About the dictionary definitions from the source I used, I don't see the first definition as applying to computer games, since I don't see all computer games (certainly not adventure games) as a "competitive activity or sport". However, "played according to rules", sure. But then, books are read and films are viewed according to some rules, too.
I do see computer games as a competitive activity, in the sense that they're a personal challenge, in a similar way that climbing a mountain is competing against the elements, so to speak; like playing solitaire or solving a crossword puzzle, single-player video games are competitive activities in that one can either succeed or fail in a way that doesn’t really apply to watching movies or reading books.
On the "gameplay" vs "story" issue: In my way of looking at this, almost everything you might call gameplay (and that I have been thinking of as gameplay for the purposes of this thread) is actually part of the story. This is really the true and whole meaning of my thinking of it as an interactive story. And yes, it is a personal view only and I am not trying to convert anyone into sharing it!
I totally believe that you are not motivated by any desire to impose your viewpoint on others. But you have framed some of your statements in a way that goes beyond the expression of opinion. Several of your statements posit something about the essence of KQ -- "This clearly shows that King's Quest is a story first and foremost."; "...the most essential part of KQ - the part that makes it possible to recognise it as KQ - is the story content, not the gameplay…" -- as if they were universal truths.
Those ideas might flow naturally from your viewpoint of adventure games as playable stories, but I don’t believe there’s any objective basis for them outside of that and so they’re not necessarily valid characterizations of KQ for those with different approaches to adventure or computer games. Moreover, I’m not sure there’s any rational way to determine what defines KQ or what makes it great. I would suggest it’s whatever the fans say it is, individually and collectively. Of course it's not possible to know the collective or majority consensus. But from what I know about KQ fans, I believe that any assertion about what makes KQ great has to include both story (defined any way you want) and gameplay, regardless of whether it's included in the definition of story, pretty high on the list.
What I mean is, "story" comprises not just the scenario or premise or basic plot. It also includes the narration, the dialogue, every action, every consequence, the sights and sounds - just like with a story in any other medium. The only difference is that the player controls the actions of the main character(s). Playing an adventure game (or most other types of games) is almost nothing else than story.
I understand that your idea of story doesn’t mean merely plot but encompasses gameplay and other things, that that follows from your view of games as playable stories, and that you might even view these things as somehow inseparable. But what I’ve been trying to show is that gamers can and do view these things as separable, especially for purposes of analysis and evaluation. That’s why I can’t accept the hypothesis that story is more important than gameplay -- even though your vision of what story means encompasses gameplay -- because I can, do and will continue to evaluate the games I play on the basis of gameplay, independently of any other features.
It's not that I think your ideas are blatantly wrong, it's that they don't even begin to capture why I enjoyed the King's Quest series or play computer games in the first place, and especially why I play them instead of watching movies or consuming stories in any passive media. That the player controls the actions of the character might be the only difference between an adventure game and other forms of media, but it's a huge difference, a fundamental difference, for me and probably many others who talk about gameplay around here.
You know, I also lump some elements together when thinking about what makes a particular game or games in general enjoyable. My personal rubric for evaluation is two-fold: gameplay and what I'll call "atmosphere", which includes plot, writing, art style, music, sound, and the like. These two terms are probably how I will decide for myself whether the new game captures the spirit of the existing KQ games. But I can readily see that this breakdown would be insufficient for someone who plays games for different reasons or different experiences than I do. I can insist (and actually do believe) that the first Quake FPS had terrific atmosphere, and insist that my view of atmosphere includes plot, but to someone for whom high-quality plots are tremendously important in a game, my assertions would be meaningless at best, dismissive or even insulting at worst.
I reckon it all comes entirely down to our different ways of seeing things.
So, yeah, it does come down to our different ways of seeing things. I've enjoyed learning about your personal view of adventure games; your ideas are more intricate than those found in the many plot-vs.-puzzles debates I've seen in other adventure gaming fora over the years. What those debates have taught me is that, even though gameplay is more important than story for me personally, it would be wrong to work that into any kind of general rule or definition for all adventure gamers.
This exchange has been very interesting and useful for me, too! Your spirited advocacy of gameplay is both appropriate and necessary. And I think I now understand what you meant: that crucial factor X (which we have called gameplay and interactivity and interactive storytelling) that makes adventure games a very special form of entertainment for both of us and that can transform even a lesser story into solid entertainment.
