How should this game handle ingame deaths?

[Chyron8472]

How should this KQ game approach dying? Specifically, should it have a "Restore/Restart/Quit" popup with only manual saves, should it have a "Try Again" popup with autosaves set right before encountering unavoidable death, or should it have less frequent autosaves and still require you to manually restore?

Do you have any different ideas?

[Lambonius]

Personally, I would prefer manual saving ONLY, to preserve the integrity of the golden age Sierra experience. However, I think varying the amount of autosave/retry options based on a chosen difficulty setting is a brilliant way to handle it.

[SHODANFreeman]

Mandatory manual saving is a pointless waste of time. Spending hours looking at a save game screen does nothing to enhance the game experience.

[Irishmile]

I agree with my fellow Wisconsonaut

[Rather Dashing]

Anyone please correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems to me like a save/reload system should be one of the easier things to provide a "choice" to. Wouldn't it make sense for a save feature called "Classic Sierra" or something along those lines, which has only manual saves and quicksaves? Even if you hate the idea, think it's the stupidest thing to ever happen, etc, if everyone gets a chance to opt in or out...why should you care if someone else might have been forced to opt out of something they may have enjoyed, for whatever reason they may have for that?

[Irishmile]

I also agree with my fellow Dashingnaut

[SHODANFreeman]

Also, I voted for more options, because options are good. Unfortunately, Telltale's stance on options typically tends to be "Our customers are too stupid to make any decisions so we can't have complicated options or they'll get confused."

[techie775]

I picked choose in the beginning cause everyone will prefer there own way. I don't know if that's difficult to do but it'll seem to please the most people. I actually didn't mind the KQ7/SQ6 restore method cause it got me right back where I left off if i didn't know I was in danger and died.

[Scnew]

I definitely vote for the option of having a choice between old school and new school. But really, I don't care that much as long as there a ton of interesting and sometimes pointless ways to die with humorous pun-filled explanations. It's funny, but I really love how Sierra games could kill you for no real reason... such as just walking too close to the river at the beginning of KQ5.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'd really love a choice. I'd love to play without autosaves or retries. It ups the challenge. Having a choice is a brilliant way to approach it.

[chucklas]

Mandatory manual saving is a pointless waste of time. Spending hours looking at a save game screen does nothing to enhance the game experience.

except for giving the game a classic feel and increasing difficulty (which many people actually want.)

I went with provide a choice. It would be simple to do and would make more people happy.

[SHODANFreeman]

except for giving the game a classic feel and increasing difficulty (which many people actually want.)

It doesn't "increase difficulty". It increases the annoyance of having to constantly mash the save key every few minutes or lose some progress when you inevitably die in some strange way. Nothing about the game itself becomes harder, it just becomes more annoying.

But either way, I already said let there be choice.

[MusicallyInspired]

For you. There's a feigned sense of actual real danger to your playing experience if you haven't saved and you die. That's challenging. You're a lot more timid and nervous about things (which immerses you more into the experience) if you know you could die at any moment (as much as in real life) if you do something silly or make a mistake. If you die without a save it's like you actually died and you have to start over. It's very similar to any arcade game. If you're smart enough to save, however, you get to continue.

The way I see it, if there's going to be a retry or autosave function then why have deaths at all? That sense of danger is completely gone and it turns into a simple puzzle game.

So, make it a choice.

[SHODANFreeman]

For you. There's a feigned sense of actual real danger to your playing experience if you haven't saved and you die. That's challenging. You're a lot more timid and nervous about things (which immerses you more into the experience) if you know you could die at any moment (as much as in real life) if you do something silly or make a mistake. If you die without a save it's like you actually died and you have to start over. It's very similar to any arcade game. If you're smart enough to save, however, you get to continue.

The way I see it, if there's going to be a retry or autosave function then why have deaths at all? That sense of danger is completely gone and it turns into a simple puzzle game.

It's less a sense of danger for me and more a sense of "God, I am sick of hitting save after every other step I take." The way deaths worked in 302 was perfect for me.

[thesporkman]

You don't need to save after every step you take. Just save after you've done something important, i.e. after you've done something that increases your score, or before attempting something that might be risky. If the only progress you've lost is walking around and looking at things, then you haven't actually lost any progress at all. And if you do lose significant progress, it isn't actually that bad to replay it. It goes much faster after you've already figured out what to do.

[SHODANFreeman]

You don't need to save after every step you take. Just save after you've done something important, i.e. after you've done something that increases your score, or before attempting something that might be risky. If the only progress you've lost is walking around and looking at things, then you haven't actually lost any progress at all. And if you do lose significant progress, it isn't actually that bad to replay it. It goes much faster after you've already figured out what to do.

It's still a mostly unnecessary annoyance. The only tangible difference between auto-saving after you solve a puzzle and manual save is that you have to poke around on a save menu constantly with manual saves.

[thesporkman]

It's still a mostly unnecessary annoyance. The only tangible difference between auto-saving after you solve a puzzle and manual save is that you have to poke around on a save menu constantly with manual saves.

I kind of agree, actually. An experienced adventure gamer will automatically save as a sort of mechanical Pavlovian reaction anyway. It's not really a matter of skill or strategy. It's like periodically saving a text document you're working on in case something screws up; it's just kind of a good idea, and a prudent person knows to do so. If the games were really meant to be cruel and difficult, they wouldn't let you save at all, like their arcade and action game contemporaries that would send you all the way back to the beginning if you died. Most other game genres have check points and autosaves now, and those seem like a reasonable thing to include in adventure games too. Since King's Quest is a nostalgic franchise, and fans expect nostalgic gameplay from it, though, I think Telltale should definitely give the player a choice.

[MusicallyInspired]

I wouldn't mind autosaves as long as they didn't kick in RIGHT before you die. That's basically a "retry" which makes deaths minor annoyances and pointless. I wouldn't mind if it autosaved once you reached a new area (not a new screen, a new area) or maybe after you receive a point or find an important item or something.

[wilco64256]

I wouldn't mind autosaves as long as they didn't kick in RIGHT before you die. That's basically a "retry" which makes deaths minor annoyances and pointless. I wouldn't mind if it autosaved once you reached a new area (not a new screen, a new area) or maybe after you receive a point or find an important item or something.

Which is why I absolutely HATED the newer Tomb Raider games and the Uncharted Games. If I screw up and the game only backs me up like ten seconds then it takes all the pressure off me to play properly.

As opposed to something like Demon's Souls where if you screw up you could potentially lose hours of hard work.

[Radogol]

Which is why I absolutely HATED the newer Tomb Raider games and the Uncharted Games. If I screw up and the game only backs me up like ten seconds then it takes all the pressure off me to play properly.

There's still plenty incentive to play properly. Anybody can finish an Uncharted game, but it still takes a lot of skill and effort to complete it on a high difficulty level and with decent "score". That, to me, is the best of both worlds.

[wilco64256]

There's still plenty incentive to play properly. Anybody can finish an Uncharted game, but it still takes a lot of skill and effort to complete it on a high difficulty level and with decent "score". That, to me, is the best of both worlds.

Yeah see I want a game to challenge me because it's a challenging game, not because I set the difficulty setting higher. There's a difference between a challenging game and a difficult game.

[Radogol]

Yeah see I want a game to challenge me because it's a challenging game, not because I set the difficulty setting higher.

This statement baffles me to the point where I'm at loss for words. Well played.

[wilco64256]

This statement baffles me to the point where I'm at loss for words. Well played.

I think what you're missing here is my point that there's a huge difference between a game being a good challenge and it being difficult just because there's a setting I can change so that the enemies do a ridiculous amount of damage to me. Making the ghosts travel ten times faster in Pacman might make it more difficult, but that's not a "better" challenge.

In the same light, I don't see how increasing the "difficulty" setting on Uncharted makes it any better. It doesn't change the mechanics of how the game plays at all.

[Radogol]

Uncharted gives you all the tools you need to complete each level without a scratch. If a player can't complete an encounter on Crushing, that's because his skill is insufficient, not because the game is unfair.

[SHODANFreeman]

I think what you're missing here is my point that there's a huge difference between a game being a good challenge and it being difficult just because there's a setting I can change so that the enemies do a ridiculous amount of damage to me. Making the ghosts travel ten times faster in Pacman might make it more difficult, but that's not a "better" challenge.

In the same light, I don't see how increasing the "difficulty" setting on Uncharted makes it any better. It doesn't change the mechanics of how the game plays at all.

How is being sent back to play through the same area you've already completed earlier more challenging than raising the difficulty to the point that you have to play extremely carefully to avoid being killed?

[MusicallyInspired]

Becuase you obviously don't want to go back to play through the areas you've played through already. This goes back to my earlier point. There's a danger to your accomplishments up to that point. If you haven't saved you're going to lose it. In an FPS this isn't necessary, but it is crucial (for some of us) to the experience of an adventure game.

This is really a mindset thing and how specific people look at adventures. I doubt people with an opinion like yours, Shodan, will even understand it. (that was in no way a jab or an insult) That's why I ask for a choice.

[wilco64256]

Becuase you obviously don't want to go back to play through the areas you've played through already. This goes back to my earlier point. There's a danger to your accomplishments up to that point. If you haven't saved you're going to lose it. In an FPS this isn't necessary, but it is crucial (for some of us) to the experience of an adventure game.

This is really a mindset thing and how specific people look at adventures. I doubt people with an opinion like yours, Shodan, will even understand it. (that was in no way a jab or an insult) That's why I ask for a choice.

This right here, it's just a different mindset about what makes a game good. If a good game to you is one that just changes the damage variables so that you die 600 times in every area that's totally fine. That's just different from what some other people consider to be a proper challenge.

[Radogol]

If a good game to you is one that just changes the damage variables so that you die 600 times in every area that's totally fine. That's just different from what some other people consider to be a proper challenge.

Don't be such a patronizing dick. The generalizations are uncalled for.

[wilco64256]

Don't be such a patronizing dick. The generalizations are uncalled for.

Wow, easy tiger. It's perfectly okay to have a difference of opinion but there's no need for you to start calling names.

[puzzlebox]

Hey guys, keep it classy here.

As for in-game deaths - I just don't like to see my character die, and that's enough to create a sense of "danger" for me. Dying feels like failure. Sure, I'll poke the wasp's nest just to see what happens, but I'll probably only do it once (unless it leads to an amusing death that begs repeated viewings).

Manual saves don't really add anything to the experience for me, so I'm all for KQVII-style "try again" popups. I sure don't mind if the player gets to choose autosave frequency, but I'd be going the least manual route.

[chucklas]

But imagine leaving in deaths and dead-ends...etc. You have to play the game in such a way that you are trying to prevent these things from occurring. To me that makes a great challenge. If you remove those elements, it makes it so you can't play on if you haven't done everything right to that point. Why not let the adventurer decide if he thinks that he is ready, and if he is not, lets hope he saved just in case. That to me makes a great sense of adventure and challenge. In KQVI I wouldn't go into the catacombs unless I felt confident that I had everything that I needed, and if I forgot something, I would be screwed. But I save before going in just in case. I don't know how anyone can see a problem with that design, but then again, everyone doesn't think like me. That is why having difficulty settings makes sense. No one is the same in what they like or how they think.

[wilco64256]

Yeah see the difference between having to do your own saving and the whole autosaving thing is that an autosave takes (just my opinion) all of the challenge out of a game by showing you exactly where you screwed up. If you have to do all your own saving then it takes a lot more thought and planning on the player's part to figure out what's going wrong when they get stuck or die.

[ScreamingFalcon]

How about a pop up option asking the player the style they'd like to play under? Like asking them if they'd like to play the "Classic Sierra" way (Save Early, Save Often), the "Modern Sierra" way (reversible death, KQ7-esqe), or the "TTG/LucasArts" way (the only reason to save is incase of power failure)?

[wilco64256]

How about a pop up option asking the player the style they'd like to play under? Like asking them if they'd like to play the "Classic Sierra" way (Save Early, Save Often), the "Modern Sierra" way (reversible death, KQ7-esqe), or the "TTG/LucasArts" way (the only reason to save is incase of power failure)?

The main problem I see with that is it's extra work to code multiple methods into a game like that and I don't really see Telltale wanting to spend that time or effort required to do so. They do the games and get them out the door. I'd love to see that, but I don't expect it at all.

[SHODANFreeman]

the "TTG/LucasArts" way (the only reason to save is incase of power failure)?

LucasArts games never had auto-save. :p

[ScreamingFalcon]

LucasArts games never had auto-save. :p

True, but my statement still holds true. The only game from LucasArts (LucasFilms Games as it was known at the time) that I can recall that you could actually die (or be captured, as was the case) in was the first one, Maniac Mansion.

[Lambonius]

True, but my statement still holds true. The only game from LucasArts (LucasFilms Games as it was known at the time) that I can recall that you could actually die (or be captured, as was the case) in was the first one, Maniac Mansion.

The Indy games, too. Zak McKracken also had its fair share of dead ends.

[ScreamingFalcon]

The Indy games, too. Zak McKracken also had its fair share of dead ends.

Meh, never much of a LucasArts fan back in the day.

[SHODANFreeman]

True, but my statement still holds true. The only game from LucasArts (LucasFilms Games as it was known at the time) that I can recall that you could actually die (or be captured, as was the case) in was the first one, Maniac Mansion.

