Just a question about AGS future

James Kay · Mon 15/12/2003 06:54:06

Quote from: Snake on Mon 15/12/2003 04:26:09
F*ck 3D.

Good point well made!

3D has done more to make the gameplay experience mediocre than a handful of nepotistically employed publishers ever could!
"We need a better plot?"
"No way, just add a few thousand polys to the main character and add 'amazing 3D graphics with new tesselation technology' on the back of the box."
"Our last game sold terribly!"
"Really, we'd better rewrite the 3D engine then and make the sequel prettier."

Bah humbug!

Gonzo · Mon 15/12/2003 11:10:36

James Kay touched on it earlier, AGS takes us back to the golden age of adventure gaming - when it was most popular, when the current technology suited it best, and simply, when the best games were made.

Whilst the '3D era' has seen a few decent adventures (I'd argue that out of the 3D adventure games, only Grim Fandango is a truly great game), we're never going to look back on the past 5 years and say it was a great time for adventure games. Not like we look back on the early 90s and try to recreate the feel and quality of those games, in 2D, the best format for adventure games.

AGS started as a nostalgia trip for me, but I think the era we look back on fondly to isn't go to change as time goes on. The heydey was then and probably will always be.

Then there's the simple fact that not as many people played adventure games (of which there were far less anyway) in recent times, so there's less people who are going to be looking back and saying 'those were great games, I want to make one like that', than there are people looking back on the 'golden age' I'm talking about.

Some people want to make 3D games yes, but AGS looks unlikely to be the engine that will suit them by any stretch of the imagination, IMO.

GarageGothic · Mon 15/12/2003 11:44:29

This thread has gone somewhat off-topic already, so I hope I'm not upsetting anyone by posting some non-AGS related thoughts on 3D.

I'm not as nostalgic about early point-n-click adventures as most others in the forum. Maybe because I'm nostalgic about the late text parser games from Sierra, like Colonel's Bequest, Police Quest 2 and Conquest of Camelot. And nobody really does that style anymore. So it's not as if I have much of a choice.

With the risk of starting a huge debate, I must say that I actually like 3D when it's done properly. But I'm not sure that's been done in true adventure games yet. I think Grim Fandango, while a great game, could easily have worked with drawn or possibly pre-rendered characters. The main difference, the controls, have nothing to do with 3D as such. In my book, GK3 is pretty much the only "true" 3D game, which was still a pure adventure (there might have been others, but less succesful).

The main feature added by 3D graphics with a movable camera (whether 1st person, 3rd person over-the-shoulder or 3rd person character-independent camera) is exploration. You can walk around objects, look under them, behind them, on top of them. As a designer you can actually hide things in the environment, and still expect them to be found without pixel hunting. Under a Killing Moon and its sequels did this very well, but the gameplay was hurt by the bad resolution of early 3D technology.

Whenever I play 3D shooters, it disappoints me that you have all these beautifully modelled surroundings and characters and all you do is put bullet holes in them. It's such a waste. In my mind, the perfect neo-adventure game would be a third-person game with a Max Payne-style over-the-shoulder view semi-attached to the character (similar to the first Hitman game, where you could move the camera in a half circle around the character without changing the way he was facing). And just like the Hitman games, you would have a cursor that would highlight whenever you moved it over interactable objects. When you clicked on them, you would have some sort of verb-coin or tlj-like interface. Character movement with keys, cursor movement with mouse.

Broken Sword 3 nearly did it right, except it removed mouse control and it added too many non-adventure obstacles (boxes, nuff said). As soon as some designer realizes that action-adventure graphics doesn't necessarily mean action-adventure gameplay, I think a lot of you are in for a pleasant surprise.

Gonzo · Mon 15/12/2003 12:08:34

Well I'd definitely like to think that someone can do a really great adventure game in 3D. So far they've been mostly quite flawed I must say. I don't know if Sam And Max 2 will be true 3D but the look of the trailer is spot-on, it suits the style down to the ground - so if the game's going to look like that, it has a lot going for it.

Ultimately though, everything so far has led me to think 2D (point 'n' click) is the ideal format for the adventure. I like 3D in action-adventures, RPGs etc, but adventures seem to grate with it a little.

You're right about true 3D not being Grim-style, but with movable camera etc. - but AGS accomodating that is even more hard to imagine, as even less adventure games have done that. GK3 is the only one that immediately springs to mind.

Ghormak · Mon 15/12/2003 12:08:49

QuoteWhenever I play 3D shooters, it disappoints me that you have all these beautifully modelled surroundings and characters and all you do is put bullet holes in them. It's such a waste. In my mind, the perfect neo-adventure game would be a third-person game with a Max Payne-style over-the-shoulder view semi-attached to the character (similar to the first Hitman game, where you could move the camera in a half circle around the character without changing the way he was facing). And just like the Hitman games, you would have a cursor that would highlight whenever you moved it over interactable objects. When you clicked on them, you would have some sort of verb-coin or tlj-like interface. Character movement with keys, cursor movement with mouse.

