It''s not fair to generalize that walkthroughs mean bad design most of the time. For instance, if you''re playing an adventure game and you''re stuck, and you go to the walkthrough and see that the answer was: "Use Screwdriver with Peanut Butter" or something that makes no sense, THEN it''s bad design.
But if you check the walkthrough, read the answer and think: "DAMN IT! I could have gotten that!" THEN it''s your own fault. Especially with an adventure game ... you didn''t buy it just to breeze right through, did you? You wanted to be CHALLENGED mentally. If you look at a walkthrough to find the answer to a GOOD puzzle (even if it was hard), it''s your fault, not the designers.
I tend to enjoy walkthroughs for games that don''t have definitive answers (like strategy/action games). Though usually I like to look at them AFTER beating a level, and then seeing if there was an easier way to do it in the walkthrough.
Also, walkthroughs can be good because they can give you fun little cheat codes (like how to get into a movie theater in Syphon Filter) or Easter Eggs (like the Corely Motors poster in Grim Fandango).
So, in conclusion: Viva Los Walkthroughs!
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Changing the face of adventure gaming...
Atypical Interactive
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Whats wrong with Walk-Throughs
Author
So what is the expressed reason why we (Game Designers) put puzzles into a game?
So the player can be mentally challaged? There''s more than one way to do that. So the player exercises different skills like logical thinking?
That''s all fair and well but when a player gets stuck it somewhat pulls them out of the suspension of disbelief that they were enjoying prior to the puzzle. How does this add to a game?
Do players like having to search the net for the walk through and print it out? No, at course not, its a major inconvienance to them.
In fact its discusting to see developers opening pay per minute telephone lines to solve puzzles in games. Its a very low act that betrays consumer confidence.
I love Game Design and it loves me back.
So the player can be mentally challaged? There''s more than one way to do that. So the player exercises different skills like logical thinking?
That''s all fair and well but when a player gets stuck it somewhat pulls them out of the suspension of disbelief that they were enjoying prior to the puzzle. How does this add to a game?
Do players like having to search the net for the walk through and print it out? No, at course not, its a major inconvienance to them.
In fact its discusting to see developers opening pay per minute telephone lines to solve puzzles in games. Its a very low act that betrays consumer confidence.
I love Game Design and it loves me back.
Well an adventure game(pure old-style adventure game) is based on puzzles.The puzzles are created to challenge the player.
That''s after all what a player seeks in a game when he gives money for it :
Challenge!
Atypical got this right.
If a game can''t challenge a player then it doesn''t worth it.
A game challenges the players speed,reaction,managing ability,intelligence and more.Well most games concentrate on only one or two aspects of challenge.
Adventure games for example don''t test the player''s speed but his intelligence(and luck
).
And how do they do this?With puzzles.
Now if the puzzles are "unnatural" or natural but very hard then a player should seek the answer on a walkthrough.
But as i have said before this is based on the player''s ability and the game''s design.If both are bad then a walkthrough is a must have.
Voodoo4
That''s after all what a player seeks in a game when he gives money for it :
Challenge!
Atypical got this right.
If a game can''t challenge a player then it doesn''t worth it.
A game challenges the players speed,reaction,managing ability,intelligence and more.Well most games concentrate on only one or two aspects of challenge.
Adventure games for example don''t test the player''s speed but his intelligence(and luck
).And how do they do this?With puzzles.
Now if the puzzles are "unnatural" or natural but very hard then a player should seek the answer on a walkthrough.
But as i have said before this is based on the player''s ability and the game''s design.If both are bad then a walkthrough is a must have.
Voodoo4
The key issues are that games are designed to be a challenge and that not all people think the same way or have the same ability to control a game (manual dexterity) or solve problems.
The challenge - by its nature it is designed to cause problems and there will always be people who can''t or don''t wish to struggle to solve the problem but do enjoy seeing what comes next. They will always want and need a walkthrough. The alternative is to have no challenge in the game, which makes it a movie instead.
The People - You can''t make a game that is set at the perfect difficulty level for everyone as people all think differently. If the lowest common denominator could solve the game others would find it too easy and boring.
Walkthroughs as an enhancement to the game - Yes they can add to the game’s enjoyment if the are constructed properly. Most walkthroughs take the player by the shortest route and do not point out much of the most interesting scenery. If they were redesigned to take the player on a more leisurely route they would enhance the pleasure.
Dan Marchant
Obscure Productions
The challenge - by its nature it is designed to cause problems and there will always be people who can''t or don''t wish to struggle to solve the problem but do enjoy seeing what comes next. They will always want and need a walkthrough. The alternative is to have no challenge in the game, which makes it a movie instead.
The People - You can''t make a game that is set at the perfect difficulty level for everyone as people all think differently. If the lowest common denominator could solve the game others would find it too easy and boring.
Walkthroughs as an enhancement to the game - Yes they can add to the game’s enjoyment if the are constructed properly. Most walkthroughs take the player by the shortest route and do not point out much of the most interesting scenery. If they were redesigned to take the player on a more leisurely route they would enhance the pleasure.
Dan Marchant
Obscure Productions
SonicSilcion: I too had trouble with the lightbridge buttons. It was not until a friend of mine played the game and held them down that I learned how to activate them.