That first half of the term I used, "interactive story", is indeed fundamentally important to the charm these games hold for me as well. If these stories were stripped of all interactive elements and reduced to a single linear narrative, they would lose much of their allure for me. I love exploring the boundaries and the workings of the story worlds in every sense, trying different permutations, seeing how far off track they let me stray, etc. Things that are only possible in computer games.
I love exploring the boundaries and the workings of the story worlds in every sense, trying different permutations, seeing how far off track they let me stray, etc. Things that are only possible in computer games.
I think thats why so many are worried about KQ. If they don't make it with actual KQ fans in mind and try to bring in a larger audience the actual KQ fans will be seriously disappointed.
I think thats why so many are worried about KQ. If they don't make it with actual KQ fans in mind and try to bring in a larger audience the actual KQ fans will be seriously disappointed.
Exactly. See the problem? And the reason for preemptive negativity? Telltale may have said that they're going to have to cater a little bit to the KQ audience because of the type of game KQ is, but that means virtually nothing really because we don't know how much they are going to remain faithful and how much they are going to change. And also because they've lied to us before.
Exactly. See the problem? And the reason for preemptive negativity? Telltale may have said that they're going to have to cater a little bit to the KQ audience because of the type of game KQ is, but that means virtually nothing really because we don't know how much they are going to remain faithful and how much they are going to change. And also because they've lied to us before.
And to those who think the whole argument is just about save games or deaths or dead ends...etc. this is why it really is more than all of that. Once they start messing with auto saves and retrys, they are tipping their hand that they are trying to cater and design the game for those who are not comfortable with KQ to begin with. Even though some KQ fans like some of those ideas, the game is not being designed for them, it is being designed for a much different, much larger demographic. It makes sense for their bottom line, but as KQ fans, the game wont be made with us in mind.
TTG's need to expand the audience for its offerings isn't the only cause for concern here: If it were merely about making games more accessible, there are various ways they could have done so without sacrificing what makes games enjoyable to experienced adventure gamers. I think the more troubling issue is the philosophical shift toward cinematic production. And before anyone says the philosophy will only be applied to "the movie games", JP and BTTF, note that this shift started before the Universal deal; it's clearly evident in The Devil's Playhouse -- Sam & Max. Not a movie. -- and IMO gameplay suffered as a result.
The latest spewing of this philosophy can be found in this interview with TTG's Executive Producer of JP, who says "every scene, shot, and activity" in JP is being composed cinematically. I have difficulty seeing how the adoption of cinematic composition as a central design goal could provide an enjoyable experience for gamers who value exploring a gameworld and tackling substantive obstacles to progression found therein.
I have always appreciated TTG's attention to visual design, but they went overboard in TDP, and actually scuttled the ship in BTTF. Who knows what their thinking is on cinematic design wrt King's Quest? I don't think it's a sure bet either way. But the cause for concern is justified.
Its interesting that from Roberta William's perspective, often it was technology that was the essence of King's Quest. She used it, and all her games to some extent push technology. Plot and story, and puzzles came second!
Which is the worst King's Quest game?
A) Telltale's King's Quest Machinima The Silver Lining
C) King's Quest: Mask of Eternity
You need to add King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride to that (it's one of the most criticized games in the series). Some people include King's Quest V (due to Cedric, and 'incoherrent' puzzles/dead ends)!
You need to add King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride to that (it's one of the most criticized games in the series).
True...I almost did include it, but left it off at the last minute for some reason I can't remember now.
I honestly have a feeling Telltale's KQ will feel most like KQ7, which is why I'm dreading it so much, as I absolutely HATE that game. Telltale's KQ will most likely have: 1) a single cursor that does everything, 2) only a few clickable hotspots per area, 3) automatic retries for deaths, etc.
Telltale's KQ game is going to be everything fans of the series hated about KQ7. Mark my words.
What I meant was, they advertised it as something akin to what they were always doing. We didn't have the knowledge or the time to know exactly what it was before it came out and before we preordered it so we could make an informed decision. They didn't tell us it was going to be easier and geared more towards fans of the movie series rather than gamers. As a result many people (myself included) preordered the game almost immediately thinking it would be something it wouldn't.
We didn't have the knowledge or the time to know exactly what it was before it came out and before we preordered it so we could make an informed decision.
But that's always the case with preorders. You can never really trust trailers, screenshots, previews, etc. to tell you what a game will be like. Think of the times you've read a glowing preview, or seen a wicked trailer, only to throw down the dosh for the game and realize that it's nothing at all like you thought. Sucks, doesn't it? But that's what you get for being hasty with your purchase.
