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tigressaofkanjis · 6 months

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Transformers Games That Should Exist

Transformers - Social Simulation (Based on Animal Crossing/Palia/Dreamlight Valley)

Synopsis: Traveling from afar, you (Bot or Human unknown, job: professional mechanic) find an abandoned space bridge in a remote region and repair it only to summon notable Autobots, Decepticons, and many others. As you create and mold the region to your liking, you build relations with the Cybertronians you encounter and make them comfortable living in the region with you. Hunt, gather, harvest, and document all the region has to offer from various colored Energon crystals growing in the wild to cybernetic species unleashed. Work together with your Cybertronian friends to maintain a world of your design.

Like Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you can venture into parts of Cybertron and some colonies to find certain Transformers and bring them to your region.

Region will be an Earth-based open world (could be another planet entirely) with plenty to explore including secrets of the past, up to eight different environments to unlock to roam among which will have cybernetic animals of all types you can interact with and document (possible organic animals may be included, some can even become mounts). Shockwave and/or Perceptor would have the most rewards for discovering animals and substances respectfully (they are unlocked as companions by completing that section of your guide).

Quests will be available from many Transformers, and when your relations with Transformers have built up to certain levels, you can either have them follow you as your companion or ride on their shoulders and control them to navigate your world but be mindful of certain limitations with each type of Transformer.

There is no timer on how you wish to approach Transformers or on their quests. The only thing that might cause delay is Transformers may return to and from their worlds so if you can’t find them in the overworld region, look in their respectful areas on their planet.

You can destroy the environment with your Transformers (it’ll grow back in an hour, don’t worry) and build activities for them to do to keep them and you entertained.

Various skins (G1, TFP, TFA, etc can be unlocked)

It is somewhat stylized, a mix of cartoon blending like Dreamlight Valley and Animal Crossing combined but in a ground level 3D space like regular games. Cues were also taken from Paleo Pines.

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Transformers – Survival (Ark: Survival Evolved, Raft, Don’t Starve)

Synopsis: Stuck in a world unknown filled with Transformers, you must gather resources, survive on the land or suffer imminent death as the environment takes its toll, and the Transformers are not your friends. Tame them to use their abilities or kill them to utilize their parts to conquer your hell or succumb to it.

More resource heavy with little to no story and multiple challenge maps.

Will consist of different Transformers to either kill or tame for your benefit. Talking interaction is nonexistent, however, as specialized devices must be created to tame them as they will otherwise attack you. Most Transformers encountered will be generic Seekers, grounders, Predacons, Dinobots, etc and randomly spawned in the region, can be spray paint customized or modded with certain unlocked kits. Any Transformer of this kind killed in an area for parts will be replaced after a certain period of time in the wild with a randomized other respawning.

Main Transformers characters (i.e. canon characters) will have to be discovered and earned in the encounter. If option is chosen to kill them, the main characters you know will NOT respawn, but their resources are far more useful and will not break. The only way to get canon characters back once dead is to restart the survival mode or go to a previous save if appicable. If tamed, they come with their own unique features that can be utilized not just for various tasks and resources but killing other Transformers. Tamed main characters cannot be altered by their primary color visually but can get upgrades and can have colored designs added.

Will have an online mode where you can hunt and survive with friends. Dying is permanent until the party restarts. Will have revive feature with medical kits built unless dying health bar is depleted.

Transformers can swim…don’t think you are safe.

Battle modes are available with tamed Transformers, including canon characters both online and in single player challenge settings.

Transformers can be mounts but certain sizes and vehicle forms are better for certain resources and against certain Transformers than others.

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Transformers – Action-Adventure Open World (Legend of Zelda, Immortals Fenyx Rising, Horizon Zero Dawn/Forbidden West)

Synopsis: In the world of Autobots and Decepticons, you (a formerly neutral bot) must find your place among them and survive all their trials and tribulations. Explore Cybertron like never before, unlocking old mysteries with the Allspark as your guide, see past and present through the eyes of many, and learn what it takes to be a hero under the command of Optimus Prime and against the forces of the malicious Megatron.

