From what I read and hear, I feel like Telltale is positively inclined to stick with the 1-episode per month episodic model for the Sam and Max franchise. As Dan Connors said in his recent interview, being out once a month allows them to stay top of mind, as the moment interest and conversation dies down on one episode, the next episode is right around the corner.
So I'm not sure if bumps in release schedule and price would actually be attractive--especially not mid-season, but maybe not even for future seasons. Most of their positive press (and if I get my shady inferences right, attraction from the big 3 console makers) comes from the fact that the season is a monthly release that has been staying on schedule--in fact, many comments on mainstream websites after Situation:Comedy came out were the (mistaken) dismayed comments about Telltale's inability to release Situation:Comedy 1 month after Culture Shock, as they had "planned" all along (in fact, Telltale had always planned on the initial 2-month period between 1 and 2). And the fact that Telltale has stuck to the schedule so far is bringing good press from some unlikely quarters, like forums about Half-Life 2 that complain about the changing release schedule for its episodes and people saying things like "Why can't they be like Telltale?" Changing it up, even if it's a change to another regular schedule, might result in similar negative attitudes--people would say "How do we know they're not going to change it again?"
I'd like to see how the latter half of the season--where many have claimed is where Telltale has started hitting its stride--measures up before pointing out problems with the development schedule. Coupled with Brendan Ferguson's claim that the first episodes are purposely designed to be easier, it may well be likely that some wishes will be accomplished without a change in schedule. The "But the season's not done yet" argument definitely becomes less usable as the season moves closer to the end.
That said, Connors also alludes to the possibility of different release schedules for other episodic games, dependent on the type of game--in his interview--"It could be every 2 or 3 months, or every week." I'm hopeful that a regular schedule for Bone gets established after the end of the Sam and Max season, and doubt that it's epic nature will lend itself to a monthly schedule.
And what do you mean the series is being held back from building each episode? Are you playing the same games as everyone else?
That was in response to Reverend Ted's post..and his suggestions.. follow the thread...
In a normal adventure game as you progress.. you will have access to a larger number of locations, and will build a larger inventory. These episodes don't work that way. You start with a new episode, you only get 3 new locations, you cannot re-visit the tv studio or the home for child stars. You don't start off with all the inventory items from the past 2..or 3 episodes when you start episode 4. Its not 1 long game broken up into 6 episodes. Its 6 individual short episodic games. I was merely pointing out why his suggestions couldn't work in the series, but if you want to suggest I'm playing a different game than everyone else go ahead.
Telltale stated people can jump in an any point in the series, and while strictly true, it's pretty clear that anyone who does so is missing out on the overarching plotline.
Is there a single story driven game where this really works? I doubt it...but hey you can do some Loadrunner Levels instead... :O)
And as for the playing time. As already stated by others before. Increase the complexity/difficulty/amount of the puzzles and the playing time will increase automatically without the need to add more rooms.
It's interesting that most of the other games come with possibilities which allow the user to adjust the level of difficulty to his/her personal needs. Only in adventures such a system isn't common (remembering the thread i talked to Emily about this). If this would be solved nicely than a lot of the "it's too easy or too hard hassle" would be gone.
The only alternative to me is that you succeed in delivering a perfectly balanced game where everyone is pleased. May it be that you start easy and increase the level of difficulty slowely or that you please everyone right from scratch. Both solutions would be more like a good book then.
Difficulty levels in an adventure game probably wouldn't work. A puzzle may seem mind-numbingly easy to one player, and mind-numbingly difficult to another. (Either way, minds shall be numbed... oh yes, they shall. Muahahaha!)
Plus, the designers would have to remake the puzzle from scratch for every setting. When the puzzle is elaborate and finely tuned, that can take much more work than most would be willing to put in. And if the solution is alluded to in dialogue beforehand, script rewrites might have to be done. Adventure games have a balance to them that other genres don't. The slightest alteration can bring down the whole thing.
There are many ways how to vary the difficulty also of adventures. Some of them have been discussed in other threads before without touching the puzzles too. Giving more hints visually, by characters, by sound, leaving out parts of a complex puzzle for the easy mode. For instance remember the puzzles about Leonard and Sybil i've written about in this thread before? In the more challening mode (normal) you would have to distract them first or argue that they allow certain actions from you first.
It always is more work adding diferent difficulty levels for a game but it does make a lot of sense as that's what people complain most about. Either you introduce such a mechanism or you put all the work into a improved balancing for all.
At the moment people are mainly complaining about that it's too easy. Once the difficulty is increased i bet that there also will be people who complain about that it's too hard, so...
I think even better (and easier!) than allowing easy/difficult mode, is to provide alternative more difficult solutions to the same puzzles. The more difficult solutions could be more rewarding for some reason (for example, they would cause some funny dialog or animation, or reveal a little more of the plot). This as been employed to some extent, for example, in the old Sierra games, where you had a few ways to pass the Troll in King's Quest 1, or a few ways to pass the Sarien guards in Space Quest 2.
