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[Dead Man]

Checkpoints arent really hand holding, if anything "save anywhere" makes games too easy since you can save just before a big fight or even mid way through a fight so you can keep retrying until you do it perfectly.

Checkpoints on the other promote different strategies since your last save isnt 5 seconds ago, so you are more cautious about how you approach a situation instead of relying on trial and error.

I don't think the freedom to try different approaches to a situation is promoted by the caution checkpoints only saving creates.

 

[Wallach]

Exactly. As long as the checkpoints aren't onerous it works out pretty well. Much better than constantly saving every few seconds or bringing up a menu every time you do absolutely anything of interest. I don't understand how game designers balance difficulty in quick-save games, or if they even feel the need to worry about it.

The funny thing is that you don't have to think about it at all with a quick save system, but you have to think about it with every single element you design with a checkpoint system.

 

[Niblet]

Oh shi- my heart, upon just reading Skyrim will be $60 on PC. Not day one =( Looks like I'll be waiting for these games to be sub-$30 on intkeys.

 

[DevelopmentArrested]

Saves whatever.

Much more worried about the actual gameplay.

 

[NullPointer]

The funny thing is that you don't have to think about it at all with a quick save system, but you have to think about it with every single element you design with a checkpoint system.

Well there you go, and to some that sounds great. But to me it screams lazy design. Similar to the design sense you get in games with regenerating health. There's little thought to balancing encounters, or making them escalate organically, or allowing a player to truly make their way through a battle without getting shot up a ton of times. You can just allow quick saves and regenerating health and a few things to hide behind and you're done.

 

[AEREC]

Oh shi- my heart, upon just reading Skyrim will be $60 on PC. Not day one =( Looks like I'll be waiting for these games to be sub-$30 on intkeys.

Seriously? It's $10 extra on a game that most likely has 100x more content than most other games and will last anyone over 100 hours easily. It's also the best version of the three platforms and costs the same.

 

[Wallach]

Well there you go, and to some that sounds great. But to me it screams lazy design. Similar to the design sense you get in games with regenerating health. There's little thought to balancing encounters, or making them escalate organically, or allowing a player to truly make their way through a battle without getting shot up a ton of times. You can just allow quick saves and regenerating health and a few things to hide behind and you're done.

Well, no. You balance the encounters exactly in the same way as you would in a game like Dark Souls. The only type of game that requires design consideration to include player save mechanics are games that use mandatory checkpoints where the game progress ends with player death. Those are the ones that are typically lazy because they can safely assume that the player won't lose much progress if they fuck something up design wise and the encounter sucks.

 

[MrTroubleMaker]

 

[AEREC]

Well, no. You balance the encounters exactly in the same way as you would in a game like Dark Souls. The only type of game that requires design consideration to include player save mechanics are games that use mandatory checkpoints where the game progress ends with player death. Those are the ones that are typically lazy because they can safely assume that the player won't lose much progress if they fuck something up design wise and the encounter sucks.

huh?

 

[Poimandres]

Exactly. As long as the checkpoints aren't onerous it works out pretty well. Much better than constantly saving every few seconds or bringing up a menu every time you do absolutely anything of interest. I don't understand how game designers balance difficulty in quick-save games, or if they even feel the need to worry about it.

It depends on the situation. A game like STALKER, for instance, would be hindered greatly by checkpoint only saves. If a game is trying to portray a dangerous environment where death can come quickly and unpredictably auto saving just isn't going to work well.

As for Rage, I prefer my post apocalyptic worlds ruthless and punishing so I'll be setting the difficulty high and quick saving often.

Self managed saving isn't ideal for console games, but I had no trouble adapting when I played through something like Bioshock (without using vita chambers). It's just about approaching situations in a different frame of mind.

 

[NullPointer]

Well, no. You balance the encounters exactly in the same way as you would in a game like Dark Souls.

I don't get this. You're saying quick-save games balance encounter design in a manner like Demons Souls? I wish.

It depends on the situation. A game like STALKER, for instance, would be hindered greatly by checkpoint only saves. If a game is trying to portray a dangerous environment where death can come quickly and unpredictably auto saving just isn't going to work well.

How does quick saving not hinder the portrayal of a dangerous environment? Seems like allowing saves at any time, especially instant saving would make the entire mood of danger evaporate as soon you hit F5.

 

[IoCaster]

Some early game impressions from SA forum poster Clonexx:

I'm around 2 hours and 15 mins into the game, and so far I am impressed, very impressed. I have always been a huge fan of Carmack though, to me the guy is a genius.