DLC items would include an Earth story against Tarn and others. Faction DLCs would be available as well: choose between Autobot and Decepticon and roam through Cybertron with your fellow bots in different, isolated stories of past and present.

The Allspark Trials will earn you specialized Energon and resources unfounded to boost your stats and powers.

Mounts of neutral Predacons and Dinobots as well as other cybernetic creatures will be available to discover.

Don’t worry, the Nemesis means you no harm…yet. While you roam your world of Cybertron, you may see the Nemesis and Darkmount lingering in the distance. You can explore to your heart's content battling Decepticons in your own time as you see fit but do be warned. Megatron can occasionally cause havoc during your adventures from unleashing dastardly enemies like the vicious Predacons under his command to sending armies to scour the land for you. Hope you brought your A-game.

Unlock and upgrade weapons, obtain new chassis gear and colors to really stand out among the crowd. You can even earn your wings, literally. Make yourself the hero you want to be.

You can interact with cities and their bots from both sides that may request things from you. Be wise how you approach them as some interactions may not go as smoothly as you hope.

Hunting down commanders and lieutenants of the Decepticons in your journey is crucial in progressing but they can be anywhere, so be prepared when you find them. You are in for a devious fight ahead as you make sure Megatron cannot conquer Cybertron.

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Transformers – Survival Horror (Resident Evil, Outlast)

Synopsis: You (human) find two ships on a wayward island, crashed and decimated. Not only are they beyond repair but the entire region has been destroyed and infected with the Energon spilled. But not everything is as it seems. On Cyber Island, you are trapped there by malevolent robotic aliens, deranged and broken, and creatures of unknown make as they aim to kill you. Fight through the forces of both Autobots and Decepticons, or this isle will be your tomb.

It is your job to outwit and escape the clutches of the Cybertronians and the residents of the isle that have been mutilated by the toxins of Energon exposure. If you don’t, well, you’re just another dead body they can use.

It’ll be a boss run mostly against both Autobot and Decepticon canon characters by playing their greatest strengths and weaknesses against them. You have no allies; you must survive with limited ammo and resources.

Look for notes and other hints of characters’ pasts and how it got up to this point. Decipher the mysteries of the monsters that you cannot allow off the island.

All canon characters are sadistic, messed up versions of themselves and you will encounter them as such. No, you can’t save them. They are beyond repair.

Possible DLC would be playing as Autobot or Decepticon and seeing all the madness unravel before crashing on the island.

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Transformers – Kids Apps/Cozy Apps (Cooking Games, Coloring Games, Puzzle Games, Basic Sports Games, etc.)

Synopsis: There technically isn’t one. But hear me out…

Just fun little games with Transformer themes. We rely so heavily on action stuff that sometimes I wish there was a little game like a cooking app or something where I can just have my favorite Transformer character as a muse, or they are my instructor.

Also, it wouldn’t be bad for kids too, you know? I wouldn’t care if the characters are Chibi or stylized to the environment. I would love a Transformers game where I can relax and not have anything to do except maybe play a few cheesy games with them as the mascot. Kids would probably love it.

If they came out with a bubble blast game with Megatron and Optimus just being there on the screen with like two motions total, I would love it. If Shockwave was just making simple little projects in a kid's science app, I would love to see that.

A Feed Grimlock app, a Talking Transformer app, a coloring app featuring unique Transformer designs from all the continuities, something, man.

Transformers don’t have to be all about war or if you do, reinvent it kind of. See, we don’t utilize Transformers as we should!

