Inside the Vault - Alan Nanes

[xdarkyrex]

And the irony is that an isometric perspective is at least as cinematic as a first-person perspective. For every first-person perspective shot in film (see Crank, Doom, Being John Malkovich, Psycho, The Shining, etc.) how many crane shots (aka isometric) have there been? Lots. To Live and Die in L.A., The Player, High Noon, Gone With the Wind, and countless others. It is a staple of modern cinema, so why isn't it a staple (or at least an option) of modern gaming?

I've always gotten the impression that crane shots are intentionally used to take things out of normal perspective and show something unique.

But how many crane shot stills have you seen that really scream "art"?

because in a turn based game, things arent fluidly moving around to look like some sort of visual representation of something else, and generally speaking, a fluid camera movement also tends to lend to the view as well, ususally zoom or panning.

 

[quietfanatic]

It would be nice if they had more real writers, even if they didn’t have experience as QA people or the like in games development. Being a RPG fan would be a plus, but quality writing seems to be what Bethsoft is sorely in need of.

I easily get most immersed in a book, no doubt about it. No external visual stimulus required.

Pen and Paper RPG's are supposed to be just that - pen and paper based, not miniature based. Any good GM can describe and execute good combat scenes without miniatures.

I played a lot of miniature games as well, like Warhammer and Necromunda (the latter has a slight fallouty vibe to it - just google it!), but those are strategic wargames and have nothing in comon with RPGs. The only hybrid I can think of at the moment is a game called Inquisitor, which is basically a strategic miniature game with a GM.

Good by some people’s standards, but maybe not by mine. I don’t like boringly simple combat mechanics and situations.

Necromunda is just as much a hybrid as Inquisitor is. Of course it is a strategic war game using dice, but it also displays RPG elements during campaigns, such as a strong emphasis on narrative battles and situations. Individual characters develop (if the players have imagination), get injured or killed, earn experience points leading to better statistics and new skills, and can be given new equipment. The broad story arc and special scenarios require a GM again (called the Arbitrator), who sometimes controls NPCs.

A sufficiently complex combat situation is next to impossible to conceive of without a map. RPGs can obviously have strategic combat, and with multiple enemies, cover, vehicles etc., pen and paper alone won’t be enough. There is a logical progression from having counters on a map with labels, to counters with pictures, to miniatures, which are easier to keep track of and more pleasing to the eye. I suspect those who don’t use miniatures either don’t need them because of unsophisticated mechanics or are lacking in imagination. Similarly, the map can become a series of markers, then real models if players have the ingenuity and resources to do that.

Amusingly, I have run a few sessions that played like Diablo (darn kids), but I found them infuriatingly boring. Still, I like interesting combat when I am GM’ing.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Fallout characters were supposed to look like miniatures, as they do somewhat, but intention isn’t that important, as they stem naturally from ISO, in turn from TB, just as miniatures are used in role-playing for combat.

 

[Bagge]

Necromunda is just as much a hybrid as Inquisitor is. Of course it is a strategic war game using dice, but it also displays RPG elements during campaigns, such as a strong emphasis on narrative battles and situations. Individual characters develop (if the players have imagination), get injured or killed, earn experience points leading to better statistics and new skills, and can be given new equipment. The broad story arc and special scenarios require a GM again (called the Arbitrator), who sometimes controls NPCs.

Using GM's in Necromunda is, at best, optional, unlike Inquisitor, where a GM is required. The game certainly has more RPG elements than straightforward strategy games like Warhammer, but I would not go as far as calling it a strategy/rpg hybrid. A strategy game with RPG elements, perhaps - a bit like Fallout: Tactics.

 

[Brother None]

But how many crane shot stills have you seen that really scream "art"?

Anything in heroic bloodshed films.

Damn, it would be nice to know which of his statements (especially those about EC Comics) are true and which are false.

It would be. But it's close to the emotional equivalent of asking your best friend what the colour of hair of his dead child was just because you and your wife can't agree on it. Not going to happen.

I was stating my perception of Fallout's style being similar to tabletop miniature games (both the perspective and size of characters) in opposition to a style that isn't similar (Fallout 3's FPP view).

You said "On the other hand it makes the departure from the tabletop miniature game style even more sad." Your sig compares Fallout directly to tabletop miniature play.
...And it's all just personal interpretation? That makes it the rational equivalent of saying "for me, only the setting is important."

I've got people to understand my points on Fallout because I can say "my opinion is no more important than Todd Howard's, but Tim Cain's is a lot more important than Todd Howard's." And that gets some nods of understanding. Shouting more interpretations as facts won't.