Now, maybe with the adventure genre being so sparsely populated preorders are a safer bet, but I think anyone willing to slap their money on the table before reading a review or playing a demo is taking a gamble and shouldn't complain if the product isn't up to their standards.
I don't think the "Retry" option would be applicable....especially if you missed something early on in the game. I'm sure anyone here who has played KQ5 is more than familiar with the cat & mouse fiasco.
As someone who only started playing King's Quest recently (late last year, if I recall correctly. I've only played AGDI's remakes of KQ1-3), I can say that while the whole "save often" thing doesn't bother me, it doesn't add anything to the experience for me. Deaths should absolutely be there, it wouldn't really be King's Quest without them.
Deaths in adventure games serve no purpose unless they're funny or add to the tension of a conflict puzzle. However, my normal reaction to dying is something like "Damn, now I have to backtrack because I don't save every time I walk onto a new screen. How was I supposed to know that that Graham would be attacked by a wolf from out of nowhere before I could react?" It's more a frustration than anything, especially in King's Quest games where the developers were clearly just messing with the players at some points, and there's nothing wrong with a game that doesn't punish you for exploring.
There's nothing wrong with being punished for exploring either. It's all a matter of tolerance and what you can (or want) to handle as a gamer. I personally don't see a point in deaths if there are no consequences for it (like losing your place and having to start over). It's a threat to the continued progress of you the gamer, like any death should be in any game. Without it it's more like a "GOTCHA!!! Hahaha no I'm just kidding. I had you, though! I had you!" thing. Which is funny in Family Guy, Monkey Island, and even Space Quest, but not in King's Quest.
I disagree fundamentally with the first sentence of your post. I mean, yes, if you do something completely stupid, like walking up to a dragon, you should die, and if you didn't save before, that's your own stupid fault. But the sheer unpredictability of some of the game overs in the early KQ games really baffles me as to why people would find that enjoyable. It's not punishing bad decisions, it's punishing not guessing what ludicrous thing the game developers wanted you to do, or not walking right along the two pixel-wide walkway perfectly, or not knowing the in-game timer to a T.
And I guess I'm confused to why people are getting so worked up about this, even if there was a choice to disable the feature, and why people are saying the mere knowledge that some people aren't playing it as hardcore as them is ruining the game. I mean, the first three games have fan remakes that disable dead-ends. Does that ruin the original games for you?
That logic doesn't apply to my original point (if I remember it correctly)... Taking dead ends out of the game was the right move. King's Quest is (ideally) supposed to keep you on your toes while you play, not screw you over at the very end because you forgot one item at the beginning that you can't get now. We should draw the line for how the KQ player experience should be reasonably; let's not fall into a slippery slope argument where if we can do one thing in one situation it automatically applies in all situations.
I wasn't referring to you or anyone else specifically. And yes, I know that nobody (sane) would argue that the "You forgot an item three hours ago? Unwinnable." approach should stay. But there are a LOT of deaths in the old Sierra games that didn't need to be there.
For example, King's Quest I: You had the various rivers in the game. Fair enough, if you walk into the river, the game lets you know this is bad by killing you, and it's easy enough to tell which bodies of water are shallow enough to wade across. Then you had the witch, dragon, and giant. All plot relevant, all obvious dangers, as fairly easily avoidable until you were ready to deal with them.
Where it loses me is with the wolf, the ogre, the dwarf, and the leprechauns. The first three, they're just there to antagonize you with no context, and inhibit exploration in an often unfair and unpredictable way. Yes, they always appear on the same screens, but you won't know that until you've already had to restart because of them.
And the leprechauns represent the absolute worst trend in adventure games: The aforementioned punishment for not having the right item. I guess it wouldn't be too bad, except that you can save between when you can last acquire the item needed to get rid of them, and when it's too late to go get it, and you probably will because of the obvious danger in the cave leading up to them. But again, I don't think anyone is defending this trend.
I guess it really boils down to this for me: If the cause of death has a place in context of the story, and is obvious enough to encourage you to save before experimenting, then it's fine. It's the random, out of context middle fingers that Sierra would send my way that make me prefer the fan remakes of the first three KQ games.
EDIT: I'm going strictly from memory on this, by the way, so if there are contexts for the dwarf, wolf, or ogre, or if the game prevents you from going to the leprechaun cave without the clover or fiddle, then I will concede those points. And I know the dwarf is provided context in later versions, but not the original, if I recall correctly.