This has the benefits of:
a) allowing novice players to get through the game
b) allowing experienced players to be rewarded for spending more thought
c) giving a cool replay value - I'd replay the games again just to look for alternative solutions to puzzles.
I wouldn't alter the puzzles or the rewards as this might lead to a lot of work on the artwork side. I would prefer a hint system or that a certain part of a puzzle is left out for the easy version. So instead of a 5 step puzzle there are only 3 steps to accomplish. This a) rewards you already with more game to play and dialogues to listen and b) is easier to balance in my opinion.
I really wouldn't mind if telltale would experiment with this in the game as in the end we all could end up with adventures where less people are complaining about the difficulty.
Just thought of a genious way to easily increase the difficulty in the game!! Here it is:
We could have a diffculty slider which goes from "1" to "10". In "1", the game would work as it does now. However, as the difficulty approaches "10" the mouse cursor would get more and more jiggly, so it would be very hard to point it to the exact wanted item. I bet telltale could implement this in a few hours.
I wouldn't alter the puzzles or the rewards as this might lead to a lot of work on the artwork side. I would prefer a hint system or that a certain part of a puzzle is left out for the easy version. So instead of a 5 step puzzle there are only 3 steps to accomplish. This a) rewards you already with more game to play and dialoguies to listen and b) is easier to balance i my opinion.
I really wouldn't mind if telltale would experiment with this in the game as in the end we all could end up with adventures where less people are complaining about the difficulty.
Well, maybe you're right in that it would be easier to leave puzzles out in the easy version, but this still requires some work (more dialog to get around the missing puzzle). Also, I really liked it that in "Monkey Island 2" some of the puzzles are actually different and not just missing in the "lite" version.
I still think it would be more cool to have multiple solutions to puzzles, but oh well
Just thought of a genious way to easily increase the difficulty in the game!! Here it is:
We could have a diffculty slider which goes from "1" to "10". In "1", the game would work as it does now. However, as the difficulty approaches "10" the mouse cursor would get more and more jiggly, so it would be very hard to point it to the exact wanted item. I bet telltale could implement this in a few hours.
If they actually implement that feature, I reserve the right to set up a SAW-style trap for you, involving razor blades, malt vinegar, and a poodle named Phyllis.
@matan
The problem with those multiple ways of solving is that you have to invest a huge amount of work into something which most of the people won't see, so it's kind of wasted.
Just thought of a genious way to easily increase the difficulty in the game!! Here it is:
We could have a diffculty slider which goes from "1" to "10". In "1", the game would work as it does now. However, as the difficulty approaches "10" the mouse cursor would get more and more jiggly, so it would be very hard to point it to the exact wanted item. I bet telltale could implement this in a few hours.
Hah--if you've played Bone: The Great Cow Race, you definitely will know that they can do a jiggly cursor (it was for a minigame)--and it does make things hard.
Hah--if you've played Bone: The Great Cow Race, you definitely will know that they can do a jiggly cursor (it was for a minigame)--and it does make things hard.
Right! I forgot about that one! Great, then they already have everything implemented and good to go
Difficulty levels. I am totally pro those. First, create a puzzle, then, make it more complicated for the hard version. Easy as hell.
There are still some issues with this, in my opinion.
First off, difficulty is in the eye of the beholder--some will believe that a Myst-level of difficulty would be appropriate, while some would ask for a Grim Fandango level of difficulty--some people are asking for being able to distract people first, some people want red herring items, some people want red herring characters, some people want more (non-red herring) items, some people want to carry items you won't use into later episodes, some people want to revisit old locations, some people want item combination, some want to use Max, some want all of the above, and some say that the level of difficulty on the level of a Myst age would be appropriate--this is the same with the complaints about length; some people are asking for 30 minutes more in Episode 3, some just want an hour more, and some even are asking for it to be triple the length, with a bumped up price and a different release schedule.
Secondly, it turns the designers away from focusing away from their strengths--a very dense concentration of smartly written dialogue, towards coming up with ways to trick up the player. For example, it looked like the designers ended up having to hire an outside writer to come up with dialogues for Episode 2 and 3, to keep up with the pace of production--money that maybe they didn't intend to spend. It is true that experience makes puzzles easier to solve; many reviews have (rightfully) pointed out that Episode 3 seems easier because of your experience with the puzzles in the past. So to truly keep up with a harder difficulty level, the designers literally would be wracking their brains trying to figure out ways to trick the hardcore players that would play such a level, instead of wracking their brains coming up with Sam and Max dialogue (which is already very hard to do--try writing a Sam and Max webcomic). How frustrating would it be for a designer who after lots of doubts, decides to make the leap to creating a harder difficulty level, and then to later still face criticism that it was still not hard enough (given the different number and types of "make it harder" requests I outlined above--it is very feasible). In effect, it will make them try to design the hardest puzzles most possible, to get the criticism out of the way once and for all.