#transformers #farm sim #social sim #open world games #video games #survival horror #survival games #optimus prime #megatron #grimlock #shockwave #transformers animated #transformers prime #transformers g1 #transformers lost world

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ineffectualdemon · 7 months

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I think I decided open world games weren't for me when I was playing Skyrim and I:

started fighting a group of vampires and in doing so

accidentally hit a dragon that flew in

The dragon was way too high level and immediately killed me

I kept spawning back in the area where I would be attacked by the vampires and Lydia would run of to start attacking the dragon again

So I kept trying to run away and get Lydia to STOP ATTACKING THE FUCKING DRAGON LEAVE IT GIRL YOU'RE GONNA DIE

I kept dying and respawning and Lydia kept immediately running at the fucking dragon

I finally managed to lure Lydia away from the dragon and she GRABBED MY HEAD AND SLAMMED IT INTO HER KNEE REPEATEDLY UNTIL I DIED AND SHE THREW ME IN THE FUCKING RIVER

BECAUSE I DIDN'T WANT HER TO FIGHT AN OVERPOWERED DRAGON THAT WAS WAY WAY WAY OUT OF OUR LEVEL

SHE'S NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO DO THAT

anyway I never touched Skyrim or any other open world game ever again

#games #video games #gaming #open world games #skyrim #i am bad at video games

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tobydontknowsh-t · 2 years

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botw is making me crazy

#kenny muffles #meme #open world games #breath of the wild #botw #minecraft #red dead redemption #skyrim #those are just some i can think of from the top of my head

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videogames-i-wish-were-real · 5 months

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Videogames I wish were real #86

An open world survival game set in a desolate world where the only food and resources left grow on colossal kaiju beasts (imagine Godzilla with a forest on its back. Also, I know what you must be thinking: wait, if it's a desolate world what do kaijus eat? Well, they get their energy from the sun and sometimes if they get a craving they eat other kaijus). After a kaiju dies, the resources they were sustaining quickly degrade, so the best bet is to harvest resources from live kaijus. The best way to do this is to climb the kaijus, since their skin is thick enough not to notice a thing. No two climbs will ever present the same challenges, since there are many types of kaijus, and you never know what might happen: it could start raining, or some of the creatures living on the kaiju might see you as easy prey and attack you, or the kaiju could decide to run, sit, sleep, or even fight or fuck another kaiju. Once you manage to climb on top of the kaiju, you'll need to gather resources: wood, fruit, plants, flowers, mushrooms... instead of forests, some kaijus might have rocky formations full of metals and minerals on their backs, or other types of biomes. The only animals that are still alive on this world also live on the kaijus, so if you feel like hunting, you can also take out your bow and arrow or your handheld weapon and get some fresh meat or hides. Once you're done gathering resources, you can take out your glider and fly off to safety... although, in a world populated by kaijus that love to fight each other, safety is always relative.

Similar media that actually exists: The Wandering Village (a game suggested by @thebazilly), The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi (the book that partially inspired this post)

#viwwr #videogames i wish were real #videogames #video games #writeblr #writers on tumblr #the kaiju preservation society #godzilla #john scalzi #concepts #open world games #survival games #THEY GET WATER FROM THE RAIN IT'S A VERY RAINY WORLD FOR NARRATIVELY CONVENIENT REASONS #the wandering village #the game also inspired this post but i forgot to @ it because that's what i get for writing these an hour before they are due to be posted #game design

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devileaterjaek · 9 months

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#gaming #ps2 #playstation 2 #spider-man #ultimate spider man #venom #open world games

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bodymodificationnation · 8 days

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By efimov.tattoo

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thefugitivesaint · 9 months

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Unnecessary Update From Poster to Viewing Audience

There’s been a significant gap between active posts on this here tumblr page. Part of the reason is that I finally got around to playing ‘Zelda: Breath of the Wild.’ All the praise the game was lauded with from critics and players has proven to be warranted. It’s one of the most enjoyable gaming experiences I’ve had in many years. It’s great fun. Sure, I know that I’m mortal and that one day I’m going to die (could be tomorrow, who knows?) but I’m digging exploring the constructed world on offer in BoTW. The sound design in particular is quite absorbing. Two hearty thumbs up. I’ll get back to wasting time providing this medium with new(ish) content. Whoever you are reading this, I wish you well and I hope that chance favors you.

