While I'm still holding out hope for more of the Star Trek-style future, in which whatever problems we have now fade as our philosophy and technology improve and we continue to improve as a species and a civilization, there is something very fertile about the post-apocalyptic setting. And the invention of the Atomic Bomb seventy years ago made the possibility of a really global-scale apocalyptic event terrifyingly plausible. We spent the entire Cold War afraid that NATO and the Warsaw Pact would end it by nuking each other into oblivion (and the cumulative effect of such an event would be terrible for everyone else as well.) That threat isn't gone, but we trust more in the notion that no one wants to see that terrible scenario of mutually assured destruction. Let's hope that such sanity persists.
Fallout portrays a world in which such sanity did not. It's not really our future, because the nuclear war that happened was actually in our future - the 2070s, if I recall correctly. Why had everyone reverted to a 1950s aesthetic, despite all the advanced technology like robots? Well, I think it's an aesthetic choice - the 50s were the height of Cold War paranoia and in the US, an insistence on a homogenized culture that was seen as the direct opposite of Communism (one that didn't really have a place for the poor or minorities.)
So we spent Fallout 3 combing through the ruins of Washington DC, and it was really grim. There were very few settlements - essentially Megaton (which, if you're evil, you can destroy,) Tenpenny Tower (which, if you're "good," you can unleash a bunch of murderous ghouls on,) but there is no real structure of society that has come back.
While Fallout 3 does end with a ray of hope - the water-purification system starts working, giving people safe water to drink finally - it still feels like the world is in a state of despair.
A point I once heard about post-apocalyptic settings is that the reason they're so dreary is that people are too obsessed with what once was. If the world's going to end, you want there to be something new.
To me, I think the appeal of a post-apocalyptic setting is not just depression-porn, but the idea that familiar things are reimagined to become something different. And we do see a bit of that in 3 - the Pentagon becomes the Citadel, for example.
So I do have some hopes for 4 - for one thing, the game just looks more colorful. In Fallout 3, it seemed like everything was a shade of grey, brown, or a sickly radioactive green.
I'm not sure when all the Fallout games are set, but given enough time, it would be nice to see at least plant life start to grow back. And what I have seen of 4, there is just more color there.
The other thing that excites me is that there seems to be a theme of building things - you get to build a house (or multiple houses) and your own weapons. You can call a helicopter down for you to ride, which implies that there's enough of a support network for you to have such a thing.
I'll admit that partially this is because of my love for my hometown, but I don't want to go into Boston and see nothing but rubble. I want to see people who have cleared away that rubble and instead built a crazy temple out of the State House, or turned Faneuil Hall Market into an actual market for bartering. It looks like Fenway Park has become a little town in the trailers - that's more my speed.
Because really, with enough time after the nuclear war, assuming that people did survive at all, you'd think that something resembling an earlier society would begin to grow up. I would love, love, love to see Fallout 4's Boston (area, given that I think MIT is part of it, which is technically in Cambridge) less just a total depressing ruin, and instead a Skyrim-like landscape of different new kingdoms popping up to replace the society that was once there.
Showing posts with label Fallout. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fallout. Show all posts
Thursday, June 18, 2015
Friday, June 5, 2015
Should Open-World Games Have a "Main Quest?"
Fallout is, unsurprisingly, a game that is coming up in my thoughts more recently - not only was Fallout 4 just announced, set in my own hometown no less, but I also saw Mad Max: Fury Road not too long ago, so the idea of a post-apocalyptic landscape is kind of... not really zeitgeisty, but something that I've been thinking about.
Fallout 3 was a great game, but it had its flaws. And one of the biggest flaws (spoilers for a rather old game) was the way it ended. After tracking down your father's water-purification project, the Enclave tries to sabotage you and you basically are forced to sacrifice yourself in order for the project to start up - you're bathed in radiation and die. This was made all the more frustrating by the presence of a supermutant follower, who is immune to radiation. Wouldn't it be far easier to just have him enter the code?