If you stayed underwater for 10 minutes in the first Monkey Island, the game would become unwinnable, too.

[Chyron8472]

Yeah see the difference between having to do your own saving and the whole autosaving thing is that an autosave takes (just my opinion) all of the challenge out of a game by showing you exactly where you screwed up. If you have to do all your own saving then it takes a lot more thought and planning on the player's part to figure out what's going wrong when they get stuck or die.

This.

I want a Restore/Restart/Quit screen. If I have an an autosave function, I want to it only save at various checkpoints or when I get a point for doing something. I don't want to go right back to before I died. I voted for having a choice.

Shodan, you've played too many LucasArts games and too few Sierra games to understand the value of making the player save early, save often and be careful about overwriting ealier savegames.

In KQ3, you're made to walk down the mountain at least once to get to town. If you fell off the mountain and the game gave you a Retry screen and put you right exactly next to where you fell, then there would be no feeling of precariousness. There would be no thought of "oh, crap I hope I don't fall... maybe I should save right here so I don't have to walk all the way down again if I die."

Also, say you're playing KQ6 and wandering the catacombs. If you walk into a room with a trapfloor, die and get a Retry screen, you would be put in the room immediately before you walked into the trap. Such a thing would drastically reduce the feeling of peril you get from playing the game.

But if you don't want the feeling of peril, then fine. I voted for choice anyway.

[MusicallyInspired]

If you stayed underwater for 10 minutes in the first Monkey Island, the game would become unwinnable, too.

Wasn't there also a dead end where you could waste all your pieces of eight on the Grog machine or something?

[icedan]

Programming wise, I'd imagine the easiest method would be to have a switchable auto-save feature. Saving the game manually comes as default, so no extra programming needed there. All we need really is an option for those who don't like dying and loading a save from 10 minutes ago.

The auto-save feature will enable the game to save when you do something that kills you and puts you back right before you made that deadly action. Unfortunately, this method would probably not work under timed events or falling.

Although I like how LucasArts handled deaths in Monkey Island, it's just not fitting for Kings Quest.

Lastly, Space Quest 3 Deaths ftw

[Scnew]

Although I like how LucasArts handled deaths in Monkey Island, it's just not fitting for Kings Quest.


Err, handled deaths by not having them? (10 minute one doesn't count)

[SHODANFreeman]

Wasn't there also a dead end where you could waste all your pieces of eight no the Grog machine or something?

I think so, and I think there was also one where you could burn all of your items on the ship and be unable to light the cannon.

Err, handled deaths by not having them? (10 minute one doesn't count)

He dies in MI2, also, and it cuts back to him and Elaine with a "wait that's not how it happened" moment.

[thesporkman]

So... so far this poll shows that 20 people are pro-choice and 12 are pro-life.

Yeah, I went there. Sorry. :p

[Mr. Freeze]

I voted other. I think it should be A, with an unskippable warning at the beginning of the game that informs you that there may be surprise deaths and that you should save frequently.

[icedan]

Err, handled deaths by not having them? (10 minute one doesn't count)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENeRZEnn2Fc

enjoy

[Brainiac]

Wasn't there also a dead end where you could waste all your pieces of eight on the Grog machine or something?

I dead-ended on the ship once myself (I hadn't gotten the map in Chapter One and wound up with nothing to turn into a flaming mass).

[GuruGuru214]

The Indy games, too. Zak McKracken also had its fair share of dead ends.

Both of them? I thought only The Last Crusade had dead ends. I thought every game starting with Loom was impossible to make unwinnable.

[Lambonius]

Both of them? I thought only The Last Crusade had dead ends. I thought every game starting with Loom was impossible to make unwinnable.

No no, I was saying that in the Indy games, you could DIE. I wasn't talking about putting the game in an unwinnable state.

Zak McKracken was the only Lucasfilm game that I can think of that really had bad dead ends in it. I'm actually pretty sure there are no true dead ends in Last Crusade. The original Maniac Mansion may have had some dead ends in it, too, but I can't really remember.

[GuruGuru214]

I don't know, I'd consider it pretty damn impossible to win a game when you're dead.

[Lambonius]

I don't know, I'd consider it pretty damn impossible to win a game when you're dead.

Well you could definitely die in Fate of Atlantis. You could be shot, killed in fights, fall prey to booby traps, eaten by a giant octopus, fall into a pool of lava, etc. :)

[StarEye]

I like how the thread title emphasises that we're talking about "in-game" deaths. I'd like to know how a game could handle any other kind of deaths. :D

[Chyron8472]

I dead-ended on the ship once myself (I hadn't gotten the map in Chapter One and wound up with nothing to turn into a flaming mass).

Nothing? you can turn Stan's card(s) or the cereal box top or various other things into a flaming mass. You don't need the map for that.

[Lambonius]

Nothing? you can turn Stan's card(s) or the cereal box top or various other things into a flaming mass. You don't need the map for that.

Yeah, I always used the feather pen from the captain's quarters.

[SHODANFreeman]

Nothing? you can turn Stan's card(s) or the cereal box top or various other things into a flaming mass. You don't need the map for that.

Yeah, I always used the feather pen from the captain's quarters.

You can put all of those into the cooking pot.

[MusicallyInspired]

IIRC, in the first releases of Monkey Island you could only use one or two objects to create the flaming mass.

[antoniomsg]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENeRZEnn2Fc

enjoy

But that's a spoof of the deaths in the Sierra games.

[SHODANFreeman]

IIRC, in the first releases of Monkey Island you could only use one or two objects to create the flaming mass.

I think one of the ways this was (partially) fixed was that you eventually get an infinite stack of Stan's business cards, since he gives you one every time you leave, but if you know what you're doing, you never get enough business cards for the infinite stack to happen.

[Brainiac]

You can put all of those into the cooking pot.

And that's why it can be a dead end. It's possible to put everything that you can turning into the flaming mass into the cooking pot before finally setting off the spell and thus being trapped just off the coast of Monkey Island. I'm pretty certain it's doable in any version of the game since I did it in the Monkey Madness CD edition (I never tested for it in the Special Edition, but I'd bet it's still possible there as well).

Now that I've said that you are correct and thus confirmed your superiority, SHODANFreeman, may I please be given a free pass for when you finally snap and kill us all? Between your handle and your avatar, I seriously fear for my life. ;)

[Radogol]

(I never tested for it in the Special Edition, but I'd bet it's still possible there as well).

How much are you willing to bet?

It was removed in the Special Edition.

[Chyron8472]

And that's why it can be a dead end. It's possible to put everything that you can turning into the flaming mass into the cooking pot before finally setting off the spell and thus being trapped just off the coast of Monkey Island. I'm pretty certain it's doable in any version of the game since I did it in the Monkey Madness CD edition (I never tested for it in the Special Edition, but I'd bet it's still possible there as well).

I still think there has to be something you can burn even after making the spell. If you're saying the flaming mass burns out over time (which I haven't confirmed yet) I still think there's something of inventory you can acquire while on the ship that you still can get enough of after the spell (perhaps rope or cereal) to make a flaming mass, and that you simply hadn't tried enough things to burn.


It was removed in the Special Edition.

What was removed?

[Brainiac]

I still think there has to be something you can burn even after making the spell. If you're saying the flaming mass burns out over time (which I haven't confirmed yet) I still think there's something of inventory you can acquire while on the ship that you still can get enough of after the spell (perhaps rope or cereal) to make a flaming mass, and that you simply hadn't tried enough things to burn.

You can add extra ingredients to the pot without destroying the spell. As long as you hold on to one required item until the end, you can put everything that's burnable in the pot and thus create a dead end. The rope can't be used (it's an infinite fuse source only) and the cereal isn't flammable. The big error I think is that the two unnecessary pieces of literature (the ones not about getting ahead in navigation) can't be used either (I think because making it that obvious which one is important would spoil the joke).

What was removed?

That very dead end, apparently. Feel free to test it. In order to duplicate my conditions as closely as possible, you must NOT get an endless number of business cards from Stan, you can NOT buy the dance map, and finally you have to put everything you can into the cooking pot before adding the last necessary ingredient to trigger the spell.

[Cojo the Monkey]

So...uh...why does there have to be the potential for death again?

Yeah, I get it, death is a part of the old Sierra games, but I always thought one strength of Lucasarts above Sierra was that the player wasn't penalized for exploring, and it seems like the Telltale developers subscribe to that philosophy.

For crying out loud, in KQ5, there were so many instances of bad game design I almost quit playing it in the middle. Merely walking into the pub gets you killed - not throwing a boot at the cat - etc.

As long as they have some type of maze, I'm happy.

[MusicallyInspired]

Because in King's Quest you were penalized for all your actions. That was part of it. That was the idea. You're in a whole dangerous world with consequences. It was risky. And it was exciting.

[Radogol]

In order to duplicate my conditions as closely as possible, you must NOT get an endless number of business cards from Stan, you can NOT buy the dance map, and finally you have to put everything you can into the cooking pot before adding the last necessary ingredient to trigger the spell.

Wait, you may be right after all. But how can you not buy the map and still find the treasure?

The Grog machine dead end was removed for sure.

[SHODANFreeman]

Now that I've said that you are correct and thus confirmed your superiority, SHODANFreeman, may I please be given a free pass for when you finally snap and kill us all? Between your handle and your avatar, I seriously fear for my life. ;)

No free passes left, unfortunately, but I do still have a 50% off coupon, if you're interested in that. :p

Wait, you may be right after all. But how can you not buy the map and still find the treasure?

The Grog machine dead end was removed for sure.

You can find the treasure after following the shopkeeper into the forest, as you're no longer restricted from going in.

[Radogol]

You can find the treasure after following the shopkeeper into the forest, as you're no longer restricted from going in.

By stumbling around randomly? Is that even mathematically possible?

You're never restricted from going in.

[MusicallyInspired]

Yes, you are. If you try to go in before getting the map or following the shopkeeper Guybrush refuses to go in the forest after a couple screens unless he has "...some kind of guide or something."

[Armakuni]

For me, the ideal solution would be to include lots of deaths, just as in earlier Kings Quest games... but have an (optional!) autosave where the game will automatically save whenever you reach somewhere potentially dangerous.

They could even include a third option that simply allowed to you to press 'continue' whenever you died and simply keep playing, but that would have to be OPTIONAL!

But yeah, as long as those things are fully optional, I wouldn't mind at all.

I can't imagine it being very difficult to implement, either.

EDIT - One more thought regarding this - if Sierra was still around, and still making adventure games... I have to admit I'm doubtful they themselves would have continued their old trend of lots of deaths everywhere you go. Maybe they would, but I think chances are they would have changed a lot of things you find in their classic, old games.
Well, who knows, and pretty irrelevant anyway.

[SHODANFreeman]

By stumbling around randomly? Is that even mathematically possible?

The path is the same every time, so once you know the forest, you hardly need the map to find the treasure.

[Chyron8472]

By stumbling around randomly? Is that even mathematically possible?

What do you mean randomly? Back left right, Left right back, Right left back (cha cha cha!)

It's not random.

[Brainiac]

No free passes left, unfortunately, but I do still have a 50% off coupon, if you're interested in that. :p

That depends; do I get to pick which half? :cool:

Anyways, like everyone's said, the forest becomes open to Guybrush after you get the map or follow the shopkeeper. Both the Sword Master and the X marking the spot (don't tell Indiana) are always in the same place. As such, the map is not necessary, even on your first playthrough if you wander enough.

[Chyron8472]

tbh, on my very first playthrough I found the Sword Master quite by accident. I didn't even realize you could follow the storekeeper until I read about it somewhere later.

[Radogol]

In the immortal words of Brandon Blume, "I can admit when I'm wrong". I was wrong.

[Blackthorne519]

Well, I say give all the options - but, as a reward, you get a different ending with each level of difficulty. If you have the easy Auto-Save route, the ending is standard. With the medium (occasional Auto-Save?) difficulty, you get a special bonus ending - and with the third, Classic Hard (No Save) mode, you get the best ending with all the bells and whistles. It gives incentive to play it at the harder levels.


Bt

[SHODANFreeman]

Well, I say give all the options - but, as a reward, you get a different ending with each level of difficulty. If you have the easy Auto-Save route, the ending is standard. With the medium (occasional Auto-Save?) difficulty, you get a special bonus ending - and with the third, Classic Hard (No Save) mode, you get the best ending with all the bells and whistles. It gives incentive to play it at the harder levels.


Bt

Annoying =/= hard.

[MusicallyInspired]

Deaths =/= annoying.

[Brainiac]

Annoying =/= hard.

Deaths =/= annoying.

Both inequalities = subjective statements.

[MusicallyInspired]

Brainiac's post = my whole point.

[SHODANFreeman]

Deaths =/= annoying.

I'm not saying deaths are annoying, I'm saying removing auto-save and forcing people to manually save is annoying, and not beneficial in any way to the game experience, nor does it in any tangible way increase difficulty.

[wilco64256]

I'm not saying deaths are annoying, I'm saying removing auto-save and forcing people to manually save is annoying, and not beneficial in any way to the game experience, nor does it in any tangible way increase difficulty.

But if a game handles saving in any situation that requires it, where's the pressure on the player to pay attention to anything? You can just wander along totally carelessly knowing that the game is holding your hand in case anything bad happens. Personally I prefer having to be responsible for covering my own tracks.

