Changing Games

Dragon Age 2 has upset me.

I really enjoyed the game. Sure, it had its flaws, but on the whole I was very pleased with the changes made since the original Dragon Age Origins. The fact that many fans of the original do not share this opinion would not upset me, but for the ferocity of the hatred these fans have for the sequel.

Dragon Age 2 was met with mixed reviews,
particularly among fans

I can ignore the odd hater or two hundred, but when fans write threads on the developer’s forum with titles requesting the firing of specific senior developers, it gets personal. I can’t even imagine how I would feel if I were one of the individuals being attacked in such threads.

So what have Bioware done to offend their fans so? Changed stuff. Ruthlessly – or so a hater would have it. If somebody feels something is perfect, then before you even tell them what the change is, their default stance is: a change from perfection can only be worse! This has been the case with Dragon Age 2, but the biggest pity is that not only were the changes good (in my opinion)… but they weren’t actually changing the core stuff at all!

Whats curious with change, is how it would have worked the opposite way around – if Dragon Age 2 came out before Dragon Age Origins. I hypothesise (in a statement that could never possibly be disproved) that fans would hate Dragon Age Origins.

So how does one implement change in a game series? Probably the same way you’d implement any change. So I did a search on how to cope with change, and found an iVillage article on this subject. You’d be surprised how applicable many of their tips are to changes in games. So here’s a summary, inspired by that article on how a developer should implement a change to a successful formula.

Football game developers delay planned changes
to deliver just the right amount of familiar and new.
Don't believe me? then you won't have any difficulty
identifying the game (and version) shown above...

Take your time. Thrusting a change onto someone is likely to result in an adverse reaction (see “sink or swim”). Leaving it more than 18 months is a bare minimum for a sequel with lots of change (nudge, nudge Bioware) . Implementing the changes over two or more games is better still, and will allow you to have hooks for the next game in the series. MIKENOTE: FOOTBALL GAMES

Get players on your side. Get them wanting the change: show them there’s good in it. Explain why the new is better than the old. Admitting the old was bad is a double-edged sword: you run the danger of being hostile to your fans’ nostalgia, but doing so often better demonstrates the need for the change. Handle with care.

Avoid Alienation. If you’re implementing a big change, then hang on to familiar aspects so it’s not totally alien. If you want to change so much that nothing is familiar, then take a bold step and give it a new name – if you had to change so much, it’s probably good to avoid the old title!

Some things simply have to be changed. Like this baby.
Don't let unpleasantness stop you.

Divide up the changes. Implementing changes over the course of the first half of the game (rather than all at the start) is great if possible. If not, consider releasing a demo ahead of release with some of the changes shown, provided they reflect the changes very positively.

Accept the changes. Don’t try and hide the changes away or tell players only small changes have been made – you’ll only make the shock greater. You’ve changed stuff for a reason (hopefully), so be confident about the changes.

Characters in Video Games

Utterly absorbed.

Games have an advantage over all other media. That advantage is interactivity. No other entertainment medium offers (demands?) the same level of interaction. Interactivity allows the player to connect with the elements in the game – the world, story and characters. Further than that consumers typically invest a greater span of time in a game than a film, TV episode or book.

But very few games have brought me to tears or thrilled me in the way films or TV can. To connect most deeply with the consumer, the media must nail everything just right. An unbelievable world, an uninteresting story, poor writing or acting – any of these things will break the spell. But one thing games often fail at – and consequently lose their magic – is in creating interesting characters that the player cares about.

Of course, we can make excuses for games – facial animation is still generally unbelievable, the gameplay disconnects the player from the drama, “engaging characters” don’t sell games (directly)… but the simple fact that there are games which have got this right, proves that it can be done.

I can only really list two game characters I connected deeply with. The first is Link’s childhood friend Saria in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time. The friends part ways in Link’s youth, but even after Link learns to travel through time, he is unable to prevent Saria’s death or even say a final farewell – just her haunting melody echoes through the Kokiri Forest Meadows.

Lost Odyssey delivered short stories with simple pictures
and music to develop the characters

The other character with whom I developed a strong connection was Kaim Argonar from Lost Odyssey (2008). Much of Kaim’s character is revealed in the game’s Thousand Years of Dreams sequences where Kaim remembers things from his past. In these sequences, the player is presented with third-person prose accompanied by simple abstract visual backdrops and music and ambient sounds. Through these “dreams” the player is shown the sword-for-hire mercenary’s sympathetic and caring nature.