I'm not defending dead ends so much as I'm attacking autosave/retry deaths. I could live without dead ends, even though I appreciate them. I can't live with retry deaths or without an option to disable them. It renders them pointless.
And I don't consider these classic adventure game mechanics so much as trying to guess what the developer wants you to do as it is searching out the game world and experimenting to find out just what kind of world it is and what dangers it holds. Some call this fourth-wall breaking and frustrating because it absolutely depends on the save game feature, I beg to differ. It's all part of the game experience for me. Deaths and dead ends to me are dangers that impede your ability to progress and complete the game. It's an added difficulty. Obstacles to overcome. Gamers today don't appreciate this. Even in the FPS world. We don't even have save slots anymore, we have checkpoints. So you never have to worry about losing in your game. Just shut it off whenever you're done and the game automatically saves your progress. I guess I'm just used to the old-school days of not even HAVING saves and you have to beat the whole game in one sitting (like the NES and SNES classics) and when a game does have the ability to save I use it for all it's worth. I don't think saves should come packaged with the game, I think they are a game tool one must utilize, not something to not have to worry about.
Regarding dead ends, they're frustrating, yes. But as I said above I also consider them gaming obstacles. Whether intended or unintended implementations. If you're at the end of the game and you don't have the item you need and can't figure out what to do it's you're logical reasoning skills (a mandatory adventure tool) that deduce that you missed something and have to go back. This isn't a bad thing! This means you GET to go back and explore the world again! More game! You missed something! There's more of the world to explore and solve before moving on! I always worry when moving into new game areas that I missed something beforehand because of this and make sure I look absolutely everywhere I can think of. Of course this doesn't always work, but again, you get to play the game longer to find new things you never noticed before. There are ALWAYS things you never noticed before in an adventure game. Even if you beat it. There's always more in the world to see and do that you missed (not in Telltale games, but anyway...).
I do this in other games too. FPS, RPG, everything. I look around everywhere for every possible secret I can find and make sure I have everything I can get before moving on. I'm not saying that everyone should share my practices of playing a game, I'm just sharing how I enjoy and support deaths, random deaths, and unwinnable situations. I'm romanticizing a little bit, as dead ends CAN be insanely frustrating to the point of me wishing they weren't even there, but at the end of the day it makes for much more enjoyable experience when I finally beat it with full points. Yeah! I BEAT this sucker! Bring it on!
I think King Graham should finally be made to pay for his crimes.
Oh, those aren't the kinds of in-game deaths we're talking about? Because I know a couple of witches' families who might have a thing or two to say about that. Those poor old ladies didn't get to SAVE and RESTORE, that's for sure.
Just because people are too lazy nowadays to enjoy a good dangerous baffling adventure game and want every answer handed to them on a silver platter in the safest game environment possible doesn't mean I'm speaking solely out of nostalgia.
I'm alright with removing dead ends. That will never work ever again I imagine. But that doesn't mean that gameplay and that on-edge feeling of exploration has to be completely nonexistent. I don't understand gamers today. Games just aren't challenging anymore.
I personally think that totally random and unpredictable deaths are terrible - you know, walk onto a new screen, and WHAM, before you get the chance to do anything, a werewolf kills you. Ones that could've been avoided if you used logic, common sense and a bit of cautiousness (sp?) are great, and add to the game.
Just because people are too lazy nowadays to enjoy a good dangerous baffling adventure game and want every answer handed to them on a silver platter in the safest game environment possible doesn't mean I'm speaking solely out of nostalgia.
I'm alright with removing dead ends. That will never work ever again I imagine. But that doesn't mean that gameplay and that on-edge feeling of exploration has to be completely nonexistent. I don't understand gamers today. Games just aren't challenging anymore.
Yet you have rock-hard games like Demon's Souls or Super Meat Boy that are somehow both hard and fair.
I don't think it's really laziness. Dying should be instantly reversible, and not a punishment. No menu should come up. Press "R" to return to the edge of the cliff you so beautifully slipped over.
That's a fair point, but you can't compare two genres together. Even Super Meat Boy doesn't allow you to continue from the very point you died. And it wouldn't be very challenging if you did. You have to start the whole level over. And that can be just as maddening if not more seeing as it happens so frequently.
Right, except getting to the edge of the cliff in Super Meat Boy is in itself a challenge. In King's Quest, it's just clicking on a point and watching your character slowwwwwwwly get there. I think most gamers would die of boredom the fifth time they had to do this. Instant access to rooms via double click was the best thing that ever happened to adventure games.