Third, not only does it makes designers' jobs harder, it may also lead to making the designers more lazy--sounds paradoxical, right? Here's what I think--instead of the ramping up of difficulty that Brendan says they are planning, they decide on splitting the difficulty level. That means there will always be easy puzzles for the easy players at a standard level, while there are very difficult puzzles in each new game on the hard level. In effect, designers will toss out lazily designed puzzles (since they're easy to design, they must be easy, right?) to the easy level, and the overall design philosophy for a progression of challenge is tossed out the window. Established easy-level players looking for more challenge must be tossed in the ever-increasing vat of acidic difficulty as outlined in the previous paragraph. But what about making a medium difficulty, you say? It would further exacerbate the lazy design problems highlighted in this paragraph and the "eye of the beholder" argument I made earlier. And these games aren't built with lots of money and time to throw around either...A segue into my last point.
These $6 games are built with extremely tight time and budget pressures. Spend lots of time designing (and programming) multiple levels and your time and money for other things like music and dialogue creation is lost (unless you start hiring more people, which still translates to money lost). As I read on another forum: "These games aren't made with employees pocket change in their spare time, they're made on a very regimented budget that can't slip in any direction. That means that every penny spent has to show up on screen. Why would money be - effectively - wasted making content deliberately designed just for one pocket of [the] overall audience."
Once again, there are no guarantees that moving in such a direction actually will satisfy everyone. As I said before, even though people are asking for "more difficulty," there is a vast difference in their opinions on the matter--look around--"some people are asking for being able to distract people first, some people want red herring items, some people want red herring characters, some people want more (non-red herring) items, some people want to carry items you won't use into later episodes, some people want to revisit old locations, some people want item combination, some want to use Max, some want all of the above, and some say that the level of difficulty on the level of a Myst age would be appropriate."
Having other writers come in has been in the plan for a while, so don't worry about that.
Ah, though I did somewhat expect that, Jeff Lester's comment on his blog could've been interpreted differently, where he said, "Because they were working on such an ambitious schedule, they found themselves looking for a contract writer to help with the dialogues in Episode 3 to keep on schedule."
Still, my overall point is that there will probably be more costs when there are few guarantees of added benefits.
(Secretly, I was just using it as a point to show that it costs a lot of money to make these $6 games, even for the dialogue that some difficulty-hounds take for granted--did not actually believe that it was money you didn't intend to spend--Shh, don't tell anyone).
And some say they won´t preorder the next season. Like me. I might be in minority, and it doesn´t bother me. If I don´t like it, I´ll do something else. Also, the developers will be happy, I won´t be bitching here. Heck, why shouldn´t they make an interactive cartoon right away, that would surely scare me off buiyng their product (oops, I forgot that they already made three).
What would be the problem with ramping up the difficulty on both easy and hard mode? I mean, just keep on with the original production plan and simultaneously make insanely hard puzzles for the hardcorers. Surely Telltale´s employers have more experience in creating puzzles and maybe they have a wilder imagination (hopefully, they are professionals and get paid, I don´t) but it maybe took me an hour to design this in my head. I´ll quote myself from the past:
Drop a bowling ball and knock a soda popper unconscious.
That would be the easy puzzle.
Now, basically they would have to expand this puzzle a little bit. I came up with this after thinking for a while how the game could have been a little harder. It didn´t take too long.
Now, what if Sam doesn´t want to drop Lou because he suspects that some dude might stole it while he is upstairs? Well, Bosco could sell some extra-strong rubber bands in his store along with a heap of other useless junk (just to distract the player). OK, Sam notices that the rubber band won´t fit into Lou´s holes, it´s just a little too thick (after all it´s a rubber band and it´s, how should I put it, "twice fold" since it doesn´t have ends). Surely he could fit it in that hole if he could break it and make it more of a rubber string. But it´s extra strong and he just can´t break it with his hands. So, what if he walked outside and put the string on street sings on both sides of the road. When a car drives through, the band breaks (if you put a couple of extra bands there at the same time you could make a giant car-sling). So, now you have a string, and it fits into the hole but now there´s some empty space in that hole. Luckily Bosco sells extra fast cement in his store and you just have to get some water. Sadly, the water cooler is malfunctioning, the fish who lives there has been stuck in the tap and therefore you can´t just take water straight away. Well, you have a big gun so why shouldn´t you use it. Just shoot a hole into the water cooler, combine rubber string, Lou, cement and water and voila, you have a bowling ball yoyo.
More work? Yeah. More satisfied customers? I don´t know. It would even help if there were like three or four harder puzzles per episode in hard mode. That´s like a workday of thinking (and lots of programming, hehe).
And by the way, I don´t think the difficulty level of past adventure games didn´t cause the fall of the genre. I think the reason was just that they weren´t sexy enough anymore. That´s my opinion, my take on the discussion about the fall of the genre.
What would be the problem with ramping up the difficulty on both easy and hard mode? I mean, just keep on with the original production plan and simultaneously make insanely hard puzzles for the hardcorers.