Curiously, neither example relies on bleeding-edge visuals or carefully orchestrated cutscenes. Written word and well-pitched audio are the only thing used to develop a connection with the player and enhance the emotional experience. While Kaim’s multifaceted character sustains interest and believable humanity, the simplicity of Link and Saria’s friendship tragedy was enough to pull at my heartstrings without overdeveloping the characters’ depth.

Poor Maximus never wanted to mutilate all those gladiators,
he just wanted to get touchy feely with the corn.

Call it macabre, but few things get the emotional response from me as a classic greek tragedy – a hero’s fall. Maximus, the protagonist from the 2000 film Gladiator is a good example of a character who “works” for me. We see him first as a general, then as a father and husband, then as a vengeful warrior. Exposing so many of these facets of the character, and being so close to him during pivotal moments in his life allows the viewer to develop a very strong relationship with the character.

In most cases the character’s appearance is only used to make an engaging first impression and provide a visual summary of the character, but this importance shouldn’t be understated. In some cases, the appearance can be used to support emotions which put greater emphasis on appearance. Familiarity is generally broken by characters with an inhuman appearance – and consequently attachment is lost. This is often intentionally the case with “the bad guys”. Physical attraction can also be important if the story nurtures a relationship between two characters; Hollywood knows all too well to use attractive actors and actresses when making romantic films and the same should be true for games.  

But ultimately, I feel the single most important part of creating an engaging character is the script. The events which happen to the character, their backstory and also what they say during the experience are what separate engaging characters from flat ones. Books are unable to use visual appearance and films are necessarily short, yet memorable and deeply emotional character engagements happen in these media frequently.

Increasingly, Hollywood talent is providing voice acting in games. But it’s still rare that big or small screen scriptwriters get contracted for games. If the games industry cannot – or will not – attract the best of this (and other) writing talent, then its little wonder the characters come up short. With the ever-increasing budgets required to make games, why not splash a little cash in the writing department? Let’s see if they can come up with some characters that players actually care about.

Relatively Good

BattleField Bad Company 2 for iPhone

“this games actually pretty good”

My flatmate Jamie’s surprised reaction to playing an iPhone game I purchased recently. The game was Battlefield Bad Company 2. The game is based on the popular multiplatform game of the same title, but has been built for mobile platforms. 

As he watched the clunky characters wobble about and wrestled with iPhone’s touch-screen interpretation of first-person shooter controls, I mused that he would scoff at it on any other platform. It got me thinking: has this game received a positive reaction from the player entirely because of relative and not absolute expectations? Is it only good because his expectations on this platform are low?

It makes an interesting comparison, since a game with an identical brief (and title) has been produced for other platforms which allows us to make direct comparisons. The console version has undeniably better graphics, better control, longer gameplay, more dramatic cutscenes, more weapon variety… the list goes on. If the mobile game were ported directly, with no changes made, onto a console platform, you would be hard-pressed to find anyone that gives the game the time of day.

Of course, it seems perfectly natural to scale our expectations to match the platform on which we are playing. However, if our ultimate goal of playing a game is to enjoy it, is our observation of “good” – relative or otherwise – at all relevant anyway? Shouldn’t we be making comments like “this games actually pretty fun”? As soon as we force our observations to meet the criteria of “fun”, we can make relevant relative comparisons across not just platform, but also time: “the new Prince of Persia games haven’t been as fun as Sands of Time”.

The next best thing to having
a magical Ocarina in your pocket

One of the most anticipated titles for Nintendo’s new handheld, the 3DS, is The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time. The decision to remake this game for 3DS might have been out of convenience – production costs for remakes are certainly lower. It might have been for the sake of the game's heritage and renown. Or just maybe it was because what was fun 13 years ago will still be fun today?

Minutes later, a different flatmate walked past and said the above iPhone game looked like sh**.

Update 3

It’s been a while since the last Progress Update and for that I can only apologise!

  

I also rendered this out in a turntable video

Since then I’ve modelled trees, a sniper rifle and a transit van. In each project I’ve been trying to experiment by doing things somewhat unconventionally to see how successful different methods of texturing and modelling can be. They’ve yielded mixed results, but the learning process has developed my skills further. I will, however, need to work faster in future since I took longer than most of my colleagues, and certainly longer than a professional would take.

Trucker character miniature, height ~8 inches

   

Perhaps I am too close to it, but I feel progress in my visual design has been a little slower and at times I’ve been reluctant to give it the time it deserves. Hopefully this admission will stir me into action! I am pleased with my development in Photoshop, though I still need a lot of practice.   

Life drawing has taken a larger component now and highlights a weakness - my experience at drawing the human figure is limited and its something I should be concentrating on. I’m looking forward to focussing on the face later in the course since right now most of my faces look awful!

