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german? austrian?

I don't know, is this better than if the character gives you a warning and doesn't move so he won't die (in effect, leaving you stuck in the hallway until you get it right)? I don't know.

If you don't see any merit in rote repetition of gameplay until you overcome a challenge, then I fear you don't seem to see the merit in gaming. If the game isn't fun to play, of course you won't replay it. If it is, you won't mind dying (or losing) and redoing the section. That is what I think we should be focusing on, not as easy and painless a storytelling experience possible. We've said this a lot of times, I'll say it again: if I want just a good story, characterisation, plot, thematic consistency, I'll read a book and it'll be a million times better than a computer game 99% of the time. A computer game should be foremost about gameplay.

I never said death is the only risk. But in the vast majority of the well-liked Adventure games (mostly non-Sierra), there's no risk at all! You cannot even lose the game in most of them, it's either being stuck, or progressing! I think there's an important discussion to be made on that point.

there is a mindset that is promoted when you understand you can either be stuck, or be progressing. From there starts the 'click on everything' issue, for example. If you know that if you do the wrong thing (like in KGB) you're at risk of detrimental effects, not just NOTHING NOTHING NOTHING AH YES THIS ONE WORKED, you play much more carefully, and probably become more immersed as you haven't become meta-bored with the process and are just clicking through it to get to the next part.

Or should I just have him step back quickly and say "I can't go out there or he'll see me!" I myself, decided to choose the latter because I thought it would be annoying to see the character die for walking out into the open, or maybe because the player clicked there by accident and didn't save.

Depends... do you perhaps feel that a needed element in a game is the capacity for losing as well as winning? Should a game be stuck in the same place until the player somehow figures out what the designer had in mind in order to progress in a linear path towards resolution? Oh wait... adventure games.

The abolishment of risk in adventure games, I never understood.

There must be repercussions, and those repercussions will most likely take away from the normal gameplay and not make any sense.

I remember Sierra giving you a textbox of death. Still better than 'I don't want to do that.'

This would be an acceptable response if the main character was a small child, but not if they were a grizzled marine. It would be fun to find the child a nightlight, but irritating to find the marine a torch.

Yes I guess my problem is how when the designer feels like it, the small child will do completely risky stuff if they are the 'correct' thing to do, and not do all the rest of them he hasn't designed more involved try-and-fail responses to. So the same child that refuses to go in the dark, will throw water at a circutry board.

The thing is, most real people, and well-written characters will *not* feel compelled to do any sort of adventury-gamey thing besides the straightforward "I have locked myself out of my house!" scenario. So any sort of character in your game, unless they're McGyver, a private eye, some sort of master thief or what have you, is probably breaking character if you have them combining icecream with a magnet or somesuch. I can see how an everyman might be stressed to the point where he'd try inventory combinations, if he was really at risk and forced to be inventive, but as it happens most adventure games are totally sedate in atmosphere and it's just some dude walking around on a general 'quest' doing odd things like combining toothbrushes with flamingoes as if that's totally normal.
They don't seem to lack the motivation to do this shit, then why do they lack the motivation to put themselves at risk, or otherwise break character? They're breaking it just by carrying 30 items in their pockets.

If I am going to be combining random shit in a game, you bet your ass I want to be able to walk into toxic waste.

The issue with 'I don't want to do this' is player command, and the designer hiding behind a silly 'free will' clause for the main character. So we feel we're not really *controlling* the main character, we're just nudging him along in what he wanted to do anyway, because he has a 'character' and he can't step outside of it. This is in most cases awful. Either the character is compelled to do every little silly thing we want him to do, and is therefore more of an Avatar than he is an actor ( Sierra deaths ahoy! ) or our method of control of the character has to be scaled back considerably (The Last Express, for example). DON'T give me a walk pointer and then rob me of the ability to walk in toxic waste. DON'T give me a gun and then tell me 'I don't want to kill these innocent people!'. Bad design.

...okay. I'll... try harder.

I don't have a blog or similar thing, though I suspect I wouldn't use it regularly enough and do pr for it to the point where it would be useful or read a lot.

You don't pretend to know the nature of heaven and hell, but you have opinions on other such inscrutible matters as absolute justice, omniescence and generally the divine? What's the difference?