[Lambonius]

I'm not saying deaths are annoying, I'm saying removing auto-save and forcing people to manually save is annoying, and not beneficial in any way to the game experience, nor does it in any tangible way increase difficulty.

The whole point of death in any type of game, not just adventure, is to provide negative consequences for the player's careless actions. In an adventure game, it is careless to go through large sections of the game without saving. In a shooter, it is careless to run through large sections of the game without enough health, or without stopping to heal (actually I hate the magic recharge system from current shooters, but that's another story.) If you remove the consequences of careless play, you remove the player's responsibility to play the game intelligently. I'd say that is a pretty darn blatant decrease of difficulty.

[SHODANFreeman]

But if a game handles saving in any situation that requires it, where's the pressure on the player to pay attention to anything? You can just wander along totally carelessly knowing that the game is holding your hand in case anything bad happens. Personally I prefer having to be responsible for covering my own tracks.

The whole point of death in any type of game, not just adventure, is to provide negative consequences for the player's careless actions. In an adventure game, it is careless to go through large sections of the game without saving. In a shooter, it is careless to run through large sections of the game without enough health, or without stopping to heal (actually I hate the magic recharge system from current shooters, but that's another story.) If you remove the consequences of careless play, you remove the player's responsibility to play the game intelligently. I'd say that is a pretty darn blatant decrease of difficulty.

If you can hit save at any point on your own, then all it is doing by removing auto-save is removing convenience. Nothing is getting harder except your ability to continue enjoying the game uninterrupted because you have to keep jabbing a save menu any time you accomplish anything significant. Also, no one on earth is going to just wildly charge through levels just because auto-save exists. The incentive to play intelligently is already present in the form of the desire to not repeatedly fail the same thing for hours on end.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'm not saying deaths are annoying, I'm saying removing auto-save and forcing people to manually save is annoying, and not beneficial in any way to the game experience, nor does it in any tangible way increase difficulty.

And I'm saying leaving in an autosave is not a real death.

If you can hit save at any point on your own, then all it is doing by removing auto-save is removing convenience. Nothing is getting harder except your ability to continue enjoying the game uninterrupted because you have to keep jabbing a save menu any time you accomplish anything significant.

Yes, but then it's your responsibility and not that of the game itself. I think the argument here is mostly that we believe the gamer has too much convenience as it is. Yes, we believe that is part of the gameplay experience. It's psychological and it matters. Why should I care about what actions I take if the game won't let me fail? But the moment you do care about your actions the game becomes a lot more real, engaging, and ultimately a lot more fulfilling in the end.

[SHODANFreeman]

And I'm saying leaving in an autosave is not a real death.



Yes, but then it's your responsibility and not that of the game itself. I think the argument here is mostly that we believe the gamer has too much convenience as it is. Yes, we believe that is part of the gameplay experience. It's psychological and it matters. Why should I care about what actions I take if the game won't let me fail? But the moment you do care about your actions the game becomes a lot more real, engaging, and ultimately a lot more fulfilling in the end.

How does this change if you can save whenever you want? You can just save, do random stupid crap, and reload, any time you want, so why does it make a difference if the game throws in a few auto-saves after you complete a section of the game or not? If you were arguing in favor of static save points (as in Resident Evil, or Dead Space) rather than constantly-available-manual-save, I could see your point, but currently, I am honestly confused as to how forcing you to interact with an immersion-destroying menu at all times is something you are seeing as a good thing.

[MusicallyInspired]

Yes, you can save whenever you want. The game can't. That's a big difference. A huge difference. It's psychological. No, it doesn't make much sense especially with the way you're describing it, but it's true. And everything you're saying is absolutely correct. But that's the way the human mind operates. I just believe that the gamer should be responsible for the safety and continuation of his own gameplay because that adds more realism than staying immersed without having to exit to a menu does. Otherwise I just don't see the point because you just wouldn't care WHAT you do if you can't fail. It's a psychological fact that if one believes they receive no consequences for their actions (or if they don't care about those consequences) they don't care what they do. Because they don't have the responsibility. It's an extreme example but it's the perfect way to explain it.

And I don't see escaping to the menu "all the time" (I don't believe it's "all the time," either, you're exaggerating here) being distracting or "immersion-breaking." If you know what you're doing and you're being careful enough it becomes part of the gaming experience and you never even have to do it that often. I don't mind saving manually at all. I can't stand any game that saves for you. Checkpoint FPS's drive me insane, for instance. I love me my quick save keys.

Basically, I believe that the frustration that comes from losing game time due to death and no automatic saving is frustration with you the player, not the game. It's not the game's fault. It shouldn't be the one looking out for you. But everybody wants everything done for them all the time. But this has proven to be completely unfulfilling in every facet of life. You only truly enjoy something when you've done it yourself. Again, extreme examples but it's all the same and it certainly applies to video games. I just believe video games today cause gamers to be extremely lazy. Take BTTF. You don't even have to think to get through the game!

[Armakuni]

Yeah, as much as it might sound like just an unneccessary hassle to have to save manually, there really is a difference in how it feels to play.
I think it's essential to leave this optional.

The problem having the game automatically save whenever danger lurks is that it's so easy to get into a pattern of not caring if you die and just going ahead at full speed, which completely changes the atmosphere as you now feel perfectly safe at all times.
A bit how I feel about health automatically recharging in modern FPS games as opposed to good old health kits, but now I'm going too far off topic :p

Anyway, strange as it might sound, even though you can save manually whenever you want, it really does *feel* very different somehow, and this also allows you to choose how often you wish to save... you might want to let some time pass in between saves, I often do that in games... I used to save every 5 seconds but now I find it more fun to space them out a bit more (though I still do 'save early, save often', just not *as* often :p).

Anyway, rambling on as usual, but having a traditional save system should definitely be an option, and I can't see why it shouldn't be - I find it hard to imagine implementing an option like that could take very much effort on Telltales end.

Something I'm even more worried about though is - Telltale not including many deaths at all. Have they given any official statement on this? I can easily imagine a scenario where they decided to cut that specific part of what is very much what makes up Kings Quest, in a misguided attempt to make them more playable.

[MusicallyInspired]

A bit how I feel about health automatically recharging in modern FPS games as opposed to good old health kits, but now I'm going too far off topic :p

Yes! I hate that! :) People may think they want to have certain features that do things for them (and unfortunately game developers deliver this *cough*nowalkinginjurassicpark*cough*) but ultimately the end result turns out to be extremely mediocre eventually as a result. Look at games like Call of Duty. They're not popular and the best selling games because of the checkpoint-laden single player campaigns (which are barely anything to speak of and are simply comprised of the same drivel over and over again). It's the multiplayer. Because that's the only way they can derive a new experience from the game; by playing with other human players. Most FPS games now are multiplayer games with a single player campaign tagged on as opposed to the other way around (the way it should be). And when you think about it, the relation of this being fun to an adventure game with deaths and no autosaves being fun is the human factor which is the only reliably varying factor in the entire equation. Human interactivity is what makes games fun. Whether it be just one person being responsible for most of his own gameplay in a game world, or playing with another human being in an otherwise completely structured and "choice-safe" FPS multiplayer game.

I'm rambling as well...

[SHODANFreeman]

Being forced to even restart a single fight in a game is enough frustration for me to play to the best of my ability at all times. Furthermore, Amnesia uses an auto-save system, and I'm still scared to death of every noise and wet myself when I hear an enemy. Auto-save has no effect on my desire to do well in a game, and I think it's a ridiculous claim. I do not know anyone who would intentionally half-ass a game just because they knew it auto-saved regularly. No one wants to lose or die if they have any say in the matter, period.

Also, if a game has auto-save and manual save, and you don't want to use auto-save, just don't reload an auto-saved game. :p

[MusicallyInspired]

At that point it's too much work to AVOID the autosave feature, which to me breaks the immersion.

This just proves that everybody has a valid opinion and nothing is a ridiculous claim. In short, it should be optional, which is what I've been arguing all along. I only keep on because you keep trying to prove how it's pointless and invalid when it in fact isn't.

[wilco64256]

Also, no one on earth is going to just wildly charge through levels just because auto-save exists. The incentive to play intelligently is already present in the form of the desire to not repeatedly fail the same thing for hours on end.

That's exactly how I (and a lot of other people) played through Tomb Raider Legend, Tomb Raider Underworld, and both Drake's Fortune games. There's not even any actual need for health packs in the TR games because if you get low on health all you have to do is die and the game gives you a brand new full health bar.

[SHODANFreeman]

In short, it should be optional, which is what I've been arguing all along. I only keep on because you keep trying to prove how it's pointless and invalid when it in fact isn't.

I've said it should be an option the entire time, I completely agree that more options = better, I'm just trying to decipher why it makes a difference to anyone if you save after a boss fight/new section of the game, or if the game does it for you.

That's exactly how I (and a lot of other people) played through Tomb Raider Legend, Tomb Raider Underworld, and both Drake's Fortune games. There's not even any actual need for health packs in the TR games because if you get low on health all you have to do is die and the game gives you a brand new full health bar.

Why would you intentionally ruin the experience for yourself by playing like a careless idiot, just because you are able to? How is it fun to play a game intentionally as stupidly as possible, dying over and over and over just so you can later complain that auto-save made you do it? I just don't understand this mentality.

[Blackthorne519]

If you're really looking for "immersion", you shouldn't be able to "save" at all. Because you can't save and reload in life, man!


Bt

[SHODANFreeman]

If you're really looking for "immersion", you shouldn't be able to "save" at all. Because you can't save and reload in life, man!


Bt

That's how most games worked in the NES era, but then again, most NES games are less than 1-2 hrs long from start to finish if you know what you're doing. In games that are anywhere from 10 to 100 hours long, saving is kind of a necessity. :p

[thom-22]

It's psychological. No, it doesn't make much sense especially with the way you're describing it, but it's true. And everything you're saying is absolutely correct. But that's the way the human mind operates.

It's funny how this is, like you say, it's psychological. The logic behind what SHODANFreeman is saying is airtight, and yet if given the choice, I would choose to manage my own saves and face the consequences. But it's hard to explain why...

Some other haphazard thoughts on the topic:

While it's fine for a poll, I don't think presenting users with three different, somewhat related choices would work well -- as a sometimes software designer, I can tell you that's usually just bad user experience. And realistically, knowing Telltale, I'd have to guess the game will, by default, offer a "Try Again" button that just puts the player right back to before where the death occurred (as in KQ7). Like most everyone else here, I hope they include some alternate choice for old-school players. Maybe a setting that would change the death screen to have only a "Reload" button instead of "Try Again"? That's just off the top of my head, as something that sounds straightforward and not too difficult to implement.

I also think that the circumstances of in-game deaths might influence how they're handled. For instance, if all of the deaths can be reasonably anticipated by players, then that might suggest one way of handling them that might not be best for a game where deaths are more random. (Personally, I've always thought KQ was about the former and not random, but it seems to get accused of having random deaths more often than is warranted.)

Finally, I hope that the possibility of death is given the same tone as it was in the original games, that deaths aren't turned into some kind of inside joke or parody, or a gimmick meant to appease KQ fans.

[Chyron8472]

I've said it should be an option the entire time, I completely agree that more options = better, I'm just trying to decipher why it makes a difference to anyone if you save after a boss fight/new section of the game, or if the game does it for you.


Have you played KQ6? Have you played KQ7?

Don't you see how being responsible for the proper continuation of your own gameplay after death increases the suspense and realism?

In KQ6, if you go blundering about the Island of the Beast, and click on the area where the gardener is without paying attention, you get skewered through the chest by a stone arrow. I was on a fast playthrough of the game once and accidentally clicked in the upper area of the screen. "Oh, damn." I believe is what I would have said.

If in KQ7, such a thing were to happen, the only thing I would emote is a mild =\ because the game will start you right back before you died with zero consequences for your carelessness.

In my opinion, having a Retry option that loads the game to a point immediately before death provides no more challenge or suspense than having no death at all. This isn't to say that I don't like Monkey Island. I do. I'm saying that KQ7's difficulty is on par with Monkey Island whereas the earlier KQ games up the bar on suspense, immersion and difficulty by forcing you to personally take consequences for being needlessly careless. They force you to pay attention. If you don't, you may die. If you die, you may have to go back a ways because you didn't take the time to save your progress recently.

KQ's way of treating death isn't better or worse than MI, it's just different. The KQ series (largely) treats death with far more consequence than the MI series does, and as the KQ series is known for having such a method of gameplay, I would prefer that this game have it also.



Again, I did vote for choice. I believe giving the gamer a choice would prevent alienating old school purists or casual gamers alike, even though I side with the former.

[joek86]

Here's some basic truth here, the manual saves weren't put in old adventure game to make them more difficult, it was a limitation of the era, nothing more. I prefer the KQVII style, where you had the deaths and retries. I don't like to save my game all the time, and if it's a good game, I want to keep playing, not constantly dealing with a save screen. That was one of the bad things about the old adventure games was that half your playthrough was spent dealing with the save system.

[MusicallyInspired]

It may have been merely a limitation, but it turned into the gameplay experience for a lot of people. The simple fact is that retry deaths make it too easy for a lot of people.

And personally I've never had to look at the save screen so much. I mean come on, even when you do it doesn't last long. You get to a new area you, press F5, type your save name, hit save. Done. The whole process lasts like 5 seconds if that.