I really, really don't like GUIs or menus in my games. If you want death, fine; but don't use it as punishment, nor bring up a menu everytime it happens. Make it instantly reversible, and use it as feedback to players - a way to tell them that whatever they just did was wrong. I can't see it being useful otherwise.
What is the difference between being able to chose retry or having to load an old game anyway.
To make a death meaningful all saves have to be deleted.
Preferable the adventure gets changed around too, so you can't use previous experience to handle things better.
(Too bad that current adventures do have a problem with randomizing the environment)
What is the difference between being able to chose retry or having to load an old game anyway.
Bringing up menus is an immersion killer for me. I just wanna get on with it. We Arabs have a word for it - "Yallah!". Hurry up already. I could do without the silly menu.
Right, except getting to the edge of the cliff in Super Meat Boy is in itself a challenge. In King's Quest, it's just clicking on a point and watching your character slowwwwwwwly get there. I think most gamers would die of boredom the fifth time they had to do this. Instant access to rooms via double click was the best thing that ever happened to adventure games.
You sound like the type of person who would love the new Jurassic Park game. Perhaps King's Quest isn't for you.
I really, really don't like GUIs or menus in my games. If you want death, fine; but don't use it as punishment,
Then what good is it? For a laugh? That's not King's Quest, that's Space Quest. Or to a lesser extent Leisure Suit Larry.
nor bring up a menu everytime it happens. Make it instantly reversible, and use it as feedback to players - a way to tell them that whatever they just did was wrong. I can't see it being useful otherwise.
Geez, you sound like an incredibly impatient gamer. Perhaps adventure games themselves aren't your cup of tea? Adventure games aren't about "getting on with it." It's about exploration, discovery, and the journey. Not the goal.
What is the difference between being able to chose retry or having to load an old game anyway.
To make a death meaningful all saves have to be deleted.
The difference is it's your responsibility as a gamer to save the game yourself. So if you forget or don't bother it's your fault. It's a threat to the progression of the game. What else should a death be? They're completely pointless otherwise. This is the first and oldest rule of video games in general with regards to failure. The save feature should be bonus enough. Autosaves are just handing the game to you without putting up a fight. And that's just not fun and makes deaths merely minor annoyances rather than the show-stopping dangerous game events they should be.
One of the things that gave King's Quest (and other Sierra) games a distinct style is that as the player, you are responsible for your character's feet. Graham and family do not automatically avoid raging rivers and toxic swamps as Guybrush does. Other threats are mobile and so must the player be prepared to use the character's feet to get his or her ass away from them. You need to put yourself into your character's feet -- and not just their inventory stash -- to survive icy mountains and vast deserts.
While it has mostly disappeared from the adventure genre since the heyday of Sierra, puzzle-solving from the perspective of the feet can add excitement to gameplay and contribute to immersion in the game-world (far more than occasionally having to reload a saved game detracts from it). There's nothing inherently "unfair" about it -- just as it's not unfair to have to be responsible for aiming your character's weapons in a third-person action-adventure even though many of them have auto-aim, it's not unfair to have to consider your character's feet in an adventure game just because most of the others incorporate an auto-danger-avoidance system during movement.
It's a different approach to gameplay, and one that I think is worth preserving in any honest attempt to revive the King's Quest franchise. Why are adventure gamers always so eager to have every title hammered down to fit the same mold?
Here's an interesting article on deaths in video games past, present, and what to expect in the future. It doesn't really tread into the adventure genre, but it does raise some great points nonetheless which I think are just as pertinent to adventure games.
... those of you who grew up with the old-school games, have you felt anything like the horrible tension you felt when you knew that you were on that last life, on that last level and that dying meant everything you had accomplished would be wiped out?
The stakes were so high, and the feeling you got from winning was like you'd won the Super Bowl. Now, when I'm given a virtual God Mode from the very beginning as part of the game design, it just feels ... well, kind of wrong. But the new generation of gamers disagree with me, and the entire concept of getting stuck in a game is treated like a bug that gets squashed during play testing. So games have moved on to the "long interactive movie" concept, a progression from A to B where it's a foregone conclusion that you're going to win, and without any kind of real hardship along the way.
You know, that quote immediately made me thing of Contra. I love that game. It was fun to use the code for 30 lives to easily beat the game, but the game was so much better when I sat down with a buddy and played the game for 2 days straight until we beat it without using the code. There were some seriously tense moments, and when we finally beat it, the satisfaction was huge. I haven't felt that from a game in a LONG LONG LONG time.
