Specific features we don't like in games
eddys...@hotmail.com
As there's another thread for features we would like, I thought this
would make a nice alternative thread :)
Please no DRM as that gets plenty of attention in other threads, but
what game specific features are a turn-off for you ?
Let's start with some pet peeves of mine :
- Orthogonal projection (diamonds). I recently re-tried to play the
Bulge scenario that comes with the demo of Strategic Command 2 -
Weapons & Warfare and no matter how hard I try, I can't force myself
to like them.
- Crucial unit info not on the main screen. The unit icon on the map
must contain enough info for you to play the game without having to
consult info panels on another part of the screen.
Greetz,
Eddy Sterckx
Big Salad
> Please no DRM as that gets plenty of attention in other threads, but
> what game specific features are a turn-off for you ?
No support for primary/secondary mouse button support. I use a
left-handed mouse configuration. Most games support the native windows
settings. Some games have their own separate configuration. But some
games stubbornly refuse to allow for the possibility.
Jan Szkudlin'ski
> Please no DRM as that gets plenty of attention in other threads, but
> what game specific features are a turn-off for you ?
I don't like when an often used function is initiated only with a mouse
point and click- i.e. no keyboard shortcut/hotkey.
Regards,
Jan Szkudlinski
Gumby
widescreen support. No widescreen mode? No buy!
Vincenzo Beretta
"Gumby" <gu...@is.cool> ha scritto nel messaggio
news:KRFWj.138233$Cj7.125878@pd7urf2no...
> Wargame developers that are still living in the past and neglect to give
> us
> widescreen support. No widescreen mode? No buy!
Agreed, as I often pointed out in the past. The screen is basically a
"window" on the wargame's map. Whereas in a tabletop wargame you can embrace
the whole battlefield at a glance, in a PC wargame you are limited by the
screen size and the resolution. Since I bought my 24" I'm enjoying TOAW III
more: that's a fact.
Dav Vandenbroucke
wrote:
>1/ CRTs (combat results tables) . The idea that if you just add that
>engineer battalion to your multi-division attack you can't get worse
>than a "retreat" result . They may have been a necessary evil in board
>games, but a nono for me on a computer.
These days, even board games have adopted mechanisms that discourage
factor counting.
Dav Vandenbroucke
davanden at cox dot net
Giftzwerg
@d1g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
> As there's another thread for features we would like, I thought this
> would make a nice alternative thread :)
>
> Please no DRM as that gets plenty of attention in other threads, but
> what game specific features are a turn-off for you ?
1. Not using standard Windows / OS conventions. For instance, the "X"
in the upper right corner of the window closes the window - if Joe
Developer thinks he's got a better way to do it, he needs to convince
Microsoft of it, not just stick it in his game and screw up users.
Multiply this by the 57 different ways a budding developer thinks he
"knows better," and the game sucks.
2. Not supporting all the screen resolutions that exist today - and
will exist tomorrow. Nothing is more infuriating than spending a
fortune on a fabulously nifty new display / video system and watching
your favorite games squash themselves into the two stupid resolutions
the developer could think of.
3. Simulating a paper & dice boardgame instead of simulating the
military situation in question directly. As I mentioned in another
thread, this makes about as much sense as building an advanced robot
prostitute and consciously modeling it on a plastic blowup doll instead
of Angelina Jolie. Stop porting hex and chart games to the PC and start
porting reality to the PC.
4. Inappropriate 3D nonsense. Unless the game screen is filled with
cockpit instruments or the HUD of my Space Marine suit, then 3D is
probably a needless feature. No game that models a scale greater than
single vehicles or men needs 3D.
5. No tooltips. The first Imperial Fiat from Emperor Giftzwerg I will
be that every single computer program in the realm will - on pain of
death - attach a *useful* tooltip to every single button, slider,
window, widget, gimcrack, and thingie. It's just a no-brainer these
days; don't bother putting some obscure icon on the screen unless I can
hover my pointer over it and get a reasonably fulsome explanation of it.
