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| 10/5/99 |
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“No language, just sound, that's all we need know, to synchronize love to the beat of the show.” - Ian Curtis Hello everyone, As I mentioned in my previous update, we are currently finished with design implementation on Planescape, and now the majority of our time is spent PLAYING the game, fixing bugs, and tweaking gameplay/balance issues. It’s during this process that I think a lot of people start comparing a game to their experiences with other RPGs in the past. You start asking yourself questions like “Would this game make me call in sick for work?” “Exam or finish this dungeon?” “Go out with friends or journey on with party?” If you seriously have to consider these options when playing Planescape (not that I would EVER encourage you to consider such deviant behavior as skipping class or faking illness,) then I think we’ve done our job. Obviously, before I became a game designer I was definitely a CRPG fanatic, and in today’s update I thought I might share with you some of the games that actually made me ask those questions (and start thinking of game design as a career.) Ultima IV When Gamespot recently did their bit on the “Top Ten Games That Need to Remade,” I was really surprised that they choose Ultima I. While certainly massive in scope and a fun game in its own right (especially after it was retooled in the late 80’s,) Ultima I, in my opinion, isn’t even the same league as the Quest of the Avatar. Not only was it a game of epic proportions and incredible gameplay, but it brought to the CRPG world the concept of creating characters that were reflective of who you were (or wanted to be) as a person, and having that effect the world around you. Instead the usual raise stats, kill baddies, collect goodies route that every CRPG had followed before it, Ultima IV required the player to take responsibility for his/her actions, keeping track of players doings within the world and rewarding/penalizing accordingly for it (and man was it tough to be humble!) The end game expanded upon the uniqueness of the title by incorporating a final sequence that was really removed from what you’d come to expect for games of this nature, and it was extremely rewarding (as opposed to the previous game in this series, which was one of the more disappointing endings ever.) I think it was the beginning of real role playing with computer games, and I think that Black Isle has really expanded on this idea with Fallout and Planescape. While the Ultima series lock the player down into one way of accomplishing a particular end goal, the Fallout series and Planescape allow the player to role play even farther, be who they want to be, and come to a conclusion that is indicative of how they played the game. Fallout I, like most computer role players, suffered through the a large portion of the 90’s with substandard to bad CRPGS, and the release of Fallout in 1997 was a godsend. It was the return of the role playing experience to computer gaming, with a world that responded to your actions and a story that allowed you several different routes to accomplish your tasks. In addition to that, the SPECIAL character generation system quickly became my favorite for the genre, as it really allowed you an enormous amount of flexibility in creating your in game persona. Likewise, it brought a new angle to combat that really had me enjoying getting into random encounters where many games in the past (see SSI gold box) had me looking for the “quick resolve” way out. On top of all this was a fantastic story and stylized setting that really set it apart from the rest of the genre, and it’s really cool to see CRPGs and other games with RPG elements being developed that don’t necessarily used the tried and true high fantasy elements. Fallout really was the title that made me revaluate what I was currently doing with myself at the time and start thinking seriously about getting involved with the game industry. System Shock Traditional high fantasy computer role playing games are one of those things in life I’ll never tire of, but it’s always such a great surprise when something unique as System Shock comes along. In fact, Shock was so well received and beloved after its release that it’s sort of disappointing that only now are we starting to see similar hybrid games being developed. System shock was amazingly fun, extremely detailed, and up until the release of Half-Life last year, the spookiest game I’d ever played. Shodan was one of the better villains ever developed, always making sure that players always knew that however far they progressed through the ship and discovered what was going on, it always had complete control over the situation. I think the most important aspect of the game, however, is that it showed the industry that it was possible to deviate from the norm and still make something that was AS compelling, and arguably more so, than the genres it was incorporate elements from. So there’s a little insight into some of the stories and systems that fueled my desire to become a game designer. Hopefully with the release of Planescape, we too will inspire other ambitious gamers and role players out there to go forth and challenge the industry by creating some revolutionary stories of their own.
Scott Warner |
| Planescape: Torment & Design: © 1998 Interplay Productions. All Rights Reserved. © 1998 TSR, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Planescape, the Planescape logo, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Torment, the AD&D logo, and the TSR logo are trademarks of TSR, Inc. and are used by Interplay under license. TSR, Inc. is a subsidiary of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. Interplay, the Interplay logo, Black Isle Studios and the Black Isle Studios logo are trademarks of Interplay Productions. Exclusively licensed and distributed by Interplay Productions. All other trademarks and copyrights are property of their respective owners. |