I'm led to understand that some DLC fixed this - allowing you to recover afterward - but it's really an odd idea in the first place - to have an open-world game... well, end. Games often have linear narratives, but this makes sense for some genres more than others. In linear games, it makes sense to have a story that hits plot points in a straight line. But the open-world game is more about setting than plot. Plot and characters inform that setting, to be sure (all the elements of storytelling are pretty inextricably linked anyway,) but the core engagement with your open-world games is a sense of freedom and exploration. The danger of having a main quest is that you essentially tell players "you can do anything here! But remember that if you aren't on this single path, you're on a side quest."
Now perhaps that isn't so bad. In Skyrim, I've created assassin-type characters who really just do the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves' Guild chains and basically feel complete (Dark Brotherhood especially.) But I think there are ways to tell compelling stories that don't push a single one to the forefront.
Probably the most culturally relevant fantasy work at the moment is George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, which you probably already know is the series of books upon which HBO's Game of Thrones is based (though the show and books are deviating more as the show has caught up to or passed Martin's writing.) While there's every possibility that the various plot threads will ultimately entwine to give us the series' endgame, for much of its run there have been wildly different events going on - all of which are certainly important.
The two most important supernatural forces in the story are separated by thousands of miles. Jon Snow, up at the Wall, is desperately trying to work out a peace deal with the Wildlings because of the necromantic Others (White Walkers in the show.) Meanwhile, Daenerys Targaryen achieved a miracle in bringing three fossilized dragon eggs back to life, and has her legitimacy as a conqueror and liberator backed by her status as "Mother of Dragons."
These are both hugely important things happening in the world, but the meat of the series has been more concerned with political intrigue in King's Landing. But that's not all - you've also got the chaos in the Riverlands, possible treachery in the Iron Isles (something the show hasn't dealt with all that much,) and a religious order of badass, terrifying assassins across the sea in Braavos.
The point is, Game of Thrones isn't just one big fantasy epic - it's like ten of them all happening at once.
And an open-world game could work that way.
World of Warcraft actually manages this, somewhat as a consequence of its periodic structure. Each expansion has focused the story somewhat, but generally, we move on to fairly different threats each time we go somewhere new. The Lich King and Deathwing were both existential threats to life on Azeroth, yet they felt very different and involved totally different "major players."
The leveling experience in the old world, even post-Cataclysm, really embodies this idea - you'll start in your own racial starting zone (and the fact that there are so many allows you to have quite different experiences even early on,) and while you can see how the various plot threads are connected, you can have a pretty different kind of adventure depending on where you go.
Is this all that different from how games like Skyrim work already? Perhaps not. The question is whether games would work if the makers tore up the signs that said "this way to most important plot." Does the main quest act as a crutch - a little linear game to provide structure lest people be overwhelmed by the freedom they're given? And would taking that crutch away make them fall? It's certainly possible, and I'm definitely an armchair game designer here.
But it might be cool to play a game where you really don't know which of the world-ending threats that pop up is the biggest one.
Fallout 3 was a great game, but it had its flaws. And one of the biggest flaws (spoilers for a rather old game) was the way it ended. After tracking down your father's water-purification project, the Enclave tries to sabotage you and you basically are forced to sacrifice yourself in order for the project to start up - you're bathed in radiation and die. This was made all the more frustrating by the presence of a supermutant follower, who is immune to radiation. Wouldn't it be far easier to just have him enter the code?
I'm led to understand that some DLC fixed this - allowing you to recover afterward - but it's really an odd idea in the first place - to have an open-world game... well, end. Games often have linear narratives, but this makes sense for some genres more than others. In linear games, it makes sense to have a story that hits plot points in a straight line. But the open-world game is more about setting than plot. Plot and characters inform that setting, to be sure (all the elements of storytelling are pretty inextricably linked anyway,) but the core engagement with your open-world games is a sense of freedom and exploration. The danger of having a main quest is that you essentially tell players "you can do anything here! But remember that if you aren't on this single path, you're on a side quest."
Now perhaps that isn't so bad. In Skyrim, I've created assassin-type characters who really just do the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves' Guild chains and basically feel complete (Dark Brotherhood especially.) But I think there are ways to tell compelling stories that don't push a single one to the forefront.