Anyway, to answer your questions, the combat has been in the middle so far. Not slow, but not frantic either. They seem to be throwing a good mix of guys that stay at range and pick at you and guys that are melee/shotgun that absolutely close in on you and try to facerape you. The guys that close in are pretty quick and good at it, most of them do NOT just run in a straight line waiting to get ripped down. They zig zag left and right and depending on who you are fighting, they vault off walls and use pipes above them to swing forward, etc. It's pretty insane.

The environments are stunning. There is a noticeable texture pop in, but I don't think there is ANY way to avoid it with how ambitious Rage is. Even with the pop in, the game looks gorgeous for being on a console. Of course it will not compete with high end PC's at all, but that's to be expected. Carmack is an engine designing genius and the game looks to me, like the best looking game the 360 has ever seen. So far it's been running at a steady framerate with no noticeable slowdowns. The world is stunning and great to just sit there and look around.

As far as the interface, it's clean and functional. You have your standard minimap in the upper right, gun/gun selection in the bottom right (right bumper), ammo selection on the bottom left(right bumper), defibulator charge in the bottom left next to ammo. Hitting the back button will bring up the standard interfaces you have seen before for inventory, quests/journal, engineering and arsenal/armory which outlines what guns you have, what ammo you have for those guns and what armor you have. Overall it's all very easy to work with and works very well. It feels pretty RPGish actually in that sense.

It is a save anywhere system, which I am thankful for. The game actually does not auto-save very often that I have seen. It will save when you transition from outdoor to indoors and the reverse. but that's all I've seen so far. If there is one piece of advice I can give, it is to SAVE OFTEN, because if you die and your last save is the auto-save when you entered some bandit hideout 30 mins ago, then you are screwed. The load times seem fine to me, I installed Disc 1 to my HDD and it takes about 10 seconds to load an area I am going to and the same to load the Wasteland when I leave. You don't do a ton of that though, so far at least it's been pretty minimal.

Some of the cool things I've noticed so far is that for one, some guys wear helmets. A headshot will pop the helmet off violently and knock them down. The way the game handles guys getting shot and dying is pretty damn cool. Many of the melee guys that charge you, if you kill them while they are still coming at you, will hold their chest and stagger with continuing forward momentum for at least a few feet more, dropping their weapon in the process. They will then fall forward dead after staggering. It may seem like such a small thing, but it's an awesome touch and a nice change from the standard "shoot them and they just fall down" formula. Other guys you will shoot a few times and they then make some comment about being all fucked up, they start to crawl away or for cover while shooting at you from the ground, that's another very cool touch.

I can already see the card game getting me horribly addicted. I haven't even played it yet, but I have been collecting cards. I am already feeling that MtG like pull to get all the cards, assemble and awesome deck and whoop up on unsuspecting wasteland peoples.

While the game may not look very unique or new from the commercials and videos, it really does feel new. They seemed to really go out of their way to not just spit out some clone of what modern shooters are. So far it feels like a cross between Fallout and Quake but with vast improvements over either of those. Even though they are avoiding the RPG tag, and I do agree it is absolutely not an RPG, there are elements that very much feel like an RPG. Going through the beginning 2 settlements and talking to people, gathering schematics and parts so that you can build shit using engineering, the fact that you even have an inventory screen and a quest log. While none of these are "new", in this combination they feel really fresh.

The game feels immense. I don't know what the length of the game is, but it truly feels massive. It's 2 DVDs for the campaign with a 3rd DVD for multiplayer. I do know from interviews that there is a TON of side shit that you can do or just ignore. I believe I read that there is something like 26 different race circuits you can join to do vehicle racing, yet only 2 are required for the story. Which reminds me, so far I have only gotten to drive an ATV, but the driving feels smooth and responsive. It is a LOT of fun to just tear ass across the wasteland on my ATV with an afterburner on it. There's jumps and shit to mess with all around.

Since I am only in the beginning, it has been very linear so far. Story driven with a few side quests that I could have ignored. From what I understand, it will open up a bit later on, but it is not a fully open world game. There is always guidance and the main story with the side stuff supporting it. Whether it will feel incredibly linear or not, I don't know yet. It's too early to tell. I do know that I am definitely enjoying the shit out of it so far though.

I'm going to go back to playing, I can post more impressions later or tomorrow. If you guys have any other questions, ask away, I am happy to help anyone who is deciding whether or not to pick the game up.

It sounds phenomenal and I can't wait to dive in. HYPE!

 

[GhostRidah]

Steam is getting more money from a PC purchase than either Microsoft or Sony on consoles.

