The Sad Plight of the Adventure Game Bum

Posted by brendan

July 4, 2004

Hello there, friends. I'm here today to tell you about a problem that affects us all: getting stuck. I'm not talking about getting stuck to a flagpole or a toilet seat; I'm talking about getting stuck in an adventure game. When some puzzle proves too devious, or it's simply unclear how to proceed, even the best games devolve into major snooze fests. It's not uncommon for an adventure gamer to fall asleep on his keyboard and awaken to find that he'll be paying exorbitant amounts of money to have his drool extracted from said keyboard. The Telltale crew is sick and tired of paying for drool extractions, and we're prepared to take action.

I bet you'll recognize this scenario if you've ever played an adventure game. You're playing the game and you realize at some point that you're not quite sure what to do next. You've exhausted every dialog option with every character. You've clicked on everything you can think of. You've consulted your Magic 8 Ball and it's being strangely laconic. So what do you do? You exhaust every dialog with every character again. You click on every object on every screen again. If you're like me, at this point you finally begin to suspect the true solution: you must drop your computer from the top of the Empire State Building.

You want to know the shameful truth? I often never figure out what to do next. I just keep wandering around the game world for the rest of my days like some sort of hobo. It's sad really. I paid all that money for my education and now I'm an adventure game bum. That's no fate for the hero of an adventure game. Unless the hero of the game is a bum, I guess. But in all other cases, heroes ought to be more, well, heroic.

Imagine, if you will, an adventure game adaptation of Raiders of the Lost Ark...

Indiana Jones holds up the staff of Ra and a beam of light shines through the head piece. That's strange... It's not illuminating a building on the map; it's illuminating a baloney sandwich that somebody left on the floor of the map room. That can't be right. Surely the Lost Ark isn't buried in a giant baloney sandwich somewhere in Egypt? Thinking that his staff may not be the right length, Indy climbs out of the map room and asks his friend Sallah about it. Sallah laughs heartily but says only, "Hurry, Indy!" Indy proceeds to ask every guard, every townsperson, and yes, even villain Rene Belloq, about the staff, but to no avail. He flies back to the States to check his house for anything he might have forgotten. Did he check the bathroom before he left? He flushes the toilet a few times just in case. Stumped, Indy decides to take a long bath and let Marcus Brody sort it out.

This won't do. Indiana Jones can't fly back to the U.S. to search his bathroom in the middle of the adventure. Indy needs to stay focused. What can be done to keep the player on track?

The brilliant minds at Telltale have been working night and day to answer that question; everyone else at Telltale has been working an hour a week to answer it. We think the game ought to recognize when the player is bumbling around, and do something about it. We feel that some element of the game world (usually another character) should assist the player in figuring out what to do next when he gets stuck.

For example, in the Telltale version of the Raiders of the Lost Ark game, Sallah would probably nudge Indy if he wasn't making progress. I don't mean nudge him physically; I mean give him a hint. If you had never read the inscription on the head of the staff, then perhaps Sallah could ask you if you noticed anything unusual about it, which would prompt you to look at it. If you were still stuck, he could suggest that the inscription probably refers to the staff length, cluing you in to the fact that you need to translate the inscription. If you were still stuck even then, he could just take you to the fellow who can translate the inscription on the staff.

And if you were still stuck after all that, he could tell you how to get to the Empire State Building so that you could drop your computer from the top of it.

This solution actually serves two of Telltale's game design goals. One goal is to make games where the characters feel alive. They should be responsive to you, and proactively help move the narrative along when you get stuck. I mean, sure, the characters are technically just 3D models with unbelievably simplistic AI, but you shouldn't be thinking about that when you're playing the game! I don't even know why I mentioned it.

The other game design goal it serves is to keep the narrative moving forward. Pacing is as important to games as it is to non-interactive media. We want to keep the story from stalling out, and one way to do that is to have characters in the game help the player along when he's not making any progress. Furthermore, having characters assist you is preferable to having an in-game hint menu, since it maintains your immersion in the game world.

