FPS Discussion - Old School/New School?

I was recently reviewing several FPS (First Person Shooter) games in order to evaluate them and think about the genre. I replayed or sat and thought about games like the original Unreal, Doom, Half-Life and System Shock 2. I also played games like Quake 4, Half-Life 2, Prey and other fairly modern FPS games. I noticed some significant changes in the genre and I also noticed that I enjoyed the older versions (for the most part) than the newer FPS games. I wanted to start a discussion about why someone might prefer one over the other. Here are my initial thoughts.

The original FPS games (Doom, Unreal, Half-Life, etc) may have had a story or not, but the end-user was not always privy to it. This meant that there was a lot of discovery along the way. In some cases the discovery may have been relatively small. For example, in Doom you wanted to get past a door and so you needed to find the key card for it. Other than point and shoot, there was not much more to the game. However, Doom is still fun to play. This may be because Doom is really not much more than a 2D side scrolling arcade game brought into a form of 3D! And arcade games are simply mindless fun (for the most part). Nothing wrong with that at all!

Unreal added a few other elements. Yes, triggers needed to be tripped to open doors and activate elevators and all of that, but they added some cool things like better AI, the earth would shake (at one point in the game) giving the possibility of knocking the player into lava and a few other cool, but simple, things. For all intents and purposes, the game play between Doom and Unreal was not all that different. Even so, it still remains one of my all-time favorite games despite its age and despite how many times I have played through all the levels.

Half-Life added a few other things to the genre. The story was more complex and there was a sense of purpose that was stronger than in the previously mentioned games. HL was just a tad more than an arcade game turned on its side. Even so, the story and driven purpose of the game did not really dominate the game and, thus, the game for many was as joyful to play as any mindless arcade game. In fact, if you wanted to ignore the story and just run around shooting things and looking for the exit, you could and you could still win the game. So the story was a nice tool, but it did not detract from the overall game. In fact, it did a good job of enhancing it.

But things start to change significantly for me with some of these newer games. I had never played Quake 4. Somehow I missed that one. I started to play it a few days ago and I certainly liked the details surroundings and the nicely detailed models. But I frankly became bored with the game. Why? The reason, for me, is that the story took a higher role than the idea of simply having fun blasting things. And the way this was done was that I was FORCED to do things the way the game wanted me to. I was DRIVEN to move from one point to the next whether I wanted to or not. I did not feel FREE to explore the WORLD of Quake 4. I was simply a cog in a machine and the game was my master instead of the other way around. I quickly found myself turning on God Mode so that I could ignore the game and study the surroundings.

For me, this trend toward controlling the player causes FPS games to loose their appeal. And the control employed (i.e. assigning missions as they do) takes away from the discover of the unknown. There is NOTHING to discover! You are simply TOLD what to do and then, like a good little robot, you go out and do it. BOOOORRRIIINNNGGG.

Now, Half-Life 2 did a great job of trying to combine the two ideas. They did guide you, that is true and you had a little less control of your destiny, but you could make choices and there was plenty to discover. Even so, the mystery of the earlier games was gone for me. I enjoyed Half-Life 2, but I find that I enjoyed the original Unreal even more.

What made the original Unreal so appealing to me personally? Well, as the player you had no real idea what was going on. You wake up on a crashed ship. What are you? Why are you there? No one tells you. It is a mystery. You find your way off the ship and, in the process, see some things that give you a clue to the world you are about to enter. You hear the screams of others on the crashed ship being slaughtered. You catch a fleeting glimpse of one of the monsters running away after tearing apart someone.

Then you exit the ship on a strange planet. No one tells you where to go. No one tells you what to do. You can find messages on dead bodies or carved into a wall, etc. But you can totally play the game never reading them. Or you can immerse yourself in the story. Whatever. The choice is the players. This is not the case with games like Quake 4, where you are led by the nose.

System Shock 2 is another game that I have always enjoyed. While its story was king and the player was led by the nose to some extent, the player still had a sense of freedom. You could be half-way through the game and work your way all the way back to near the beginning if you wanted to. All doors were open, so to speak.

I suppose what I am discovering as I write this is that, in order for a good FPS to be successful, it must give at least the illusion that the player has virtually absolute freedom ... that all choices are his and his alone. If the player feels they are being led by the nose then the experience can be significantly lessened.

Perhaps I am just too simple and like the old school, simple games of the past and, as a result, perhaps the problem is me and not modern FPS games. But I sense this may not really be the case.

What are your thoughts? What would make a good modern FPS game and why?

I totally agree with you - maybe because I'm also an old school.
It would be interesting to know what the youngsters think about it.

I'm working myself on a fps several months and was happy to realize that the old - not that complex - fps are more fun to play than the new complex one.

