As an adventure game musician, one thing I often find to be quite tricky to compose for is a cut-scene where you can skip the speech, by clicking the mouse or pressing a key etc.
I'm a sucker for skipping speech because I can read pretty quickly, so I often find myself skipping or moving the speech on.
Skipping speech means that music thats time to run with events will go out of sync and stuff. But my main questions are these;
- Do you, as a player, skip speech?
- Do you, as a developer, leave the option to skip speech on, or would you consider turning skip speech off during cut-scenes?
- Do you, as anyone, prefer to be able to skip speech in cut-scenes or are you not fussed?
:)
For cutscenes i don't mind if you can't skip the text or not, but of course during normal gameplay I would want to be able to skip text whenever I wanted to.
I don't skip the speech as long as it is the first time I'm playing the game. I add this option to my adventure games.
I usually skip speech, unless the game has voice speech. In a cutscene I'd turn skip speech off, if the music is timed. And in cutscenes, I think skipping speech should be turned off, developer can use StartCutscene and EndCutscene commands and cutscenes are like breaks when player can rest after solving a bunch of mind-bending puzzles :)
Cool, but what exactly is the use of the StartCutscene and EndCutscene commands?
You use the StartCutscene(type);
as your first cutscene command, do alll the cutscene coding inside that
and end with EndCutscene(); (which returns 0 if the player watched the cutscene, or 1 if they skipped it if you wanted to find that out....)
just useful to use to help your players with skipping a whole portion, such as a in intro, or some movie that may get tiring after the fourth time.
And I've agreed with what everyone else has said about skipping speech
- Do you, as a player, skip speech?
Only if it's like, you know, when you're clicking around for stuff and the character keeps saying, "I'm not putting my lips on that, I'm not putting my lips on that, I'm not putting my lips on that' over and over...
- Do you, as a developer, leave the option to skip speech on, or would you consider turning skip speech off during cut-scenes?
Turn skip speech off during cutscenes.
- Do you, as anyone, prefer to be able to skip speech in cut-scenes or are you not fussed?
Not fussed.
Believe it or no, in MI1 and MI2 you couldn't skip speech (Well you could by pressing ., but nobody knew that back then). Since the dialogue was so rich, and not too long winded, and since the speed of the dialogue could be set, it really didn't bother anybody.
Quote from: Indiana Psychonaut on Fri 19/03/2004 15:22:32
Believe it or no, in MI1 and MI2 you couldn't skip speech (Well you could by pressing ., but nobody knew that back then).
It was in the manual... I knew you could back when it first came out. Whenever I try and replay a certain part of the game, I'll use the skip speech part. :P
Nice livejournal, btw.... teh crAziness!
No, players don't have to be able to skip speech in cutscenes. For cutscenes only, this option can be disabled. However, the ability to skip speech for the rest of the game is an absolute much. (Just repeating what everyone else said, basically.)
I'm a fast reader, too, and I don't like having to wait for the voices to finish. It's even worse when they're not enjoyable voices. Sam & Max had great voices, though. That was one game where I absolutely didn't skip speech at all. I think the goal should be to make your voices interesting enough that players won't WANT to skip the speech.
I think skipping speech is essential when you don't have speech going on because the player reads it at his/her own pace. now in cutscenes, if the music has to sync, I guess it's acceptable to to skip speech....
Quote from: Indiana Psychonaut on Fri 19/03/2004 15:22:32
Believe it or no, in MI1 and MI2 you couldn't skip speech (Well you could by pressing ., but nobody knew that back then).
Ha ha, speak for yourself!
btw I did accidentaly discovered that . option, but i would have eventually... :P
I'm sure the . thing for lucas games was in the manual, no?
In adventure games I think speech and cutscenes should be mandatory. You will need it eventually, you know? As for other games, I just skip the speech, or cutscene, what ever it may be. However, if it is a conversation that you reoccurringly play then I think after the first time it should be skippable.
i usually don't skip speech unless it's something i've already heard, or if the character speaks in a really annoying way (like that bouncer guy in Fatman), but if the voice acting is good and suits the characters, like in Grim Fandango then i don't skip it, no matter how many times i've played the game...
fcukin a!
thank sfor replying. dont know what it was in aid of tho. :P
i hate not being able to skip speech. i read fast, and it irks, no pisses me off when i cant skip it. even in cutscenes...
i think either players should be able to skip speech in cutscenes or skip the whole cutscene..
when you're not playing the game for the first time the cutscenes are kinda boring for me..
I think pretty much everyone knew . skipped text in LEC games. Yufster didn't find out because she's dim.
During the game, I always skip speech.
During a cutscene, I always skip speech if the game will let me. If it won't let me, there'd better be a damn good reason (like the music is timed to fit the cutscene). Otherwise I start yelling design criticisms at the monitor as though it gives me a direct audio line to the developers (I did lots of this during certain sequences of BS3 :p).
But the entire cutscene should be skippable too, just for players who don't like to rewatch them on a replay.
It's funny how we've all got used to m0ds posting while drunk that nobody comments on it any more. ;)
Just to say.
I only skip speech if I've played the game before and I want to get to a certain point quickly.
Otherwise...Never, no, not at all.
Some games feature filmed cutscenes, instead of 'realtime'. Grim Fandago, for example. You couldn't skip speech, because you were watching a movie.
So my option: Skip speech off during cut-scenes is fine, but do make it possible to skip cut-scenes.
--Erwin
I 2nd Erwins opionion.
CMI also had this kind of thing.. and probably all 1995 --> had that thing.