Comments
I do see computer games as a competitive activity, in the sense that they're a personal challenge, in a similar way that climbing a mountain is competing against the elements, so to speak; like playing solitaire or solving a crossword puzzle, single-player video games are competitive activities in that one can either succeed or fail in a way that doesn’t really apply to watching movies or reading books.
I totally believe that you are not motivated by any desire to impose your viewpoint on others. But you have framed some of your statements in a way that goes beyond the expression of opinion. Several of your statements posit something about the essence of KQ -- "This clearly shows that King's Quest is a story first and foremost."; "...the most essential part of KQ - the part that makes it possible to recognise it as KQ - is the story content, not the gameplay…" -- as if they were universal truths.
Those ideas might flow naturally from your viewpoint of adventure games as playable stories, but I don’t believe there’s any objective basis for them outside of that and so they’re not necessarily valid characterizations of KQ for those with different approaches to adventure or computer games. Moreover, I’m not sure there’s any rational way to determine what defines KQ or what makes it great. I would suggest it’s whatever the fans say it is, individually and collectively. Of course it's not possible to know the collective or majority consensus. But from what I know about KQ fans, I believe that any assertion about what makes KQ great has to include both story (defined any way you want) and gameplay, regardless of whether it's included in the definition of story, pretty high on the list.
I understand that your idea of story doesn’t mean merely plot but encompasses gameplay and other things, that that follows from your view of games as playable stories, and that you might even view these things as somehow inseparable. But what I’ve been trying to show is that gamers can and do view these things as separable, especially for purposes of analysis and evaluation. That’s why I can’t accept the hypothesis that story is more important than gameplay -- even though your vision of what story means encompasses gameplay -- because I can, do and will continue to evaluate the games I play on the basis of gameplay, independently of any other features.
It's not that I think your ideas are blatantly wrong, it's that they don't even begin to capture why I enjoyed the King's Quest series or play computer games in the first place, and especially why I play them instead of watching movies or consuming stories in any passive media. That the player controls the actions of the character might be the only difference between an adventure game and other forms of media, but it's a huge difference, a fundamental difference, for me and probably many others who talk about gameplay around here.
You know, I also lump some elements together when thinking about what makes a particular game or games in general enjoyable. My personal rubric for evaluation is two-fold: gameplay and what I'll call "atmosphere", which includes plot, writing, art style, music, sound, and the like. These two terms are probably how I will decide for myself whether the new game captures the spirit of the existing KQ games. But I can readily see that this breakdown would be insufficient for someone who plays games for different reasons or different experiences than I do. I can insist (and actually do believe) that the first Quake FPS had terrific atmosphere, and insist that my view of atmosphere includes plot, but to someone for whom high-quality plots are tremendously important in a game, my assertions would be meaningless at best, dismissive or even insulting at worst.
So, yeah, it does come down to our different ways of seeing things.
That first half of the term I used, "interactive story", is indeed fundamentally important to the charm these games hold for me as well. If these stories were stripped of all interactive elements and reduced to a single linear narrative, they would lose much of their allure for me. I love exploring the boundaries and the workings of the story worlds in every sense, trying different permutations, seeing how far off track they let me stray, etc. Things that are only possible in computer games.
Which is exactly where BttF has failed.;)
Without our knowledge or consent.
Exactly. See the problem? And the reason for preemptive negativity? Telltale may have said that they're going to have to cater a little bit to the KQ audience because of the type of game KQ is, but that means virtually nothing really because we don't know how much they are going to remain faithful and how much they are going to change. And also because they've lied to us before.
And to those who think the whole argument is just about save games or deaths or dead ends...etc. this is why it really is more than all of that. Once they start messing with auto saves and retrys, they are tipping their hand that they are trying to cater and design the game for those who are not comfortable with KQ to begin with. Even though some KQ fans like some of those ideas, the game is not being designed for them, it is being designed for a much different, much larger demographic. It makes sense for their bottom line, but as KQ fans, the game wont be made with us in mind.
The latest spewing of this philosophy can be found in this interview with TTG's Executive Producer of JP, who says "every scene, shot, and activity" in JP is being composed cinematically. I have difficulty seeing how the adoption of cinematic composition as a central design goal could provide an enjoyable experience for gamers who value exploring a gameworld and tackling substantive obstacles to progression found therein.