And this is exactly the point I think: KISS - "keep it stupid simple"

*easy character control
*easy world (switches, doors, elevators, explodabals, breakable walls/glass - thats it)
*easy (but cool) weapons
*smooth training curve
*from time to time new and stronger enemies / weapons
*challenging boss enemies per chapter
*and - most important - IT SHOULD BE A SHOOTER WITH ACTION not a mixedup "adventure", "strategic game", "dark horror" or "soldier team training".

What about "Far Cry"? I think, it still gives you a lot of freedom. Did you play, or re-play this one?

I really enjoy freedom and I liked HL more than HL2.
A good game that gives you no freedom is CoD4:Modern Warfare. It is because you're just part of a great war, you're not the boss, you're trying to support your members. What the game does great is to show you something new every time. Get the pilot out of the crashed helicopter before the enemy troops kill him (holy crap, Black Hawk Down(tm)!). Fight your way through a bunker to finally stop the nuclear missiles and a third world war...great. The difference to Quake4 is that you have the feeling that although you're just a small wheel in the machine your actions still have an impact on the world. Also CoD4 uses wide areas where you can freely move so it's your choice how to approach the enemy. If you play together with your team mates and use their cross fire as cover the game gets easier - this is cool.

The only thing I didn't like about the game was that although you had plenty of allies there was sometimes no progress whatsoever. Enemies spawn endlessly and if you don't start to try to advance into the enemy area all your comrades will just cover and shoot around (without really hitting the enemies of course)

I like FPSs' with freedom but i think that they need limitation because if they didn't it would end getting boring for players if they can wander far away from the battle.

But on that note i bring your attention to a modern game which redefines freedom (in some sense), this game is Medal Of Honer: Airborne. I liked this game because you can land any where on the given map, so there is the freedom, and it has very standard gameplay, shoot advance blow up shoot keep shooting.

I guess what I liked about old school FPS games like Doom, Unreal, etc, is that I was expecting something akin to an arcade game (back then) and got a little surprise in that there were things to discover! Again, in Unreal, I could totally ignore the storyline if I wanted to. I have played it several times without reading a single message on a dead soldier's message machine or a single prophecy on the walls of the temple. And, yet, at other times I have read through the entire thing and let the "story" grab me a little. Now, admittedly, Unreal really didn't have much of a story. But that was part of its charm. You were free, as the player, to sort of imagine a bit here and there.

The pleasure in Unreal was the unexpected. For example, in the first level, you come to a door you cannot open, but it is obvious that you need to go through it. You hear the screams and the sounds of the creature attacking. The door starts to open in time for you to witness the dead and the monster running. So there was a little drama. Later, when you finally exit the ship, you are treated to an absolutely stunning outdoor scene (for the day in which this game was created)! The turbulent sky, the chasm with the river at the bottom, the waterfall ... it was a great contrast to the interior of the ship, which was a fairly typical RT3D type environment. Every so often Epic threw in a curve to keep you entertained while leaving the basics of an FPS completely intact. It worked!

I have not played CoD4 or Far Cry. I did download and play a portion of the Crysis demo. Crysis was beautiful to see, but it was the same old, I am a pawn to the story stuff. I don't play it. Co4D sounds like fun, but like Quake 4, it does not really strike me as an FPS (from your description). It sounds like someone was trying to mix a bit of a strategy game in with an FPS. If so, things like this are done all the time ... mixing genres to see what works.

I guess the old school in me is a big advocate of the standard fare FPS, but I also want to find a way to make the standard FPS unique without detracting from it. System Shock 2 did this. The found a good balance between making you a slave to the story and letting you play a standard FPS.

Did you ever play Deus Ex, that to me offered the most freedom to do anything I have seen in a game even though it was driven by a multi-linear story

For me, mercuryus hit the nail on the head (k.i.s.s.). Too many gadgets and control keys ruin any game for me. I don't buy a game to sit for hours reading what I have to do to play it, only to find I have to contort my hands in unnatural positions to perform the flying kick that will kill a boss.

One of the aspects that the old-style games seem to have that the new games miss out on is the game pace. Games like Doom or early Quake had intense action followed by lulls that allowed the player to relax just enough to get a bit of shock when the next action set began.

HL2 and F.E.A.R are both pretty good at controlling the game pace.

Far Cry is a good example of a game that didn't have the right pace. I played it a few times. I found myself spending more time stock piling weapons and vehicles than actually playing the game.

Yep. I agree. K.I.S.S. is imperative to a proper FPS. However, there are things that can be done to make one FPS different from another. Otherwise, why create a new one? We can all just play Doom and Unreal over and over again.

One of the things I mentioned that I like about the old FPS is the discovery of what is going on. The story might have been there (Unreal) or not (Doom) but it was not the overriding thing that dominated the game (Quake 4). Discovery in Doom was the new weapons, the new opponents and the new environments. That would be a bit "thin" these days. In Unreal they had all of that, but they added some other things to make it interesting without detracting from the game play. Half-Life expanded the story aspect, but still somehow preserved the game play. It's when the story took over and controlled the player that I see the FPS decaying.

So, in the spirit of K.I.S.S. how does one preserve the spirit of the original FPS, but also provide something "new"?