Whenever Fallout's perspective was an intentional stylisation or a functional choice or adhering to certain tradition, it does resemble a tabletop miniature game and shares with it the certain aesthetic qualities, which distinguish it from games like Morrowind, Oblivion, Operation Flashpoint, etc.

That's nice. But neither did Diablo. Will you be starving for Diablo III (or SC II) when it is announced as isometric? Is the viewpoint that important?

Simply, recent rise of the enemy ideology of "innovation", "immersion" and recreation of "reality" requires a counter-ideology which praises other qualities represented by tabletop games and tabletop miniature games.

Well, two points here...
1. Nothing helps the "enemy" ideology more than calling it the enemy ideology. Nothing vilifies a person easier than attempts to vilify someone else.
2. A "counter-ideology" would require a certain base in rationality or popularity to get people to "use" it. It'd have to be unified, which demands no sub-counter-ideologies, it'd have to be defensible, which demands as little speculation as possible, and it'd have to make sense, which means no terminology that just raises questions or heckles. Neither you nor anyone here is in any position to represent such a counter-ideology.

 

[xdarkyrex]

But how many crane shot stills have you seen that really scream "art"?

Anything in heroic bloodshed films.

All those typically employ motion though, don't they?

Usually camera motion or wind or something dramatic, like shadows stretching out as the camera watches.

 

[Brother None]

Yes. And yet some stills would be considered art by any standard.

But the fact is, analysing movie stills as art and as stills alone is the equivalent of demoting them to photography status. Not fair.

 

[xdarkyrex]

Yes. And yet some stills would be considered art by any standard.

But the fact is, analysing movie stills as art and as stills alone is the equivalent of demoting them to photography status. Not fair.

While I agree that it can be art, I think the possibilities without having a smooth flowing world is much more limited than having a movable camera

I actually think it's likewly I will play this game in 3rd person, if only for further emphasis on my tiny character up against a radscorpion or behemoth or super mutant or whatever else. I rather enjoy looking at my character, like someone else said earlier. But the top down view gets boring, I like a more dynamic camera. I daresay that I liked the camera style for resident evil 2 the most, but it made controls somewhat awkward..

 

[whirlingdervish]

See, again you're assuming that immersion only means FPP and "being" the character.
I get immersed in the world, in my character's journey. Too much sometimes, I hate it when it all has to end.

As a mapper for first person games (like quake), I find other people's views on immersion to be way too general to adequately describe the technique.

I'm sure Todd and Co. have latched onto the term for this exact reason: Very few people even know what immersion is supposed to mean in a first person game, where you can see a 3d world from an in-eyes perspective.

It really has very little to do with the perspective and a lot to do with the conditions of that 3d world from any spot that the player could stop and look around and LISTEN and absorb what that world is supposedly doing around them.

Iso perspective is actually quite a bit more effective than FPP when it comes to immersing a player in the game, because you can see details of everything, even the little people who are having a conversation behind you, or the dog running around in the background after you pass by.

In FPP you're left with sound to tell the story of these elements of the game world once you stop looking at them, and this is a very limitted way of fooling your brain.

In an Iso game, you can see it and hear it at the same time, which should help convince your mind that it is actually interacting with a vibrant world that lives and breaths around you, as opposed to a sterile 3d map that makes noises when you step on a trigger.

here's a link to an article at Rust: Game Design that elaborates on the use of immersion techniques and effective scripting to draw a player in:

http://www.gamedesign.net/node/1191

it could use a run through spellcheck, but many of the points the author makes about immersion in an FPP/FPS game are spot-on.

 

[Allen63]

...
In FPP you're left with sound to tell the story of these elements of the game world once you stop looking at them, and this is a very limitted way of fooling your brain.

In an Iso game, you can see it and hear it at the same time, which should help convince your mind that it is actually interacting with a vibrant world that lives and breaths around you, ...

I think of Iso mode as God's Eye mode. In Iso I do not "feel" like I am part of the world. Rather, I "feel" like I am an outside observer. I "feel" that my PC is a person who I am "helping" get through the situations -- in other words, I "feel" like a god or guardian angel.

In First Person, I sometimes do "feel" like I am really there. For openers, the viewpoints are what I would experience in "real life". For example, I use the sound coming from left, right, and behind (I use 5.1 sound in games that have it) to get my bearings (just as I might in real life). Sometimes, the sound coming from behind me from something I cannot see is startling. I just do not get these feelings from an Iso view.

Having said that, Iso is fun in some games -- but, for me, it does not have the immersion of First Person. Not saying everyone else has to feel like me -- but the Fallout 3 approach does seem more immersing than the Fallout 1 approach.