It is 60$ on all major game selling sites

 

[Poimandres]

How does quick saving not hinder the portrayal of a dangerous environment? Seems like allowing saves at any time, especially instant saving would make the entire mood of danger evaporate as soon you hit F5.

I suppose it does to an extent, but the reduction in frustration is worth it. If a game isn't designed around "neat" enemy encounters, like some open world games or games with wandering AI, it seems pretty difficult to properly implement auto-saves.

People always complain about at least a few checkpoints in most games, especially first person shooters. And these are usually the games with clearly signposted enemy encounters!

 

[Wallach]

huh?

In a system where the player is the one in command of recording progress, you don't have to think about the save mechanics from a design standpoint. They are removed. So, you balance the game just like you would balance any properly made game; against the mechanics you are trying to employ at any given moment. No consideration has to be given from a design standpoint to whether the player is going to "lose" something beyond what costs within the game design you have appended to player failure (whether that is "GAME OVER" or sending you back to a bonfire in Dark Souls).

In a game with mandatory checkpoints and no means of manual saving, you have to give direct design consideration to everything because what the player loses beyond the normal penalty when they die is dictated by you and not them. So because you're responsible for the costs incurred on their failure, the flow of your entire game is dictated by the distance between these points. Every time you try to escalate the challenge within a particular scenario, the consideration is not just that they have a higher risk of seeing "GAME OVER" but "GAME OVER" plus the progress you have revoked from them; either you soften the blow by placing a checkpoint behind every isolated instance of increased challenge, or you rebalance the original design to be easier based on the distance from that point to your last checkpoint.

 

[Definity]

Sounds fucking awesome. I can't wait. Going to play this until my eyes bleed.

 

[NullPointer]

In a game with mandatory checkpoints and no means of manual saving, you have to give direct design consideration to everything because what the player loses beyond the normal penalty when they die is dictated by you and not them. So because you're responsible for the costs incurred on their failure, the flow of your entire game is dictated by the distance between these points. Every time you try to escalate the challenge within a particular scenario, the consideration is not just that they have a higher risk of seeing "GAME OVER" but "GAME OVER" plus the progress you have revoked from them; either you soften the blow by placing a checkpoint behind every isolated instance of increased challenge, or you rebalance the original design to be easier based on the distance from that point to your last checkpoint.

This is interesting. What I like about games balanced without regenerating health or quicksaves or mad potion gulping is that encounters are designed so that a good player can get from one checkpoint to the next without dying. Sometimes this is really challenging, but also rewarding.

It requires more thoughtful design though. Now if you rely upon a player hitting the quicksave key there is nothing from stopping you as the designer from throwing all sorts of unbalanced crap at the player. Because at the end of the day you can just say "hey, you should have saved early and often".

 

[Wallach]

How does quick saving not hinder the portrayal of a dangerous environment? Seems like allowing saves at any time, especially instant saving would make the entire mood of danger evaporate as soon you hit F5.

That's pretty simple to answer: if the sense of danger is not caused by some element within the gameplay that is in fact actually dangerous to the player's progress, then the sense of danger is false and will be dispelled very quickly whether the player saves or not.

This is interesting. What I like about games balanced without regenerating health or quicksaves or mad potion gulping is that encounters are designed so that a good player can get from one checkpoint to the next without dying. Sometimes this is really challenging, but also rewarding.

It requires more thoughtful design though. Now if you rely upon a player hitting the quicksave key there is nothing from stopping you as the designer from throwing all sorts of unbalanced crap at the player. Because at the end of the day you can just say "hey, you should have saved early and often".

It is true that it requires thoughtful design; but what you're speaking to is a design problem that exists outside of the save mechanic. I think by realizing that you will understand what I have been saying very clearly. The save mechanic itself hurts your design integrity only when it begins to influence it at all.

 

[NullPointer]

That's pretty simple to answer: if the sense of danger is not caused by some element within the gameplay that is in fact actually dangerous to the player's progress, then the sense of danger is false and will be dispelled very quickly whether the player saves or not.

Ok then, what is dangerous to me as a player when I can instantly save my progress? I can do this mid boss fight and mid battle. Where is the real danger here?

The only danger I can think of is that you quicksave at an inopportune time, like just as you're about to succumb to the enemy super-attack and have no way to escape, or just as you go careening off of a cliff. In that case the danger is really the player, not the game itself. And in that case you have to go all the way back to your last save file or restart the chapter, which may be really screwed.

The save mechanic itself hurts your design integrity only when it begins to influence it at all.