Give this fps a chance ;): The suffering

...and play it.
I like it VERY much because of:

easy controll
creative and various level design
much action

and the fresh differences to other fps are:

* the strange/cool story without any big complexities (it's leads the game, makes it interesting [the WHY? and WHO AM I?])
* the freedom to decide to be good or evel (with an consequence in the end [what makes it worth to play it again])
* you have short time partners but you're the "boss", the "single HERO" (what is btw. the most important thing to me in a FPS).
* and all other aspects of a cool fps (leveldesign/weapon varity, small quests)

* ah yes - and it's like Quake: you can sloughter through the levels without talking/reading all the extra story stuff - the great leveldesign leads you through the levels without getting stuck (and therefor frustrated)!

[edit]...and very important in general i think: the hero (representing "me") in the game MUST be a cool, smart, tough. This can for example be realised by

* a cool voice (duke nukem)
* a special character (graduation) like in HL (everyone [of the good guys] is happy to see you)
* ...

[edit2] And... a new fps should have one or more cool new features (the player/customers/magazines) can talk about.
Like seen with the "portal technique" or a "gravity gun" or maybe a very new idea for the enemy AI?

I'll give it a shot!



This reminds me of another old favorite of mine: bioforge.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioforge

While it was not an FPS, the concept that you did not know who you were, could discover that as you played the game and that choices you made in the game determined who you were ... that was just cool! And, yes, it made you want to play again to try and determine a different outcome.

I absolutely agree that this is vitally important to an FPS, otherwise the "F" is missing. An FPS is all about "FIRST" with the that "PERSON" being me, the player!

Quake 4, as an example, removes this and makes you simply a cog in the big machine. You may be an important one, but you are a cog none-the-less.

Looking forward to hear what you think about "the suffering"!
Hope you have that much fun like me...

Only, very few notes:

You can't compare FarCry with Crysis, the first was a success, the second wasn't, for good reasons. IMO, the demo of Crysis is a mess, there is no fun at all, while I enjoyed playing the demo of FarCry for hours, and it is one of the very few games that I bought in the year after it was published. And, I never was tempted to stock piling any weapons. I think that FarCry actually is a game that you can play the way that you described about playing Unreal. You don't need to care about the story.

Another game is Gothic, I never played its whole story, I'm absolutely bad in role playing, because I don't care of careers and rewards.
BTW, I didn't play through the whole story of FarCry, too.
Nonetheless, I played FarCry and Gothic for hours, enjoying to discover the landscapes, to fight against (often, too) strong enemies (because I didn't level up), trying to trick their intelligence, trying to isolate single enemies from their group, and got defeated by surprise attacks, because I didn't expect them to follow me at such hidden or 'safe' places where I escaped to.

Don't miss to play FarCry, it _is_ K.I.S.S., and it has its very own challenges.

I agree with almost everything you wrote:

Crysis vs. Far Cry. Yes, I still did not buy Crysis, Far Cry was just better than the demo of Crysis promised. I could just play and it still looks very good.

Bioforge: This was a great game, I am still waiting for Bioforge 2, the end of the game promised a second part. It was so movie-like at this time, what a nice feeling to be part of this sad and deep story.

Unreal 1: I love this game. It was so much better than Unreal 2. The mixture of fantasy and sci-fi, the story, the beautiful peaceful world in contrast with the evil invaders. The Nali were such a nice race, helping me on my journey. The setting was so varied. The balancing was fine and technology was just impressive at that time.

Quake4: Here I have to disagree. I enjoyed it to be a part of the game, not the über hero. I very much liked the missions with some marines helping me, lighting the darkness with their flashlights. It felt a bit more real to know that I am not the only one, that I am just part of a big invasion. I got the same feeling in "Star Wars - Republic Commando" and I really like the AI of the other commando members, taking strategic positions for sniping, grenade launching and so on.

HL2: I think this game and the following episodes are very well made. It is still an old-school FPS but contains a lot of extensions (placing turrents, using pheromones, vehicles, solving puzzles, using physics). But every new element is introduced so carefully, you find hints to solve puzzles everywhere. This game is made for everyone. You can get the idea how they did it if you replay it with comments of the developers. They really tested the gameplay a lot and balanced everything after this.

Bioshock: Did you realize that they tried a lot to make it easy, more easy than System Shock and co? And it helped, they sold much more units now. You can play it like a shooter, you can just follow the arrows in your HUD to find the next goal and you can ignore all the special magical abilities, the turrets and the tricks like burning oil, electrical shocks in water.
So it offers both: a simple shooter layer and a more advanced layer for people who like to dive deeper in it. This approach is quite good.

And now I compare the old games often to the new FPS games. What is happening now? If I hide behind a rock then all my life energy comes back, magically. I dont get into this. It just feels so fake.
Then all these new games use third person views for shooting around corners. This breaks the idea of FPS and also feels strange to me.