If we're successful in our game designs, then getting stuck will be a thing of the past. Indiana Jones won't ever stop for an ill-timed bath, and you will never again have to be an adventure game bum.

Unless we decide to make that Bum Simulator that everyone's been requesting.

Tagged Game Design

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35 Comments

	Well, this is becoming a trend, first here again. I love the idea of characters helping out, I just hope they seem a bit confused themselves instead of feeling as if they know exactly what to do and are just screwing with you. I also think you've been playing too many old Lucas games.
	Comment by Jake July 4, 2004, 8:21 pm

	I don't remember a single game with an innovative hint system. Well, except for the old Infocom games of course, and surely I don't know all adventure games there's ever been, but... ...would it be possible to have an intelligent hint system that evaluates the situation of the player and gives subtle hints according to how stuck he currently is? Maybe delivered by NPCs, to keep the player close to the story? "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" comes to my mind, in an abstract way: Requesting help by email, with the answer arriving way later.
	Comment by Nomad July 5, 2004, 2:23 am

	Just a comment on the site itself ... it's really hard to notice the link under "..." I didn't even see the first post was so long until I discovered it! Maybe you can give the link a color so that no one will miss out on your nice editorials. :)
	Comment by Marek July 5, 2004, 3:58 am

	I really like this topic, particularly since I'm apparently writing a thesis on this (when I'm not procratinating). Consider yourselves quoted in the paper. It's nice to be able to support the argument for hint systems. I'm making a small game to go with the theory. What I did is have the main character rub his chin every now and then and give a hint. That's a fine line to walk though. I found out that if you take the hints too far, it starts to threaten the narrative, in that the main character seems to have a strange intuition for everything. I'm thinking I should either incorporate that into the story as a character ability (make the hints visions or dreams, pretty much like The Sands of Time) or find some alternative means of delivering the hints. I wrote four hints for every puzzle: restating the goal, a vague "hunch", a more direct hint, and finally something that practically gives it away. The hints are supplied based on "idle time" (number of minutes of not solving a puzzle). I works kind of OK, but I'm thinking of how to make it work better. I figure another way to get players on the right track is to eliminate some of the paths that don't lead to a solution. When I'm stuck in an adventure game, I often just do things over again just in case I missed something. In a typical adventure game, the protagonist always willingly complies when you command him to do something for the umpteenth time. Perhaps if the character comments on that, saying it isn't very productive to continue going down that path, the player can strike that idea off his list and look elsewhere. If the player keeps looking in a certain corner, and you tell him that's not the right corner to look in, that also counts as a hint. I'm thinking this might actually be more natural, but I'd love to hear your throughts on that. I'm thinking of assigning a value to each action, and if the player keeps repeating that action it eventually becomes a negative value which triggers a hint. Don't know yet if it will work! Perhaps if you're stuck at one puzzle for a period of time, an alternative event can be triggered that introduces a new, possibly easier puzzle. Maybe the game Fahrenheit does this a little. I couldn't tell exactly from the E3 demo what happened "behind the screen", but it seemed that if you messed up the first puzzle (cover up a murder by removing blood stains, hiding the body etc.) it just triggered a new event (a cop knocks on your door) and a new puzzle presents itself (convince cop that nothing is wrong). You might also get arrested and deal with the consequences of that. This is probably very tricky to do right. It's asset-heavy and probably a design minefield. (This really treads on the "non-linearity" debate.) I guess you could do it by using various scenes and assets in very clever ways, but obviously an approach like this has its limits. It always sounds nicer on paper than it is in practice, though it can be done to some degree. Fahrenheit probably only has three paths for that particular scene, but it felt like you really affected the outcomes and had to think fast. The puzzles felt less like arbitrary obstacles and more like "OK, I'm this guy, some things just happened... what would I do in his situation?". Sorry for the long post. What does everyone else think?
	Comment by Marek July 5, 2004, 4:50 am

