should Back to the Future games bring back the adventure game idea of multiple solutions and multiple paths through the game? A lot of the old Lucas arts games like the Indian Jones series had several ways to solve puzzles and even multiple routes through the game. Don't you think the tell tale games could benefit from this?
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I suppose it would be possible to create multiple paths that are contained to a single episode so that the start & end points would be the same for everyone but the journey could be different.
For instance let's say the game gave you 2 standard approaches to the main puzzles in the episodes
- Wise Cracking
- Creative
So you are given the problem of like. Biff has stolen the Deloren and locked it in a warehouse, and is currently standing guard.
- Wise Cracking approach - After first retrieving your trade mark skateboard you confront Biff. Then Using a variety of carefully chooses insults you get him to chase you leading to an skateboard chase mini game that inevitable results in Biff crashing into a manure truck.
- Creative approach - Using your knowledge of pop culture, quick thinking, and a collection of seemingly random items you manage to obtain a spare key to the warehouse and lure Biff away long enough to steal back the Deloren.
Ideally episodes allowing you to import a pervious save game that alters some events or aspects of the current episode. Maybe giving you an extra item that can help you solve a certain puzzle, or simply changing some events subtly.
Why would puzzle solving should change anything in the next episodes ?
You obtain the same result. So the episodes will just take taht into consideration.
ditto
You solve puzzle #1. Solution 1 is kicking in a window. Solution 2 is luring someone away with a false call.
Cue Ep 2. 1998.
Solution 1 caused a break-in, deal with the consequences, which stole the item you needed to solve a current puzzle.
In solution 2 your mother suddenly fell in love with the wrong guy (think BTTF1). Paradox. Fix it.
As such not even episodes are replayable, but the entire season. Works better for a full game, but it could work fine for episodic too. Thinking not is just shortminded, and less awesome
I was thinking that, have a problem solved 2 different ways then it would have an alternate ending, then the next episode asks you what option you chose, that would make the games different depending on what you chose in the first one. Also who in their right mind would play the second episode first, i say tough if they don't know what option to choose, just play the first one first and problem is solved.
The programmers have stated they'd rather not divide things in such a way that they're making content that a significant portion of their audience is guaranteed to never see, and choices that may be out of character (Would Marty really approach the situation with solution B? or solution C? or is solution A clearly most in character for him?) and instead put that effort into making more content that reaches the majority of players in a logical manner.
Would you rather play a 4-hour game with an hour's worth of content that varies, or a coherently plotted 5-6 hour game?
And guess what; the linear non-choice shooters take 5 hours, while they still take 20+ hours.
Adventure games are not about character customization. They're about puzzle solving and while there may be many ways to solve a puzzle there's usually only one best/funniest/most interesting way to do it. Why bother with the rest?
If the game has multiple paths, then great. I'm only trying to list the reasons I've seen programmers from Telltale state in the past why we're not likely to see it. And it's not a dumb reason. Do you want them to work on more content you probably won't see or content you probably will?
And they would need to all resolve and re-integrate by the end of each episode, as there are logistical issues in reading savegame data on consoles from the previous episode.
@ Xavian; so why not Adventure games? Isn't "lack of replayability" because it's always the same one of the big cons of the genre. How are you going to alter that if it stays on it's pre-defined path of 'one puzzle, one solution'?
Like said, RPG's do it since, well, forever. Adventure games can really benefit from this too.
Why would I go back and solve the puzzle a different way, I already would have completed the story, time to move on. Heck, I don't even replay any RPGs that do stuff like that. When I beat a game, I want to move on.
So, King's Quest 6, Fate of Atlantis, (arguably) Last Crusade, Maniac Mansion...all wastes of resources?
I agree there are several reasons it wouldn't work in an episodic game, but for adventure games in general, I think multiple story paths not only adds replayability, but added value for different player levels. Someone a little less comfortable with adventure games can complete the story from the "easiest" path, and someone who wants to dig a little deeper can get a more complex story.
I understand why more adventure game designers don't do it--it's a LOT of hard work--but I always get excited when I realize there were multiple story options in an adventure game.
I'm not sure you can alter it. My point is that it works well with RPGs. In RPGs, you have the potential to create different kinds of characters with different advantages, disadvantages and possibly different philosophies. There it might make sense to let you bypass a dangerous situation by attacking, talking your way out of it, or sneaking past it. That's great for an RPG.
But in an adventure game, not so much. Will people go back and replay it JUST to see the alternate solutions? Die-hard gamers, certainly. They're the same people who will probably replay it just to see dialogue choices they didn't click. But the casual gamer? Not nearly as likely.
Someone mentioned the Indiana Jones games having multiple solutions. That's great. But are all the solutions really something Indiana Jones would do? Did they all really feel like something you'd see in the movies? Some of them yes, others probably not.