I also think that the circumstances of in-game deaths might influence how they're handled. For instance, if all of the deaths can be reasonably anticipated by players, then that might suggest one way of handling them that might not be best for a game where deaths are more random. (Personally, I've always thought KQ was about the former and not random, but it seems to get accused of having random deaths more often than is warranted.)

Finally, I hope that the possibility of death is given the same tone as it was in the original games, that deaths aren't turned into some kind of inside joke or parody, or a gimmick meant to appease KQ fans.[/QUOTE]

Great points here.

[Armakuni]

Greatly reducing, removing entirely or altering in some drastic way (forced autosave, etc)... would in my opinion cause such a drastic change in how a Kings Quest game feels (goes for a lot of other Sierra series as well).

In fact, I think it goes so much against part of the 'essence' of these games that if they actually plan to cut deaths or alter them in some way to remove any sense of danger, then I can't help but wonder why they would pick a series like Kings Quest... why not another Lucasarts license, or any other of the many adventure game titles/franchises designed in this more 'user-friendly' manner already?

Maybe especially so with Kings Quest - in my opinion, the actual storylines were for the most part not all that interesting... not saying I didn't enjoy them, but in the case of Kings Quest, they were never my main reason for playing the games.
Neither were they particularly funny games... instead of any of that, the Kings Quest games rather seemed to rely on having the player feel like an actual adventurer/explorer... exploring the diverse landscapes that made up the games, feeling like you were on an 'old-fashioned' adventure, in many ways.
And an essential (!) part of that is exactly the feeling of danger surrounding you, nearly every step of the way.

Had the Kings Quest games been heavily story-driven, with deep and engaging storylines, then picking the series up even if planning to remove deaths... well, then it could maybe make a bit of sense, as that would mean one of the main reasons for playing the games would always have been the storylines, where (not saying it wouldn't change anything, of course) deaths might be less of an issue... you could probably write quite a tense and exciting storyline without necessarily having to rely on deaths (certainly you would not need the abundance of deaths you have in KQ games).

But yeah - that's not Kings Quest... Kings Quest 6 might have started going a bit in that direction, but for the most part, that never seemed to be the idea behind the games.

[SHODANFreeman]

So what you're saying is that it's more important that the game kills you and makes you lose any unsaved progress out of nowhere every 2 minutes than that the game has good puzzles and a worthwhile storyline?

[Armakuni]

No, I'm saying these games have never had particularly strong storylines, I think this is quite obvious. Not saying they're bad, just not that great.

I think I explained what I meant fairly well, you're somewhat strawmanning I think.

Whether or not unfair deaths bother me in games greatly depends on how they're implemented, in some games I find them quite humorous and entertaining.
But I don't believe I said they should necessarily include the very most unfair of deaths, ones where you don't even suspect there could be something dangerous.

I happen to find storylines very important in adventure games generally, I can also enjoy games like Kings Quest where the focus happens to be elsewhere, more so than in many other games anyway.

While the storylines aren't bad, the games often seem to let the story slide a bit to make room for other aspects... some of them have various degrees of non-linearity, and in many cases also allow them to put more very different stuff in there, some of which might have been sacrificed if storyline was the number one focus... as an example, the games can go from quite silly/childish fairy tale stuff to quite serious scenarios, in the very same game and in short periods of time as well.
Seeing as the storylines aren't written to be masterpieces in storytelling, and being as blatant about it as they were with most Kings Quest games, allows for these kinds of things much more easily - without it feeling totally out of place.

I'm sorry if you hate the idea of playing a game where the storyline isn't a masterpiece, but if that was of such importance to them, they should probably have picked something other than Kings Quest.

And puzzles are obviously important, that's a given. Sadly I fear this is another area these episodes might end up disappointing, I have my doubts we will have many particularly challenging puzzles here.

I worry that removing the sense of danger one usually is presented with when playing a Kings Quest game could very well make them dull.
Now, you can obviously argue what causes a game to have an atmosphere like this, you might very well think there are much better ways than including several ways to die.
Obviously having numerous ways to die is not the "be all end all"... it's merely one of the many ways a sense of danger is created, and one Kings Quest happens to have been using heavily, in my opinion for the better.
Anyway, to me this is such an integral part of the experience that I can't imagine it being the same if they change this too much.
When the decision is made to create games based on an existing franchise, it doesn't make sense to me to change any of the fundamental aspects of said franchise... then, as I already pointed out, why not simply pick some other series which is already closer to what you want to include in your games already.


EDIT - just one more thing I'd like to mention - while these games have lots of ways to die, and while a certain number of them are undeniably unfair (such as standing at the wrong side of the rock you push in Kings Quest 1 to reveal a dagger, which ends up crushing you... without hinting that this might happen), I still think it's been exaggerated a fair bit on these forums.
Generally speaking, I don't have much trouble avoiding most deaths in Kings Quest games, the main exception being puzzles where you're in immediate danger and have to figure out the solution before the monster/whatever it is ends up killing you... which I don't mind at all, puzzles of this nature would lose their 'punch' if you couldn't die.
And it's not that I'm such an expert at adventure games, a lot of the time it's simply quite obvious what will kill you.
The majority of times I die, even when I first played them, I did so on purpose just to see the resulting animations and oftentimes accompanying sarcastic message, etc.

It's not so much about actually dying all the time, it's more the feeling generated by having the possibility of dying present.

[coolguy721]

just add an option to turn them off

/thread

[Lambonius]

Armakuni is right on the money.

Unfortunately, I doubt Telltale has the balls to make a King's Quest game that does the series justice.

As for puzzle difficulty, I suggest four difficulty levels. From hardest to easiest, they would be: Sierra (difficult), Lucasarts (moderately difficult), Sam & Max Season 2 (moderately easy,) Back to the Future (so easy a braindead chimp could "solve" them.)

[MusicallyInspired]

As for puzzle difficulty, I suggest four difficulty levels. From hardest to easiest, they would be: Sierra (difficult), Lucasarts (moderately difficult), Sam & Max Season 2 (moderately easy,) Back to the Future (so easy a braindead chimp could "solve" them.)

Hahaha that would be so epic if they were actually named that.

[Sinaz20]

I voted other.

King's Quest lends itself a nice magical world in which the mechanic of saving could be embedded more into the actual fiction of the game.

We could use voluntary save points-- maybe Graham takes naps around magical wells (hypothetically.) At the same time, I'd want there to be a manual save system simply for the sake of being able to access any point of the game's progress for whatever reason the player wanted (like making a FAQ/Walkthrough or simple getting screen shots.)

I believe that King's Quest could be designed in such a way that the exploration was not only nonlinear, but backtracking would never be gated. So in one respect, I see a majority of the challenge comes from exploring and puzzling the relationships of inventory and environment. If you are missing something, go back and find it.

Meanwhile, peril can be designed into the environmental puzzles. The blind witch is in the house with you-- while you explore, you evade the witch. I could see that exploring the environment without the tools to solve the puzzle would cause the witch to become more and more aware of your presence. Lingering too long and fiddling with too much stuff would result in death. Difficulty levels would control how much you can get away with while exploring a dangerous situation.

Another hypothetical: there's a puzzle involving a dragon. You may already have a shield. The shield can take three streams of fire-breath before liquefying, causing you a painful death of molten steel and fire! Easier difficulty, the shield takes more consecutive attacks before failing. All the while, you are frantically putting inventory items in their place to solve the puzzle.

For whatever reason, I certainly don't want arbitrary surprise deaths. No looking into a hole and getting murdered for your curiosity. I would want peril broadcasted in some way and give you the option of daring to proceed or realizing you are ill-equipped.

Ultimately, I believe there is a lot of classic mechanics that can be brought into the modern era- given new purpose and execution without castrating the "Sierra" experience. And I think there is a way to do it where we accommodate a spectrum of player types.

[Lambonius]

I voted other.

King's Quest lends itself a nice magical world in which the mechanic of saving could be embedded more into the actual fiction of the game.

We could use voluntary save points-- maybe Graham takes naps around magical wells (hypothetically.) At the same time, I'd want there to be a manual save system simply for the sake of being able to access any point of the game's progress for whatever reason the player wanted (like making a FAQ/Walkthrough or simple getting screen shots.)

I believe that King's Quest could be designed in such a way that the exploration was not only nonlinear, but backtracking would never be gated. So in one respect, I see a majority of the challenge comes from exploring and puzzling the relationships of inventory and environment. If you are missing something, go back and find it.

Meanwhile, peril can be designed into the environmental puzzles. The blind witch is in the house with you-- while you explore, you evade the witch. I could see that exploring the environment without the tools to solve the puzzle would cause the witch to become more and more aware of your presence. Lingering too long and fiddling with too much stuff would result in death. Difficulty levels would control how much you can get away with while exploring a dangerous situation.

Another hypothetical: there's a puzzle involving a dragon. You may already have a shield. The shield can take three streams of fire-breath before liquefying, causing you a painful death of molten steel and fire! Easier difficulty, the shield takes more consecutive attacks before failing. All the while, you are frantically putting inventory items in their place to solve the puzzle.

For whatever reason, I certainly don't want arbitrary surprise deaths. No looking into a hole and getting murdered for your curiosity. I would want peril broadcasted in some way and give you the option of daring to proceed or realizing you are ill-equipped.

Ultimately, I believe there is a lot of classic mechanics that can be brought into the modern era- given new purpose and execution without castrating the "Sierra" experience. And I think there is a way to do it where we accommodate a spectrum of player types.

I agree with and like every one of these ideas. Good on ya.

[Bloody Eugene]

Sinaz20 is right.

[MusicallyInspired]

I like the idea of a countdown-to-your-death puzzle but not for ALL deaths. I really feel that the one-off deaths for carelessness are important as well.

[SHODANFreeman]

I really feel that the one-off deaths for carelessness are important as well.

The Sierra definition of carelessness is "doing anything ever" though.

[wilco64256]

The Sierra definition of carelessness is "doing anything ever" though.

Hardly. Standing downhill from a boulder and messing with it is a bad idea in the real world too.

[Lambonius]

Hardly. Standing downhill from a boulder and messing with it is a bad idea in the real world too.

Right, as is walking off the edge of a cliff or stepping into a rapidly flowing river when you don't know how deep it is. Sierra punished you for doing STUPID things in the game. The number of truly "surprise!" deaths has been greatly exaggerated by Sierra detractors over and over again. That's not to say that they weren't there, but they weren't nearly as common as people like to claim.

Personally, I would take great joy in being able to walk my character off a cliff in any Telltale game. :)

[Armakuni]

Hardly. Standing downhill from a boulder and messing with it is a bad idea in the real world too.
So are you telling me you could tell this boulder is situated on any kind of sloped terrain?

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c274/laffer/th_kq1rockdownhillornot.jpg (http://s29.photobucket.com/albums/c274/laffer/?action=view&current=kq1rockdownhillornot.jpg)

[wilco64256]

So are you telling me you could tell this boulder is situated on any kind of sloped terrain?

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c274/laffer/th_kq1rockdownhillornot.jpg (http://s29.photobucket.com/albums/c274/laffer/?action=view&current=kq1rockdownhillornot.jpg)

Yep, that's clearly uphill. Everything in Daventry is uphill if you're going North and downhill if you're going South.

[Armakuni]

Oh yeah, obviously! Somehow I always missed that :eek::eek::D

[MusicallyInspired]

lol Sierra logic.

[wilco64256]

Also note that if it were downhill simple physics state that the rock would have gone the other way when rocked loose. It certainly wouldn't roll uphill to kill Graham.

Makes about as much sense as the fact that one can apparently never actually physically leave Daventry by walking, which makes me wonder how they ever had wars with anyone.

[Armakuni]

If you've read another post I wrote some days ago, about your favourite Kings Quest moments, I actually listed that very thing with the boulder as my favourite moment from Kings Quest 1 :D

It's the most memorable moment for me, I laughed so hard when the game killed me there the first time I played it... such a ridiculous way to die, one can't help but laugh :eek:

I have a similar favourite moment from the first Leisure Suit Larry game, involving a toilet there.. :D
But going off topic a bit so I'll stop now :p


Makes about as much sense as the fact that one can apparently never actually physically leave Daventry by walking, which makes me wonder how they ever had wars with anyone.
Sounds like something North Korea would be interested in :p:rolleyes:

Anyway, never been a fan of that in games... it occurs in several old games, not only Kings Quest... and most of the time it's annoying.
But at least in Kings Quest it can save you some walking if you use it in a smart manner.

[wilco64256]

But at least in Kings Quest it can save you some walking if you use it in a smart manner.

Yeah, if you know what you're doing. Personally I'm really crappy at keeping a proper mental image of where everything is in relation to everything else so unless I have an actual map to look at I always end up taking the long way to go anywhere.

[Armakuni]

Yeah, me too... too lazy to draw a map so I just walk around until I find the places I'm looking for.

Much easier in KQ2 though as the world only 'circles' in the up and down directions.

Btw, deaths in these games is fine (and even essential as has been pointed out repeatedly), but one thing I'm glad they got rid of, and that annoyed me for the longest time back before we had internet access, is crazy hard puzzles... well, granted, there is only one but it was so damn annoying... that gnome puzzle. Only time I had to use a walkthrough (when I finally got internet access) and I don't regret doing that - I'm pretty damn sure I would never have solved it on my own.

If there's anything about really old adventure games I dislike, it's stuff like that... there are many text based adventures with ridiculous puzzles as well, which is what prevents me from enjoying many of those.

But this is a bit off-topic, sorry.

[MusicallyInspired]

Paw agrees with me (http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/teamt/paw/kingsquest/30490-kings-quest-retrospective-the-princeless-bride). Check out his latest King's Quest retrospective video on KQ7 (the death handling comment is at around 2:00.

[Mr. Freeze]

I like the idea of a countdown-to-your-death puzzle but not for ALL deaths. I really feel that the one-off deaths for carelessness are important as well.

I agree. And the sierra definition isn't always that doing anything should get you killed, in most instances your common sense can save you.

Right from the get-go in KQ5, there's not too many ways you can die. But for the few that there are, it's fairly obvious that you shouldn't do them. For example, running into the rattlesnake or the bear, going into the dark forest when Cedric warns Graham about it (and there's a huge sign in front of it as well), and jumping into water. Others are not so obvious, of course, such as going into the bar or wandering around in the desert for too long, and I suppose that it can be argued that those shouldn't be kept around.

I really do think, however, that deaths that can reasonably fall on your blame should be left in.

[chucklas]

Others are not so obvious, of course, such as going into the bar or wandering around in the desert for too long, and I suppose that it can be argued that those shouldn't be kept around.


My argument to keep these deaths in the game is that although you die, you gain an insight into a situation. You learn that you might need something else to prevent death later. Imagine you get tied up and die, later you see the cat chasing the mouse. Anyone who has heard the fable of mouse and the lion might recognize the importance of helping the mouse. Many complain about this dead end, but the point of the sierra style was to make you, the gamer, figure out and make these connections. The deaths provide hints into other things you might need to do.

[Lambonius]

Paw agrees with me (http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/teamt/paw/kingsquest/30490-kings-quest-retrospective-the-princeless-bride). Check out his latest King's Quest retrospective video on KQ7 (the death handling comment is at around 2:00.

Hahaha...That review was great. KQ7 is terrible.

[SHODANFreeman]

Many complain about this dead end, but the point of the sierra style was to make you, the gamer, figure out and make these connections. The deaths provide hints into other things you might need to do.

From what I've seen, the point of the Sierra style was to have puzzles so obtuse that you would almost never be able to solve the game barring extreme amounts of trial and error or luck.

"AH! It's a yeti! If only I had a pie!"
"Hey, I bet this bridle will turn this snake into a magical flying horse!"
etc etc

[MusicallyInspired]

From what you've seen? You really need to experience them to form a proper opinion. Don't ride with the masses.

[SHODANFreeman]

From what you've seen? You really need to experience them to form a proper opinion. Don't ride with the masses.

Having a single "use pie with yeti" puzzle is enough to determine they had awful game designers, or that their entire intent wasn't to make good puzzles, but to make impossible to figure out puzzles.

Also:

"At one point you have to venture into a spooky forest and vanquish an evil witch. When you try to depart the forest however, you find that you’re trapped in a magical sort of time-space loop, treading the same paths over and over. Take a minute to imagine how you might escape from this predicament. Got any ideas?

If so, I’m 100% sure one of them was not, “Pour some peanut butter on the ground, and then drop jewels in the peanut butter, so that a greedy fairy who you’ve never heard of before will rush out of the bushes and get himself stuck in the peanut butter. If you free him, he’ll help you out.” (http://www.davidbarrkirtley.com/blog/?p=2012)"

[MusicallyInspired]

Yet, you instantly cast the same blame on all the puzzles in every Sierra game for being just as inane even though you've never played them. You're exaggerating the bad to epic proportions and completely leaving out the good. That is not a balanced opinion.

And it wasn't peanut butter it was honey, and it wasn't a fairy it was an elf. :rolleyes: That review instantly proves the guy has no idea what he's talking about. He couldn't have if he actually though it was peanut butter because the puzzle to acquire the "peanut butter" directly involved rescuing a swarm of bees who repay you by giving you some of their honey. They even state so. The guy has no idea what he's talking about. Much like you. And anybody who chooses to believe everybody else and not play the game for themselves.

[thom-22]

"At one point you have to venture into a spooky forest and vanquish an evil witch. When you try to depart the forest however, you find that you’re trapped in a magical sort of time-space loop, treading the same paths over and over. Take a minute to imagine how you might escape from this predicament. Got any ideas?

If so, I’m 100% sure one of them was not, “Pour some peanut butter on the ground, and then drop jewels in the peanut butter, so that a greedy fairy who you’ve never heard of before will rush out of the bushes and get himself stuck in the peanut butter. If you free him, he’ll help you out.”"

It was honey, not peanut butter; an elf, not a fairy; and a forest, not a time-space loop. Moreover, the elf didn't appear out of nowhere -- you could see his eyes shining back in the trees, and you could click the emeralds on either the eyes or the ground to tempt him out, and you could see the affect of doing so with one or two emeralds before you needed to think about putting the honey on the ground. I think it's a perfectly reasonable puzzle -- I mean you're supposed to be an adventurer, you're trapped, it's logical to try to interact with any and all other characters to see how they might help you out. (That's actually one of my favorite puzzles from KQV).

I'm not going to defend everything Sierra did, and I'm sympathetic with those who think that dead-end/walking-dead situations should be relegated to the past along with floppy disks. But this is just what I meant when I said above that accusations against Sierra are way overblown. Lucasarts games, Zork games, and many adventures of that era were just as "guilty" of "impossible" or "unfair" puzzles.

[Radogol]

What a terrible example. The forest elf puzzle is very reasonable when seen in context. In fact, King's Quest V consists almost entirely of puzzles requiring only common sense (with a small number of notable examples, such as having to enter a situation which usually ends with death with little indication that the result may be different this time). If it weren't for dead ends, it would be one of the easiest adventure games I ever played. For the record, I first played KQV last month and no, I didn't use a walkthrough. I'm also a Lucasarts fanboy.

[SHODANFreeman]

Sorry but I didn't have a chance to read any of your responses, I was too busy using masking tape to make a cat fur mustache to disguise myself as someone who has no mustache.

[MusicallyInspired]

Do you have all the rare really bad Sierra puzzles locked away in a chest somewhere that you whip out when people approach you for never playing a Sierra game? You're over-exaggerating it. Those bad puzzles were few and far between. KQ5 and GK3 are probably the greatest concentration of them. What about the Eco Quests? Conquests of Camelot? Longbow? The first Gabriel Knight? Space Quest 5? Laura Bow? Police Quest 2? Police Quest 1? King's Quest IV? Space Quest 3? Space Quest 2? The Manhunters? The Quest for Glory's? Torin's Passage? Or the many many other Sierra adventures? You have any articles about bad puzzles for those? Maybe you should try them and form an actual opinion.

[Armakuni]

Police Quest 1 has the call 411 puzzle though... which is pretty hard for people not living in the US... or can it be found in-game somehow and I've just kept missing it?

But I wholeheartedly agree with your point though - people tend to exaggerate these things very much... if one didn't have experience with Sierra games, one could be left with the impression that their games are nothing but absurd puzzles and unfair deaths.

Thanks for that Paw link btw, I didn't know about that series of videos he's been doing... watched all of them earlier today, love that kind of stuff.

[MusicallyInspired]

I believe all of that information was in the game manual, which was a type of police manual. It had radio codes, police procedures, etc. I'm sure the 411 number thing was found there as well. I could be wrong, however.

[Armakuni]

I can't remember having seen that, I will look through my manual here very thoroughly to check and let you know.

From my memory of reading the manual, I think it was only filled with police related codes and information... a number like that seems like quite an odd thing to include in an instructional manual aimed at police officers (which the manual mimics).

How did you solve this puzzle originally? Can you remember still, I assume it's a very long time ago... did you just happen to know the number? I see you live in Canada, I have no idea if you use the same number there?

But I'll have a look and post what I find.

[Lambonius]

Shall we make a list of all the ridiculous design decisions and puzzles in Lucasarts games, too?

How about Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade's Brunewald Castle sequence, where you have to either trial and error your way through dialog conversations and be a VERY lucky fighter, or just magically KNOW the correct dialog options?

Or how about in The Dig, where in order to activate the light bridges you had to just KNOW that you were supposed to click and HOLD down the mouse button, despite no other sequence in any other Lucasarts game having that type of control?

Let's see, what other random obscurities can we dredge up and use as blanket examples in our strawman anti-Lucasart's argument? Anyone?

[Armakuni]

How about Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade's Brunewald Castle sequence, where you have to either trial and error your way through dialog conversations and be a VERY lucky fighter, or just magically KNOW the correct dialog options?

You couldn't have picked a better example, I've rarely been more frustrated with an adventure game than I was when doing this for the first time (on subsequent playthroughs I've resorted to walkthroughs for this part... having already done it the 'honest' way without using any hints, I don't feel bad about doing that... it's the only way I can be bothered to replay the game at all).


EDIT - I had another thought regarding the possibility of dying in adventure games, another reason why I'm in favor of having this in there (not in ALL adventure games, it depends on what you're going for when making it, obviously).

Anyway, it occured to me that it's not just the possibility for me, as the player, to fail and having to replay a little portion of the game that makes the possibility of dying something that adds to the atmosphere of a game - there's another important aspect of the possibility to die that also changes the mood of games having this.
Which is that a world where your character can end up dying in several different (and sometimes rather gruesome) ways ends up feeling very differently from a world where your character is always safe.
The difference is that here, I'm only talking about the different atmosphere created by having you see the character you control actually die, which obviously colors the world in quite a different way.
It adds a feeling of 'harshness' and danger to the world... not the 'danger' of facing the inconvenience of having to replay parts of games, but the danger simply created by knowing your character can die.
For people that actually manage to really get immersed in games, and to some degree identify with the character one controls... it seems obvious this helps create a certain kind of atmosphere.

[Jennifer]

Let's see, what other random obscurities can we dredge up and use as blanket examples in our strawman anti-Lucasart's argument? Anyone?
Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders had those annoying mazes that were just trial-and-error. Plus, you could run out of money, causing a dead end, and could only get more by getting the winning Lotto numbers from Elvis' spaceship. :eek:

The monkey puzzle in Monkey Island 2 would be pretty impossible to figure out for non-Americans who have never heard the term "monkey wrench".

Sam & Max Hit the Road had the puzzle where you had to wet Max's head and put it in an electrical socket.

The signpost puzzle and Glottis barf puzzle in Grim Fandango used logic that was really odd too.

[Armakuni]

One design aspect in Sierra games I can fully understand people greatly disliking, when compared to most Lucasarts games and other games where this is not to be found, is how so many of them have dead ends.

This never bothered me, and it somewhat gives the impression the designers were more free to design the games however they wanted, without having to create them in a way (which could easily end up seeming a bit artificial in some cases) to prevent players from encountering any kinds of dead ends.

But that said, this is one issue I feel comes down to preference alone, I have no problem seeing how people often despise dead ends... I certainly don't think that not taking issue with dead ends or even finding them to add to games in many cases is in any way a more 'logical' view, just because it's the one I happen to hold myself.

[Jennifer]

One design aspect in Sierra games I can fully understand people greatly disliking, when compared to most Lucasarts games and other games where this is not to be found, is how so many of them have dead ends.
I don't mind dead ends, I just hate that you can save after you reach a dead end. It would be great if you'd get a death screen saying "You missed something, now you're stuck" rather than allowing you to save your unwinnable game over your potentially winnable save game.

[Armakuni]

Yes, that can definitely be very annoying... the best idea is just to create a lot of saves and never overwrite.
However, seeing as that issue is easily solved by simply creating a lot of saves, it's not what I find the most difficult about not having an indication that you've reached a dead end - the one thing that sometimes really bugs me is when I reach a point where I feel unsure of whether I'm just stuck and need to keep trying, or whether I've actually encountered a dead end.
It can be annoying when you're not sure which is the case.
On the other hand, I think it's a great feeling whenever I successfully solve a puzzle I realize could easily have turned into a dead end.

I also find it kind of annoying (though a very minor annoyance) there isn't room for more saves in each folder... especially in these games where I always end up with a lot of saves.
Not a big effort to create more folders, but still one of the things I've always found a bit annoying.

Anyway, maybe it's better to get back to talking about dying, it's much too easy to wander off topic when talking about something I'm (maybe even a bit excessively) interested in :p

[coolguy721]

Thing is is that the harder the puzzle the longer the game. also it's a lot more satisfying when you solve a harder puzzle then an easy puzzle

[Armakuni]

Yes, as long as the dead ends/general puzzles/ways to die aren't completely unfair, I'm completely fine with it.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'm slowly realising this is exactly the same debate as when the parser was replaced with P&C. Or when 160x200 was replaced by 320x200. Or EGA replaced by VGA. or Super VGA. Or 3D (as is evident in another thread). And now retry deaths. This is a huge preference thing. Granted, some things really detract from the gaming experience (P&C and non-retry deaths), but that doesn't change what's going to happen whether we like it or not, unfortunately. Telltale are going to put in retry deaths I guarantee you. And there's nothing we can do about it. :(

[chucklas]

I agree with you MI, TellTale will do it their way, and I imagine deaths will be included but it will most likely just have the KQ7 retry as the means to handle them. I would love to be able to disable that feature (which would not be too hard to do) but I doubt it will happen.