Probably the most culturally relevant fantasy work at the moment is George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, which you probably already know is the series of books upon which HBO's Game of Thrones is based (though the show and books are deviating more as the show has caught up to or passed Martin's writing.) While there's every possibility that the various plot threads will ultimately entwine to give us the series' endgame, for much of its run there have been wildly different events going on - all of which are certainly important.
The two most important supernatural forces in the story are separated by thousands of miles. Jon Snow, up at the Wall, is desperately trying to work out a peace deal with the Wildlings because of the necromantic Others (White Walkers in the show.) Meanwhile, Daenerys Targaryen achieved a miracle in bringing three fossilized dragon eggs back to life, and has her legitimacy as a conqueror and liberator backed by her status as "Mother of Dragons."
These are both hugely important things happening in the world, but the meat of the series has been more concerned with political intrigue in King's Landing. But that's not all - you've also got the chaos in the Riverlands, possible treachery in the Iron Isles (something the show hasn't dealt with all that much,) and a religious order of badass, terrifying assassins across the sea in Braavos.
The point is, Game of Thrones isn't just one big fantasy epic - it's like ten of them all happening at once.
And an open-world game could work that way.
World of Warcraft actually manages this, somewhat as a consequence of its periodic structure. Each expansion has focused the story somewhat, but generally, we move on to fairly different threats each time we go somewhere new. The Lich King and Deathwing were both existential threats to life on Azeroth, yet they felt very different and involved totally different "major players."
The leveling experience in the old world, even post-Cataclysm, really embodies this idea - you'll start in your own racial starting zone (and the fact that there are so many allows you to have quite different experiences even early on,) and while you can see how the various plot threads are connected, you can have a pretty different kind of adventure depending on where you go.
Is this all that different from how games like Skyrim work already? Perhaps not. The question is whether games would work if the makers tore up the signs that said "this way to most important plot." Does the main quest act as a crutch - a little linear game to provide structure lest people be overwhelmed by the freedom they're given? And would taking that crutch away make them fall? It's certainly possible, and I'm definitely an armchair game designer here.
But it might be cool to play a game where you really don't know which of the world-ending threats that pop up is the biggest one.
Wednesday, June 3, 2015
Fallout 4 Officially Announced
Like many, I'm sure, my experience with Fallout started with Fallout 3 - the game that came about after the title came into the hands of Bethesda, the makers of the Elder Scrolls games. Now, I'm no expert - I never played New Vegas, the quasi-sequel (akin to Brotherhood and Revelations to Assassin's Creed II - essentially a huge expansion pack, as I understand.)
I enjoyed Fallout 3 a lot, though it never felt like it had the depth of the Elder Scrolls games. There was plenty of exploration to be done, but not a lot in the way of major quest lines. Now admittedly, there's something kind of freeing and exciting about a world in which there's no quest marker pointing you where you should go, but instead just discovering little things along the way (the Vault that was nothing but "Gary" clones was simultaneously horrifying and hilarious. The one with the "Blue Gas" was just pants-crappingly terrifying.)
Still, the world definitely didn't feel as large as Cyrodiil or Skyrim, but given that we know this company is capable of doing such things, I have high hopes for the next entry.
Fallout 4 will be set in the ruins of Boston, which is really exciting for me as I grew up in a Boston suburb. Two things immediately stand out to me: The first is that there's a lot of footage in the trailer that shows the world before the nuclear war. It's even possible that the player character lived through that war, which I believe would mean that this game takes place earlier than the other games. Given that the trailer shows events occuring in that pre-war time, some have been led to speculate that we may, in fact, get to play through some of that - though whether it would use time-travel or flashbacks or what is anyone's guess.
The other thing that could be exciting is that the area seems better populated than the Capital Wasteland. In the Fallout timeline, MIT became "The Institute," which seems to have become a beacon of continued scientific progress within the post-apocalyptic world, and I imagine that if that's the case, they probably have a relatively safe perimeter to work within.
