How to make an episodic KQ feel vast, expansive, and explorable
So...what do you guys think the best way to approach this problem would be?
The small, contained, constantly reused environments are one of the primary weaknesses of Telltale's games, and the main reason I have so much trouble getting into their Sam & Max games (though Season 3 remedied this issue pretty well.) BttF is so far the absolutely most atrocious example of this feature making the game bland and boring. It worked alright with Tales of Monkey Island because of island hopping nature of a standard Monkey Island game, but I just can't see this approach working with King's Quest--at least not without significantly diverging from the "feel" of a traditional King's Quest game.
TSL has taken the episodic approach, but even their excuse for the lack of the ability to explore the entire game world is pretty contrived. However, I DO like the fact that once an area is open to you, it remains open, so that each episode has a larger area to explore than the last. This approach works alright in TSL partly because of the island nature of its setting. I couldn't see exploring the land of Daventry, for example, working nearly as well with the same type of contrived "you can't go here yet" limitations, though.
So what can Telltale do to marry the episodic game format with the freedom of exploration and large environments that are characteristic of most King's Quest games?
Thoughts? Comments? Concerns?
The small, contained, constantly reused environments are one of the primary weaknesses of Telltale's games, and the main reason I have so much trouble getting into their Sam & Max games (though Season 3 remedied this issue pretty well.) BttF is so far the absolutely most atrocious example of this feature making the game bland and boring. It worked alright with Tales of Monkey Island because of island hopping nature of a standard Monkey Island game, but I just can't see this approach working with King's Quest--at least not without significantly diverging from the "feel" of a traditional King's Quest game.
TSL has taken the episodic approach, but even their excuse for the lack of the ability to explore the entire game world is pretty contrived. However, I DO like the fact that once an area is open to you, it remains open, so that each episode has a larger area to explore than the last. This approach works alright in TSL partly because of the island nature of its setting. I couldn't see exploring the land of Daventry, for example, working nearly as well with the same type of contrived "you can't go here yet" limitations, though.
So what can Telltale do to marry the episodic game format with the freedom of exploration and large environments that are characteristic of most King's Quest games?
Thoughts? Comments? Concerns?
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Comments
I think it's really important for the sense of scope of the adventure not to have the small contained areas like Hill Valley Square or Sam and Max's block. The map absolutely must be LARGE, even if they reuse certain areas. The screens should all be unique though--nothing like the recycled forest backgrounds from Tales of Monkey Island.
If they block off certain areas early on, they should go the route of KQ7, where once areas of the world opened up to you, they remained open. In later chapters of KQ7, you could still walk all the way back through the rest of the world if you wanted to--back to the very beginning in the desert. There wasn't really anything to do in those old places, but it still added to the feeling of the world being vast and explorable.
A great way to expand on that approach would be to have new situations and puzzles pop up in some of those older areas that rewarded the backtracking. On the other hand, a reliance on backtracking could end up be more of a negative than a positive, and could ultimately lead to the the feeling that areas were being reused just so that Telltale didn't have to go to the effort of creating a larger world to explore. It'd definitely be a fine line.
Yeah, good point. In BttF when you go from Doc's driveway to old Edna Strickland's apartment, it'd have been nice to have been able to actually traverse some of the town.
I agree with you to a point, but I also see Telltale's reasons for not building an environment just for the sake of walking space. In most KQ games, just about every screen has a purpose other than just padding out the world.
Well, that's not necessarily true, especially in the first four games. There's a lot of wandering in KQ4 for example. But that's part of the fun.
On the other hand, I agree that empty areas where you couldn't do anything really wouldn't be great in a standard Telltale game. But that's why Telltale should focus on making the world a lot more interactive. In a game like BttF, where there are only a few hotspots on each screen, empty areas would be a big problem (heck, even the screens where you do stuff FEEL empty because of the lack of interactivity.) But in a KQ world with storybook narrations and a multitude of hotspots, the wandering areas could be a lot more interesting.
Btw, I enjoyed your review of TSL and KQ3 Redux! (That was you, right?)
Maybe my mind's just glossing over the screens without any purpose. I will say that some of the screens have redundant purposes (ie, several screens in KQ2 where the fairy might show up.
Agreed! I think adding more interactivity is a better solution than removing areas. (Maybe not better from a space/budget standpoint, but certainly a better gaming experience!)
Hey, thanks!
Of course, I don't want the game to feel so huge that it ends up becoming a pile of filler where I spent more time walking than enjoying the game. KQ6 kept its world tightly knit, and simply made the game feel bigger through the use of scenery and perspective.