There's no point in offering us multiple ways to bypass a puzzle if one or more of those ways doesn't feel like something Marty would do or if it wouldn't belong in the movie. If there's only one clear obvious approach that's suitable for Marty McFly, then I'm fine if the programmers want to focus their attention on that. And if having less alternate paths means more puzzles/more content in the main linear path, then that's fine with me too.
Before we worry about a game that's entertaining to replay, let's remember the important thing is to make a game that's entertaining to play.
Well, in that case, I agree.
But that's okay; replay value isn't the only reason to have multiple solutions/storylines. Multiple solutions are great for gamers with different levels of experience/different ways of thinking, and having those solutions have different consequences just makes the story and the world deeper. And while the effort required to make that happen will be lost on a lot of people, the effort behind EVERY aspect of any piece of entertainment is lost on most people. :P
It's been a long time since I've last played them, but I don't remember any solutions sticking out in my mind as un-Indy-like. Of course, maybe I just never found those particular solutions. :P
Who cares if casual players only play a game once? Are we going to let our games suffer in name of pseudo-gamers?
I don't mind them, but if my games are molested to make it friendly for them, and hence unfun for me, I really don't want it anymore.
TTG already makes most games unable to get 100% of all content in a single playthrough. According to your philosophy they should throw these side-gags away for something that everyone get to experience? How would it be different with this, except the effort is spend on something else than merely a gag (think the excellent golden pantaloons scene in 304)?
Episodic might even make it easier and better to do this, cause if you want to change something in ep #3 you don't HAVE to do #1 and #2 too, unlike full games, to get a new savegame with the changes you wish for.
Stagnation is devolution...
I think you're still missing my point, which I'm not going to reiterate except to say that there's a big difference between a few lines of alternate dialogue or an optional sight gag and a /puzzle/ in a /puzzle-based/ game that the player will not see in the course of playing the game. To ensure that a player /cannot/ see /all/ the puzzles in a single playthrough is a colossal waste.
And my final point above was very valid. That before Telltale worries about making sure this game is fun to replay, they need to make sure it's fun to play. That has to be the utmost priority. There's no excuse to sacrifice play value for replay value. Not in this genre. If you disagree, fine, but I think most people will agree that it makes sense to focus on the core game rather than sidetracks.
But realistically, the game will be what it can be. This thread is no more likely to cause Telltale to add multiple paths if they didn't plan to, and my replies are unlikely to discourage them from doing so if that is their intention. This whole debate is meaningless. The decision was made months ago. All we can do is wait and see if they made the right choice.
Finis.
I am taking a rather simple standpoint in the matter. All effort of the game developer is towards player immersion; player immersion is tied to interactivity or at least the illusion of interactivity; and whether multiple solutions to a single puzzle help creating more player immersion (or, a deeper world, a more emotional attachment, a greater feeling of realism, whatever) depends largely on one's personal perception of these possible different outcomes.
Let's face it, adventures are pretty linear. The explorative aspect of Telltale's games tries hard to buffer this fact, with some success. It is, in fact, the easiest way to immerse the player. If you have multiple solutions to a puzzle, but the player experiences only one (and knowing this solution, uses it again in subsequent play-throughs), the desired effect will be lost. But if the next game would be all about finding "alternate" solutions, the game might feel even more restricted, although you are in fact experiencing something new.
Back to the Future, on the other hand, has great opportunities to really give the player the idea that he himself has done something individually, chosen his individual path, decided a certain outcome. If that wonderful feeling emerges, it's well worth the effort; but I'm with many in this thread who fear that the feeling might not emerge while the effort put into these multiple solutions would be tremendous.
In my youth, I wrote countless interactive stories (I think they're called "Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks" in English). It was a great and creative thing to do, but you're really hesitating to write (and draw!) too many options because you're rather sure no one would ever read them. Any more thoughts on this?
If in short comic form, I will get through all too, it doesn't take long after all.
And as said, I am an RPG-player, so I often replay those games and then do stuff different. The best being ones that actually respond on your decisions.
See: Vampire: Bloodlines or Alpha Protocol for some recent examples.
Though they aren't the most popular games, as railroaders like Mass Effect are much more popular. But well, TTG should be big enough to take said risks, no, and evolve adventures as they are if the succeed...
Good man!
Still, the question remains how that freedom can be applied to adventure gaming. How can the feeling of interactivity be achieved in the FIRST run trough a game? In choose-your-own-adventure books, you actually get a list with your options. In Adventure gaming, in your first game, you can't easily know whether what you do is the only choice or not. So although you might present a very interactive storyline to the gamer, he might not actually feel that it is. Am I making sense here?
As said, like an RPG. There you also pretty much don't know how many solutions there are until you open a walkthrough, and that's perfect, don't want the first game, or following game spoiled by already knowing all solutions do you?
Telltale provided walkthroughs for older games so that could solve that for people who really want to know. But I think they didn't give one for Season 3, so I don't know if they still plan to do such for their games...