I really would like to have the budget and time to be part of a project similar to the first Unreal, maybe smaller, with a few nice extensions and modern visuals. A short prototype would be enough for the first run.

I downloaded and started to play The Suffering. I have to say that I was not impressed (but that's me). The game is not all that old, right? Released in 2004? But the graphics seem more dated than Unreal, which preceded it by six years!

During the intro movie one of the prisoner's hands kept going into the wall of his cell (his hands were supposed to be against the wall). One of the creatures with swords for hands and feet ... his sword feet passed deep into the floor. The player character could swing his knife at posts and glass windows, etc, and his hand and knife would just pass through. The prisoner models for the intro were poorly created in that animation caused them to contort over much (arms would get strangely thin with some motions or edges would "pop" with others).

After getting to the part where I meet a living guard and he starts his speech about us working together, I decided to strike him with my knife. He fell to the ground, stood up and started his speech all over again as if I had not struck him. So I did it again. And it repeated this. About the fourth time the guard suddenly decides to pull his pistol and start shooting me. Then I was finally able to kill him and get his gun. Duh!

I went down the stairs, attacked the next creature and then got bored, shut down the game and uninstalled it.

I am sure I did not give this one a fair shake, but it failed to suck me in from the beginning.

Frank,

I loved Bioshock. That is one of those games that I would like to see a modern remake of. They are make a lot of remakes of movies, how about video games?

Perhaps you and I should talk about making some sort of Unreal like game some time. Hint. Hint.

Yes, absolutely. I will write you a PM now.

Unreal was a fantastic game, I played it 5 years late but enjoyed every second of play. I wish Epic had continued with this (Unreal 2 wasn't the greatest though) rather than focus on the Unreal Tournament spinoff series

I'm feeling a deja vu about Dan's plan exactly one year ago ?

Keep it simple, otherwise you´ll fail.

I was just playing Crysis, and I must say that Im very disappointed.

Compared to Farcry, I dont have much better graphics.
There are (apart from the Suit) no real gameplayimprovements to
Farcry, it has basically all been done in Farcry before.

BUT: The player has much less freedom:
-When I leave the "Combat Zone", The suit gives my a short contdown and then kills me. (in Farcry I could run anywhere I want)
-After playing the first level I still dont understand who I am, or what the objective is.
-The game ripped me out of the game to lead the next level - within the action! (shooting at guys who where close)
That is about the worst leveldesign possible.
-There is no real Tutorial (to learn the new functions)

Crysis is a good example, that relying on the pure shooter mechanics dont seem to marked well enough,
so the designers and developers stuff in
scripted sequences, limit the players freedom
to make him HAVE to see the scripted sequences,
and adding expensive graphical effects, wich dont add much to the game in my opinion, and just slow it down.

--

Fallout 3 (although not really a shooter) was
one of the few modern games wich I enjoyed in the recent time,
as the player really has enough freedom.
Without getting "lost" or having too less action.

I have to disagree with everything OP said. But then again, I never enjoyed overhyped games like HL series (except Episodes 1 & 2 where they actually improved it) with lamest possible storyline and action so slow, you can probably run through the whole game if it didn't force you into one triggered fight into another (hell, you can see a trigger coming up the moment you enter the area).

For me, a game which tries to give too much freedom and no proper explanation of why you are there, who you are and why are you doing what you are about to do is just a headache.

I enjoyed Suffering: Ties that bind. It has a LOT of bugs (major bugs like sometimes, even getting stuck at the opening sequence due to clipping). But the dark twisted atmosphere/story/characters, excellent enemy design and just incredible amount of gore filled action which just feels natural to our hero (compared to other games) was just incredible experience.

I guess I just like games with levels and characters who feel realistic for the world we are living in (in-game that is). That's the reason why DeusEx (1) and Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, are still on top of my list with Gothic 3 sharing the third space with Stalker and Mass Effect.



As far as Unreal is concerned. I never finished that game. It was boring, pointless, but had pretty graphics with Skaarj that were indeed scary at that time. Unreal 2, I finished it. The level design in that game was really good. The actions scenes where you got to burn spiders and god knows what with your sexy flame thrower were really fun, but what about the story and gameplay overall? Felt like Unreal Tournament trying to have a story. Actually, if you have played Gears of War, you know Epic can't create a proper story and interesting characters if their life depended on it. It was all one triggered fight after another back then, still is. BTW, Unreal 2 wasn't developed by Epic (though I am pretty sure they were in on the whole universe/characters).

System Shock 2. Game got so-so rating when it was released. I played the demo and only remember getting chased by monkeys (?). I played the whole game years later after DeusEx. Yup, it sucked. But I was spoiled by DX, which did the whole upgrades/inventory bit way better in the end. I never finished SS2 in the end so I can't say anything about the story (which I found boring when the game started anyway).