It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design. This argument comes up in education a lot, actually. The argument goes like this: A high school history teacher that has to teach 2 classes, "normal" and "honors/advanced" ends up just babysitting the normal class--showing videos, giving them busywork, not really encouraging thinking beyond superficial aspects on the subject matter--while focusing all of his/her energy on teaching the "honors/advanced classes." But if the students weren't divided as such and the same teacher were to teach 1 "normal" class, he would actually try much harder and the overall educational experience for all students is actually better.
Of course, wishful thinking is that teachers and designers aren't all like that, which is true--but I feel that the budget and time constraints of a monthly $6 game would make it more likely for designers to cut around the corners if they are now tasked to come up with what is effectively 2 games in the same time, with the same budget.
Regarding the different difficulties issue - while I agree that having "easy", "hard" etc. difficulties is fun, I think it's kind of ridiculous to talk about it when the current puzzle difficulty is definitely below what would've been considered "easy".
numble, regarding the "difficulty in the eye of the beholder" - I think at the current non-existent difficulty level, people are not exactly expressing different opinions of what makes a puzzle difficult, but just offering suggestions for how to relatively easily make the puzzles a bit more difficult. It doesn't mean pepole define "difficult puzzles = lots of red herrings", just that adding red herrings automatically make the existing puzzles a bit harder - without need to change any of the puzzles.
I'm not exactly bitching, since as I've said - I'm perfectly happy with playing an interactive cartoon, but I still think the difficulty level of episode 3 was a little TOO low. I don't think it's because I'm getting used to the puzzles. Actually I solved
the Sybil puzzle
immediately by accident -
I wanted to fill the cup with coffee but Sam didn't agree, so I just thought - oh, the ketchup is here nearby, and I used to ketchup last time - let's try filling it with ketchup. Then I didn't know what to do with it so I gave it back to Sybil. Then it was pretty obvious
. Since that was supposed to be the hardest puzzle in the game, it kinda made the game super easy for me. Same thing happened in episode 2 - I've solved many of the puzzles by accident (
for example - the probably hiding a cow puzzle, which I accidently solved on the first shot of the show
). I think that's a side effect of having a small set without many items to interact with.
(For some reason, even though the first episode was smaller, I didn't solve any of the puzzles by accident and therefore it took more time and was more satisfying)
I still think the plot and dialog is getting better each episode, which is positive
numble, you are forgetting one pretty important motivator: money. As soon as the developers begin their lazy design it will be noticed. Even though the reviewers and fans have complained about the easiness of the puzzles perhaps everyone has still agreed that they were well designed. Certainly a review with words "the puzzles were badly and lazily designed and just bad" would scare away more players than "the game is too easy".
I don´t think they would have to design two games at once. Even a couple of harder puzzles would make me happy.
Sybil puzzle was soooooo easy, by the way. I didn´t even have to think about it.
numble, regarding the "difficulty in the eye of the beholder" - I think at the current non-existent difficulty level, people are not exactly expressing different opinions of what makes a puzzle difficult, but just offering suggestions for how to relatively easily make the puzzles a bit more difficult. It doesn't mean pepole define "difficult puzzles = lots of red herrings", just that adding red herrings automatically make the existing puzzles a bit harder - without need to change any of the puzzles.
Yeah, I admit I kind of exaggerated when I lumped a lot of those suggestions together, but I'd still argue that there's a chance that the difficulty level, if given as a separate level, could still prove unsatisfying to some--it's not beyond my imagination to envision this kind of response to a separate, hard difficulty: "You call this harder?! This is medium difficulty, please make an actual hard level."
I am not arguing about the present easiness of the current levels, or that future episodes shouldn't be harder--only presenting reasons why the creation of separate difficulty levels might not be ideal compared to the established goal of progressively increasing difficulty for later episodes.
I thought episode 3 was hillarious. I thought the puzzle level was alright. But I don't want it too hard either, because then I just end up playing half of the episode and then forgetting all about it. What's most important to me is that the episode got good humour and that I spend more time laughing than scratching my head If I want to scratch my head, I would have bought myst . What is dying away from the rest of the adventure games is the adventure game humour, which is a special kind of humour you only find in adventure games(yeah, the same kind of humour you find in sam & max or Broken Sword), so I think that's a good niché to focus on. But of course, it wouldn't harm with more puzzles either. Maybe more ways to solve an episode would be something to consider if you get some spare time? (yeah right spare time )
numble, you are forgetting one pretty important motivator: money. As soon as the developers begin their lazy design it will be noticed. Even though the reviewers and fans have complained about the easiness of the puzzles perhaps everyone has still agreed that they were well designed. Certainly a review with words "the puzzles were badly and lazily designed and just bad" would scare away more players than "the game is too easy".