#legend of zelda #breath of the wild #botw #open world games

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zombiscribe · 4 months

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#mafia definitive edition #mafia trilogy #mafia #gaming #video games #open world games #screenshot #mine

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jellyfishinc · 5 months

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My Open World Mario Game Pitch

Bowser has kidnapped Peach again, but this time it's different:

He's put together a ginormous circus, and has challenged Mario to fight for the right to Princess Peach's heart as the big Showstopper.

Here's where things take an interesting turn: you can fight Bowser as the final boss as many times as you want. In fact that's a requirement when you first get to the circus.

HOWEVER, it's made clear that it's not just about defeating Bowser anymore, because when you try to go up against him the first time, while you may beat him, you will still automatically fail, because the audience is still on Bowser's side.

And so, he challenges you to come back when you can make the fight more interesting.

How do you do this? By visiting all the other tent attractions and helping them with their acts. Each one has a new skill you can use against the fight with Bowser, AND the more people you get on your side, the harder Bowser's fight becomes, acknowledging your leveling up.

And yes, it is possible to beat the game without helping with all the tents. That's the whole point of an open world game.

However by doing so, Bowser's fight now has a full house, and THIS is the hardest the fight will ever get. Because if you lose, you will also lose the audience, giving an immediate game over, and Bowser laughing that even with an audience, Mario can't beat him.

BUT that will still take you back to before you did the battle, so you can try again or do something else that might better your chances.

And all I ask for the ending is two things:

1. Giving Mario a chance to redeem himself for Odyssey.

Instead of taking the "prize", he gestures for Peach to show off her own act. (This can be anything, even a tie in to Showtime!)

And she does.

2. Luigi shows up post-game, all insecure and nervous cause he wants his own tent, but is too shy to ask. But Mario agrees. And so we now get to set up a balloon themed tent for our Weegee!

The rewards:

1. still the online gaming feature, but the point here is you have to set it up in the actual game before you can access it, so players don't miss out on Luigi time just because it's an online game.

2. Luigi is added to your audience, and he increases your audience to infinity. You know. Just so you can have the satisfaction of beating Bowser so easily it's embarrassing. Because Luigi's the best brother ever.

#mario #luigi #super mario #mario movie #mario and luigi #super mario bros #open world #open world games #idea #mario game idea #pitch

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tigressaofkanjis · 28 days

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Cozy Farming Sim with Transformers

Long talk but if there was a game that I would want most, it would be the cozy, laid-back world building sims we have been seeing as of late. But of course there would be a twist needed to make such a game with Transformers to exist. So my rant of the games that should have a Transformer spin off in another post I mentioned had a few open world games and I said a cozy sim. This is the previous post.

"Synopsis: Traveling from afar, you (Bot or Human unknown, job: professional mechanic) find an abandoned space bridge in a remote region and repair it only to summon notable Autobots, Decepticons, and many others. As you create and mold the region to your liking, you build relations with the Cybertronians you encounter and make them comfortable living in the region with you. Hunt, gather, harvest, and document all the region has to offer from various colored Energon crystals growing in the wild to cybernetic species unleashed. Work together with your Cybertronian friends to maintain a world of your design.

Like Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you can venture into parts of Cybertron and some colonies to find certain Transformers and bring them to your region as companions.

Region will be an Earth-based open world (could be another planet entirely) with plenty to explore including secrets of the past, up to eight different environments to unlock to roam among which will have cybernetic animals of all types you can interact with and document (possible organic animals may be included, some can even become mounts). Shockwave and Perceptor would have the most rewards for discovering animals and substances respectfully (they are unlocked as companions by completing that section of your guide).

You can destroy the environment with your Transformers (it’ll grow back in an hour, don’t worry) and build activities for them to do to keep them and you entertained.

Various skins (G1, TFP, TFA, etc can be unlocked)

It is somewhat stylized, a mix of cartoon blending like Dreamlight Valley and Animal Crossing combined but in a ground level 3D space like regular games. Cues were also taken from Paleo Pines."