HL2. What is worse than a game trying to give the player the illusion of freedom? A game which tries to give an illusion of some dark interesting storyline behind it. I never found that compelling story in HL, never found anything interesting in HL2 and Episodes. Is the compelling storyline in that briefcase that weirdo keeps carrying around? No? HOWEVER, since Episode-1, I have seen a good amount of upgrades in the gameplay and the engine itself (hell, Doom 3 was way better looking than Ep-1.. except for the character models and outdoor scenes). I really loved the use of colours in the outdoor levels of Episode-2 and the reason why I pretty much rate it the best HL game so far. It actually has suspense, still awfully obvious triggers, but the action usually seams realistic enough when triggered like (SPOILER) the part when you defend the Vortigaunts healing Alyx (though I still want to know where all enemies sleep when waiting for Freeman to do such things).


BioShock. I still have to complete it. I can't because I don't feel like completing it. The story just keeps getting ridiculous deeper I venture into the rapture. 90% of the game is same old enemies who can't see you crouching few feet in front of them. I know it's dark but jeez, I am crouching out in the open. The only interesting and cool creature so far is the BigDaddy, and I am freaking using him as an ally so that totally rocks. But damn, another game which is way too linear but tries not to. I really hate these games. They try to balance Choice-1/2 in same areas thinking that the player will actually replay just to see what happens with Choice 2 (I can just quickload to do that) only to discover that both choices most of the time lead to pretty useless and lame results with no satisfaction/rewards at the end. Again, DeusEx did it better, hell, even Bloodlines did it better.

/rant

You hate games? Such strong feelings for master pieces of software engineering, story telling and artwork? Strange. Why do you buy them if you hate them? You even do not finish a lot of your games.
Watch a good movie instead!

If I spend money for a game then I have read an article about it, some reviews, watched a few movies or played a demo. If I dont like the demo (like the Crysis demo) then I just dont buy it. So there is no chance to not finish it.

While I prefer some games over some others I would not hate them except they crash, are full of bugs and the publisher will not give me my money back.

Hate them? I never said that or that I never finish them (though the last post probably sounds.. err.. read like that). It's master piece for you, it's not for me.

BTW, I have played all HL games except Opposing Force (I played Blue Shift though). I enjoy few fights here and there, when the game starts getting boring, I uninstall and come back later to continue that game in a week or months even. I am not insane enough to buy games and not play them.

Also, please explain how Half Life 2 story is compelling or 'master piece' in any possible way. I enjoyed Doom 3 more than sitting through that game and D3 didn't even have any interesting characters except for Betruger, the main boss which you only see for few seconds in opening, hear for the rest of the game and then see once more in the end. Now THAT game was fun. Had a proper theme and the universe was created realistic enough to be believable.

What made D3 exciting was putting together the story in D3, imagining yourself what probbaly happened just by reading PDA's, listening to voice recordings or watching UAC promo campaign videos. In HL2, all I did was run around a dead world with replica enemies and NPC's and teams.. I am sorry but I never took Gordon seriously since day-1. I wouldn't exactly start fighting next to a guy wearing an orange suit in the middle of a freakin warzone. Why don't they just give him a large "Shoot Here for max damage." sign pointing at his head.


The expansion for D3 only made it better with more action and kickass boss fights. Now lemme compare that to two 'episodes' out of which only the second one provided some good action triggers (cause every fight is just a trigger away in HL2, just terrible).

Lemme know when they release a demo for these games and where I can find a site which doesn't decide to give all overhyped games 9.9/10 even before they get the review copy so I can decide not to buy them.

These are just my views of course. I am sure the games I hate are groundbreaking, revolutionary, genre bending (words like that) etc.. for others. Great.

When I get bored of these games, I do watch entertaining movies as well. Infact, was watching Taken few hours ago (Neeson is almost the Bourne) after making my way through White Forest in Ep2.

Here are your words:







That certainly sounds like you said that you never finish some games ...

Unreal 1 (I was at Na Pali or something). So yeah, it was same thing over and over, the reason why I never finished. Is there something new in that game? Cause I have the disc and can go through it again if I want.


SS2, yeah, never finished that one.


BioShock
"I don't feel like" != I'll never finish it
It's still installed and like I said, I will go back to it in a week or a month or so when I am not bored enough.

Infact, out of about 400+ titles I have, I haven't finished (as in, 'never will') SS2, Manhunt, Spore and Unreal. Umm, anyway, it isn't exactly an acievement or a plus for a game in my books if I don't feel compelled enough to finish it in 3-4 sittings in a week so I really don't see the point in telling me I never finish them. I finished HL2 in about 3 months. Finished 3 different titles in-between. HL2 was really revolutionary.. :P

And this is off topic discussion, anyway. The point was, you simply contradicted yourself.