That's a good line and one I'll take some time to chew on. Thanks ;P

I still don't see how a save system can avoid influencing how the game is played on a fundamental level, but its food for thought.

 

[Wallach]

Ok then, what is dangerous to me as a player when I can instantly save my progress? I can do this mid boss fight and mid battle. Where is the real danger here?

The only danger I can think of is that you quicksave at an inopportune time, like just as you're about to succumb to the enemy super-attack and have no way to escape, or just as you go careening off of a cliff. In that case the danger is really the player, not the game itself. And in that case you have to go all the way back to your last save file or restart the chapter, which may be really screwed.

The danger would be whatever the danger is whether you saved or not. Ask yourself this; why is anything in Dark Souls dangerous if you can never die and never really lose?

 

[NullPointer]

The danger would be whatever the danger is whether you saved or not. Ask yourself this; why is anything in Dark Souls dangerous if you can never die and never really lose?

The danger is losing time and the souls you've gathered. The risk is putting hours of exploration into a dungeon only to die and lose almost everything. It forces you to be careful and precise with every engagement, or at the very least not to slip up and give your opponent's openings as even the weaker enemies can cut you down to size very quickly.

The danger is there only because there is no way to save your progress. If you could quick save at any moment the game would lose almost all of what defines it. The danger would cease to exist in any meaningful way.

Apologies if I've completely derailed this thread. Wasn't my intent, but I do love the exploring the principles behind a game design.

 

[Niblet]

Seriously? It's $10 extra on a game that most likely has 100x more content than most other games and will last anyone over 100 hours easily. It's also the best version of the three platforms and costs the same.

Everyone has their price points. I can't do $60 day ones at this time.

Intkeys has both for $35. I would jump on that, but I have other games that will be holding my attention in the next few months so I figure they'll drop a little by then.

 

[I H8 Memes]

RAGE, first 20 min( PS3 version). You can notice fade ins from textures, hope 360 version fares better.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6yvW72A8q8
Got to say that draw distance is spectacular. Really really awesome looking, especially for 60hz game.

Hey it's John Goodman!

 

[AgentOtaku]

Hey it's John Goodman!

Didn't know that eh?
Yeah pretty damn inspired casting even if the dialog is run of the mill

Watching the PS3 footage now and feeling alot better about buying it on triple rather than PC

 

[kemical]

this discussion of quicksave vs autosave, I kinda think the best would be if the game just could always jump about 5 minutes in the past, and that is all you have. Some of the best moments in games like Stalker or other FPS are where I have a ridiculous situation to get out of just using one quick save and it takes many tries but is possible.

 

[Stallion Free]

Steam is getting more money from a PC purchase than either Microsoft or Sony on consoles.

Except if you buy it from anywhere that isn't Steam (every store carries it) Steam doesn't get 1 penny.

 

[Teknoman]

Hoping Bethesda insiders can help save me money on both Rage and Skyrim with all the releases coming out before year end.

 

[soulassssns]

It is 60$ on all major game selling sites

Yup, Thats why you shop around. I am getting my copy for 46$

 

[Buckethead]

I really want to play this game but trying to finish one up right now and Arkham City is around the corner then Uncharted and Zelda.

Looks like I won't be playing until summer. Bummer.

(First world problems).

 

[Wallach]

The danger is losing time and the souls you've gathered. It forces you to be careful and precise with every engagement, or at the very least not to slip up and give your opponent's openings as even the weaker enemies can cut you down to size very quickly.

The danger is there only because there is no way to save your progress. If you could quick save at any moment the game would lose almost all of what defines it.

Don't get too ahead of me here. Obviously being able to save (or more specifically load a saved point in the past) without changing any of the other design would destroy Dark Souls.

It's about asking why that is. They dictate to the player a big laundry list of things that will happen if they die. You shit your souls in a green pile on the ground right where you died, you turn undead, and you get moved to the last bonfire you rested at. Right?

So the key to the danger working here is that you cannot undo any of your forward progress even if your forward progress involves getting your shit slapped. They've also removed the typical element of forward progress ending at all. To do that, you have to take control of the recording of progress entirely. There's no other type of saving that works; design has dictated that forward progress must not end, so the player may not interfere.

In a game like RAGE (many other games certainly), when you really die you're fuckin' dead. Donezo. Forward progress just ate shit, the game is over. The design of the game literally stops here - there is no more consideration, all design considerations have to take place in the gameplay that leads here. Doesn't matter whether that comes from beating the game or tripping on a rock and falling off a cliff ten minutes in. That's why, ultimately, you would balance the encounters in the same way as you would Dark Souls - because you design and balance encounters to dictate only the flow of forward progress.

