Posts by Rick_D

  • Duke Nukem Developer 3D Realms Shuts Down (??)

    He was a bit of an idiot really. Regardless of what he had done in the past (which was, by all accounts, simply getting other people to implement his latest whim) he fucked up massively with DNF. At so many points they had something great looking and he fucked it up by demanding more. From what I read from a former employee, the great E3 demo was literally just a series of heavily scripted moments, and they had built everything to be tailored towards those scenes, rather than building an actual game.

    Still, the idea behind the DN games is nice, but he is dead. He and his balls of steel have gone to a better place.

  • Alan Wake

    Sort of interesting but some of the things that stood out to me most were the animations - couldn't they have some contextual stuff like a catious walk cycle so it wouldn't look so retarded when you go from running from the cops to simply walking normally as you would down a calm street. it looks really off and kills any sense of immersion!

    secondly the actual chase looked boring as fuck, there was no real feeling that you were running from someone or doing anything to avoid the cops other than simply walking down a linear path. there's only one option, how can you go wrong, so why feel any aprehension?

    as far as voice acting and police dialogue go - it sounds fine, great in places, dunno what anyone is complaining about tbh.

    also 7 years for this, i sure hope 6 of those years were spent playing ping pong in the rec room D:

  • Level Design Books

    this "fun is not measurable" but "immersion is" stuff is bullshit. how do you measure immersion. a 5 year old is immersed like fuck into super mario world, but if you analyse that with a microscope and pick out what you thought (remember psychology is a very personalised subject, you can study it but it also manages to study you) made it immertsive and then apply that to a game for 10 year olds and soon you realise that all you've done is make a shitty game that no-one enjoys because you've aimed it at the wrong audience, learnt the wrong lessons and applied what you know, badly, to a game design you didn't understand.

    the best you can do to learn, is to take somethign you enjoy playing, be it fps, rpg, platformer, whatever, get a game that has mod tools, and experiment by doing, learn to use the tools, learn what makes a fun experience for you, get others to play it and learn how they felt about it.

    if you open up an editor and say to yourself "i am going to use all my knowledge about every aspect of game design to create the most immersive piece of work i can create" then you will start working in circles, trying to perfect everything as you go and trying to rely on each moment to be a perfect example of the immersion you want to experence (but will never be able to because you are on the other side of the monitor as it were, never able to really experience what you have created through the eyes of someone who has never played it, or seen any part of the development process).

    i will not argue that psychology of human beings is not important in level design. i think it is important to understand that peopel do certain things when they are under pressure, to know the kinds of patterns our brains are receptive to, and the type of imagery that we are repelled by. but it is a vitally important step to simply create little arenas of gameplay to find out how to do things, what is actually enjoyable (a far better word that combines both fun and immersion ) and how to guarantee you can recreate certain feelings and experiences in different situations.

    saying that fun is not important and that you should focus on trying to be some artsy ponce making braid all over again is a waste of everyones' time and doesn't help the OP who wanted to know what to do next. and frankly there's books out there that don'ty really explain shit. you are better off learnign by doing, getting a job as a junior, and learning from others with more experience. some of the best level designers and artists have never written a book in their lives.

  • 70 minute long video review of Phantom Menace

    oh sentura

    :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:

  • Crysis 2

    Quote from Mazy

    TLDRIs it still jungle? I'd love to see Crytek trying something outside their comfort zone, its starting to get a little bit ridiculous with the jungles, even if they do look amazing.

    I think that comment is a little unfair. Both games pushed the boundries of their platforms in terms of visuals, sounds, and the sandbox style of gameplay.

    I don't think I've seen a game that matches the visual fidelity of Crysis, and that game is 2 years old.

    And they only made 2 games (Farcry and Crysis - Warhead is simply an expansion on the original Crysis with very little "new" content).

  • MapCore Job Census

    Just because it is old doens't mean it isn't shit.

    Anyway, different studio worked on Rogue Warrior (the place I was at), the "main" studio is doing AvP3. It still uses the same engine though, and they have crammed more stuff in there. So if people felt that RW ran at 20fps god forbid what AvP3 will be like.

    Still, I am sure it will sell in decent quantities if Sega can get enough marketing behind it.

    As for blizzcolos0, I wouldn't say he is too good for there, but that I think he has found a place where his talents will be fully utilised. I am really happy for you man, it is a pretty big place to end up at. Nice to be able to check out the USA as well.

  • Batman: Arkham Asylum 2

    All games are art and nobody ever tries to make money. The only people trying to make money are evil big businesses who want to take our bedroom hobby away from us and make us all create evil child murdering simulators.

    Damn you big business, damn you!