[Lambonius]

Yes--please Telltale, give us the option to customize the play experience slightly. The option to disable automatic retries should be quick and easy to implement, and would please both sides of the debate.

[Sinaz20]

Yes--please Telltale, give us the option to customize the play experience slightly. The option to disable automatic retries should be quick and easy to implement, and would please both sides of the debate.

So, is the only difference, in your opinion, of automatic retries, and a save game manually made right before a perilous part of the game just that the player had to make the decision to save?

Or is there something deeper?

Our engine has autosaving and manual save. What if autosave just kicked in after solving a puzzle rather than before (as would make sense to me at least?)

I think we have the ability to disable autosaves by simply not calling them as well, but I think some skus require an autosave feature. I could be wrong, though.

[wilco64256]

So, is the only difference, in your opinion, of automatic retries, and a save game manually made right before a perilous part of the game just that the player had to make the decision to save?

Or is there something deeper?

Our engine has autosaving and manual save. What if autosave just kicked in after solving a puzzle rather than before (as would make sense to me at least?)

I think we have the ability to disable autosaves by simply not calling them as well, but I think some skus require an autosave feature. I could be wrong, though.

The difference is that having an autosave happening automatically before any perilous situation takes the pressure off me trying to plan ahead for those types of situations. If I know a game is protecting me from any peril then there's no effort needed on my part to stay safe or pay attention until after I get killed and choose the Retry option.

On the other hand, if I'm expected to manage my own saves then I'm going to be a lot more careful and observant of my surroundings and so forth. For example, in Tomb Raider Underworld I never felt any desire to deliberately save the game or be careful at all as the game was constantly autosaving and a death only cost me maybe a minute or two tops. In Thief Deadly Shadows I am manually creating new saved games every five minutes or so just in case I manage to get myself killed or stuck someplace I didn't expect. Thief is the far better game in my opinion.

[Lambonius]

So, is the only difference, in your opinion, of automatic retries, and a save game manually made right before a perilous part of the game just that the player had to make the decision to save?

Or is there something deeper?


The point is making the player feel the NEED to save at all. :)

A sense of unexpected peril around any corner was a staple of the KQ series, and a big part of what made those games feel like such memorable adventures. Automatic retries remove that sense of peril and ultimately make the game a more shallow and bland experience as a result. In order for something to really feel dangerous, there needs to be a sense that missteps in those dangerous situations will have actual tangible consequences.

[thesporkman]

So, is the only difference, in your opinion, of automatic retries, and a save game manually made right before a perilous part of the game just that the player had to make the decision to save?

Or is there something deeper?

Our engine has autosaving and manual save. What if autosave just kicked in after solving a puzzle rather than before (as would make sense to me at least?)

I think we have the ability to disable autosaves by simply not calling them as well, but I think some skus require an autosave feature. I could be wrong, though.

Autosaving after solving a puzzle sounds like a good idea to me. It's still up to the player to determine whether something might be perilous and whether they think they should save beforehand, but if they do mess up and don't save, they'll lose some progress but will only have to go back to the last logical checkpoint.

[MusicallyInspired]

I believe I suggested earlier the idea of saving after solving a puzzle or receiving a point. As long as that point isn't before a major perilous event. I don't mind losing some progress as opposed to all of it, though that would be the better choice I think personally. But autosaving after a puzzle is solved (which I would do anyway) or when you reach a new area or something (as long as it's not a dangerous area) seems an ok compromise.

Basically, I just want deaths to mean something. Don't put them in if it's just going to be a retry. There's no point. KQ deaths were not for the lulz, that was Space Quest's shtick. KQ's deaths were meant to hinder your progress and punish you for making wrong decisions.

[Lambonius]

KQ's deaths were meant to hinder your progress and punish you for making wrong decisions.

Good times, man.

[ATMachine]

Interesting that you Sierra fans talk about the necessity to punish the player. I think that's a major point where the Sierra and LucasArts design philosophies differed, with LucasArts (almost) always trying to avoid penalizing the player for screwing up.

Personally, I would like a "retry" feature, although I wouldn't complain if there isn't one. However, I must admit I grew up as a LucasArts fan first and foremost, so I think punishing the player is something that generally should be minimized. :)

[MusicallyInspired]

The design philosophies are certainly very different. Sierra and LucasArts split the adventure community into two groups; those who wanted to explore, discover, and solve puzzles without the possibility of failure, and those who enjoyed the challenge of overcoming deadly puzzles and obstacles. Not that there's anything wrong with either, but they are two very real and very equally-sized groups. That's why Sierra did so well alongside LucasArts. LucasArts didn't steal any fanbase from Sierra, they merely provided an alternative.

The downside is the "do no evil" side (LucasArts) of the fanbase criticizes deaths and player punishments as design flaws and considers most Sierra fans to be gluttons for punishment. This is not the case. There is simply a greater feeling of satisfaction for solving and beating a dangerous adventure game, in my opinion, by overcoming all those obstacles and perilous areas. Sierra made adventure games alive with danger. Despite the fact that it was just a game where you walk around and click on things, their games felt very dangerous and so felt very alive, while LucasArts games lacked that in a way (games like Myst and most Adventure Company games completely lacked this in every way, which is why most people consider adventure games today to be boring; no challenge, no live atmosphere). To make up for it almost ALL of LucasArts' games had great humour and dialogue, but if you removed those things their games wouldn't nearly be as fun at all gameplay-wise. Even the Indiana Jones games had a bit of humour and where it lacked in humour it added actual deaths and consequences. Even LucasArts seemed to realize that you can't have a serious adventure game without peril. I believe there's actually a quote somewhere where they said adventure games needed to be funny to be entertaining. And you can't have peril without deaths and consequences. And those consequences mean absolutely squat if you can just retry to avoid it.

[Lambonius]

...you can't have peril without deaths and consequences. And those consequences mean absolutely squat if you can just retry to avoid it.

Exactly. Retries are not a compromise; they completely negate the consequences of dying in the game. You either have deaths, or you have retries. Deaths with retries are not deaths.

The bottom line is you simply can't make a good KQ game adhering to a strictly Lucasarts design philosophy. Heck, it wouldn't even be a KQ game, period.

[chucklas]

Yes the philosophies are different, but there is the simple fix of allowing the user to DISABLE auto save and retries. If this were done (a simple fix from the design and programming perspectives), then everyone would be happy. The revised death poll so far shows 100% of the people that have responded say that they would be satisfied with this solution. It doesn't get much better than 100%.

[MusicallyInspired]

Of course.

[Chyron8472]

What if autosave just kicked in after solving a puzzle rather than before (as would make sense to me at least?)

I believe I suggested earlier the idea of saving after solving a puzzle or receiving a point. As long as that point isn't before a major perilous event. I don't mind losing some progress as opposed to all of it, though that would be the better choice I think personally. But autosaving after a puzzle is solved (which I would do anyway) or when you reach a new area or something (as long as it's not a dangerous area) seems an ok compromise.

Basically, I just want deaths to mean something. Don't put them in if it's just going to be a retry. There's no point. KQ deaths were not for the lulz, that was Space Quest's shtick. KQ's deaths were meant to hinder your progress and punish you for making wrong decisions.


I agree. I would prefer it didn't autosave after every puzzle.

In KQ6 on the Isle of the Beast, if there were such a post-puzzle autosave, I would prefer it didn't happen after disabling each trap, but instead after disabling every trap and dispelling the curse on Beast (which you must solve after completing the last trap lest you die.)

In KQ2, I would be perfectly okay if it only autosaved after unlocking each door while expecting that if I wanted more frequent save points then I must do it myself.

TTG's King's Quest doesn't need unfair deaths, but I would also qualify unfair and unexpected as different ideas. There ought to be a way to keep exploring fun such that you're not penalized for poking around a lot, while still having places where something can startlingly pop out and kill you in a way that adds to the tension without detracting from the fun.

[SHODANFreeman]

The only people that KQ deaths ever punished were people that didn't mash their save button every time they ever accomplished anything (read: no one).

How many times did you lose any significant progress (as in, something more than having walked into a new area) to a death? My guess is either zero, or one time, because after one death of that sort, you started saving so often that it never mattered.

If adding some kind of auto-save to a game makes you unable to enjoy the game because you force yourself to play like a complete fool, perhaps you should try playing things as they're intended rather than exploiting them on purpose and blaming the game for your own stupidity? Basically, you're just saying that you want to be forced to manually save so that if you somehow happen to forget (you won't) and die, you can curse yourself out for being a total moron. It's an annoyance, not a feature, and nothing anyone can ever say will convince me otherwise.

(PS: I am still in favor of an option allowing auto-save to be turned off, though I completely don't see the point in doing so.)

[Armakuni]

Just having to save the game a lot is a constant reminder of how you could die at any moment, which is lost when you don't have to worry about this at all.

Another thing you'll lose if saving is automatically done for you is the feeling of being really glad you just saved the game.
Not everyone saves the game all the time, many people mostly only save when they suspect something dangerous is about to happen... and it's kind of a nice feeling when you have that suspicion, save the game and then end up dying soon after.
Instead of having the game doing that for you, it becomes your own decision and your own responsibility.

[Lambonius]

The only people that KQ deaths ever punished were people that didn't mash their save button every time they ever accomplished anything (read: no one).

How many times did you lose any significant progress (as in, something more than having walked into a new area) to a death? My guess is either zero, or one time, because after one death of that sort, you started saving so often that it never mattered.

If adding some kind of auto-save to a game makes you unable to enjoy the game because you force yourself to play like a complete fool, perhaps you should try playing things as they're intended rather than exploiting them on purpose and blaming the game for your own stupidity? Basically, you're just saying that you want to be forced to manually save so that if you somehow happen to forget (you won't) and die, you can curse yourself out for being a total moron. It's an annoyance, not a feature, and nothing anyone can ever say will convince me otherwise.

(PS: I am still in favor of an option allowing auto-save to be turned off, though I completely don't see the point in doing so.)

As usual, the degree to which you miss the point is staggering.

If this discussion bothers you so much, maybe you should just opt out. Or perhaps your insult-laden posts are just trolling for your own entertainment?

[SHODANFreeman]

Play Amnesia and then tell me that auto-save diminishes the fear of death or sense of dread in any way.

[Chyron8472]

Shodan, you've already been called out on never really having played (much less completed) any Sierra game but you keep harping on and on about how much they suck. I don't understand why you insist on bashing their games. If you hate Sierra style games, you don't have to play them. We already know you hate them and you're not backing down. However, I would appreciate it if you stopped beating a dead horse already.


Really, we're trying to have a constructive conversation here and you're not helping by ranting all the time.

[SHODANFreeman]

Shodan, you've already been called out on never really having played (much less completed) any Sierra game but you keep harping on and on about how much they suck. I don't understand why you insist on bashing their games. If you hate Sierra style games, you don't have to play them. We already know you hate them and you're not backing down. However, I would appreciate it if you stopped beating a dead horse already.


Really, we're trying to have a constructive conversation here and you're not helping by ranting all the time.

I don't have to have played some random game to discuss the design philosophy behind auto-save mechanics. Everyone conveniently ignores everything I say and says "it makes a difference because I want it to" and that's the best response they have for why they want to manually save constantly instead of the game doing it for them every once in a while.

I understand not wanting a retry button, really, I do, but not wanting the game to EVER save for you is a bit insane. If there's a save point roughly every 30 minutes of gameplay, how does that do anything other than save you the trouble of doing it yourself?

If you really wanted the game's save system to "increase the difficulty", you would be advocating save points rather than manual save, as those require you to progress through a specified amount of content before you're even allowed to save.

[Lambonius]

I don't have to have played some random game to discuss the design philosophy behind auto-save mechanics. Everyone conveniently ignores everything I say and says "it makes a difference because I want it to" and that's the best response they have for why they want to manually save constantly instead of the game doing it for them every once in a while.

I understand not wanting a retry button, really, I do, but not wanting the game to EVER save for you is a bit insane. If there's a save point roughly every 30 minutes of gameplay, how does that do anything other than save you the trouble of doing it yourself?


There you go again, belittling everyone who doesn't share your exact view. Not only that, but you're completely ignoring the clearly stated and thoughtful analyses of Sierra design philosophy, the pros and cons of deaths, the pros and cons of retries, etc. that many people have written. You're insulting everyone involved in this discussion when you imply that people are just listing the same inane responses, because it simply isn't true. In fact, the only person here insipidly repeating the same argument ad infinitum IS YOU.

Lastly, most people here have agreed that autosaves are okay--they just don't want them every 10 seconds or after every single puzzle/interaction, which is what had been suggested. It's automatic retries that people are mainly discussing here, which DO ultimately negate any consequences of dying in these games, regardless of whether you like deaths/retries or not.

[SHODANFreeman]

There you go again, belittling everyone who doesn't share your exact view. Not only that, but you're completely ignoring the clearly stated and thoughtful analyses of Sierra design philosophy, the pros and cons of deaths, the pros and cons of retries, etc. that many people have written. You're insulting everyone involved in this discussion when you imply that people are just listing the same inane responses, because it simply isn't true. In fact, the only person here insipidly repeating the same argument ad infinitum IS YOU.