I have always appreciated TTG's attention to visual design, but they went overboard in TDP, and actually scuttled the ship in BTTF. Who knows what their thinking is on cinematic design wrt King's Quest? I don't think it's a sure bet either way. But the cause for concern is justified.
Which is the worst King's Quest game?
A) Telltale's King's Quest Machinima
C) King's Quest: Mask of Eternity
You need to add King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride to that (it's one of the most criticized games in the series). Some people include King's Quest V (due to Cedric, and 'incoherrent' puzzles/dead ends)!
But I'm sure each game has its detractors!
True...I almost did include it, but left it off at the last minute for some reason I can't remember now.
I honestly have a feeling Telltale's KQ will feel most like KQ7, which is why I'm dreading it so much, as I absolutely HATE that game. Telltale's KQ will most likely have: 1) a single cursor that does everything, 2) only a few clickable hotspots per area, 3) automatic retries for deaths, etc.
Telltale's KQ game is going to be everything fans of the series hated about KQ7. Mark my words.
That's a really, really weird comment...
But that's always the case with preorders. You can never really trust trailers, screenshots, previews, etc. to tell you what a game will be like. Think of the times you've read a glowing preview, or seen a wicked trailer, only to throw down the dosh for the game and realize that it's nothing at all like you thought. Sucks, doesn't it? But that's what you get for being hasty with your purchase.
Now, maybe with the adventure genre being so sparsely populated preorders are a safer bet, but I think anyone willing to slap their money on the table before reading a review or playing a demo is taking a gamble and shouldn't complain if the product isn't up to their standards.
As someone who only started playing King's Quest recently (late last year, if I recall correctly. I've only played AGDI's remakes of KQ1-3), I can say that while the whole "save often" thing doesn't bother me, it doesn't add anything to the experience for me. Deaths should absolutely be there, it wouldn't really be King's Quest without them.
Somewhat related, Telltale fans are really whiny.
And I guess I'm confused to why people are getting so worked up about this, even if there was a choice to disable the feature, and why people are saying the mere knowledge that some people aren't playing it as hardcore as them is ruining the game. I mean, the first three games have fan remakes that disable dead-ends. Does that ruin the original games for you?
For example, King's Quest I: You had the various rivers in the game. Fair enough, if you walk into the river, the game lets you know this is bad by killing you, and it's easy enough to tell which bodies of water are shallow enough to wade across. Then you had the witch, dragon, and giant. All plot relevant, all obvious dangers, as fairly easily avoidable until you were ready to deal with them.
Where it loses me is with the wolf, the ogre, the dwarf, and the leprechauns. The first three, they're just there to antagonize you with no context, and inhibit exploration in an often unfair and unpredictable way. Yes, they always appear on the same screens, but you won't know that until you've already had to restart because of them.
And the leprechauns represent the absolute worst trend in adventure games: The aforementioned punishment for not having the right item. I guess it wouldn't be too bad, except that you can save between when you can last acquire the item needed to get rid of them, and when it's too late to go get it, and you probably will because of the obvious danger in the cave leading up to them. But again, I don't think anyone is defending this trend.
I guess it really boils down to this for me: If the cause of death has a place in context of the story, and is obvious enough to encourage you to save before experimenting, then it's fine. It's the random, out of context middle fingers that Sierra would send my way that make me prefer the fan remakes of the first three KQ games.
EDIT: I'm going strictly from memory on this, by the way, so if there are contexts for the dwarf, wolf, or ogre, or if the game prevents you from going to the leprechaun cave without the clover or fiddle, then I will concede those points. And I know the dwarf is provided context in later versions, but not the original, if I recall correctly.
Bt
And I don't consider these classic adventure game mechanics so much as trying to guess what the developer wants you to do as it is searching out the game world and experimenting to find out just what kind of world it is and what dangers it holds. Some call this fourth-wall breaking and frustrating because it absolutely depends on the save game feature, I beg to differ. It's all part of the game experience for me. Deaths and dead ends to me are dangers that impede your ability to progress and complete the game. It's an added difficulty. Obstacles to overcome. Gamers today don't appreciate this. Even in the FPS world. We don't even have save slots anymore, we have checkpoints. So you never have to worry about losing in your game. Just shut it off whenever you're done and the game automatically saves your progress. I guess I'm just used to the old-school days of not even HAVING saves and you have to beat the whole game in one sitting (like the NES and SNES classics) and when a game does have the ability to save I use it for all it's worth. I don't think saves should come packaged with the game, I think they are a game tool one must utilize, not something to not have to worry about.