6. Phases. Some games - GUNS OF AUGUST / RUSSO-GERMAN WAR - appear to
believe that "the more the merrier" is the right approach to phases.
Now, some phase controls are probably unavoidable; a game that modeled
skydiving, for instance, would rightly require the player to don his
parachute *before* jumping out of the plane, and would rightly penalize
a player who advanced to the "jumping" phase before the "putting on
chute" stage. But most of the time reality isn't a nightmare of
retarded linearity. If Frank Hunter designed physics, forgetting one's
wallet wouldn't simply mean snapping one's fingers and trotting back
inside and grabbing it; the unlucky drone would be forced to forego
lunch, dinner, a hotel room, and a ticket home ... ultimately starving
in the streets of a foreign city. Lose the fucking phases whenever
possible.
7. Maps that look like anything except ... a map. You know, this?
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/maps/wwii/index.html
Why is it that game designers always inflict something that looks like
it's straight out of Marvel Comics when we've all seen these wonderful
military maps ... and we spend the whole game staring at a screen that's
a *map*? Even designers who avoid tessellating the screen with dopey
hexagons shower us with blobs of green and brown and grey. Even
*attractive* games, like BoA, feature a map that looks more like the
placemat-map at Joe's Diner (You Are HERE!) than an actual military map.
8. Not playing nice with other software. Why the hell do game
designers so often imagine the users PC as a digital tabula rasa and
assume their loopy game will have the place to itself? Memo to
developers; my PC *will be running other stuff*. Yup, even when your
loopy game is running. I need to page out of it. Open other stuff.
Take a phone call. When I go "Alt-Tab", your loopy game needs to
quietly, respectfully, and decisively get off my fucking screen. When I
flip back, it needs to still be there, all neat and tidy, patiently
waiting.
--
Giftzwerg
***
"My all-time favorite political cartoon dates back to a couple of
decades ago. It shows an American explaining our politics to a man from
Eastern Europe. 'Well sure,' he says, 'the government lies.
And the newspapers lie. But in a democracy they aren t the same lies."
The AP has become very closely allied with a certain political party.
Pretty soon they may be the same lies."
- Mike G.
Giftzwerg
@NOSPAMZ.hotmail.com says...
> In article <9b8203e9-05b5-4be5-874f-36bd9afc3020
> @d1g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>, eddys...@hotmail.com says...
>
> > As there's another thread for features we would like, I thought this
> > would make a nice alternative thread :)
> >
> > Please no DRM as that gets plenty of attention in other threads, but
> > what game specific features are a turn-off for you ?
9. Programs that refuse to routinely communicate their own state.
Example; you're assigning units to an attack in some boardgame
simulator. You click on each unit and press the "Assign" button." OK,
you're finished. But why is the "Resolve Attack" button grayed out?
Grrrrrrr. So you scrabble about in the manual and find that you must
have odds of so-and-so before the "Resolve" button is active. But
here's my problem: the program "knows" why it has the button grayed-
out. In fact, it specifically grayed-out this button because a
condition has not been met.
So why not communicate this to the player in an obvious way? Why
wouldn't a designer building an object that could be grayed out fashion
it so that it could be passed a tooltip from the code that grayed it out
in the first place?
Too many games do this bullshit. Buttons and menu items just
mysteriously go gray and refuse to tell us why.
eddys...@hotmail.com
> In article <MPG.229a9a4076085f86989a58@localhost>, giftzwerg999
>
I pretty much agree with your points (except 3D - which I think has a
role beyond tactical) but what struck me is that points #1,2,5 and 8
are things which should be put in some sort of guideline for
developers as minimum requirements.
But wargames being what they are I think I'm kidding myself here, it's
not like in the book publishing business where publishers can be
choosy about which manuscript on offer they'll publish. Basically if
you've got a working wargame, no matter how clunky you'll find a
publisher.
Greetz,
Eddy Sterckx