True, true--which is why my original post included other mitigating issues. Still possible that that other sections of the game--dialogue, for example, might suffer. And a review that said "Not funny" or "Bad dialogue" would also potentially scare away people. Time constraints for a monthly released $6 game are very real. But no, they can just hire more writers/designers to keep to the production schedule right? Except that one factor comes in again: money--if it costs $6000 to hire another writer, they will have to sell 1001 more games to justify that; (not to mention the extra game programmers needed to make the extra hard puzzles in the extra difficulty level) and I'm not privy to their market data to know if an added difficulty level will result in the extra sales to justify the added costs.
I've been playing through Sam And Max with my 9 year old daughter and it's been rather good fun. Last Saturday I downloaded Ep3, but as I was due to be out in the morning I let my daughter play on her own.
Of course when I got home later that afternoon I asked her if she fancied playing the game together.
I'm sure you can guess the rest...
When I signed up for the season I wasn't envisaging buying a kid-level difficulty game. I really hope Ep4 is a lot more challenging.
It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design. This argument comes up in education a lot, actually. The argument goes like this: A high school history teacher that has to teach 2 classes, "normal" and "honors/advanced" ends up just babysitting the normal class--showing videos, giving them busywork, not really encouraging thinking beyond superficial aspects on the subject matter--while focusing all of his/her energy on teaching the "honors/advanced classes." But if the students weren't divided as such and the same teacher were to teach 1 "normal" class, he would actually try much harder and the overall educational experience for all students is actually better.
Of course, wishful thinking is that teachers and designers aren't all like that, which is true--but I feel that the budget and time constraints of a monthly $6 game would make it more likely for designers to cut around the corners if they are now tasked to come up with what is effectively 2 games in the same time, with the same budget.
"It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design."
You mean lazy like now?
Plenty of adventure games use a hard and easy mode-Monkey Island 2 and 3, loom...
Your bogus education comparison doesn't fit because plenty of games have used it successfully as stated above. Why would you compare it to education anyway when you could have just compared it to other adventure games?
True, true--which is why my original post included other mitigating issues. Still possible that that other sections of the game--dialogue, for example, might suffer. And a review that said "Not funny" or "Bad dialogue" would also potentially scare away people. Time constraints for a monthly released $6 game are very real. But no, they can just hire more writers/designers to keep to the production schedule right? Except that one factor comes in again: money--if it costs $6000 to hire another writer, they will have to sell 1001 more games to justify that; (not to mention the extra game programmers needed to make the extra hard puzzles in the extra difficulty level) and I'm not privy to their market data to know if an added difficulty level will result in the extra sales to justify the added costs.
Actually it is a monthly released 9 dollar game. Only 6 if you pre-ordered while having no idea if you'd get your money's worth or not.
"It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design."
You mean lazy like now?
Plenty of adventure games use a hard and easy mode-Monkey Island 2 and 3, loom...
Your bogus education comparison doesn't fit because plenty of games have used it successfully as stated above. Why would you compare it to education anyway when you could have just compared it to other adventure games?
Again, in context, I said this problem was exacerbated when combined with the mitigating factors of time, cost and release schedule for a monthly $6 game from a small development studio--this isn't a company with the backing of George Lucas' empire. Notwithstanding the fact that yes, I do believe that plenty of the easy puzzles in Monkey Island 2 and 3 were lazily designed, those games still took 2-3 years of development, were backed by a huge studio, and had a retail price of $40-60 initially, if I remember correctly.
Actually it is a monthly released 9 dollar game. Only 6 if you pre-ordered while having no idea if you'd get your money's worth or not.
If you can claim that the real price of a HL episode equals $9 (when that is a now non-attainable price point, you can only get it for $19.95 now), I can say that a still attainable price point of $6 ($5.83 actually) is the real price of a Sam and Max episode.
I don't know what I'm allowed to talk about, so I'm not gonna say much, but
Ep 4 is great. It's length is a nice change from 3. Just when you think its over, you have a whole 'nother act. There are some great scenes in new enviroments and the puzzles are plentiful and more of a challenge. That said, keep you're eye out for the ep. 4 trailer. I promise it'll raise some questions in your little heads
talk about, so I'm not gonna say much, but Ep 4 is great. It's length is a nice change from 3. Just when you think its over, you have a whole 'nother act. There are some great scenes in new enviroments and the puzzles are plentiful and more of a challenge. That said, keep you're eye out for the ep. 4 trailer. I promise it'll raise some questions in your little heads
Yeah, little comments here and there like these from you, Jake, Dan C, et al are what amounts to a lot of anticipation/excitement in me for Episode 4, so much that I may intend to avoid trailers/spoilers before I actually play it--I'll watch them afterwards, I promise.
I don't know what I'm allowed to talk about, so I'm not gonna say much, but
Ep 4 is great. It's length is a nice change from 3. Just when you think its over, you have a whole 'nother act. There are some great scenes in new enviroments and the puzzles are plentiful and more of a challenge. That said, keep you're eye out for the ep. 4 trailer. I promise it'll raise some questions in your little heads
SPOILER TAGS PLEASE!!!! It would have been a nice surprise!