Regarding dead ends, they're frustrating, yes. But as I said above I also consider them gaming obstacles. Whether intended or unintended implementations. If you're at the end of the game and you don't have the item you need and can't figure out what to do it's you're logical reasoning skills (a mandatory adventure tool) that deduce that you missed something and have to go back. This isn't a bad thing! This means you GET to go back and explore the world again! More game! You missed something! There's more of the world to explore and solve before moving on! I always worry when moving into new game areas that I missed something beforehand because of this and make sure I look absolutely everywhere I can think of. Of course this doesn't always work, but again, you get to play the game longer to find new things you never noticed before. There are ALWAYS things you never noticed before in an adventure game. Even if you beat it. There's always more in the world to see and do that you missed (not in Telltale games, but anyway...).
I do this in other games too. FPS, RPG, everything. I look around everywhere for every possible secret I can find and make sure I have everything I can get before moving on. I'm not saying that everyone should share my practices of playing a game, I'm just sharing how I enjoy and support deaths, random deaths, and unwinnable situations. I'm romanticizing a little bit, as dead ends CAN be insanely frustrating to the point of me wishing they weren't even there, but at the end of the day it makes for much more enjoyable experience when I finally beat it with full points. Yeah! I BEAT this sucker! Bring it on!
Yeah.
Oh, those aren't the kinds of in-game deaths we're talking about? Because I know a couple of witches' families who might have a thing or two to say about that. Those poor old ladies didn't get to SAVE and RESTORE, that's for sure.
It's the stuff real men are made of.
I think you're completely wrong, but when did rational argument ever beat nostalgia in a sparring match?
I'm alright with removing dead ends. That will never work ever again I imagine. But that doesn't mean that gameplay and that on-edge feeling of exploration has to be completely nonexistent. I don't understand gamers today. Games just aren't challenging anymore.
Yet you have rock-hard games like Demon's Souls or Super Meat Boy that are somehow both hard and fair.
I don't think it's really laziness. Dying should be instantly reversible, and not a punishment. No menu should come up. Press "R" to return to the edge of the cliff you so beautifully slipped over.
Dead ends never worked in the first place.
I really, really don't like GUIs or menus in my games. If you want death, fine; but don't use it as punishment, nor bring up a menu everytime it happens. Make it instantly reversible, and use it as feedback to players - a way to tell them that whatever they just did was wrong. I can't see it being useful otherwise.
To make a death meaningful all saves have to be deleted.
Preferable the adventure gets changed around too, so you can't use previous experience to handle things better.
(Too bad that current adventures do have a problem with randomizing the environment)
Bringing up menus is an immersion killer for me. I just wanna get on with it. We Arabs have a word for it - "Yallah!". Hurry up already. I could do without the silly menu.
You sound like the type of person who would love the new Jurassic Park game. Perhaps King's Quest isn't for you.
Then what good is it? For a laugh? That's not King's Quest, that's Space Quest. Or to a lesser extent Leisure Suit Larry.
Geez, you sound like an incredibly impatient gamer. Perhaps adventure games themselves aren't your cup of tea? Adventure games aren't about "getting on with it." It's about exploration, discovery, and the journey. Not the goal.
The difference is it's your responsibility as a gamer to save the game yourself. So if you forget or don't bother it's your fault. It's a threat to the progression of the game. What else should a death be? They're completely pointless otherwise. This is the first and oldest rule of video games in general with regards to failure. The save feature should be bonus enough. Autosaves are just handing the game to you without putting up a fight. And that's just not fun and makes deaths merely minor annoyances rather than the show-stopping dangerous game events they should be.
While it has mostly disappeared from the adventure genre since the heyday of Sierra, puzzle-solving from the perspective of the feet can add excitement to gameplay and contribute to immersion in the game-world (far more than occasionally having to reload a saved game detracts from it). There's nothing inherently "unfair" about it -- just as it's not unfair to have to be responsible for aiming your character's weapons in a third-person action-adventure even though many of them have auto-aim, it's not unfair to have to consider your character's feet in an adventure game just because most of the others incorporate an auto-danger-avoidance system during movement.
It's a different approach to gameplay, and one that I think is worth preserving in any honest attempt to revive the King's Quest franchise. Why are adventure gamers always so eager to have every title hammered down to fit the same mold?
Check it out.
http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-crucial-lessons-learned-by-watching-kids-play-video-games/
Here's a particularly interesting tidbit, though: