3D adventure games.

[miguel]

I agree with you all,
But that last comments made me think that we don't give the same treatment to sound than we do to graphics.
I mean, we really don't mind that MIDI is out of the way on adventure games, do we?
Maybe some of you do, but that way we could not have Guybrush speaking.
Just a thought.

[ManicMatt]

Miguel, that's more like comparing blocky 2D monkey island 1 graphics to higher res 2D monkey island 3 graphics, isn't it?

[miguel]

I guess you're right, but I wasn't comparing anything,
I would rather play old pc games with no sound even if they are blocky 2D than some crappy 3D games.

[Candall]

Well, of course you would if they're crappy 3D games.  By that token, I'd rather play a faithful remake of an old blocky 2D classic in nice, attractive 3D.

Note the emphasis on "faithful".

[auriond]

I think all of the complaints in this thread are justified but they don't stem from 3D adventure games in principle. Bad design is bad design irrespective of game engine...

It's funny but I haven't yet come across an adventure game that uses full 3D well. Granted, I haven't been playing many (or any!) of the modern 3D games, but from what I hear they often make use of mouse+keyboard controls that sound good for first-person games. Can anyone tell me which third-person adventure games have made good use of the 3D controls? I'd like to check it out.

[Mantra of Doom]

I'd like to bring up the Telltale Sam & Max series, as well as Bone 1 and 2. They use 3D... but they play like a 2D a 2D point and click game.

[ildu]

I'd like to bring up TellTale's up-and-coming Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures. It's full3D and it looks gorgeous, and better than it would in 2D, because it looks pretty exactly the same as the show itself. I'm not usually an advocate of full3D, but TellTale is special . Now, if only DoubleFine would make a game that's a little more adventurey, and less platformy (though, Brütal Legend is looking awesome as well).

http://www.telltalegames.com/wallaceandgromit

[Dualnames]

Adventures are just not created to allow total camera manipulation, they are created to show a story from someone's point of view and camera if staying in a certain place serves that purpose..hopefully.

[Ali]

It's funny but I haven't yet come across an adventure game that uses full 3D well.

I know it damages my point, but while Telltale's engine is almost perfect it can be annoying to get out of a closer camera position. You have to click on the edge of the screen, and the character takes two steps. Then you click again, and the character takes two steps. And so on and so forth until the camera pulls out to a wider position. There are also a few very tricky places to click in the (largely hilarious) Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People.

I know the Myst series is not universally popular here, but Myst V uses full 3D very well. It even gives the user the option to play like a fps or like the earlier pre-rendered Myst games.

And I forgot to say before: I love GK3 to!

[miguel]

At last! I am not alone!
GK3, with all its faults, allowed total immersion on the story.
I guess that if the story and the flow of the narrative are well-balanced, even old 3D GFX like GK3 are enough.
Ali, I love you in a manly way.

[ratracer]

Well, I am not very fond of most "full 3d" games, but I was amazed for quite a while after playing UAKM (of the other Chris Jones) and the other Tex Murphy games...still back in the XXth century... Also, for quite a long time, I only remember Normality as being the only other one adventure game to feature full 3d. In both cases, I think they were done rather well, rather well indeed! Normality was not such a strong game, but I liked it and its 3d implementation anyway...
(I am not counting as full 3d those Cryo games, like Atlantis, which, although quite beautiful, were "omni 3d" which I don't think counts, right?)

Anyway, I must confess that the overall quality of the game (perceived by me, anyway) influences my opinnion on the production, but the vice-versa is true - , in more recent terms, I loooved gk3 and the watchmaker (top games in my book) so I do think that they benefited from the immersion that they managed to get from the full 3d perspective...

One exception is Culpa Innata - it was one of those games I could not put down, it was a fascinating, fascinating game! can't wait for CI 2- but the camera movements et al are quiet poor and the worst aspect of the game IMO....
BTW, is Culpa Innata considered full 3d?!?

edit: in conclusion, while a well done full3d can improve playability and therefore make a better game, the opposite is not necessarily true, i.e, a bad 3d implementation won't necessarily destroy a good adventure game; also, most good 3d implementations (IMO, anyway) were done - surprisingly - in the past.


(This is my first post in some 4 or 5 years, so I should be (re)presenting myself, but I am a bit lazy for that... in terms of game creation I didn't do anything apart from Uncertainty Machine, which I did in 2003)

[MrColossal]

It's very interesting to read some views about what an adventure game is. I never imagined that the engine mattered when it came to making an adventure game or that the camera can't move because that is important to the gameplay.

As far as I recall the majority of games are created to tell a story from one person's point of view and they do it just well in 3d or 2d.

"I would rather play old pc games with no sound even if they are blocky 2D than some crappy 3D games."

But would you rather play a crappy 2d game from the 90s over a good 3d game?

[Stupot]

Ratracer - Watchmaker was pretty good, I'll give you that.

MrColossal - I see what your saying, that the main purpose of an adventure game is to tell a story and the style of the graphics shouldn't really affect one's enjoyment of the game... but I believe it can... and does.  I suppose it depends on what type of player you are... I like to spend more time clicking and less time walking.  I personally prefer a detailed and beautifully rendered or drawn 2D background over a blocky and sparse 3D environment that has nothing in it because in a 3D world details cost filesize and performance.

I believe that the extra visual detail allowed for in a 2D adventure game can really help in telling the story... they say "a picture speaks a thousand words"... but a sparse picture with only the very necessary details can't really 'speak' as much as a picture that is full of wonderful things to look at and interact with.

[MrColossal]

I think a lot of the problem I'm having with this discussion is the words people use.

"I personally prefer a detailed and beautifully rendered or drawn 2D background over a blocky and sparse 3D environment that has nothing in it"

Sure, I agree. But I also prefer a beautifully rendered or drawn 2d background to a badly rendered or drawn 2d background. I also prefer a beautifully made 3d world to a crappily made one.

http://images.bit-tech.net/content_images/2007/08/the_world_of_indie_games/b12.jpg

This is a bad 3d room

http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/beneath-a-steel-sky/screenshots/gameShotId,213194/

This is a bad 2d room

http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/grim-fandango/screenshots/gameShotId,7635/

This is all kinds of bad by some people's standards but it's Grim Fandango so... Maybe it's the game that makes a game good and not the art style that is chosen to play it in?

[LimpingFish]

Again, I think this is all down to preference on the individuals part, rather than any one technique being more suitable than another. Early pre-rendered backgrounds such those in Grim Fandango, or the original Resident Evil, look garish when compared to later examples such as the Resident Evil remake or Syberia, but this is mostly down to advances in 3D rendering and higher resolutions. A vast percentage of early pre-rendered 3D simply doesn't stand up anymore, largely due to restrictions with the original technologies. Traditional 2D work seems to have fared better.

But rubbish graphics are rubbish graphics, regardless of media, and rubbish 2D isn't somehow more valid than rubbish 3D; although if you have a preference for one over the other...

I'd be more inclined to play a good game over a bad game, really.

[Stupot]

What I'm saying is the obvious fact that a 2D background can have much more going on in it than a 3D one because it's developers don't have to worry so much about sacraficing the little touches in order to keep things economical and efficient... and in adventure games, which tend to be slower paced, you need little these touches to keep the player entertained and immerse them in the story that is being told.

Keeping Broken Sword as my example...  In the 2D games you are faced with a screen ram-packed full of little touches, any one of which could be useful to help you progress in the game.  In the 3D games many of the normal items you would find lying around any location (whether it be a bedroom, or a factory) has been whittled down to the occasional potted plant or cardboard box... I guess it's a personal preference - I like detail - and in general having 3D graphics some of this detail understandably has to be sacraficed.

Every one of these little details could, if the makers have been thoughtful enough, help to tell the story in which the game is set.  So in making BS3&4 3D they cannot do this so much.  And from a purely business point of view, they have made a game which runs on fewer computers, meaning they've lost customers.

Again, I think this is all down to preference on the individuals part, rather than any one technique being more suitable than another.

You are mostly correct.  Most of what I have been arguing is just a reflection of my own preferences, but there are ways in which 2D is more suited to adventures than 3D... for example:

Most of us play adventures for a) the story, and b) the brainwork... I'm sure most of us don't play them for all the walking about that can be done.  In all the 3D games I've played there is a LOT of walking to be done.  A very high percentage of your clicks are being used to control the character... and if the camera is swinging about and faces in all kinds of directions then you have to navigate around that... this is neither telling me a story nor helping me solve a puzzle... I'm just walking.

Whereas in a 2D game, yes there is a bit of walking to be done, but 9 times out of ten you can click ON an item to walk towards it... thus covering your navigation and puzzling in one fell swoop as you have no camera to walk around.   Sure occasionally in a 2D game you have a scrolling screen which makes for slightly more walking, but this isn't all that often used as 2D game developers seem to have acknowledged this as a bit of a nuisance.

[LimpingFish]

Most of us play adventures for a) the story, and b) the brainwork... I'm sure most of us don't play them for all the walking about that can be done.  In all the 3D games I've played there is a LOT of walking to be done.  A very high percentage of your clicks are being used to control the character... and if the camera is swinging about and faces in all kinds of directions then you have to navigate around that... this is neither telling me a story nor helping me solve a puzzle... I'm just walking.

Whereas in a 2D game, yes there is a bit of walking to be done, but 9 times out of ten you can click ON an item to walk towards it... thus covering your navigation and puzzling in one fell swoop as you have no camera to walk around.   Sure occasionally in a 2D game you have a scrolling screen which makes for slightly more walking, but this isn't all that often used as 2D game developers seem to have acknowledged this as a bit of a nuisance.

Most adventure games contain pointless walking between screens; Tunguska, as I mentioned earlier is the exception, rather the the rule. I don't think walking has become more intrusive since the move to 3D, though if it has it's most likely down to bad game design, rather than an inherent flaw with 3D. Everything from Monkey Island to Syberia has moments of navigating through a number of otherwise superfluous screens to complete a puzzle, and I've seen little change, either way, in how adventure games deal with this. Having said that, fully 3D enviroments are often more expansive, which may or may not be a mistake when used with the adventure game.

I think the core problem with fully 3D adventure games is that few designers use the concept well, relying on well-worn game mechanics which arguably may be better suited to a 2D playing enviroment.

[Stupot]

Most adventure games contain pointless walking between screens

I'm not so much talking about walking between screens. That was discussed above.  Rather, I'm talking about walking within them.  If every clickable item is there on the screen in front of you rather than dotted around a 3D environment then you can concentrate on solving the puzzles rather than wandering around the room in order to get something into view so that you can click on it.

I think the core problem with fully 3D adventure games is that few designers use the concept well, relying on well-worn game mechanics which arguably may be better suited to a 2D playing enviroment.

I suggest that those 'well-worn game mechanics' ARE what we refer to as the 'adventure game'.  And I'm suggesting that, yes, they are better suited to 2D.

[ManicMatt]

At least 2D games don't age as badly in the graphics department.

I'd like to play Simon the Sorcerer 3 to see what happens after 2, but those graphics are so badly aged now I am hoping that 2D remake will see the light of day. Looking at badly dated 3D characters ruins any immersion for me, and instead usually makes me laugh. At  least I can still happily enjoy the graphics in Maniac Mansion to a degree.

[LimpingFish]

I'm not so much talking about walking between screens. That was discussed above.  Rather, I'm talking about walking within them.  If every clickable item is there on the screen in front of you rather than dotted around a 3D environment then you can concentrate on solving the puzzles rather than wandering around the room in order to get something into view so that you can click on it.

Yes, but that's not how 3D works. So a fully 3D adventure is indeed going to be different to a 2D one, but I still fail to see why a 2D environment is inherently better suited to adventure games. Not all 2D environments are well defined, and a lot of them are prone to pixel-hunting; something that could partly be attributed to a fixed perspective, but largely attributed to inept design. And that's the nub of my argument right there. Good design will always shine through, be it within a 2D or 3D environment. A badly designed 2D background is going to end up just as frustrating as a 3D one. An individual may have more tolerance for one or the other, but neither technology is inherently flawed.

But design problems aside, it still boils down to how you as an individual prefer to play a certain type of game.