That was the part I did about the cozy gaming. But I wanted to add to it. So, first, I would detail that you would have a relatively large isle or place you could roam in, and there would be eight environments I would include in the game:

Meadows – Contains vast fields with plentiful trees and other flora where the space bridge is first located and ideal starting land. You will mostly find grounders like plenty of Autobots and Decepticons in this area though the Dinobots and Predacons can occasionally roam through. Shockwave and/or Perceptor’s cavern labs, once restored, can be found at the edge of the area where they will exchange information, finished quests, research tasks, and more for rewards and supplies.

Ocean – Depending on the layout of the map, you will either be surrounded by it as a huge island or have certain points accessible via the beachfront. Small isles can be traversed to find certain Transformers roaming and resting. The most common you may come across are flyers like many Decepticons, Seekers, and Predacons. While it takes a few main story quests to unlock the required equipment to sail the water, it is acquired quite easily. Manning a farm or small village of befriended Transformers on an isle is difficult but not impossible with plenty of time and effort. Maybe you could even build an anchored, floating home...

Jungle – Dinobots, Predacons, Insecticons, and many more beasts call this place the home away from home. Though spooky at night with their calls, it contains plenty of resources and with a beastly companion beside you, finding a home in the jungle will make it feel less imposing.

Volcanic Basin – One of the most dangerous areas, the volcano is home to Transformers who like their isolation and cannot be penned together with only but a select few they tolerate. They prefer heat over medium and cold environments. While you may make yourself home here, not many crops and resources like the intensity, but certain Energon only grows in its fumes. A good mining located for other materials as well.

Mountains – The most difficult area to reach requiring Transformer companions who can climb or fly. Fair warning, altitudes are cold. Several caves adorned with rare materials and certain Energon deposits thrive in the temperature, but only some crops and resources can survive here. Thankfully, the cold is not low enough to be lethal to any Transformer. In storms, you may find Autobots and Decepticons rarely seen in general in the caves roaming. During clear skies, you’ll see them out and about. Some beasts call it home too.

Desert – Some Transformers prefer the desert, especially Minicons who have little trouble using their size to squeeze into low formations for shade. Heavy in sand, not much in resources. But it is a great place to dig for buried objects and possibly other things.

Canyon – If you love to fly, this is the location for you. The canyons curve with the land all the way out to sea. Many flying Decepticons and Predacons use it to roam free. The difficulty of the area is getting them to keep still as they can only be befriended on the ground. But maybe flying with them and showing off your tricks is entertainment enough as certain gestures and actions might invoke the Transformers to respond with their own mid-air styles. The river that flows at the bottom is great for plants and Energon growth, but the landscape can leave your farm and companions a little cramped.

Tundra – Less risk and slightly less rewarding in resources, the snowbound land sits at the base of the mountains. It holds Transformers who prefer the tough landscape, mostly the heavy-duty ones who can push the snow and other obstacles out of their way. The strongest Transformers can be found here but don’t let their strength and size intimidate you, they can be caught playing in the snow if you look hard enough.

Cybertron is available to reach after a few repairs to the space bridge. You can travel to over five different regions, including Iacon, Kaon, Crystal City, Tyger Pax, and the Sea of Rust. Some Transformers won’t venture outside their world upon activating and unleashing their peers among your region. You can find them in these areas including Combiners (who you must befriend and bring all components to your stables to unlock). While Cybertron is the central hub, other planets that would come into play perhaps would be Caminus, Velocitron, Junkion, and Aquatron who would have their own set of characters you could unlock though not many areas can be visited.

Different Color Schemes can be encountered in daily spawns. All wild Transformers can be encountered in Normal and Regal color schemes (2 colors in each category) while Rare and Legendary color schemes are only obtainable through secret encounters.

Normal Colors – Two color schemes that are canon to the character. Can vary in shade, patterns, and other variances between the two. Some normal color schemes may look similar to the other on the same bot so keep a look out!

Regal Colors – Two color schemes of a fancier variety, often of minerals, gems, and other royal scale alternatives. Multiple Transformers can sometimes be found with the same color or similar.