	Wow, it's one of the first times that I noticed that game developers are actually aware of typical (almost always present) problems of Adventure Games, and are trying to mastermind a working solution. Ideally, gamers should only encounter the amount of hints that they realy need, not too few (getting stuck) or too many (getting bored). From the last category I recall one where the actual solution of the puzzle was hinted in almost all descriptions of somehow related objects and rooms. And if you already know the solution, this will get annoying. Especially if the description of some object (including the hint of a particular puzzle) stays the same throughout the whole game. The major challenge is to find out how much information/clues the gamer needs to solve the puzzle in a satisfying way (which is unique for all gamers). Therefore the most important aspect of a puzzle is its logic (which has been pointed out in the earlier 'Absurd puzzle' thread).
	Comment by Jaap July 5, 2004, 8:36 am

	Hey, I have a question for you Brendan, what do you do at Telltale? You're not on the staff page; you gunna let them disrespect you like that? Are ya?
	Comment by Jake July 5, 2004, 10:25 pm

	Oh man, Jake. All this time I thought you were Jake Rodkin Jake, not Jakek Jake. Confusion!!!
	Comment by Marek July 6, 2004, 5:45 am

	Yeah, there are far too many of us. How'd you find me out?
	Comment by Jake July 7, 2004, 3:16 am

	Marek, Wow, great ideas. I do like the idea of your character occasionally making suggestions or giving hints. That works especially well in a situation where something would be obvious to your character, but not necessarily obvious to the player. If you keep asking Marcus Brody about the Staff of Ra, Indiana Jones can just say, "Marcus can't help me" because he knows Marcus well, but you the player may not realize that. Some games, though, attempt to make you feel as though you ARE the main character in a direct way. The Infocom games were typically written in that style, as well as most first person games. It might be disconcerting or inappropriate in that scenario for the main character to be speaking to the player (Woah, I'm talking to myself!). That's where having other characters in the world help you out may be the thing to do. I agree that it's important to narrow the player's area of focus when he's not making progress. Judiciously ruling out certain avenues of exploration can really help out with the problem of having to ask everybody about everything, and so on. Giving advice to the player only after he has tried the same thing several times seems like a great idea. I think we may indeed go with a system like the one you propose. The idea of having alternative events depending on how you fare certainly seems ideal from a gameplay standpoint, but I agree that it poses both design challenges and technical issues. My own inclination would be to choose key moments in the game where the player has the ability to affect the outcome of the story. That way the story doesn't diverge too wildly, but the player can still be in control. I'll be interested in seeing how Fahrenheit pulls it off. Thanks again for your comments Marek!
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 7, 2004, 5:30 pm

	This is probably obvious to say, but if you're going to have an adventure game start telling players "you don't really need to go over here to solve this puzzle" you'd better make sure that that isn't going to be a necessary (or moderately helpful) area down the line. A lot of the best LEC games (well, Monkey 2, DOTT :)) had significant amounts of mandatory backtracking and wandering. A game intentionally or accidentally telling you to stop trying to go somewhere is a potential pitfall to preventing people from solving the puzzle. This example is slightly off, but in the beginning of Monkey 2, when you first get to Woodtick, if you try to walk off the right side of the screen, Largo shows up and beats you down. Everyone I've talked to about this (including myself) read that as "I guess I can't go that way" and proceeded to spend their first hour stuck in Woodtick pissed off that characters were talking about things that you couldn't reach, even though the rest of the game was just one click off screen...Maybe I'm describing two separate problems here, but I think they're (vaguely) related...
	Comment by Jake (Rodkin) July 8, 2004, 2:47 pm

	Also I'll try to stick the (Rodkin) after anything I post around here... Other Jake: You were confusing even me. I couldn't remember writing those things, even though I agreed with a lot of them, then I realized that wasn't my email address... ¬ ¬
	Comment by Jake (Rodkin) July 8, 2004, 2:55 pm

	Another Jake, another Jake from California, even. Seven years my elder, but that's another story. It's always a bad sign when you're not sure if you wrote something or not. I agree with the Monkey Island II issue, by the way. To add to the confusion I'm sure the scene brought back memories of being blocked by that troll in front of the bridge in Monkey Island I. The issue is related, but the Monkey Island II one would have been far more simply solved: he should have stuck you in a barrel or thrown you over the side of the bridge only to have you come back out on the same screen, minus Largo. When telling a player not to go to an area I think something like "I think I need to focus on the evil cave dwelling obstetrician for the moment" would be effective.
	Comment by Jake July 9, 2004, 2:28 am