Fallout 3 was a lot of fun, but it was also a poster-child for the frustrating "brown is real" trope in art design. Everything had a kind of desaturated quality to it, and while that may be true of a real post-nuclear wasteland, I firmly believe that colors are good.
Indeed, ruins are all well and good, but I think what's exciting about the post-apocalyptic genre is not the misery and death, but the idea that new structures and cultures would rise up out of the ashes. Fallout of course derives a lot of its aesthetics from the Mad Max series, and I think what's appealing about that series is seeing the new social structures that grow out of the breakdown of the old ones. A lot of stuff might have been cobbled together out of old parts, but there's a human urge to create new things, and with the old rules broken down, people have the freedom to be very creative.
Another notable aspect of the trailer is that good old Dogmeat is greeted by the presumed player character, and he greets the dog before they head out on the road, and we hear his voice. I wonder, then, if this will be a game in which the player we control is a predetermined one rather than one we create ourselves. I generally like being able to create my own character, but I also recognize that having a set character opens up a lot more dramatic options for telling the story. Just having a voice is kind of a big deal (Mass Effect I think did a good job of hybridizing between total character creation control and a predetermined personality.)
Anyway, if this can be the Skyrim to Fallout 3's Oblivion, I'm super, super excited to see how it turns out (at some point I'm going to have to buy one of the new consoles other than my Wii U.)
I enjoyed Fallout 3 a lot, though it never felt like it had the depth of the Elder Scrolls games. There was plenty of exploration to be done, but not a lot in the way of major quest lines. Now admittedly, there's something kind of freeing and exciting about a world in which there's no quest marker pointing you where you should go, but instead just discovering little things along the way (the Vault that was nothing but "Gary" clones was simultaneously horrifying and hilarious. The one with the "Blue Gas" was just pants-crappingly terrifying.)
Still, the world definitely didn't feel as large as Cyrodiil or Skyrim, but given that we know this company is capable of doing such things, I have high hopes for the next entry.
Fallout 4 will be set in the ruins of Boston, which is really exciting for me as I grew up in a Boston suburb. Two things immediately stand out to me: The first is that there's a lot of footage in the trailer that shows the world before the nuclear war. It's even possible that the player character lived through that war, which I believe would mean that this game takes place earlier than the other games. Given that the trailer shows events occuring in that pre-war time, some have been led to speculate that we may, in fact, get to play through some of that - though whether it would use time-travel or flashbacks or what is anyone's guess.
The other thing that could be exciting is that the area seems better populated than the Capital Wasteland. In the Fallout timeline, MIT became "The Institute," which seems to have become a beacon of continued scientific progress within the post-apocalyptic world, and I imagine that if that's the case, they probably have a relatively safe perimeter to work within.
Fallout 3 was a lot of fun, but it was also a poster-child for the frustrating "brown is real" trope in art design. Everything had a kind of desaturated quality to it, and while that may be true of a real post-nuclear wasteland, I firmly believe that colors are good.
Indeed, ruins are all well and good, but I think what's exciting about the post-apocalyptic genre is not the misery and death, but the idea that new structures and cultures would rise up out of the ashes. Fallout of course derives a lot of its aesthetics from the Mad Max series, and I think what's appealing about that series is seeing the new social structures that grow out of the breakdown of the old ones. A lot of stuff might have been cobbled together out of old parts, but there's a human urge to create new things, and with the old rules broken down, people have the freedom to be very creative.
Another notable aspect of the trailer is that good old Dogmeat is greeted by the presumed player character, and he greets the dog before they head out on the road, and we hear his voice. I wonder, then, if this will be a game in which the player we control is a predetermined one rather than one we create ourselves. I generally like being able to create my own character, but I also recognize that having a set character opens up a lot more dramatic options for telling the story. Just having a voice is kind of a big deal (Mass Effect I think did a good job of hybridizing between total character creation control and a predetermined personality.)
Anyway, if this can be the Skyrim to Fallout 3's Oblivion, I'm super, super excited to see how it turns out (at some point I'm going to have to buy one of the new consoles other than my Wii U.)
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