Rare Colors – Two color schemes that are the same in name but vary in color on each bot. Beast colors reflect all animal color schemes inspired from the series Beast Wars, even to characters not found in the show. Shattered Glass colors are schemes in regard to the phenomenon of the Shattered Glass universes.

Legendary Colors – Two color schemes that are exclusive only, each reflecting either a toy exclusive, a moment in their history, or other coloration that describes them that will never be found on any other Transformer available.

But what’s this? Shockwave reports disturbances in the universe causing distortion rifts! Outbreaks of multiple cosmic clones of a single Transformer (including himself when befriended after collecting enough data across the region) can be encountered in a group of six in any occurring color schemes for that bot. Once different universal skins are unlocked (G1, TFA, TFP, etc), you may encounter not just different colors but also different molds of the character in the outbreak. You can have multiple of the same Transformer as companions on your farm and your village!

But what if you don’t like the character mold you get with a color scheme you like, do not fret. Perceptor has made a new invention just for you that can change the appearance of a Transformer to any available unlocked counterpart with the proper payment of materials of course. Don’t like TFA Arcee in a legendary color but think it’ll look good on TFP Arcee? The Universal Shifter will make it happen.

So, how do you befriend a Transformer? It’s easier than you think...but you do have to be on the lookout for what they like. Energon is always favorable to any Transformer. Most areas have the Energon needed to make any Transformer a companion, but sometimes they are very picky and may only like one type or may need quite a few helpings to get them to come around to you. So, make sure you have plenty of Energon sweets of all types available in your subspace. Some are more battle oriented. You can weaken them with other Transformers and bridge them to your base, tending to them until they trust you.

What if the Transformer form you want is all the way across the map? With the space bridge at your disposal, you can bridge anywhere, but do be careful exactly where you point to spawn. Wouldn’t want to accidentally teleport yourself into a lava crater looking for Blackout in the Volcanic Basin, would you? Or hit a slope in the mountains to fall all the way down it when you were trying to find Thundercracker roaming the icy peak. Markers will be labeled for ideal spawns to prevent that, but knowing you...

What would you be doing with the many Transformers you can collect? You can assign them tasks like scavenging, farming, and mining to help you. But you can also ride on their shoulders and take control of them to do whatever you wish. Transform, fly, drive, destroy or create anything to your heart’s desire with their powers at your command. And maybe as a bonus, you could create your own village and invite others like you to live with the Transformers.

But just remember, they sometimes can roam. You can track where they are once befriended and meet them where they go or simply call them back to home base. You can also design the island with them to make one huge isle of wonder, a whole country almost. Just make sure you design resting stables for your autonomous friends. They don’t always like being out in the elements.

Utilize any Transformer with anything you wish, the game would be for you to approach it however you want. And you get to hang out with your very own companions of your choosing. Estimated, you could have up to 80 Transformers in your home base and 30 in any three extra bases you decide to set up. Collect all the color schemes, all the skins, and just have fun.

I wish this game existed...

#transformers #farm sim #open world games #social sim #video games #shockwave #perceptor #arcee #transformers prime #transformers animated #transformers g1 #transformers beast wars #transformers lost world

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autolenaphilia · 8 months

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I like linear games, despite “linear” becoming something of a dirty word about video games, especially in the open world craze that has dominated the mainstream game market for years now. And that’s a shame, because linear game design is an artform.

The great advantage of linear game design is pacing, structure and focus. Linear games are often not that long, at most often only 8-10 hours or so. You can’t really expect much more meaningful content out of a game developer, not without exhausting their well of creativity and how much of a single game a player can endure. And linear game design is putting that gameplay content in a coherent sequence for the player to experience.

Much of this design relies on pacing, creating a good gameflow, where each successive element builds on the previous one.