Lastly, most people here have agreed that autosaves are okay--they just don't want them every 10 seconds or after every single puzzle/interaction, which is what had been suggested. It's automatic retries that people are mainly discussing here, which DO ultimately negate any consequences of dying in these games, regardless of whether you like deaths/retries or not.

You quoted part of my post, and then proceeded to ignore exactly what you quoted. I clearly said that I understand having a problem with automatic retries in the part you specifically quoted, it's the concept that any auto-saving at all ruins the experience that I am taking issue with, and it HAS been expressed by multiple posters here repeatedly.

Amnesia has auto-saves pretty much any time you ever accomplish anything, and if you can play Amnesia without caring if you die, I will give you a gold plated Ferrari filled with cash.

[Chyron8472]

I haven't played Amnesia. I'm not planning on playing Amnesia.

I want this game to feel like a real King's Quest game that's worth being called canon. I want it to feel like King's Quest. Whether you personally understand why people do/don't like automatic retries is not the point. The point of this thread is to talk about whether this King's Quest game should have only manual saves like KQ1-6, auto-retries like KQ7, an infrequent autosave feature, or be given a choice between said options.

This isn't about video games in general. This is about King's Quest. This is about trying to inform Telltale how best to specifically make a King's Quest game that is worthy of the franchise.


Stop trolling. It's been established that you haven't played any Sierra games for any reasonable length of time, and are therefore ill-equipped to advise exactly how specifically a King's Quest game should feel. So you don't like manual saves. So what? You have your vote, I have mine, others have theirs. It doesn't benefit the conversation to rant about how stupid Sierra games are or to belittle others for having a differing opinion, and it certainly doesn't lend any weight to any of your arguments to know that you never played any KQ games and so can't frame a proper basis for comparison.


Edit: and by the way, I'm not saying that, because you never played a KQ game, your opinion about what you like in adventure games is invalid. I'm saying that your accusations that Sierra is stupid or that those who enjoy the KQ1-6 Save/Restore scheme are closed-minded fools is not productive and easily dismissed as trolling when it's made known that you've never played the canon KQ games.

I mean seriously, if you could say "I've played a couple of Sierra's games and and I like KQ7's auto-retry better, especially since it resolves frustration I get from unfair deaths" that would at least be a valid point backed up by a fair level of experience, but you can't even say that.

[MusicallyInspired]

The only people that KQ deaths ever punished were people that didn't mash their save button every time they ever accomplished anything (read: no one).

You did not read one word I said did you? Or if you did, you didn't bother to try to understand.

How many times did you lose any significant progress (as in, something more than having walked into a new area) to a death?

How many times have you in a Sierra game? No experience, no opinion.

Instead of having the game doing that for you, it becomes your own decision and your own responsibility.

Already said but it's worth repeating again.

I don't have to have played some random game to discuss the design philosophy behind auto-save mechanics.

Yes, you do.

Everyone conveniently ignores everything I say and says "it makes a difference because I want it to" and that's the best response they have for why they want to manually save constantly instead of the game doing it for them every once in a while.

Well, we're not, but I'm slowly starting to realize that we should, seeing as that's all you're doing. The response isn't "it makes a difference because I want it to" the response is "it makes a difference because psychologically that's how the human mind works." It's an increase in challenge no matter how you look at it. Really, what is gameplay? It's a series if interactions which either increase or decrease your chances of completing a game successfully. Your job as a gamer is to know which ones help you and which ones don't help you. The higher the number of interactions the more challenging it is and the more skills are required. Manual saving is another gameplay obstacle. You may find it childish and stupid but don't insult us for preferring it because it actually adds challenge. That fact cannot be refuted.

I understand not wanting a retry button, really, I do, but not wanting the game to EVER save for you is a bit insane. If there's a save point roughly every 30 minutes of gameplay, how does that do anything other than save you the trouble of doing it yourself?

That's exactly the point. That makes you not have to worry about it. It makes the game not dangerous or perilous in any way. I don't see what's so hard to understand about this. You remove this from game design and rank it as something else. A gamer obligation or something outside the gameplay experience. I and others include it in the gaming experience. It's the same thing as whether you like or dislike arcade sequences in adventure games. Or platforming puzzles in an FPS. It's a gameplay mechanic. Just because you don't want it to be doesn't mean it isn't.

Quite a hot topic this is. :D

[wilco64256]

Play Amnesia and then tell me that auto-save diminishes the fear of death or sense of dread in any way.

Never scared or felt any dread in the game due to that very feature. Actually deliberately did stupid things on a number of occasions just to see what happened or do some exploration and then just let the autosave load up to bring me back.

Compared to Silent Hill Homecoming where if I screwed up I was going back to wherever I was able to save last and could lose a solid chunk of work if I wasn't careful. That one had me far more on edge.

[chucklas]

Just to play devils advocate (I agree with the manual saving) how would you feel if they only had automatic saves, and they ONLY happen after certain major puzzles are solved (infrequently compared to the length of the game)? This way you feel the need to do things perfectly otherwise you will lose progress without the opportunity to have the game saved? This way a careless death of falling into a moat or river could kill you and force you back. Also if you were doing the cliffs of logic and failed and died it would pull you back to a previous major event. I think this would add into the sense of peril because it is a forced consequence.

[ATMachine]

Just to play devils advocate (I agree with the manual saving) how would you feel if they only had automatic saves, and they ONLY happen after certain major puzzles are solved (infrequently compared to the length of the game)? This way you feel the need to do things perfectly otherwise you will lose progress without the opportunity to have the game saved? This way a careless death of falling into a moat or river could kill you and force you back. Also if you were doing the cliffs of logic and failed and died it would pull you back to a previous major event. I think this would add into the sense of peril because it is a forced consequence.
OK, when we actually start talking about console-style save points I think that's going too far. Not even Sierra at its heyday was that cruel.

[Lambonius]

Save points are just as bad in the way that they limit player choice.

[thom-22]

Just to play devils advocate (I agree with the manual saving) how would you feel if they only had automatic saves, and they ONLY happen after certain major puzzles are solved (infrequently compared to the length of the game)? This way you feel the need to do things perfectly otherwise you will lose progress without the opportunity to have the game saved? This way a careless death of falling into a moat or river could kill you and force you back. Also if you were doing the cliffs of logic and failed and died it would pull you back to a previous major event. I think this would add into the sense of peril because it is a forced consequence.

You mean no manual saving at all? In other words, the equivalent of predefined checkpoints? That certainly goes to SHODANFreeman's point that if a game allows the player to save anywhere anyway, what difference does it make if the game has auto-saves supplementing the player's manual saves. Checkpoints are the real way to give player deaths consequence. (Incidentally, SHODANFreeman, contrary to your assertion that you're being ignored, I have read, understood, and thought about your statements; just because you don't change people's minds doesn't mean you've been ignored.)

There's nothing inherently wrong with the suggestion, but why do it that way when the way the old KQs did it is what people really want? Now, I don't really agree with the implication of MusicallyInspired's post that deaths are required for an adventure game to be challenging and fun gameplay-wise; I got just as much satisfaction from playing/solving DOTT and Myst as I did from KQ games. But basically I think Chryon8472 said it best:

I want this game to feel like a real King's Quest game that's worth being called canon. I want it to feel like King's Quest.

However, I don't think auto-saves need to be completely eliminated to retain that feel. (Besides, there are reasons for both auto-saving and allowing manual saves that have nothing to do with the consequences of player death.) If I'm facing death in the game, then I'm not going to be tempted to rely on periodic auto-saves, at least not as they're routinely implemented. For instance, I seem to recall that TOMI auto-saved whenever Guybrush walked past the courthouse in Ep1. But because you could solve puzzles in any order, the auto-saves wouldn't necessarily have been helpful if I'd needed to reload after death. I'd be wondering which of my actions were captured in the last auto-save, eg. was it before or after I set the dock on fire? Whereas if I'm managing my own saves, they'll be in order and I'll have a system to remember which saves encompass which of my actions.

So I think of it like this: the old-school setting could have the usual auto-saves and, in the event of death, a "reload" button that goes to the saved games screen. The other setting could include extra auto-saves right before potential death situations and a "retry" button that would automatically load them.

[Chyron8472]

I don't want save points. That sounds like it's going too far.

I voted for choice, but if I were actually given a choice ingame of which option to use it would probably be an infrequent after-puzzle autosave which I can supplement with my own manual saves when I so choose.


autosave, not save points.

[chucklas]

Save points are just as bad in the way that they limit player choice.

This is exactly my point in my post. I think certain people have jumped on the notion that we want to manually save just because to us it makes the game more perilous and nothing else. This is one of the reasons for sure, but not the only one. I think Lamb got it just right here. For me more than anything, choice will ALWAYS be better than no choice.

[Bloody Eugene]

Unlimited manually saving is not always good.
1) it can break immersion.
2) if you know you can die, you will save every 30 seconds. Manually. Bad.
3) Vantages? I don't see many.

Points to consider:
A) you must save if something happen you while you're gaming and you have to quit: (you're late work, you've to stop, you have to turn off).
B) Avoid frustration. Difficulty is good, frustration no.

Some other options to considered:
- If you die you've to do a minigame to resurrect (do you remember Prey?)
- Limited saves (ie: max 5 savings for each episode)
- If you die you lose parts of the game (dialogues, locations, etc)
- Every time you die you lose a wonderful achievement out of i.e. 10 possible ones that will be displayed at the end of the episode.
- You can die max 10 times, after that game ends and you've to restart.
- Every time you die you've to wait 1 minute to resurrect
- Every time you die you have to go back to your body (WOW style)
- Dying let you enter another dimension with new enigmas.
- Dying makes you repeat actions (ie: if you woke up a charachter, when you resurrect he's sleeping again.)
- When you die the world change somewhat (characters are located differently, so the objects and some enigmas)
- Unlockable savegame slots. You get a savegame each time you solve 3 puzzles
- Static saving locations (like Dead Space)
- Every time you die and restart you lose part of your inventory (you have to take objects again)
- Every death you lose a save slot
- Games automatically save every 10 minutes. Trivia after death, the more you answer correctly, the nearest to the death point you'll be restored. Wrong answer lead you back in saves games i.e. 10,20,30 minutes back. Somewhat I like this one. :P



Many of these go a little off-road, but consider them for which can lead to a better game.

[SHODANFreeman]

Never scared or felt any dread in the game due to that very feature. Actually deliberately did stupid things on a number of occasions just to see what happened or do some exploration and then just let the autosave load up to bring me back.

Compared to Silent Hill Homecoming where if I screwed up I was going back to wherever I was able to save last and could lose a solid chunk of work if I wasn't careful. That one had me far more on edge.

This is where I am completely baffled, why do you intentionally ruin games for yourself? I just don't understand why you would refuse to play a game as intended simply because it saves for you sometimes.

http://i337.photobucket.com/albums/n377/GodzillaX8/dontplaytowin.png

[wilco64256]

I didn't ruin the game in any way, and I didn't say it was a bad game. I very thoroughly enjoyed it. But I didn't find it either difficult or particularly frightening. Being "immersed" in a game world to me means that I should be responsible for my own survival, and if a game takes care of the whole survival aspect for me then it's difficult for me to feel like I'm really that immersed in the game.

Autosaves have a tendency to take place right before significant game events, so I'm typically just on othe watch for that to happen to be on the lookout for something interesting to happen. If I'm responsible for saving, then I need to be constantly on the lookout for something good to come up without any warning.

[SHODANFreeman]

I didn't ruin the game in any way, and I didn't say it was a bad game. I very thoroughly enjoyed it. But I didn't find it either difficult or particularly frightening. Being "immersed" in a game world to me means that I should be responsible for my own survival, and if a game takes care of the whole survival aspect for me then it's difficult for me to feel like I'm really that immersed in the game.

Autosaves have a tendency to take place right before significant game events, so I'm typically just on othe watch for that to happen to be on the lookout for something interesting to happen. If I'm responsible for saving, then I need to be constantly on the lookout for something good to come up without any warning.

But why are you okay with dying and being sent back to an auto-save, but not a manual save? What about auto-saving makes you desire running around like a maniac? How is it satisfying to play a game and die 2036 times? Even if a death only sends me back 35 seconds, I avoid it like the plague because even looking at a loading screen is too much time spent not playing the game for me. I get really agitated when I die in a game, regardless of whatever consequences there may or may not be, because failing is not my desired outcome in any situation.

In all honesty, if Uncharted didn't auto-save as frequently as it does, I probably would've gotten so frustrated with some parts of the game that I'd have given up on it long before completing it. Being thrown right back into the action where you left off is a godsend for me, as I can't be bothered replaying something I've already completed for all intents and purposes. I don't think being forced to replay a section you've previously finished adds to the difficulty at all, as you're essentially just redoing something you've already done before, it just adds to the frustration and kills the entire experience with pointless repetition to the point of monotony.

In the case of an adventure game, this is even more pointless, as most of the gameplay is based on solving puzzles, and once you've done that, there is no challenge left to it, beyond repeating everything you've done before and avoiding whatever it was that killed you the last time, and you can avoid losing any progress whatsoever by just repeatedly saving the game any time you do anything.

Also, either I'm not human, or it's not "basic human psychology" to be more invested in a game by being forced to save yourself, because literally the opposite is true for me. If every game on earth had auto-save I'd be the happiest gamer ever. At the same time, dying massively frustrates me and there is literally nothing I hate more than failing, regardless of the penalty, or lack thereof. I would never in my life intentionally half-ass my way through something even if I knew that I could just re-spawn and lose no progress at all. Amnesia terrifies me every 3 seconds even though I know that there is no "real" penalty for dying.