Comments
So I'm not sure if bumps in release schedule and price would actually be attractive--especially not mid-season, but maybe not even for future seasons. Most of their positive press (and if I get my shady inferences right, attraction from the big 3 console makers) comes from the fact that the season is a monthly release that has been staying on schedule--in fact, many comments on mainstream websites after Situation:Comedy came out were the (mistaken) dismayed comments about Telltale's inability to release Situation:Comedy 1 month after Culture Shock, as they had "planned" all along (in fact, Telltale had always planned on the initial 2-month period between 1 and 2). And the fact that Telltale has stuck to the schedule so far is bringing good press from some unlikely quarters, like forums about Half-Life 2 that complain about the changing release schedule for its episodes and people saying things like "Why can't they be like Telltale?" Changing it up, even if it's a change to another regular schedule, might result in similar negative attitudes--people would say "How do we know they're not going to change it again?"
I'd like to see how the latter half of the season--where many have claimed is where Telltale has started hitting its stride--measures up before pointing out problems with the development schedule. Coupled with Brendan Ferguson's claim that the first episodes are purposely designed to be easier, it may well be likely that some wishes will be accomplished without a change in schedule. The "But the season's not done yet" argument definitely becomes less usable as the season moves closer to the end.
That said, Connors also alludes to the possibility of different release schedules for other episodic games, dependent on the type of game--in his interview--"It could be every 2 or 3 months, or every week." I'm hopeful that a regular schedule for Bone gets established after the end of the Sam and Max season, and doubt that it's epic nature will lend itself to a monthly schedule.
That was in response to Reverend Ted's post..and his suggestions.. follow the thread...
In a normal adventure game as you progress.. you will have access to a larger number of locations, and will build a larger inventory. These episodes don't work that way. You start with a new episode, you only get 3 new locations, you cannot re-visit the tv studio or the home for child stars. You don't start off with all the inventory items from the past 2..or 3 episodes when you start episode 4. Its not 1 long game broken up into 6 episodes. Its 6 individual short episodic games. I was merely pointing out why his suggestions couldn't work in the series, but if you want to suggest I'm playing a different game than everyone else go ahead.
I don't have the proper accent.
Is there a single story driven game where this really works? I doubt it...but hey you can do some Loadrunner Levels instead... :O)
And as for the playing time. As already stated by others before. Increase the complexity/difficulty/amount of the puzzles and the playing time will increase automatically without the need to add more rooms.
It's interesting that most of the other games come with possibilities which allow the user to adjust the level of difficulty to his/her personal needs. Only in adventures such a system isn't common (remembering the thread i talked to Emily about this). If this would be solved nicely than a lot of the "it's too easy or too hard hassle" would be gone.
The only alternative to me is that you succeed in delivering a perfectly balanced game where everyone is pleased. May it be that you start easy and increase the level of difficulty slowely or that you please everyone right from scratch. Both solutions would be more like a good book then.
Plus, the designers would have to remake the puzzle from scratch for every setting. When the puzzle is elaborate and finely tuned, that can take much more work than most would be willing to put in. And if the solution is alluded to in dialogue beforehand, script rewrites might have to be done. Adventure games have a balance to them that other genres don't. The slightest alteration can bring down the whole thing.
There are many ways how to vary the difficulty also of adventures. Some of them have been discussed in other threads before without touching the puzzles too. Giving more hints visually, by characters, by sound, leaving out parts of a complex puzzle for the easy mode. For instance remember the puzzles about Leonard and Sybil i've written about in this thread before? In the more challening mode (normal) you would have to distract them first or argue that they allow certain actions from you first.
It always is more work adding diferent difficulty levels for a game but it does make a lot of sense as that's what people complain most about. Either you introduce such a mechanism or you put all the work into a improved balancing for all.
At the moment people are mainly complaining about that it's too easy. Once the difficulty is increased i bet that there also will be people who complain about that it's too hard, so...
This has the benefits of:
a) allowing novice players to get through the game
b) allowing experienced players to be rewarded for spending more thought
c) giving a cool replay value - I'd replay the games again just to look for alternative solutions to puzzles.
I really wouldn't mind if telltale would experiment with this in the game as in the end we all could end up with adventures where less people are complaining about the difficulty.
We could have a diffculty slider which goes from "1" to "10". In "1", the game would work as it does now. However, as the difficulty approaches "10" the mouse cursor would get more and more jiggly, so it would be very hard to point it to the exact wanted item. I bet telltale could implement this in a few hours.
Well, maybe you're right in that it would be easier to leave puzzles out in the easy version, but this still requires some work (more dialog to get around the missing puzzle). Also, I really liked it that in "Monkey Island 2" some of the puzzles are actually different and not just missing in the "lite" version.
I still think it would be more cool to have multiple solutions to puzzles, but oh well
If they actually implement that feature, I reserve the right to set up a SAW-style trap for you, involving razor blades, malt vinegar, and a poodle named Phyllis.