	Very good points all around. Jaap, Marek, the two Jakes -- thank you for your posts. It sounds like we all see eye to eye on these issues (or in my case, eye to navel since I'm a twelve foot giant). And Jakek, pretty perceptive of you to notice my conspicuous omission on the staff page. It's left to the reader to determine which of the following reasons is the most likely: A) I don't work for Telltale. I hacked into their computers and maliciously posted adventure game blogs in an effort to sully their good name (mission accomplished, I'd say) B) I'm the staff animal trainer. I keep our rather sizable menagerie under control so that the others can work. The blogs are actually written by a bunch of monkeys taking time off from writing their Shakespeare knock-offs. C) I'm a designer at Telltale. I'm not on the staff page because I'm too lazy to write my bio, and I refuse to have my picture taken under any circumstances whatsoever (except for money).
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 9, 2004, 5:41 pm

	My original thought was that your name was an anagram for someone on the staff page, but that didn't pan out. According to MobyGames you did two games at Lucas, oddly neither adventures. Maybe not that oddly considering the state Lucas is in. Also, according to Google you are probably these two boys: http://www.thesylvaherald.com/images/fergusons-072700.JPG or this car: http://www.antiochianvillage.org/camp/alumni/photos/carinditch.jpg .
	Comment by Jake July 9, 2004, 10:24 pm

	Regarding Jake R.'s Woodtick example, closing off certain paths can be tricky, and actually opening up paths can be tricky as well. In Grim Fandango in year 1 Manny says something like "I'm sick of waiting around for an opportunity to get to me, it's time to TAKE one" or something along those lines. I think that caused some confusion about what your actual goal was. You get back on track a little later on, but when you're standing in that DOD hallway after that cutscene you're like "... wait... is this all? should I go to the garage now? Or the office? Or outside?" You're confused because you think you have too much hypothetical scenarios open to you, as opposed to one too few. All these examples reveal just how much adventure games rely on subtle nuances.
	Comment by Marek (the original) July 11, 2004, 8:01 am

	Sounds great! Just make it a toggle.. sometimes i like bumming around.
	Comment by DrZaius July 11, 2004, 9:45 am

	The Pajama Sam adventures (the first three, anyway, I wouldn't know about the most recent one) are a good example of integrated hints by way of environmental coercion. They work pretty much the way Marek describes above, with hints that begin subtly and progress towards the obvious the more times you seem to be interacting with the same objects or characters related to the puzzle. (The need for effective hints is even more critical in games like these which are designed to be solveable by people under the age of ten.) Another helpful tactic is to recognize alternate, reasonable but not-quite-on-the-money ideas the player may have for solving the puzzle and, when they are tried, to give constructive feedback rather than simply "That doesn't seem to work."
	Comment by Dave July 14, 2004, 1:13 pm

	Thanks Dave. I'll see if I can steal some copies of the Pajama Sam adventures. Solveable by people under the age of ten means they may be solveable by me as well.
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 16, 2004, 12:48 pm

	Hey Brendan, Are you guys ideally looking making your own branded titles (like Monkey Island was for LA), or doing stuff for licensed entities? (ie. "Hulk put AVACADO in MICROWAVE, throw MICROWAVE out WINDOW.")
	Comment by JustinPie July 19, 2004, 8:49 am

	JustinPie, Both! Naturally we've got a lot of ideas for new games, but there are many great fictional universes that we'd love to let players explore (and by explore I mean more than just shooting up the countryside). I'd love to hear suggestions for licenses that you think would make for a great adventure style game...
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 20, 2004, 2:12 pm

	Dave: that's really interesting. I'm going to check that out.
	Comment by Marek July 21, 2004, 3:25 am

	It's very important that the game doesn't simply drop hints after a certain period of time. The gamer may go for a snack, etc. and simply leave the game on. Maybe, if the mouse doesn't move the timer doesn't run? Or maybe you should make games so immersive gamers won't eat until the game is finished.
	Comment by Fop July 27, 2004, 8:14 am