A giant mushroom I did for the BGR project

 As far as extracurricular activities go, I’m still plodding along with the mod for Dragon Age. Due to a skills shortage in scripting, I’ve taken up that slack rather than doing much by way of art stuff. I’ve become pretty fluent in scripting for Dragon Age now, though I’m not sure of the value of such a skill. I guess it can’t harm! I have begun to wind down the amount of time I spend in this area, since I’m expecting to need more time toward the end of term…

Illustrations for our project by teammember Tristan Silva

An exciting recent development has been the forming of the Games Society - a collaboration of Game Art and Games Programming students to design and create playable games. We’re really excited about our game and it will be great seeing some of my work in real use! We’re making a “you’re a gingerbread man, escape the bakery” obstacle course adventure. Even if it turns out to be a rubbish game, I’m confident I’ll have a lot of fun working on it… Let’s just hope we can follow through on our plans!

 

Art Directors

Being, as I am, an aspiring game artist, my interest in the visual style and execution of video games won’t be too surprising. While many games hum the well-rehearsed rhythm of ever-improving photorealistic visuals, others adopt an entirely unique style, or even whistle their own tune for what is expected of photorealism. 


Madworld's very distinctive visual style is not just skin deep:
the musculature of characters and weapons as well as the
environments is all highly stylised, but consistant.



However, when you consider that each game has a single art style, despite a swathe of different independent artists (working in a team), one might wonder how the skills and tastes of this team of artists is unified into a single creative vision… that’s where the Art Director comes in.

It is the Art Director’s responsibility that the visual style is coherent and consistent, and projects the correct feeling onto the player. The Art Director will be responsible for overseeing concepts for the visual elements, requesting refinements and steering the course of all the visual elements’ designs in a single direction. 

While a single artist toils over a handful of assets with utmost care, it is the Art Director’s responsibility that that artist’s body of work fits seamlessly into the game and does not result in a visually inconsistent environment, character or other asset.

The role should not be confused with that of Lead Artist. While the role may, in smaller companies be embodied by the Art Director, it is still a different set of responsibilities.

A Lead Artist would be responsible not as style consultant or visual consistency advisor, but take on a more technical and perhaps even managerial role. The Lead Artist will be concerned with ensuring artists’ work flows through the pipeline with maximum efficiency: their work should be meeting a clear technical brief concerning budget, scale and other factors. They may be responsible for delegating art tasks, and ensuring artists are meeting deadlines.



Not like that, like this!



So while a Lead Artist’s skillset is likely to focus on proficiency as a 3d artist coupled with managerial skills, an Art Director’s requirements differ somewhat. The art director must understand holistically the visual aesthetic required of the game. They must be able to communicate this vision with all artists and must be able to identify when created content does not fit this brief. It will not be enough to simply request changes to each asset which does not fit – the existence of poorly-matched assets represent a communication failure either by the art director in expressing the aesthetic, or the artist in understanding it.



It takes a very special type of artist to become a director – one who is able to step back from a single isolated piece and see the entire body of work, often well before it has been created. Their communication skills must be able to match with every member of the art team. They must be willing and able to be less hands-on with the work since they are unlikely to be able revise every asset themselves.



Conductor.



One might argue that the Art Director has very limited creative freedom – simply steering other artists and often producing little work themselves. However, it is their hand guiding the entire visual design for the game. Much as an conductor lifts baton and not instrument, so too does the Art Director orchestrate the visual performance of the artists, and assist in the composition of the visual score for the game. No easy feat.

So take a bow, Art Directors.

Game Design part 1

Everyone wants to be a game designer.

Moar. I want it.

Heck, I know what’s fun, I could design a game easily. I can list a dozen ways to improve a good game and I know why bad games are bad. This job’s a walk in the park… More explosions! More violence! Better graphics! More weapons! More levels! I could invent my own game easily… the industry just hasn’t recognised my potential yet!

The above statement was brought to you by game consumers en masse, and makes hefty use of the word “more”. The consumer always wants more and they want it for less. This is true of any marketplace. Unique to the gaming market, however, is the popularly held belief by consumers that they could do the producer’s job better. And within this, few jobs receive the level of scrutiny as that of the game designer.

And who can blame them? Each year, dozens of shooters come out, many of them sequels with what must surely have been a design document similar to the above. [end obvious and rather unfair snipe at course leader Mike’s preferred genre].

I think the designer of the contraptions
in 101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions
was trying to make a statement.
But you get the point.

In actuality, inventing a game is much like inventing any other product.  Superficially effortless: a simple idea worth millions. In execution: countless hours spent developing, prototyping and refining the design. And that’s all before it’s even shown to a distributor.