Although maybe they're bringing the idea back in BttF with the Hill Valley courthouse square. At any rate if Telltale want to make KQ feel vast, expansive, and explorable one thing they can do is scrap the central-hub.
Yes, but that could be a reflection of the movies more than anything else.
True...but what works in a movie may not work in an adventure game (and vice versa.)
Plus, even in the movies we saw a LOT of other locations. In 1955 Hill Valley in the first movie, for example, we saw: the square, the diner, a gas station, several parts of the high school, Lorraine's street, Lorraine's house, George's street, George's house, Doc's house & garage, etc. etc. etc.
By comparison, in BttF episode 1, in 1930s Hill Valley, we basically get the Square, the Soup Kitchen, the street outside Arty's apartment, the road outside of town...and that's it. Am I forgetting anything? And the episode has about the same playtime as watching the whole first movie. Even places in the square that were relevant to the plot (the jail, the courthouse, etc.) were viewed from outside in the square, even when Marty was going inside them. Lame.
Oh, I forgot Emmett's room in his father's house. But of course we are warped straight there...there's no sense of the world being interconnected, no sense of distance, etc. I just can't help but see this as a huge flaw in presentation of the game.
I was thinking the same thing. I think the TOMI jungle proves they could easily make a large KQI-IV-style forested environment made up of smaller interconnected forest scenes.
For instance, if other KQ games were done episodically:
KQ1: Home area is Daventry, and over five episodes you could interchangeably visit the Gingerbread House, the Dragon's Den, the Giant in the Clouds, the Leprechaun's Cave, and Daventry Castle.
KQ2: Kolyma w/ Riding Hood's Home, Neptune's Palace, Pegasus' Cliffs, Dracula's Castle, and the Tower.
KQ4: Tamir, w/ The Ocean, the Ogre's House, The Haunted Mansion, The Troll Cave, and Lolotte's Castle.
KQ5: Serenia, w/ The Desert, the Witch's Forest, Ice-Bella's Mountains, Harpy's Island, and Mordack's Castle.
KQ3, KQ6, and KQ7 have way too many locations to be done in the same 5-episode style, but the possibilities of making an episode KQ explorable is still there.
Essentially, you'd have an unsolvable puzzles in the way of the places they don't want you to go. The way past would appear until whatever episode it is they actually want you to go through.
I always disliked the large overworld map in those games, especially QFG3, since there were so few places to actually go on it. If the map had a lot of locations, I would be fine with it though.
Yeah, but if you think about it VII was already broken down into eight episodes (chapters).
It wouldn't have to be just walking space. They could utilize these areas in different episodes.
Now, I'm just throwing this out here, but am I the only one who would like to see telltale take a different approach to developing this one? Specifically, I mean that they should develop the season BEFORE any of it gets released. There are some advantages to this, you could have resource shared between episodes, the time between episode release could be used for tweaking, fixes, and adding extra polish to each episode. I know it would be a bigger investment for TT, but then again, if there has been any project where there peak of their abilities as a company was needed, I think this would be it.
If I am to compare the KQ series with BttF the game, I would say BttF had only a shadow of the interaction that I remember from the KQ games, especially the first ones (1-4). You could basically look at "everything" in the old games, and maybe get a hint (or not at all!) about what this was useful for. Much was only for show, and several scenes seemed to be just eye candy. Which I really don't mind. But being able to freely roam around (as long as there wasn't a wolf or a witch there to kill you) and constantly having time pressure or exploring the rich interactiveness of the worlds was a big part of it. If BttF lost some of these "they don't make games like this anymore" feeling that the old KQ will give us now, I will fall out of interest quickly. (Btw. I agree with what someone else pointed out here - the episodic approach was done - well - in KQ7, but I think the game itself despite it's tantalizing Disney aspect (huuge Disney fan here) was a bit too simple.)
I think rather than try something new, Telltale Games should listen to the fan base the series have and not stray too far from the original style of the games. I realize that's a tough assignment, but it is a huge investment, too. What made the series so popular? How did it change over the years, and did that recruit more fans and/or lose the old ones?
Again, the lack of ability to move around in BttF and pretty scenes with lots of stuff you really couldn't interact with - and faaar too easy puzzles! (and too few imho) - made me just see the game as an interactive movie rather than a classic game. I much preferred TOMI because I felt it remained true to the original series, and added just what it needed.
But I do hope they give us a mix of a magical and a beautiful world that makes us long for every next scene.