Game Longativaty

[properdave]

Since i've finished university, i've been trying to really get into gaming again. So i started completing games over and over and began thinking about their longativety and how to reward players for playing again and again. One way i've not seen used properly is progression through difficulty.

Best example i think of at the moment is jfk assassination. My facts are probably off, but lets just use it as a basic guideline.

Easy mode: You are Lee Harvey Oswald, you play out his life in the Corps (play out some military missions) then his defection to Russia (play out some senarios entering into the murky underworld) then finally lead up to the assassination.

Normal mode: You are now one of the FBI operative.You are tracking the soviet underground. You find out about a plot to assassinate the president and you are in a race against time to stop it.

Hard Mode: You play the supposedly real killer. Your task is to work your way into the FBI, remain undercover, assassinate the president and frame Oswald.

The general idea being the more effort you put in the greater the reward. It also links all the aspects of the game, the understanding, experience and game play.

[strife09]

Hi.
I was reading your ideia for making a game longer. It's not a interly bad ideia though I found something that might not work.
If you make three diferente dificulties and each one deliveres a diferent experience to the player regarding the game plot, probably some players will never be able of finishing the game completly.
In other hand your are creating three diferent stories that will eventualy finish in the same plot ending (or with diferent endings) and that would require three times the effort to create a good game, having in mind that some players would not finish the intire game due to dificulty levels.
These levels could have low dificulty increments between them but then they wouldn't be really dificulty levels and more like three diferent campaigns.

I still think you have a point there in trying to creat longer games, I just don't think the dificulty levels ideia would be the most reliable.

PS.: Sorry for my "not so good" english

[Yoki]

Very interesting discussion in my opinion.
I believe you guys are talking with the RPG/FPS idea in mind so I'll evaluate it that way.

Let's see...

Taking such an option in consideration, I don't think it would be useful to us just now, as we're currently only focusing on providing the best singleplayer experience ever. The only game that I can remember of using that type of replayability is GTA IV with it's two "DLCs", Lost And Damned and Ballad of Gay Tony. I'd think it would be best to use that kind of technique in posterior DLCs or something like that.
Now that I think of it, it might be used in a different kind of game, where playing with different lives actually made sense. Something like in the culture of Assassin's Creed. But as strife09 said, that could make the player unable to finish the game completely. We would need to think about it thoroughly.
I'd be happy to discuss any more ideas you might have, as they are all welcome.

---

In the other hand, thinking of the FPS multiplayer idea, I'd like to know your ideas in order to increase replayability in it other than challenges and other basic RPG elements like leveling up. Do you guys have any ideas for this? Also, I'd like to know more ideas, other than just replayability.


But anyways, great initiative shown with this idea! ;D

[strife09]

I wasn't specifically looking at a genre but in a general way.
Most times in the RPG genre, and this happens with more frequency in western rpgs, is the side quest "system". Although some games give a rather boring experience, or it doesn't realy matter completing or not these side quest for the main outcome of the storyline.
For example, you can finish a game whitout touching any side quest, but ther's this big boss that gives you some of the key elements to forge the ultimate weapon in the game for a specific class. Those tipes of side quests are way more entertaining, and even though you don't need to do it to finish the game, it still gives you an edge on battle because of that ultimate wepond you got from it. Needles to say this quest in specific will be harder than usual quests, and if well implemented, it will give more gameplay time rewarding the player with entertainment and a bonus for the game. Adding to this, and taking the example of Xbox and Windows game achievements, you can then show all your friends that you got that ultimate weapon wich encourages people to do these side quests. The only problem I find in the trophy/achievements system is that some game developers tend to leave it more and more simple, making some of these achievementes rather easy and demotivating to do.

In the FPS genre, one thing I recall is, for example, the Spec Ops in Modern Warfare 2. Excluding the online multiplayer part, this Spec Ops thing, for those who don't know what it is, is a number of side missions you can complete, sinleplayer or co-op multiplayer, and here they add some dificulty levels (what properdave said, but in a slightly diferent context), and although you can finish them on easy, those more hardcore can always go for some bragging rights and finish them in hard or extreme mode (don't realy know the levels of dificulty because I don't have the game). This adds more gameplay time, has you all may know, to a game that has a very very short single player campaign.

[Yoki]

Yeah that's right, side quests would be the best thing to do in order to add longevity to our FPS/RPG grand-project.

About Spec Ops, I think coop is very easy to implement with UDK so I'll check that out. And yeah I liked Spec Ops, but more as the challenge of finishing them by myself other than cooping

[strife09]

There's in fact a lot o things that can be done to add some hours to the game, it's just a matter of stuying what is more reliable.