If "Heaven" is being with God for eternity and "Hell" is not being with God for eternity, and God forces someone into being with him who doesn't want to be (say, for example, a Satanist) then is that just by God's standards, or anyone else's?

if that is 'Hell' then awesome, SSH. No quarell there. Just nothingness in the absence of god, for those without faith suits me fine!

SilverTrumpet, your argumentation is very flawed, but I'll leave you to consider it on your own as I extended the question only to SSH because although he's a believer, I find him very open (as well as aware) to various religious implications and freewill scenarios. I will not even try to explain how 'free will' means nothing if the choices we make with that will are either destruction or faith.

How would I know if it is allowed? But why should you NEED to tell others about it? I don't see why you should.

Also, if salvation can be lost, in any way, then the God in heaven continues to be a petty and vindictive god. If ONE person goes to a 'Hell' then this God is not just, by his own standards. Would you like to discuss this point of view (it has to do with free will) or should I just leave it at that?

hum I am no awesome speller, but I think 'Epistemologically' was correct, no?

Epistemologically, lack of proof constitutes disprooval until there's reason to believe otherwise.

My personal relationship and experience of Jesus is my reason to belive otherwise.

That's awesome and I really have nothing discouraging to say on that. Just saying that your experience and your Jesus and your god really need not be discussed as if they're scrutable and fathomable by others. There should be no church built around these impossible to communicate concepts, nor should anyone be approached to be introduced into this church, even if they've had their own personal experiences with Jesus, because their Jesus is not your Jesus, their god is not your God. One person cannot communicate faith to another. What they do, and this is in my opinion 'wrong', is band together under the same-but-not-really-the-same Faith because that beats being alone, right?

I've had my share of personal experiences which I don't attribute to Jesus, probably because I never understood that concept. I attribute them to other things, and I go about my life with a morality probably in application pretty similar to yours, SSH. I think simpler is better in this case. I need no church, no god, and no faith to do good like the little automation I am.

Epistemologically, lack of proof constitutes disprooval until there's reason to believe otherwise. Therefore for those that enjoy rationality and things making sense, until the attributes of this god thing can be scrutinized and its premise tested, god is nothing more than a vague concept of antithetical terms like 'forever', 'all-powerful' and 'omniescent', not even a theory.

Having faith in something doesn't make it exist, it just makes you have faith in it. For example, I have faith that everything will work out okay, that people are gonna be good and that we'll all be smiling. I call this optimism. No gods required, none tested. If you have faith in a God, that doesn't mean you can say he exists. 'Existing' is a term we use for scrutable entities or concepts.

I am not a very rational person so I don't really contest god-talk so much, but just saying.

I was just making a point about transparency and abstraction, and how in harvest moon you don't 'harvest' any 'crops' or visit any 'woods'. You just move a sprite about on tiles and press a button. The game has so little immersive capability for me, it's just a bunch of disassociated graphics and numbers. Matter of taste.

A person that has lost a loved one to a random cruel act of violence and then can forgive has my outmost respect, be it because he feels "it is all in god's plan" or because of something less supernatural. It is the most difficult thing to do.

God making parenting mistakes!

Naive? woo

I am aware of the awesome Wrathful Tyrant stylings of god in the Old Testament, but for whatever reason (were come the Theologists to explain if you so desire) God had a change of heart (what?!) and decided to be all different in Testament v2.0 In the Greek Orthodox faith, the New Testament is what people base their faith on. The wrathful Jewish god is gone (hiding behind his huge finger), in enters unconditional love through Jesus. Don't ask me about the ramifications of an ultimate, unfathomable and all-powerful being having changes of heart, I don't really want to consider this. After all, I am playing devil's advocate here. And God is the devil.

oh, I think you'll also like that bit where Jesus says 'he who is without sin may cast the first stone', as far as unconditional forgiveness goes, and where he says 'love your enemy' as far as unconditional love goes. Seriously, I don't understand how Christians can miss these things.

For not dodging my point, you really are dodging my point! For the fifth time: What about when Jesus died for everybody's sins? Doesn't that mean everybody then (and presumably, everybody now) was forgiven whether they care to be forgiven or not and that if someone wants to follow in his example, he should love everybody unconditionally?

I will not ask you this again if you go blank on me, just know that I will no longer adress you in this topic, since if you say you do one thing (not dodge me) and do another (dodge me) there's not really any point to ask you for your opinions. There's worse fates than not being talked to by Helm on a subject, but I'll let you be the judge of how important all this is anyway.