At home we have a book: 101 Un-useless Japanese inventions. Many of them are simply brilliant; Excellent solutions to everyday problems. I believe in every case, however, they have failed due to entirely misreading consumer demand. But at least they made it to production. One cannot say the same of poor game designs. Bad designs simply do not get made by any studio worth its salt.

  

So game design is important. That’s why it’s a full-time job performed by specialist professionals. In actuality, the ideas for games (the bit consumers think is the entire role of the game designer) tends to come from management or from a publisher. Very often a game designer will be given a safe-bet brief, mashing together a few games into a cocktail management believe will have the lowest chance of failure. Low risk pleases the stockholders. I’ll leave my feelings on the harmful effect of low-risk development to another blog post.

Design Documents often reach
hundreds of pages

So what does a game designer do then, if they don’t come up with the original idea? Their major activity will be writing and maintaining a design document – a body of work which every member of a development team will refer to while creating the game. The design document will include detailing gameplay, narrative, setting, characters and environment. Art direction may be contained in the design document, or be supplied in a separate document once the design gets the go-ahead.

The design document should leave no member of a development team guessing what is required of their role and will provide expectations of the final product which can be presented to publishers, partners or investors. A good design document will be say precisely enough to allow everyone to do their job. This means enough information to prevent developers second-guessing and enough freedom to benefit from expert judgement from specific roles.  

So if that’s what makes a good design document… what makes a good design? More on this in coming posts.

Why corners are dark

I am constantly plagued by “why”. One of the “why”s which has been eating away at me for a couple of days is that of ambient occlusion. Ambient occlusion is a technique in games that allows raised details to “pop” more by darkening surfaces close to corners. It works well and gives extra strength to the 3D illusion. It relies on the following truism: “corners are dark”

But does it really happen? My first response was: well sure, if you’ve got a shadow being cast, otherwise probably not - just a trick to make things look less flat. But as time passed, this problem ate away at me, and I have concluded that yes it really does happen. And here’s why…

A - Corners receive less direct light. 

Relevance: 6

In the diagram, a four-walled room is being lit by an ordinary bulb casting light in all directions evenly. If we divide this light into 15 degree sections, each emitting the exact same amount of light, we can examine where this light strikes. In sections near the middle of the wall, the light strikes only a small area of the wall. The same amount of light strikes a much larger surface area in the corner of the room, where the angle is more acute.

If the same amount of light strikes a larger surface area, it stands to reason that the strength of that light is diluted across the surface, and consequently the surface appears darker.

B - Corners are far away from lights.  

Relevance: 0.1

This might be some people’s immediate response to why the corners of a room are dark. While there is some truth to this, I believe this case to be very weak.

Let’s assume light sources are not found in corners (they generally aren’t). This means generally, corners are further from the source, and when this is the case, some light scatters on dust particles/similar before reaching the corner. This is called light falloff. Comparing corners to flat surfaces, however, we’re talking about very short distances, so the amount of falloff is negligible. Dusty rooms or foggy or smoky environments would cause more light falloff, but I’m still going with “barely relevant” on this one.

  C - Corners receive less scattered light.

Relevance: 4

Light bouncing around all over the place has a reduced chance of striking in a corner. In the diagram we follow 8 paths of light from the source - only a couple strike anywhere near a corner, whereas 4 could be said to hit very near to the middle portion of one of the walls. The innermost of the corner is affected most strongly by this phenomenon.

    

D - Corners are in “scatter-shadow”. 

Relevance: 0 to 10

This is not at all true of our four-wall room scenario, but it certainly is true of many other corner situations. While this shadow may not be from direct light sources and consequently no hard shadow edges are shown, here’s an example of where a corner is in scattered light shadow (another surface is catching its scattered light).

The diagram illustrates that those sections tucked away in the corner do not catch much, or any of the primary bounce light, and must receive it from a secondary bounce (which is less strong).

  

And here’s a real-life photo taken from the comfort of my desk to demonstrate the above. Apologies for the picture quality - fetching anything more than my phone camera would require me leaving my seat. Goodness, just the thought of it… 

 

D - corners are in scatter-shadow. 

We're already in shadow from the direct light, so the shadows you're seeing within the shadow are entirely scatter-shadows. 

C - corners receive less scattered light. 

Notice how the corner is darker, particularly very near to the corner. 

  

A - Corners receive less direct light.  

As the angle becomes less perpendicular to the source of the light, the light is spread over a larger area. This can be seen in two places of this picture.

C -  corners receive less scattered light. 

Again, the very innermost part of the corner has quite a dark line where very little scattered light reaches.