So, for any sense of danger to come from a game like this, it has to come from a combination of whatever is going on in the abstract (visually/thematically/plot, whatever) and the knowledge given to the player that failing against that danger leads to that end. That sense can be heightened by increasing the challenge in a specific moment, but it still answers to the end result.

Checkpoints in a system like that don't help you solve a gameplay design problem, because by the time a player ever uses one, all the design considerations have played out to our end result.

 

[GhostRidah]

Valve needs to upload Rage on a few more servers, I still cant start my pre load lol

 

[EvilDick34]

LOL, so exactly 9 hours after i started the pre-load i think i am at 50 percent downloaded i think haha, so sad.

 

[GhostRidah]

LOL, so exactly 9 hours after i started the pre-load i think i am at 50 percent downloaded i think haha, so sad.

Your slow internet is taking up my slot!

 

[reptilescorpio]

Wait, card game? Damn, triple triad all over again. Will spend 100 hours on the card game alone.

 

[pelican]

In Canada, yes. And they are getting MORE restrictive, not less.

That is crazy.

I got an adsl 2 24m connection with unlimted dl for £25 per month. NO throttling.

 

[JJD]

RAGE, first 20 min( PS3 version). You can notice fade ins from textures, hope 360 version fares better.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6yvW72A8q8
Got to say that draw distance is spectacular. Really really awesome looking, especially for 60hz game.

Looks really, really good to this lowly console peasant! I'm glad I pre ordered the Anarchy edition! It'll only take a month to arrive! :-(

 

[Wallach]

Haven't even been able to start my pre-load man, it's been six hours.

Oh, I found this short video of the pre-order bonuses, figured someone might be interested:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmHdQ9wZ3dw

 

[Bluth54]

I get the same thing every time I try to preload.

 

[Salsa]

I get the same thing every time I try to preload.

same here :/ bullshit

 

[specialguy]

Well there you go, and to some that sounds great. But to me it screams lazy design. Similar to the design sense you get in games with regenerating health. There's little thought to balancing encounters, or making them escalate organically, or allowing a player to truly make their way through a battle without getting shot up a ton of times. You can just allow quick saves and regenerating health and a few things to hide behind and you're done.

I agree. At it's worst, you can literally peek out from cover, land one shot on an enemy without getting hit yourself, and then quicksave, rinse and repeat. I got through some battles in Crysis where I had almost no health this way, but it wasn't fun.

It also led to a lot of bugs again for me in Crysis. And then at the end somehow I got stuck with all save slots used in a bugged state. Had it been a checkpoint system this couldn't happen, as I could have just always reverted to a clean unbugged checkpoint.

 

[DaBuddaDa]

I agree. At it's worst, you can literally peek out from cover, land one shot on an enemy without getting hit yourself, and then quicksave, rinse and repeat. I got through some battles in Crysis where I had almost no health this way, but it wasn't fun.

You are in control of the quicksaves though. If you choose to game the system, you can't then complain about not having fun; that's your fault.

 

[Solo]

Aaaaaaand now the servers are too busy to resume my pre-load. RAGE, indeed.

 

[Solo]

broken shitty feature in your game? No checkpoints in 2011 is inexcusable.

:lol

Do people really want games to hold their hand this much?

 

[CozMick]

PS3 footage looks amazing, Carmack redeemed.

Back to a day one! Fifa will have to wait.

 

[Lovely Salsa]

Which version is the better version??

 

[Metal-Geo]

Aaaaaaand now the servers are too busy to resume my pre-load. RAGE, indeed.

Shouldn't have paused/interrupted it. The reset was a UI bug after all and didn't redownload the whole pack.

My download got reset at 20%. I just let it continue over the night. When I got back, the download had suspensed at 80%. I clicked 'pause', then 'resume', and then Steam told me the download was done! \o/

 

[Always-honest]

RAGE, first 20 min( PS3 version). You can notice fade ins from textures, hope 360 version fares better.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6yvW72A8q8
Got to say that draw distance is spectacular. Really really awesome looking, especially for 60hz game.

maybe this is without install?

 

[Wallach]

maybe this is without install?

Install is mandatory for PS3.

 

[Alex Connolly]

I reeeaaaally want to look at that opening 20 minutes. But self control must be enacted. I want this to be a fresh experience, outside of those delicious trailers.

 

[Always-honest]

Install is mandatory for PS3.

ah, okay.

game looks fine i guess. Nice sky.