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[thorns]

Now I'm a programmer, and some of these things I see in games drive me crazy sometimes.

Game programming takes time, but unfortunately, lately, most of that time is being taken by graphics, and games are lacking a lot of features, which usually have nothing to do with the system's power. I want this trend to change, I want devs to focus more on the gameplay programming itself.

I will give some examples to illustrate my point:

1.) Gran Turismo 4: Crappy AI, no proper starts, no online. Now most of these features have nothing to do with the PS2's power. All of them could certainly be done, given more programming man hours. But Polyphony simply focused on other aspects of the game. Same can be said for their bike game as well.

2.) Forza: Crappy replays. WHY? Can't you just assing one guy to work on a kick ass replay system like Motogp has had since a long while. They already have the foundation, but the camera is most of the time annoying. They have done most of the things right when it comes to online.

3.) Pro Evolution Soccer/Winning Eleven: One of my favorite games, yet still some of the stuff drives me crazy. Like you can't replay after the ball has gone out of play, why? The sucky replay system has been in place since PS1 days. Their save system is atrocious. Why can't they make a proper one instead of the half asssed system they have now?

Is it hard to except from big budget games to have proper gameplay programming with all the necessary little features you might expect? And no half-assed implementations. As a game that has done it right I can give Moto Gp 2 as an example. PGR3 seems to have done it right as well, although I haven't had the chance to spend much time with it yet.

Why can't most game developers can't have the decency to code decent AI and such into their game? We hear this talk about how next-gen is gonna be great for AI etc, but the truth is most of these things that next-gen is supposed to be bringing (except graphics and physics), do not have so much to do with the system's power, but more with the gameplay code itself.

Feel free to add more examples.

 

[LegendofJoe]

Time and money are finite so in the end cuts always have to be made. It would be nice to have all the pie at once, but that rarely happens- sadly you have to pick and choose what you want to focus on.

 

[FtsH]

why do you include those replay system as a gameplay programming problem?

 

[DarienA]

Now I'm a programmer.....

Unless I'm confusing you with another poster this is a revelation to me considering your posting habits here....

 

[kaching]

A lot of games get focus tested into not having these gameplay features you're asking for...its not necessarily a matter of the devs not caring to code the feature as you suggest.

 

[radioheadrule83]

Yeah, I bet you could of thought up areas where the actual gameplay was lacking aside from AI and replay-cameras. But I agree with you. Thats why I buy a finite amount of games from developers, publishers and brands that I trust first and foremost, following only exceptional impressions or reviews thereafter. When I walk into a game store I walk past racks of stuff that I've already made up my mind on, with a playing-it-safe assumption that they're probably a load of shit. I go into a game shop and I already know what I want. Impulse buying is not even remotely on the cards at £30-40+ a pop. Fuck that.

And when I think about why that is? Seems to me, in most case-by-case scenarios, publishers only care about selling games to you. So they try and pick up games on the basis they'll stand out. More often than not its easiest to do that with a a well-known name, a license, a certain graphical look, or some kind of other new aesthetic or novelty element. Its not lost on me that this is the whole plan behind the Nintendo Revolution hardware. Aside from hopefully creating new kinds of games, its also a way to create novelty, to make stuff stand out from reams of shit -- even if a large amount of games that come out on Revolution could also turn out to be just that.

If they decide its more important that the game looks good or a certain feel fits their business-plan (or advertising-angle or whatever), developers can spread that sphincter wide, sit on a bone dry finger (or fist) and swivel merrily as they tow the line.

[/jaded-mood-swing]

 

[thorns]

Unless I'm confusing you with another poster this is a revelation to me considering your posting habits here....

Well I work with encryption/cryptography,databases and multi threaded servers, so I don't know so much about console or graphics programming (which is almost the whole dicussion here focuses on - graphics). I know a little about gameplay programming, having coded some simple games (i.e. tetris).

But yeah, AI and replays were the first to come up to my mind, since theyre usually so badly done in most games. It's just annoying most of the times games lack features or have them poorly implemented, yet next-gen games are supposed to bring all those, but the truth is most of those features don't have anything to do with a system's power.

It's just disheartening to see that people focus 95% on graphics when discussing games, yet noone talks about other gameplay issues..