- Hylebos
- |
- Fabled Mythic Member
WARNING: Wall of Text Approaching!
I am by no means a succinct writer, and if you aren't a particularly patient reader, you might want to just skim this thread or go look at a different topic.
WARNING: Speculation Ahead!
While this thread contains some truths, it has a healthy dose of speculation. While I try to have mildly solid reasoning to back up the brunt of my ideas, I may or may not have pulled some of it from my nether regions. Proceed with caution, decide for yourself what to believe in!
IntroductionAs you may know, back on May 21st, 2012, Activision publicly released the contract that they had formed with Bungie as part of a lawsuit that was going on between themselves and the original developers of Call of Duty. While the contract extensively detailed the way that Destiny would be developed, released, and distributed, in terms of actually describing what Destiny was from a gameplay standpoint, this was all it had to say:
"Product" or "Products" means the following that are developed during the Development Term (as such term is defined in Section 4.1 a series of interactive entertainment software products being developed by Licensor based on the Destiny Property, planned to be massively-multiplayer-style (i.e. client-based mission structures with persistent elements), sci-fantasy, action-shooter games
The first thing I noticed when I first read the contract was that it failed to specify if Destiny would be a First Person Shooter or a Third Person Shooter. The distinction between the two in terms of gameplay is astronomical, and while the choice is ultimately Bungie's decision, I feel that it would be an interesting topic to explore.
I should probably clarify that although some games like Skyrim or Battlefront give you the option to play from either the first or third person perspective, Destiny will either be a first person shooter or a third person shooter, but not both. What you need to understand is that despite the fact that Skyrim gives you an option to play from a third person perspective, you'll notice that the game still plays like a first person adventure game. And despite the fact that Battlefront gives you an option to play from a first person perspective, you'll notice that the game still plays like a third person shooter. These games might give you the illusion that they have both the advantages of the first and third person perspective, but at the end of the day, they are designed for and limited by a single predominant perspective. The option to swap between the two perspectives is a nice addition, but is ultimately vestigial.
With that out of the way, let's proceed to tonight's topic:
Will Destiny be a First Person Shooter, or will it be a Third Person Shooter?
On one hand I could totally imagine that Destiny would be a first person shooter. Bungie has been incredibly successful with that genre over the past ten years, and creating another FPS would allow them to reutilize older assets, not to mention that they would be able to take advantage of the wealth of knowledge that they've gained from creating Halo. A first person MMO shooter would definitely work, and it might be interesting to see Bungie's take on that genre.
But on the other hand, I could definitely see Bungie wanting to distance themselves somewhat from their earlier successes and set forth down a new path. If they wanted to sit around making first person shooters for the rest of their lives, they could have just stayed with Microsoft and continued to make Halo. From watching the 20th Anniversary Vidoc, I got the impression that they plan on going somewhere new and exciting with their next intellectual property, and sticking around in the same genre seems a tad too safe to me.
Not to mention, the videogame market has been flooded with first person shooters for a while now, and as time has gone on, we've seen less and less innovation between titles. I have faith in Bungie's abillities, but it just seems like it would be very difficult for them to create a first person shooter that is not only radically different from Halo, but different from every other first person shooter. I mean, it's easy to make the game look visually different, it's all a simple matter of changing the setting, the weapons, and the types of people you shoot at. But at it's core, a first person shooter plays like a first person shooter. Will simply increasing the player cap on a given match be enough to make Destiny distinguishable from Halo?
I feel that a far more radical change in gameplay is required to solidify the distinction between the two games, and what could be more radical than a change in perspective? In my mind the third person perspective has several distinct advantages over the first person perspective when it comes to gameplay, and together, will create a game that is far more interesting than the average first person shooter.
The first and most obvious advantage of the third person perspective is expanded vision. By placing the camera behind the player rather than inside of the player, you get a much larger view of the battlefield. As simple as that may sound, I have difficulty expressing just how profound of an effect that extra visual information has on what you can and can't do with the game.
For example, one of my biggest gripes with first person shooters is how they lack truly interesting environments to explore. Outdoor areas seem more like fields littered with an odd assortment of rocks and tree trunks, indoor areas are hallway after corner after open space... everything just feels flat and rather uninteresting. Perhaps it's simply because I played a ton of platforming adventure games in my childhood, but I've always loved vertically oriented areas filled with all sorts of interesting paths. I'd love to play a shooter that takes place in a half-built urban environment, a sea of floating sky islands, or towering jungle forests, full of all sorts of hidey-holes, vantage points, and ways to navigate throughout the area.
Unfortunately, platforming elements don't really work out well in the first person perspective; there are far too many elements that compete for your attention. On one hand, you're above a bottomless pit, and you want to be looking down at your feet to ensure that you make the jump to the next platform. On the other hand, there's an alien on the other side of the chasm who is taking advantage of your predicament to turn you into swiss cheese. If you take your reticle off the platforms to aim and fight, you fall to your death. If you keep your focus on the platforms, you cannot defend yourself. First Person Platforming doesn't blend with First Person Shooting because you are incapable of looking in two different directions at the same time. However, that problem doesn't exist in the third person perspective, where your expanded vision allows you to aim at your foe while keeping an eye on the platforms.
So as you can see, the first advantage of the third person perspective directly enables a second advantage: Mobillity. With the expanded vision to properly spot edges, platforms, and environmental hazards, a developer can give the player the increased mobillity that he needs to properly navigate a more complex and interesting environment. Furthermore, if you design your game so that the mobillity is easy to utilize but difficult to master, then you have added yet another element of skill to the gameplay. A strong player will be able to flow quickly through the most convoluted of maps, allowing them to outrun and outposition their less skilled opponents.
However, I imagine that some of you might be scratching your heads at this point. "What about third person shooters like Gears of War or Mass Effect, isn't there a chance that Destiny might be somewhat more like those games?" While it is true that more traditional third person shooters tend to be heavily cover-based, I sincerely doubt that it is a path down which Bungie will follow. Remember, Destiny is a "massively-multiplayer-style" shooter, and It doesn't seem like the overly entrenched gameplay of third person cover based shooters lends itself well to a high player cap.
Small arenas festooned with various small walls for cover is one thing, but when you have an entire valley that is a literal maze of trenches formed by shipping crates, it pushes the believabillity of your scenario somewhat. Not to mention, I believe that one of the elements from Halo that Bungie would be reluctant to part with would be the chaotic vehicular action, especially since they'll have the chance to multiply that action by a factor of ten with an increased player cap. I can't imagine heavily cover based gameplay working out well when you can just drive a vehicle up over the walls and nuke your cowering enemies from orbit. No, if Bungie does something with the third person perspective, I imagine that there will be minimal cover systems at best.
Continued on Post 2
[Edited on 08.23.2012 3:14 PM PDT]