The problem with those multiple ways of solving is that you have to invest a huge amount of work into something which most of the people won't see, so it's kind of wasted.
Hah--if you've played Bone: The Great Cow Race, you definitely will know that they can do a jiggly cursor (it was for a minigame)--and it does make things hard.
Right! I forgot about that one! Great, then they already have everything implemented and good to go
There are still some issues with this, in my opinion.
First off, difficulty is in the eye of the beholder--some will believe that a Myst-level of difficulty would be appropriate, while some would ask for a Grim Fandango level of difficulty--some people are asking for being able to distract people first, some people want red herring items, some people want red herring characters, some people want more (non-red herring) items, some people want to carry items you won't use into later episodes, some people want to revisit old locations, some people want item combination, some want to use Max, some want all of the above, and some say that the level of difficulty on the level of a Myst age would be appropriate--this is the same with the complaints about length; some people are asking for 30 minutes more in Episode 3, some just want an hour more, and some even are asking for it to be triple the length, with a bumped up price and a different release schedule.
Secondly, it turns the designers away from focusing away from their strengths--a very dense concentration of smartly written dialogue, towards coming up with ways to trick up the player. For example, it looked like the designers ended up having to hire an outside writer to come up with dialogues for Episode 2 and 3, to keep up with the pace of production--money that maybe they didn't intend to spend. It is true that experience makes puzzles easier to solve; many reviews have (rightfully) pointed out that Episode 3 seems easier because of your experience with the puzzles in the past. So to truly keep up with a harder difficulty level, the designers literally would be wracking their brains trying to figure out ways to trick the hardcore players that would play such a level, instead of wracking their brains coming up with Sam and Max dialogue (which is already very hard to do--try writing a Sam and Max webcomic). How frustrating would it be for a designer who after lots of doubts, decides to make the leap to creating a harder difficulty level, and then to later still face criticism that it was still not hard enough (given the different number and types of "make it harder" requests I outlined above--it is very feasible). In effect, it will make them try to design the hardest puzzles most possible, to get the criticism out of the way once and for all.
Third, not only does it makes designers' jobs harder, it may also lead to making the designers more lazy--sounds paradoxical, right? Here's what I think--instead of the ramping up of difficulty that Brendan says they are planning, they decide on splitting the difficulty level. That means there will always be easy puzzles for the easy players at a standard level, while there are very difficult puzzles in each new game on the hard level. In effect, designers will toss out lazily designed puzzles (since they're easy to design, they must be easy, right?) to the easy level, and the overall design philosophy for a progression of challenge is tossed out the window. Established easy-level players looking for more challenge must be tossed in the ever-increasing vat of acidic difficulty as outlined in the previous paragraph. But what about making a medium difficulty, you say? It would further exacerbate the lazy design problems highlighted in this paragraph and the "eye of the beholder" argument I made earlier. And these games aren't built with lots of money and time to throw around either...A segue into my last point.
These $6 games are built with extremely tight time and budget pressures. Spend lots of time designing (and programming) multiple levels and your time and money for other things like music and dialogue creation is lost (unless you start hiring more people, which still translates to money lost). As I read on another forum: "These games aren't made with employees pocket change in their spare time, they're made on a very regimented budget that can't slip in any direction. That means that every penny spent has to show up on screen. Why would money be - effectively - wasted making content deliberately designed just for one pocket of [the] overall audience."
Once again, there are no guarantees that moving in such a direction actually will satisfy everyone. As I said before, even though people are asking for "more difficulty," there is a vast difference in their opinions on the matter--look around--"some people are asking for being able to distract people first, some people want red herring items, some people want red herring characters, some people want more (non-red herring) items, some people want to carry items you won't use into later episodes, some people want to revisit old locations, some people want item combination, some want to use Max, some want all of the above, and some say that the level of difficulty on the level of a Myst age would be appropriate."
Ah, though I did somewhat expect that, Jeff Lester's comment on his blog could've been interpreted differently, where he said, "Because they were working on such an ambitious schedule, they found themselves looking for a contract writer to help with the dialogues in Episode 3 to keep on schedule."
Still, my overall point is that there will probably be more costs when there are few guarantees of added benefits.
(Secretly, I was just using it as a point to show that it costs a lot of money to make these $6 games, even for the dialogue that some difficulty-hounds take for granted--did not actually believe that it was money you didn't intend to spend--Shh, don't tell anyone).
What would be the problem with ramping up the difficulty on both easy and hard mode? I mean, just keep on with the original production plan and simultaneously make insanely hard puzzles for the hardcorers. Surely Telltale´s employers have more experience in creating puzzles and maybe they have a wilder imagination (hopefully, they are professionals and get paid, I don´t) but it maybe took me an hour to design this in my head. I´ll quote myself from the past:
More work? Yeah. More satisfied customers? I don´t know. It would even help if there were like three or four harder puzzles per episode in hard mode. That´s like a workday of thinking (and lots of programming, hehe).