Now, can we get back on topic? We were talking about comparing old school/new school FPS games and what works/does not work and why each of us thinks so.

wait... what? a modern remake of a modern game? you gotta be kiddin me, bioshock got released 2007 :P

but hey, i LOVE that game. its simply awesome.

and about the KISS principle: i couldn't agree more. in fact, scorpion and me were (or still are) working on a fps that's all about that: simple, cool, and somewhat... weird. :P (which reminds me that i have to kick his ass as soon as i see him again... we need moar progress >_> )

Somehow I knew it that you'd tell me to get back on topic (even though I was clarifying your own offtopic reply). Either way, I was posting on the topic with my first and second post. I pretty did explain why I myself never considered HL2 to be anything more than an average game with a lot of fanboys. The game has a main guy wearing orange suit in the battlefield who never speaks and is supposed to be a scientist himself. That's not a good start for a complex story to me..

Anyways, I won't go 'offtopic' anymore by posting my views in this thread (or any replies to other offtopic replies). Sorry.

Dan probably had Bioforge in mind as he wrote Bioshock.

sounds logical to me ^^

I meant Bioforge. My bad!

But Bioforge was no fps at all.
I've played Bioforge but it never kept me playing long.
I remember the endless time critical situations to pass to a corridor or laser beam - just awfull...

This is right Bioforge was no FPS, it was similar to some todays adventure or horror-games with pre-rendered backgrounds and 3d-characters. But it rendered all this without hardware acceleration on CPU.

Bioforge was only brought up in the context of a game that allowed the player to "discover" who he was. In fact, you could DETERMINE who you were by your actions. It was mentioned, originally, in the context of some interesting things done in an FPS and then Bioforge came up because it did a very good job of this, despite not being an FPS game. However, Bioforge could have been created as an FPS.

Interesting idea!
Proper implemented it could give a fps an extra appeal.
Thanx for clarify this.

To throw in a new point, beside all the discussions about story and whatever: I think there is something that the so-called "next-gen" shooter games like Crysis do better than (most of) the old-school shooter games: They are very intense, you really feel like you're in the game. I know that is mainly because of the graphics, but it's not just the graphics.
For example, F.E.A.R (both the new and the original one) has very good particle effects and nice physics that make even just running through the levels while shooting a funny thing; In a fight then, you're just thinking "wow" because crates and barrels are flying around you, sparks and wall fractures are scattering all over the floor and explosions are blasting everything away.
This can also be found in Crysis, Far Cry 2 and nearly all modern first person shooter games (as well as in most third person games like GTA 4).
Another thing: Try and start one of these old-school FPS, for example Unreal, and take a look down. What do you see? I can tell you, nothing exept for the floor.
Now start, say, F.E.A.R. Now look down. You can see the body of the main character as well as his shadow.
This is as well giving the player the feel of really being in the game, and it's also something you cannot find in most of the older FPS.

Well, but that's just what I think, others may have other opinions.

Yeah that is true, i think what the old school FPSs' were/are missing is background action, something to add a little more realism to the whole experience

But to be fair: Games like the old Unreal rendered with software on your CPU only. They could not display Hundreds of particles and enemies, they even had to optimize sound, using CPU extensions like MMX and still the game was too slow on most of the hardware.
And if they would have let you look down at your own player model then it would be an ugly mess of 150 polygons of a body.
They did what they could do best at that time. And it was a revolution of gameplay and technology.

yeah, but the point is that because of that, those particular features were missing. not that the games were bad for not adding it, because.. well... they couldnt, but just a point for newer tech.

... and the result (of gameplay, graphics, sound, ai, ...) was one of the best it's time.
If you wan't to continue this gainful path you have to redesign the "old" feeling (for us old school's) with new, fresh parts to attract the potential customers (old school's as well as 'the others'*1 )

*1)

which makes me think about a remake of unreal 1. same gameplay, same levels, (almost) the same experience... just with up-do-date graphics...

i know it wouldn't be the same experience. not really. but dunno... i think it could be worth a try.

btw, do you remember that unreal had various ways to solve the game? as far as i recall, you were able to go different ways, (which led you to alternate levels at some time) which gave you quite a lot freedom.

correct me if i'm wrong please.

Yes, added affects certainly added to the game play. No doubt about it. However, what happened over time is that "eye candy" became the ONLY thing that was pushing some of these games. And, as a result, many FPS games sacrificed playability for cool graphics. I am certainly not against cool graphics or new graphical features. However, there has to be a balance and game play is king (as far as I am concerned).



There was a good bit of freedom in the first Unreal. For example, in the first outdoor level (right after you left the ship) you could go in a variety of directions to get to the next level. You could take an elevator down and exit beside the river and then go into a cave to eventually make it to the same part of the level that you would have gone to if you had not taken the elevator.

Basically, they did a decent job off giving the player the illusion of freedom, but confining them enough so that the player would not get lost .

that was exactly what i was talking about ^^ i just loved that, you could actually play unreal over and over again, and you'd still be able to find new routes like that. awesome.

and i agree about your point that fancy graphics got more important than the playability. bioshock, for example, got it balanced unbelievably awesome, if you ask me. just my opinion tho

I don't think this is the main/only chink of the newer fps - I think it's the excessive and additive usage of EVERY new technique (I exaggerate ;)) - [i]e.g. teamplay, strategic, advetureing,...[(i] and feature to gain more audience They sometimes miss over and over the K.I.S.S. of a simple (but exciting) shooter...