	Fop, Good point. Yes, if the player doesn't move the mouse for a time, we would assume he had left to tend to his vital human needs, so the game wouldn't start giving hints. But we'll also aim to make our games so immersive that we'll have to include a free catheter with every game.
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 27, 2004, 2:51 pm

	>> I'd love to hear suggestions for licenses that you think would make for a great adventure style game...
	Comment by jp-30 July 27, 2004, 6:47 pm

	Actually, on further reflection, any consideration given to the IP from cartoon houses such as Spumco? Kricfalusi's Ren & Stimpy & Ripping Friends could make for some pretty off-beat adventuring.
	Comment by jp-30 July 27, 2004, 6:49 pm

	jp-30, Thanks, that's just the kind of thing we're looking for. As you may know, acquiring licenses is not just a matter of promising to be best friends with the owner of the license, so we want all the suggestions we can get.
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 27, 2004, 7:30 pm

	Well, I have more, but I don't want to be a suggestion hog. Screw it. Here are some more IP suggestions you might like to consider (and then discard); ThunderBirds (the puppets, not the stupid movie) and other similar Gerry Anderson 'supermarionation' TV shows. Dr Who Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (I know, it's been done, but a LONG time ago - and there's a new movie version in the making, so there's 1/2 your marketing already sorted). These are all very UKcentric, aren't they? So, what about a Seinfeld game? I'd play it, if you got the cast in for voiceacting & some of the show's writers. And I did read that LucasArts may wish to sell their Sam & Max code to recoup some of their losses ( http://www.justadventure.com/articles/SamnMax2/SamnMax2.shtm ). Extremely unlikely I know, but imagine the publicity if you could buy the game, hire some of the now-redundant programmers from it, finish it & get it out! And.. uhh.. Magnum PI. I know these are all pretty dated suggestions, nothing new & hip & flavour of the month, but there are a hell of a lot of 'dated' folks who used to play adventures, and are hankering for more like we used to play. Like me. And my friend Dave.
	Comment by jp-30 July 30, 2004, 2:24 am

	Thanks jp-30! I appreciate the suggestions.
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson July 30, 2004, 2:18 pm

	Try just leaving a couple of laptops in the monkey cage of your local zoo, and check back regularly to see if they haven't come up with a solution to this. I'm quite sure they will.
	Comment by steeg October 4, 2004, 12:32 pm

	One step ahead of you steeg... that's how all of our games are being designed...
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson October 4, 2004, 3:08 pm

	I have an idea for an adventure game... Could be loosely based on the book " the da vinci code" except done better. More research etc. The hero would have to solve many cryptic puzzles. He would journey all over the world to find answers etc. Goto ancient places such as the pyramids maybe the temple of balbec and stone henge finding clues to different puzzles. it would definitely make an interesting adventure game I think.
	Comment by Axiom October 5, 2004, 1:49 am

	Axiom, that's a great idea. Thanks for the suggestion!
	Comment by Brendan Q. Ferguson October 6, 2004, 2:33 pm

	Kick Blizzard up the Bum and do a Warcraft adventure game, their Lord of the Clans was cancelled in 1998.... :)
	Comment by Access October 26, 2004, 7:16 pm

	I agree with Fop that using time to trip hints has flaws. It would be unfortunate if your urinary tract infection were to ruin you enjoyment of a good game because the NPCs give away the solutions everytime you return to your PC. You should instead track how many miles of screen the character covers without doing anything worthwhile before giving the hint. And since we adventure gamers are such intellectuals you should transfer Umberto Eco's "Name of the Rose" or "Faucult's Pendulum" to the digital realm. How do you win prizes on this site?
	Comment by Glottis November 23, 2004, 6:51 pm

	Sounds like you want Fable-esque AI in a point and click adventure game. I like it. It would be nice if your "assistants" actually assisted once in a while instead of standing around and repeating the same line whenever you speak to them.
	Comment by Munglai December 1, 2004, 1:59 pm

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