AtypicalAlex: Perhaps it's not fair to state that a walkthough must always suggest bad design, but in my experience I've only needed walkthroughs when stuck on unintuitive puzzles. I may have all I need to solve the thing, but there's nothing to suggest a logical approach towards a solution. The player must then resort to trial and error, trying everything he can think of, however illogical.
Adventure games like The Dig and Indiana Jones are great fun, but the fundamental flaw I've suggested at is the big difference between games of this type and real-life experience. In real life whatever you do has some kind of an effect. Yet in these sorts of games there's usually just one way to do things. Perhaps this is so by necessity, but the fact that it works this way makes bad puzzle design a lot more frustrating. A bad spot can literally become a show stopper, and in my experience it happens very, very often.
PS - What is causing the board to display things so badly? Is it the dashes in SonicSilcion's message. If so, please edit them.
Edited by - chronos on July 3, 2000 2:57:50 PM
AtypicalAlex: Perhaps it's not fair to state that a walkthough must always suggest bad design, but in my experience I've only needed walkthroughs when stuck on unintuitive puzzles. I may have all I need to solve the thing, but there's nothing to suggest a logical approach towards a solution. The player must then resort to trial and error, trying everything he can think of, however illogical.
Adventure games like The Dig and Indiana Jones are great fun, but the fundamental flaw I've suggested at is the big difference between games of this type and real-life experience. In real life whatever you do has some kind of an effect. Yet in these sorts of games there's usually just one way to do things. Perhaps this is so by necessity, but the fact that it works this way makes bad puzzle design a lot more frustrating. A bad spot can literally become a show stopper, and in my experience it happens very, very often.
PS - What is causing the board to display things so badly? Is it the dashes in SonicSilcion's message. If so, please edit them.
Edited by - chronos on July 3, 2000 2:57:50 PM
Re: Voodoo
>>Well an adventure game(pure old-style adventure game) is based on puzzles.
I think what Paul is talking about is the type of adventure games containing smaller games within them, like fitting together tubes, or trying to fit together mechanical parts. Like a bunch of silly games, bundled together into a larger game, loosely tied together with a silly plot. Myself I hate this type of adventure games. Pure old style adventure games did not lend themselves to such disaster, trust me.
>>Well an adventure game(pure old-style adventure game) is based on puzzles.
I think what Paul is talking about is the type of adventure games containing smaller games within them, like fitting together tubes, or trying to fit together mechanical parts. Like a bunch of silly games, bundled together into a larger game, loosely tied together with a silly plot. Myself I hate this type of adventure games. Pure old style adventure games did not lend themselves to such disaster, trust me.
Walk-Through''s are certainly not bad.. And they don''t necessarily mean there''s a problem with the design of a game.
I needed a little help playing "Day Of The Tentacle" and I used a Walk-Through just to give me a little nudge in the right direction; not using it entirely. I had been stuck with my characters for a few days and was actually getting bored/frustrated. It was more my fault than the games''.
And what if you had a kid that was stuck? Instead of playing an entire game yourself to help him through parts, a Walk-Through would let you give him/her hints so they could figure it out on their own...
// CHRIS
I needed a little help playing "Day Of The Tentacle" and I used a Walk-Through just to give me a little nudge in the right direction; not using it entirely. I had been stuck with my characters for a few days and was actually getting bored/frustrated. It was more my fault than the games''.
And what if you had a kid that was stuck? Instead of playing an entire game yourself to help him through parts, a Walk-Through would let you give him/her hints so they could figure it out on their own...
// CHRIS
Just to clarify, I don''t think walkthoughs are wrong, and the existence of a walkthrough doesn''t itself suggest bad design. It''s just that players shouldn''t need walkthroughs. Now this does not mean that the game should be trivial, but rather that the game should, on its own, provide enough information for the player to overcome the game''s various challenges. Gathering this information may take a bit of effort, and interpreting the information may require some thinking. This shouldn''t make walkthroughs necessary. Avoid trial and error solutions. Avoid illogical solutions. Make things make sense.
Author
I think some good AI in adventure/puzzle games would not go astray. What would be good is if the computer could tell you were having problems and would then slowly leak hints. Yes/no?
I love Game Design and it loves me back.
I love Game Design and it loves me back.
No, no, not the lightbridge PLEASE! A friend and I played that game together from start to finish in one 7 houre session. The only problem was that we could not get the bridges to work and (assuming that this would be solved at the end of the game) played all the way through the game going back and forward around the islands the LONG way (instead of taking short cuts across the bridges).
At the end of the game we were stuck and after an hour of walking around we finally gave in a tracked down a walkthrough. That really threw us cos it was talking about going across these bridges that wouldn''t work. Only solved it in the end cos I got so mad I started stabbing the mouse button over and over again and this started the bridge extending.
Dan Marchant
Obscure Productions
At the end of the game we were stuck and after an hour of walking around we finally gave in a tracked down a walkthrough. That really threw us cos it was talking about going across these bridges that wouldn''t work. Only solved it in the end cos I got so mad I started stabbing the mouse button over and over again and this started the bridge extending.
Dan Marchant
Obscure Productions
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