The most obvious is probably pacing the difficulty, going from easy to difficult. A good game usually introduces its mechanics in a simple and understandable way, gives the player easy challenges at first, and as the player develops their understanding of the gameplay mechanics, the game ramps up the difficulty to provide a consistent level of challenge. So in the end the game is not too easy and not too hard (depending on the difficulty option chosen). And instead of introducing mechanics all at once, the game maybe introduces them gradually during the early game, so that you learn one mechanic, and then another, instead of being overwhelmed by mechanics.

There is also pacing the gameplay to avoid monotony. Even action games can become too much if they are all fast paced action all the time. It can be important for an action game to have variation from the combat with exploration sequences or puzzle solving. And point-and-click adventure games may need to have variation between dialogue and puzzle solving.

Linear game design also allows for more coherent and complex storytelling. Story can matter in video games, and linear game design helps with that. Linear game design means that the developers can pace the development of the story alongside the gameplay. It allows the parts of the story to build on each other in a coherent and well-paced fashion. That doesn’t mean cutscenes, necessarily. Half-Life uses mainly environmental storytelling to tell an interesting story, and it does so in a very linear fashion.

Indeed the linearity of Half-life is part of the story. The game’s linearity reinforces how Gordon Freeman is ironically not a free man, but follows a path laid out for him by the G-man’s manipulations. The Max Payne series has similar themes about determinism and free will, reinforced by the linearity of its design. The second game has multiple levels taking place in an abandoned funhouse and the game makes those themes explicit by having him monologue that “A funhouse is a linear sequence of scares. Take it or leave it is the only choice given. Makes you think about free will: have our choices been made for us because of who we are?”

It’s a good comparison, a linear game is like a funhouse, or an amusement park ride. You get a linear sequence of gameplay and story, and you either take the ride and enjoy it, or you do not. It’s not lacking in interactivity, the player still get to actually play the game, they just don’t get a choice about the sequence of events. But if the game is well-designed, the sequence the developers offer makes sense, creates a coherent and well-paced experience, so you don’t care. Player choice is not everything, and offering a coherent tightly designed experience is a good thing for games.

It’s something that open world games can’t offer. They lack the focus and pacing of linear games. In your average open world game, the actual interesting gameplay and story content is often spread out haphazardly throughout a huge map, with lots of boring traveling. This old Prozd sketch pretty sums up the average open world experience, lots of walking between when actually interesting things happen. And non-linearity means that the various gameplay and story elements can’t build of each other in the tightly paced and coherent fashion of the best linear games. Often open world games boast of dozens upon dozens of hours of playtime, I’ve read boasts about a game having one hundred hours of gameplay. Yet because of human limits on time and creativity, the games don’t offer much more actually meaningful content than the “short” 8 hour linear games of old. Instead the rest is taken up by filler, such as travelling, and meaningless busywork sidequests like “fetch these materials” and “kill those enemies.”

I think the open world genre is part of the decline of mainstream “AAA” game design over the past fifteen years or so. Massive open world games with highly detailed realistic graphics require massive resources to create. It’s one thing that can justify the massive budgets of big game studios, and provide something that small indie devs can’t. That’s why it’s the only type of single-player genre that mainstream devs release nowadays. But it’s quantity over quality, replacing carefully tuned game design with just more content. Filler sidequests are often churned out by over-worked developers being ruthlessly exploited.

It’s also a way to justify predatory “games as a service” monetization with DLC, as it is easy to just add more content to an open world game (for a prize) compared to a small linear one. It’s easy to see when you compare modern game DLC to the expansion packs of linear AAA single-player games of old. An expansion pack in the 90s and 00s was often a short but substantial game of its own, with its own campaign and story taking about 3-5 hours to justify its existence.

Things being better in the past is often a conservative lie, but triple-aaa game development sure was. I love to play mainstream games from the 00s, and it’s stunning how well-designed they can be. And it’s partly because these developers were good at linear single-player game design, something we tend to only see in indie games today. The open world genre has proven to be fertile ground for triple-AAA games to grow its worst habits into the shambles it is today.

#my writings #video games #game design #linear games #open world games #thoughts raised in me by playing doom 3 #which is a very linear corridor shooter from 2004 #and it's pretty damn good

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