[edit]
A shooter should be a shooter - max. brain power should be to use the proper switch at the right place.. (*v*)

In fact, I was playing Unreal just last week and I went to some secret area (at least it was secret to me!) and said to myself, "As many times as I have played this game, I do not for the life of me remember this area!" I had found yet another little unexplored place!



I agree!



Well ... maybe a little more brain power . I like when certain weapons are better suited for certain creatures. So you have to think about what you are firing at what enemy. There are many simple things that can be utilized in a game to make a person think about what they are doing. But it does not have to be an overly convoluted task.

Like I said earlier on, an FPS was really just a side scrolling arcade shooter turned into 3D. These days it has left that concept too far behind (imo).

I grew up with games like Doom, Duke 3D, Blood, Unreal.

What I really liked and still like about Doom:
I know how to handle each enemy, I know their strengths and weaknesses. There are places which give you shelter, and secrets which make life easier for you.

Mean traps, weird levels.

And Doom still has those lovely shocking moments where you suddenly start crying because you did not expect this arch vile (or what was the revival guy called?) right behind the door you just opened.

Basically the levels were nonsense, but it was so much fun, and there were so many neat ideas realized with an engine which was so very limited.
A very clever secret passage system where things are shown to you and you simply WANT to get there. You have no idea because the entrance to this secret area could be at the other end of the level, so you automatically started "investigating" each single wall by hitting the space key. Every unaligned or too dark/bright texture was there for a purpose. Never had this in another game again.

The only newer games which come close to this experience are the Serious Sam series. To me they were like bringing back some of the good old times right into the present. Awesome. I have to admit that opposed to the Doom series, Sam shows it's real strength in Multiplayer games. For single player it's a bit too much straight forward - Doom has the better and more clever level design.

My second favorite would be Hexen. It took the Doom game into a fantasy setting and added more complex riddles, making the game a little bit like an adventure. I loved the atmosphere.

I've now played Doom1 and right after Doom3 to get the differences...
(Except the nostalgic thrill with doom1) for me doom1 has a plain/clear level design - the priority is on the enemies and - as Firoball mentioned - the "static enemies".
Doom3 (for example) seems to emphasize on "ambient" (darkness/complex leveldesign) what turns the focus - I like the "clean/predictable" gameplay of doom1 better....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cyHQa5wkTM

That's just insane.

A horrible maze level full of those annoying arch viles which always gave me the creeps. I hated this stage so much....

i'm pretty sure he used god mode. running through that level and killing archviles with bare fists without getting hurt looks weird to me...

anyways, back to topic :P

This is NOT god mode for sure!

1. he gets hit
2. god mode displays a different picture in the info bar
3. the way he plays does not look at all like cheating

but he looses no health all the time he get hurt!?

At the end he plays with 17 percent health, so he got hurt.

who watches all this boring movie
He gets hurt a long time without loosing healtpoints..

but who cares this detail at all?

No he does not get hurt while fisting the enemies.
The flames don't do immediate damage, only when the arch viles attack animation finishes. That long you have chance to hide around the corner. As long as the arch vile doesn't see you, it can't do any damage.

Come on guys, I thought you PLAYED Doom after all!?
Believe me, there are no cheats involved.

Except for a few monsters like the chaingun guys and the huge chaingun spider, all enemies have visible shots and you get your chance to strafe and escape without losing health.
Not many modern games are like this.
Most times there are more or less invisible shots and there's a medipack around every corner as it is intended to get hurt.

I know it's going a bit offtopic... but...

Collection of Doom2 speedruns. All 30 levels of Doom2 within 20 minutes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCFUtjXaqTM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrhDoxPACc4

That's just crazy and shows how clever the game was designed back at its time

I am wondering about a few topics regarding a remake of an old-school shooter. I see 2 alternatives to create something similar to Unreal:

A) Creating a fan-project with remakes of the Nali, Skaarj and other familiar characters and scenery: This has a great advantage to attract much more people. If the first shots look very good, then it can go through the media very fast. It is possible to use and enhance existing designs.
But on the other hand it can be stopped by Epic very soon to protect their IP (intellectual property). A commercial release is not possible except the original IP holder buys into this project.

B) Creating another game aggregating the feeling of the original: This can be built on its own IP. It cannot be stopped from Epic. A future commercial release might be possible.
But it will be watched rather skeptical from the crowds. Marketing is much harder. New designs have to be created.

Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages. It is hard to tell what option leads to the better route. Any ideas / addendum?

If you want to sell your final game...

A) The only way will be to contact Epic trying to get the license.
This is (imho) expensive or just not possible.
You may have to proove your quality by references at all.

