Making libraries fun (in games)

[GarageGothic]

This is somewhat related to my earlier post about simulating internet searches, but whereas that was more about the tech side of things, this is directly related to gameplay.

The question is this: How do you turn library research into interesting gameplay?

There have been more than a few libraries in adventure games, employing different techniques:

1) The pixel hunt library, a Lucasarts classic. Run the cursor across the "books" on the bookshelf until you find that elusive, two-pixels wide "a book". Often these books have no obvious significance at the time you find them. The "How to fly an airplane" book in Indy 3 is an example, and most recently the mushroom book in Syberia, depending on when you found it.

2) The "topic shelf" library. Used in GK1, GK2 and The Uncertainty Machine. Each shelf has a topic of it's own, say "Geography" or "German history", much like a real library. Whenever you need to research a certain topic and click the hand icon on the right shelf, the player character picks out the right book. Often this turns into a longer puzzle where one book refers to another topic - the Schattenjäger library in GK1 worked like this.

3) The easy way out. Ask the librarian for interesting books and she selects one for you. KQ2VGA used this. Can't think of other games.

4) The MI2 version with a card catalog. I really liked that, but I don't see how it could be done with AGS. Besides, nobody use card catalogs anymore, so it's not very relevant. You could do a computerized version, but it had the same problems as the www search discussed earlier.

Those were the approaches to FINDING books. Now, how could this be used for interesting puzzles? An obvious one is the misplaced/misfiled book - it could be done a bit like the switched coffins in KQ2VGA, but that wouldn't be very logical. I mean, it's not as if books are just interchangeable. An index number mix-up would be more likely, but how could that be turned into a puzzle?

I have a few library puzzles in my game, that I for obvious reasons won't reveal here, but I'm pretty much stumped in coming up with any more. And I'm still not sure how I'll design the actual finding of the books on the shelves. A combination of catalog and topic shelf would be preferable, but I'm not sure quite how to do it yet.

Any ideas?

[Evil]

Well, how about a mix of those? This can be best explained in a little story...

"John" is being attacked by the government. He has to go to the library to find info. He comes to find the library trashed and burned. He goes to a librarian who tells him that the library was broken into in which they took a few books and burned the building (government maybe?). He tells her he is looking for info on "government" (or whatever to stop the government from doing something evil). She gives him a card with the names of some books that may help him. He goes and finds the shelves titled "government". There he finds many books burned or missing. On the shelves you can see the ones the wernt burned in which you can pull out (new gui?). When doing so you can see the title and read the book. If you want you could make a message popup like "excert" or soemthing or you could do it like myst style.

What ever you choose I'm shure will be fine.

[Hobbes]

The GK1 puzzle was fun, if a bit... simple. It felt like clicking on book after book, although the supplied info was interesting, so for that game it worked really well.

The LucasArts pixel hunting was also enjoyable, especially in Indy3 (were there other games that did a library like this?) where you visit Venice.

You could always combine these two elements, and have a large library as in Indy3 and then do it topical like GK1. Would be interesting, I think.

[Goldmund]

I cannot imagine the better way than it was done in GK and Uncertainty Machine.
As for the simplicity...
Well, we should analyse one thing. I believe that after clicking on various shelves the player will anyway think that the character's done research, that there was work put into it.
If your character has to work to earn money, clicking on the spade and then on a pile of sand isn't "hard", you cannot even call it a "puzzle" - but still, when the player thinks of the story as a whole, they will say "and I had to work a lot to earn some money".
I'm not sure how far we can go into this - but I certainly felt I've done some research when I clicked this german dictionary in GK1.

[GarageGothic]

a large library as in Indy3 and then do it topical like GK1

Yes, I think that's the solution. A larger library would make it much more tedious to solve the puzzle by clicking on everything, so hopefully it would inspire the player to think.

I agree completely with Goldmund's comment on the feeling of effort being put into something, although the player character. as opposed to the player. does all the work. Every time Guybrush digs a big hole I feel absolutely worn out My worry is that the player won't feel the importance of the information he finds, unless it's been difficult to find - somehow the ease of locating the books in GK1 made the text feel less interesting than the information I found on Sidney in GK3.
evil, yes, it's a lot easier if you burn most of the books and leave the interesting ones more or less unharmed (except the boring parts) But you have a point. I think I'll stay away from helpful librarians though - librarians in adventure games should always be an obstacle, not a help, except the cute one in Darkseed

I'm not sure how far we can go into this - but I certainly felt I've done some research when I clicked this german dictionary in GK1.

Spoiler

Ah, but that puzzle demanded logic - it wasn't about finding random words from the dictonary but of connecting this with the Drachen Drei poem (and later, to the clock). I'm not sure that the act of clicking the the dictionary in itself felt like research. It only made sense if you were actually TRYING to translate the poem.

[close]

[Hollister Man]

I thought of making a really big, scrolling room.  In this room you have a large version of the bookshelves.  Only one or two rows of books fit in the view at a time.  This should allow you to make it large enough to read the spines of the books.  It would also simulate the way you can only look at a certain number of books at a time.

It could be really large, but that could get really annoying.  Three or four shelves, two screen wide would be adequate for a good puzzle.  


Maybe I'll implement that.