And by the way, I don´t think the difficulty level of past adventure games didn´t cause the fall of the genre. I think the reason was just that they weren´t sexy enough anymore. That´s my opinion, my take on the discussion about the fall of the genre.
It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design. This argument comes up in education a lot, actually. The argument goes like this: A high school history teacher that has to teach 2 classes, "normal" and "honors/advanced" ends up just babysitting the normal class--showing videos, giving them busywork, not really encouraging thinking beyond superficial aspects on the subject matter--while focusing all of his/her energy on teaching the "honors/advanced classes." But if the students weren't divided as such and the same teacher were to teach 1 "normal" class, he would actually try much harder and the overall educational experience for all students is actually better.
Of course, wishful thinking is that teachers and designers aren't all like that, which is true--but I feel that the budget and time constraints of a monthly $6 game would make it more likely for designers to cut around the corners if they are now tasked to come up with what is effectively 2 games in the same time, with the same budget.
numble, regarding the "difficulty in the eye of the beholder" - I think at the current non-existent difficulty level, people are not exactly expressing different opinions of what makes a puzzle difficult, but just offering suggestions for how to relatively easily make the puzzles a bit more difficult. It doesn't mean pepole define "difficult puzzles = lots of red herrings", just that adding red herrings automatically make the existing puzzles a bit harder - without need to change any of the puzzles.
I'm not exactly bitching, since as I've said - I'm perfectly happy with playing an interactive cartoon, but I still think the difficulty level of episode 3 was a little TOO low. I don't think it's because I'm getting used to the puzzles. Actually I solved
(For some reason, even though the first episode was smaller, I didn't solve any of the puzzles by accident and therefore it took more time and was more satisfying)
I still think the plot and dialog is getting better each episode, which is positive
I don´t think they would have to design two games at once. Even a couple of harder puzzles would make me happy.
Sybil puzzle was soooooo easy, by the way. I didn´t even have to think about it.
Yeah, I admit I kind of exaggerated when I lumped a lot of those suggestions together, but I'd still argue that there's a chance that the difficulty level, if given as a separate level, could still prove unsatisfying to some--it's not beyond my imagination to envision this kind of response to a separate, hard difficulty: "You call this harder?! This is medium difficulty, please make an actual hard level."
I am not arguing about the present easiness of the current levels, or that future episodes shouldn't be harder--only presenting reasons why the creation of separate difficulty levels might not be ideal compared to the established goal of progressively increasing difficulty for later episodes.
True, true--which is why my original post included other mitigating issues. Still possible that that other sections of the game--dialogue, for example, might suffer. And a review that said "Not funny" or "Bad dialogue" would also potentially scare away people. Time constraints for a monthly released $6 game are very real. But no, they can just hire more writers/designers to keep to the production schedule right? Except that one factor comes in again: money--if it costs $6000 to hire another writer, they will have to sell 1001 more games to justify that; (not to mention the extra game programmers needed to make the extra hard puzzles in the extra difficulty level) and I'm not privy to their market data to know if an added difficulty level will result in the extra sales to justify the added costs.
Of course when I got home later that afternoon I asked her if she fancied playing the game together.
I'm sure you can guess the rest...
When I signed up for the season I wasn't envisaging buying a kid-level difficulty game. I really hope Ep4 is a lot more challenging.
"It is a useful argument, no doubt, but I feel that, like I described, it might lead to designers being lazy--an "easy" difficulty level gives an opening for cop-out lazy design."
You mean lazy like now?
Plenty of adventure games use a hard and easy mode-Monkey Island 2 and 3, loom...
Your bogus education comparison doesn't fit because plenty of games have used it successfully as stated above. Why would you compare it to education anyway when you could have just compared it to other adventure games?
Actually it is a monthly released 9 dollar game. Only 6 if you pre-ordered while having no idea if you'd get your money's worth or not.
Again, in context, I said this problem was exacerbated when combined with the mitigating factors of time, cost and release schedule for a monthly $6 game from a small development studio--this isn't a company with the backing of George Lucas' empire. Notwithstanding the fact that yes, I do believe that plenty of the easy puzzles in Monkey Island 2 and 3 were lazily designed, those games still took 2-3 years of development, were backed by a huge studio, and had a retail price of $40-60 initially, if I remember correctly.
If you can claim that the real price of a HL episode equals $9 (when that is a now non-attainable price point, you can only get it for $19.95 now), I can say that a still attainable price point of $6 ($5.83 actually) is the real price of a Sam and Max episode.
Yeah, little comments here and there like these from you, Jake, Dan C, et al are what amounts to a lot of anticipation/excitement in me for Episode 4, so much that I may intend to avoid trailers/spoilers before I actually play it--I'll watch them afterwards, I promise.
SPOILER TAGS PLEASE!!!! It would have been a nice surprise!
I agree--pretty big spoiler.
Yeah umm I would have much rather found
Yay for shortterm memory!