My penalty for dying is knowing that I failed like a miserable loser, and that's far more severe than having to replay through the 10 minutes of a game that I may have forgotten to save during.

[MusicallyInspired]

Now, I don't really agree with the implication of MusicallyInspired's post that deaths are required for an adventure game to be challenging and fun gameplay-wise;

I didn't say that it's required for adventure games to be fun (though, personally, I do think that for myself), I said it's required for a King's Quest game.

I got just as much satisfaction from playing/solving DOTT and Myst as I did from KQ games.

So did I. But for completely different reasons. I outlined those reasons above. LucasArts games had witty and funny dialogue and great storytelling to make up for it. King's Quest was great for completely different reasons. That's why there are fans of Sierra and people who hate Sierra. And the same for LucasArts and Myst games. You can't compare the two that way.

http://i337.photobucket.com/albums/n377/GodzillaX8/dontplaytowin.png

Of course a game should be played to win. Otherwise it's not a game. Why play it? To watch?.....that takes us back to BTTF and Jurassic Park.

But why are you okay with dying and being sent back to an auto-save, but not a manual save? What about auto-saving makes you desire running around like a maniac? How is it satisfying to play a game and die 2036 times?

Overcoming it is satisfying. Being responsible for yourself is satisfying.

Even if a death only sends me back 35 seconds, I avoid it like the plague because even looking at a loading screen is too much time spent not playing the game for me.

Avoid looking at the loading screen? Talk about breaking immersion. My motivation is to avoid my character dying. And it feels more like that to me when I have to save myself. It sounds backwards but it's true. I know this doesn't make sense to you. Honestly, I'm just as baffled as to why it doesn't make sense to you. But both are perfectly valid viewpoints and that's why a choice is the best option. You'll never convince us and we'll obviously never convince you. So why are we even having this conversation?

I get really agitated when I die in a game, regardless of whatever consequences there may or may not be, because failing is not my desired outcome in any situation.

It's not about agitation or frustration. A game can have those with autosaves or not. It's about being in full control of your game. I just think in an adventure game particularly you should be responsible for all your gameplay actions. And like I touched on earlier, autosaves for me break the immersion, weird as that sounds. Because the game is constantly reminding me that it's got my back. It's like the difference between someone teaching me every little facet of playing basketball and holding my hand through the entire process criticizing my moves and strategies and someone giving me a ball and a jersey and saying "go have fun." The former is great for a tutorial section, but not for the entire game! Let me play the game myself! Stop holding my hand! That's how I feel. Or it's like how newer versions of Windows always add these stupid user-friendly tasks and functions that just get in the way of how I want to run my computer. Some people find it useful. Great. Offer an option. Case closed.

In all honesty, if Uncharted didn't auto-save as frequently as it does, I probably would've gotten so frustrated with some parts of the game that I'd have given up on it long before completing it.

Uncharted is not a King's Quest adventure game. I mean really, you're telling us to accept games the way they were meant to be played giving Amnesia as an example (for the immersion, not to win), but that's exactly what we're arguing. King's Quest was on its best day always made the way we're arguing. That's what we want back. If you don't like it don't play a King's Quest game. We're just the fans of a franchise wanting what we loved about the franchise.

Being thrown right back into the action where you left off is a godsend for me, as I can't be bothered replaying something I've already completed for all intents and purposes. I don't think being forced to replay a section you've previously finished adds to the difficulty at all, as you're essentially just redoing something you've already done before, it just adds to the frustration and kills the entire experience with pointless repetition to the point of monotony.

You're going for that FPS comparison again which completely holds no ground whatsoever. Go play a King's Quest game and get back to us. Though, I'm sure you'll get thoroughly annoyed and quit in the first 10 minutes or less anyway.

In the case of an adventure game, this is even more pointless,

In your opinion. Why are we arguing over opinions again....?

as most of the gameplay is based on solving puzzles,

....and avoiding danger. Integral part of King's Quest. Again, play a King's Quest game. You can't make these accusations and arguments over a game you've never played.

and once you've done that, there is no challenge left to it, beyond repeating everything you've done before and avoiding whatever it was that killed you the last time, and you can avoid losing any progress whatsoever by just repeatedly saving the game any time you do anything.

Taking your own responsibility for avoiding having to do it again is a challenge. Because you could get cocky and think you could just fly through it only to find that you weren't as skilled as you thought you were and have to start over....and isn't that what a game is all about? Testing your skill? And don't you do the same thing over again regardless of whether you manually save or not? Manually saving as opposed to autosaving doesn't have any bearing on repeating something you just did, which I guess is your point but that's completely missing our point. The point is it feels more real like a life is really in peril because you have to back yourself up. In real life you prepare everything for yourself to handle situations. Same for a game. Manual save to avoid having to go all the way back. To me that's immersion. Again, I don't separate the save function from the story or gameplay experience. It's all the same to me. It all is the game. It all must be under my control.

Also, either I'm not human, or it's not "basic human psychology" to be more invested in a game by being forced to save yourself, because literally the opposite is true for me.

Only because you refuse to accept it that way. And that's fine. If you gave the idea a chance you might just get used to it but you'd have to completely change your way of thinking. In my way of thinking, it psychologically makes the game feel more real and alive. And that my actions actually matter.

If every game on earth had auto-save I'd be the happiest gamer ever. At the same time, dying massively frustrates me and there is literally nothing I hate more than failing, regardless of the penalty, or lack thereof.

See, you're angry at dying whether you autosave or not. That's a completely different issue. We don't mind dying as much as you and others do. Sure, it makes the game easier for you to autosave....but that's exactly our problem with it.

I would never in my life intentionally half-ass my way through something even if I knew that I could just re-spawn and lose no progress at all. Amnesia terrifies me every 3 seconds even though I know that there is no "real" penalty for dying.

Good for you. But as Wilco pointed out, not everyone thinks the same way as you and would play that game completely differently, as has been proven.

My penalty for dying is knowing that I failed like a miserable loser, and that's far more severe than having to replay through the 10 minutes of a game that I may have forgotten to save during.

You have to replay either way. I don't understand this argument. Manual saving just gives the choice to me as to how much I will fail. That's an advantage in my eyes whether you see it or not.

The sad thing is I understand your point of view but you will not understand mine and you continually belittle it. Not that I'm surprised, it's all anybody has done even since the parser vs P&C debate. The 2D vs 3D debate. The P&C vs C&D vs WASD debate. I guess I can finally call myself and old-timer adventure for preferring something that's been replaced by something easier and increasingly meaningless instead of embracing it.

[Chyron8472]

Shodan, would you just fricken play KQ6 already? Geez. Play the game all the way through and then come back and tell us that manually saving sucks ass.

Stop telling us that TTG's King's Quest should be less like old school KQ and more like unrelated modern action-adventures. Compare King's Quest to King's Quest or at least King's Quest to something else Sierra.

I'm becoming more and more convinced that you either have never played an adventure game where manual saving was required or you have played one but it was for 10 minutes and/or a very long time ago.

The truth is, if you had played such a game for a reasonable length of time, you would know that when one dies and has to retrace their steps because they hadn't saved in a while, it makes one mad at themself for not saving more often not mad at the game for being a douche. Sure, unfair deaths are irritating, but that's a different issue from, for example, learning to save at various points while walking down Manannan's mountain in KQ3 so that when you fall you don't have to walk all the way down from the top again.

Besides all that, manual saving in King's Quest never took any longer than 10 seconds. ~3 seconds if you didn't have to rename your savegame. Why does taking an average of 6 seconds or less to save once in a while break the immersion? If anything, it increases immersion in the gameplay anyway.

[MusicallyInspired]

It's not worth freaking out over that much, Chyron. :) He's as passionate and dedicated to the playing style he likes as you are to yours.

[Chyron8472]

I'm not freaking out. His argument just makes no sense in this thread wherein we're talking about really what Telltale should implement in their KQ game. To say that TTG should make it more like Amnesia and less like King's Quest, especially without even having played a KQ game before, is just wrong in a number of ways.

I think that he's coloring aspects of the KQ series as being worse than they really are primarily because he has a lack of experience with the games. If he actually played even the AGDI KQ remakes for long enough, he ought to see that it's not as bad as he says it is.... or if it was, he would have real experiences from which to draw in making his argument, rather than just saying that Sierra games suck and that you don't need to ever play a game with manual saves to know whether it's a terrible gameplay mechanic or not.

[SHODANFreeman]

I played the first remake for like 20 minutes once. I didn't feel like the ability to walk off of cliffs by misclicking or sometimes having a monster randomly slowly walk towards me added any sense of danger to the game.

I played the original Space Quest until I walked into a room and was shot to death immediately.

The only Sierra adventure game I have ever actually completed was Shivers 2. I enjoyed it but there were very few places you could actually die, iirc.

Also, it's not exactly a Sierra game, but I've played Hugo 3: Jungle of Doom to completion.

Though, to be honest, I don't see how any of this makes a difference, because I spend probably more time than any other human on earth thinking about game design and mechanics, and manual save is nice to be able to do, but I really don't see how a game automatically saving after you complete some large task is anything but a convenience.

Also, the "being mad at yourself vs being mad at the game" argument does not work for me, because I'm mad at the game if it's a cheap death, and mad at myself if it's my fault for being stupid/unskilled, it has nothing to do with who created the most recent save file.

[thom-22]

I got just as much satisfaction from playing/solving DOTT and Myst as I did from KQ games.So did I. But for completely different reasons. I outlined those reasons above. LucasArts games had witty and funny dialogue and great storytelling to make up for it. King's Quest was great for completely different reasons. That's why there are fans of Sierra and people who hate Sierra. And the same for LucasArts and Myst games. You can't compare the two that way.

I find the gameplay equally satisfying, there's nothing about the gameplay in Myst or DOTT that needs to be "made up for" as far as I'm concerned, and to me these games and KQ were all great for very similar reasons. (And in my book, story and dialogue can only go so far to compensate for gameplay deficiencies anyway.) That's why I characterized your post as sounding like the possibility of death with real consequences is necessary for you to be satisfied with gameplay, if not the overall game. Which is fine, lots of gamers would agree. :) I was just saying that I can go either way on the issue of death and consequences and wouldn't argue, in the abstract, that one style makes for more satisfying gameplay than the other.

In this specific case, however, I argue that if you're renewing a franchise in which death and consequences were centrally important, those aspects of gameplay should be preserved at least as an option. But I think we're all agreed on the need for choice, so I'm enjoying the latter part of this thread as a more general discussion on death and consequences in gaming. It's an interesting one even if KQ is being used as the whipping boy by one side. :p God knows Myst gets used as a whipping boy by the opposite side (often by people who've never played it!) in these kinds of discussions all the time, so consider the table turned. :D

[MusicallyInspired]

That's an excellent post you have there.

:D

[ScreamingFalcon]

Heck, for me, some of the replay value came in trying to find the various ways to kill off Graham/Larry/Roger/Valanice/Rosella/Gwydion/Alexander after I'd played the game a few times already just to see the ways they would rip into me for failing. Personal favorite from Space Quest III: Deceleration Trauma: Its not the fall that gets you, its the sudden stop at the bottom.

[MusicallyInspired]

Lol. Good times. Personally, I feel completely differently about Space Quest, though. Games where death is a huge source of the comedy I'd actually feel ok with adding retries. As an adventure game I'm against it, but as a Space Quest game at the same time I'm ok with it.

[Blackthorne519]

Yeah! Half the fun of Space Quest is seeing all the deaths! I know we put a lot of charm and effort into all the animations and other special fun stuff that accompanies dying in our SQ2 game.


Bt

[ScreamingFalcon]

How's that coming along, Blackthorne?

[Lambonius]

How's that coming along, Blackthorne?

Very well. The game is complete and fully playable. Just squashing bugs and adding polish. Work has slowed down lately as several of our team members are especially busy with work/school this time of year. Summer should hopefully see the last few kinks ironed out. We're very confident it will be out this year, sooner rather than later.

[ScreamingFalcon]

For Space Quest nuts, I recall there is a website that has all of the death scenes in it. I think it was called "The Many Deaths of Roger Wilco" or something like that.

[Blackthorne519]

How's that coming along, Blackthorne?

Just like Lambo said - we're working hard on it, but everyone's been busy with their real lives - school, jobs, wives, kids..... heh. But yeah, we're moving along - a few bug polishes, a couple of graphic tweaks, a lot of voice recording.... but it's playable as it is now - we've been going through it like crazy. We've kept all the deaths in, and I think we even added a few. We also took the time to make "death screens" for all of them, ala SQ3.

Like this....
http://www.infamous-adventures.com/downloads/sq2rogerdead.jpg
This one, of course, is an homage to one you'd find in SQIII and IV. We've got more..... little animations for all of them. We had a gruesome and fun time making them, let me tell you.

They were so much fun, and we spent a lot of time chuckling over them. I couldn't imagine a Sierra game without the deaths.


Bt

[Lambonius]

They were so much fun, and we spent a lot of time chuckling over them. I couldn't imagine a Sierra game without the deaths.


Heh, nice Bt.

And note the distinct lack of a namby-pamby "Retry" button on that GUI. Rock on.