Broken Sword 3 nearly did it right, except it removed mouse control and it added too many non-adventure obstacles (boxes, nuff said). As soon as some designer realizes that action-adventure graphics doesn't necessarily mean action-adventure gameplay, I think a lot of you are in for a pleasant surprise.

Whoa, you took the words right out of my mouth. I couldn't agree more.

If only Hitman 3 turned out like the original (and by that I mean that shooting your way through is near impossible, unlike the far too easy Hitman 2) I'd definitely consider that an adventure. The Thief games are also a couple of gems I'd like to think of as adventures. Not adventure games, but adventures. And they're damn close to being what I would think of as the perfect game.

m0ds · Mon 15/12/2003 14:24:55

I think AGS should remain as a point and click engine. 3D may be the way to go but I don't persnonally believe its the way AGS should go.

IMHO :p

Captain Mostly · Mon 15/12/2003 16:28:58

Did 3D come first, or lense flare?
Why hop from foot to foot over the desire for 3D when there's so many stages in between to look for... I'd like to see layered backgrounds that scroll at different speeds, and I'd like to see the lighting feature developed further.

I can't see any reason why an engine specfically designed for retro-style game creation needs to try and compete with such things as the appauling Monkey Island 4 and friends...

SSH · Mon 15/12/2003 17:03:19

Forget about 3d, CJ needs to work on getting that "Make my game" option working properly

Joseph DiPerla · Mon 15/12/2003 18:07:37

Personally, I agree that 3D is not needed in AGS at the moment.

I think it has still some minor things to create like Sub-Rooms for lockers and stuff.

I even think that it should implement all the features, or most of the features that the plugins have.

But I think we could all hold off on the 3D. Especially like I said before, we dont have a lot of 3D designers here.

Dont get me wrong. I dont doubt the power of 3D. And I think if something was well thought out, a 3D adventure game could be made.

I think if anyone wants 3D, make a plugin. Its the only good thing to do at this point.

JD

DragonRose · Mon 15/12/2003 18:33:39

If you want to build a 3D game, there's the 3D Adventure Studio.
(The link was on the AGS links page

)

These people are working on building a 3D adventure game engine. It's just in alpha right now though.

Dave Gilbert · Mon 15/12/2003 19:08:13

Thanks for the link, Dragonrose. That engine looks very interesting. It definitely has potential.

remixor · Tue 16/12/2003 04:22:58

Quote from: James Kay on Mon 15/12/2003 06:54:06
Quote from: Snake on Mon 15/12/2003 04:26:09
F*ck 3D.

Good point well made!

3D has done more to make the gameplay experience mediocre than a handful of nepotistically employed publishers ever could!
"We need a better plot?"
"No way, just add a few thousand polys to the main character and add 'amazing 3D graphics with new tesselation technology' on the back of the box."
"Our last game sold terribly!"
"Really, we'd better rewrite the 3D engine then and make the sequel prettier."

Bah humbug!

This is really not a very solid point. The first thing that comes to mind is the fairly mediocre Runaway, and to me it seems as if the developers said:
"We need a better plot?"
"No way, just add 2D 1024x768 resolution support and put 'Highest resolution ever used in an adventure game!' on the back of the box." (by the way, it DOES say that on the box)
3D has allowed many games to provide unprecented immersian and non-linearity that is simply not possible in a 2d environment. Now, the type of games one strives to make in AGS do not require this, as their strengths lie elsewhere. I'm not arguing for inclusion of a 3d engine in AGS, but mindless 3d-bashing (of all the things to bash, geez...) is pointless to begin with.

Peder 🚀 · Tue 16/12/2003 10:10:07

I cant see why we always have to change the old stuff.. all the time there come new stuff and the old stuff go away.. like , i collect the old Sega Master System.. and i yust love to play it.. I actually starting to get sick of the new grapich,, and now its only shoot and kill games (almost,its also sportsgames.) and when monkey island was made there was also humor.. and i think thats important in a game.. Maybe the new sam and max and Larry games have humor, thay actually should have humor, if not i wouldent even try the demo, since i think that if a Sam and Max game or a Larry game dont have humor, then its not a S&M game or a Larry game.. and yust think about the grapich on the monkey island game.. the characters looks so good, and i think that wasent easy to make them, at least not for a normal guy without no skills in drawing (animation), for example me.. I dont know but theres something special with the old games, maybe because i grew up with them..

Just a question about AGS future

m0ds