B) Creating a similar shooter will be the better way (imho) but the audience - as you mentioned - can rate it (negative) as an old idea (with fresh technique/media).
But you could make a "sequel" adapting the whole gameplay (excactly) and change all media as well as the names and the story.
As I mentioned before add some fresh ideas (techniques) the crowdes can praise/talk about and advertise your game with a professional publisher.

I'm shure you will have success Frank.
The crowed can be impressed by cool graphics/lighting and this is yours.
Add some cool AI/shader/sounds/sountrack/cinematic camera in well designed levels (SP/MP) and you will find enough consumer...

Yeah, I'm afraid that this will be most likely the case.

System Shock 2 Rebooted, a SS2 remake using the Doom 3 engine, was stopped "just 10 days after the team announced the project, [because] Electronic Arts as the owner of System Shock Intellectual Property requested to drop any association with System Shock" (ss2rebooted.tk).

Chrono Resurrection (ok, its not a shooter, but it gives a good example) was stopped too, because "Square Enix Co., Ltd issued a Cease and Desist letter" (opcoder.com), even though it looked quiet professional. When Enix interfered the project was worked on for over a year (April 2003 - September 2004).

But on the other hand, Open Outcast has not been dropped yet.

I wouldn't start such a project without asking the IP owners. All the work could be in vain otherwise.

[quote=
But things start to change significantly for me with some of these newer games. I had never played Quake 4. Somehow I missed that one. I started to play it a few days ago and I certainly liked the details surroundings and the nicely detailed models. But I frankly became bored with the game. Why? The reason, for me, is that the story took a higher role than the idea of simply[/quote]

I have to agree the newer games look way better but they took the fun out of them trying to add too much the story and the controls a game comes with a manual that takes a week to learn the kiss thory is right for games up down right left shoot maybe not that simple
but they are getting out of hand and I have played a few of the new ones and some are like watching a movie that you are just sort of around to run the controls
Sarge's heros was a fun game that let you run with it in the training I wanted to see what the flame thrower do with trees and it really did burn them and it did have a story to it and each level had an avi each level with the mission but that was the story it it was SIMPLE.

not sure if this is really pertinent or not, but recently I've been playing the game XIII which is fairly old, but I really enjoy it because it never feels like its missing any component. You have some haphazard gun blazing at some parts yet at others you sneak in and kill guards before they can set off the alarm, and even tho its not a graphics show, it has some uniqueness to it since it utilizes cell shading to make it appear to be a graphic novel. Idk, i just really enjoy it.

oh yeah, XIII was pretty neat. but it was a little bit too much of sneaking imho and the balancing wasn't perfect. some bosses were extremely hard to beat, while others could be actually taken out with a sneeze. but all in one a very neat game.

I like both the "go shoot stuff" kind of game and "story" games, but I agree, sometimes being just grabbed by the hand and pulled through the game is kind of boring. The new games that I like are Medal of Honor: Airborne, which is an amazing WW2 game. You can choose which objective to do first, and how you want to go around doing it. I should go play it again. :P I also like Assassin's Creed(Yeah, I know, it's not an FPS). You get the choice to roam around the city and mess with the guards, or you can go and continue the story.

Now, being pulled through the story isn't always so bad as long as it has good gameplay, like Killzone 2. That was a fun game, but there was basically no freedom...at all. You could choose tactics in a battle, but it was basically, what cover do I use and should I flank or just take them out one by one using cover.

I like old school games because almost every one of them has tons and tons of little secrets. Like Duke Nukem 3D. You can activate a toilet and a wall opens. You can blow open a wall to get a jetpack. These games had simple controls and basically one objective...kill stuff and get to the exit.

So I think it depends on what I want to be doing at that moment. Getting immersed into a story with good gameplay to support it, or just having fun and shooting stuff.

My theory is (and I may have stated it before ... its been awhile since I posted in this thread) that the early 3D games (Doom, Duke Nukem, etc) were really just extensions of the 2D platform shooters that proceeded them. They are not much more than Space Invaders and Duck Hunt turned 3D (in principle) with their own unique twists. These types of games were created for FUN! Keeping it simple was a way of life.

Personally, I'm oldschool all the way. It's nice to have small objectives to do just as long as I'm not, as it was already mentioned, "forced to". A good example is the current Valve release "Left For Dead". Not a single object to slow down the gameplay. For those that haven't played LFD it's simple; go from safehouse to safehouse shooting as many creatures as you can, and there are plenty. Main point: just survive. You do have a small objective along the way: search everywhere for medkits, pills, pipbombs and molotovs that aid in your survival. What's amazing, and the main thing I look for in game design, is the replayability. A few of my buddies and I will play online for literally hours the same campaigns; 4 campaigns each with four levels. Addictive as hell.
I beleive game designers today rely too much on story lines with they're annoying cinematics; they're ok the first time but I hate to have to sit through them over and over. If I want to watch a movie I'll pop in a DVD, lol. I've been designing levels (maps) for Sven co-op (a modification of Half-Life) for 5 years now and each map I made focused on gameplay.