27. February 2016, 09:18:56

#285

Join2Quote

Sure, more simulated systems would be very welcome, but given the System Shock setting there's not great potential for emergent gameplay & player empowerment, it's more kill or be killed. Using the environment and interaction of game systems in clever ways to accomplish that is about as far as it goes.

The emergent part comes from the simulation-aspects of the game's world (including enemy AI) and refers to possibilities that the designers didn't think of

Yeah, as I said in a previous post: emergent possibilities that also include bugs, game balance destruction and script breaking, some of which can break the illusory/pseudo-simulation rather than enhance it. It's only a good thing if the results are positive and consistent with the intended design/game world. Ideally a game studio's testers will pick up on most emergent possibilities beforehand to filter the good from the bad, so in reality not much emergence trickles through to be discovered by the player, especially with the likes of System Shock. It's impossible to accurately answer, but what exactly in System Shock 1 has been done by the players that was both positive and not intended by the developers? I'm guessing not much. The LAM climbing in Deus Ex that Spector uses as some golden example of emergent gameplay can be used to break the story (bypass plot points), gameplay (bypass challenges) and simulation (jumping on tiny wall mines defies the laws of physics, and a broken story simply is a simulation fallen apart). I see very little positive about this emergence except "options are fun even if they break everything!". I prefer to call it an emergent bug in need of eradication than emergent gameplay and painting it in some positive light. Don't get me wrong I love the player empowerment available in these games, but emergent gameplay is merely a double-edged side effect. The genius of LGS design, to me at least, is not in emergent potential but everything else about the design.
I'll write up some examples of the genius soon, because I'm tired of this unjustified emergent gameplay boner. Deus Ex was not a great game because you could LAM climb, it was a great game in spite of that. Yes, all the many systems allow the player to do cool things, but most of it was intended. If LAM climbing is the best example of emergent gameplay you've got it isn't a very strong case.

27. February 2016, 09:31:34

#286

foxQuote

You may be surprised - that's the beauty of it!

27. February 2016, 10:24:06

#287

Join2Quote

I've experienced it first-hand. In GMDX I improved object physics by having them move when taking damage (originally objects were static to certain forces in Deus Ex - whacking a medkit with a crowbar yielded no results for example). I also added throw damage to objects, so as another example you could throw your GEP gun at people and it would do a little damage and make the NPC play a pain animation rather than the object simply bouncing off. These two new simulated effects interacted in a cool unintended way when I was testing: I went to throw my crowbar at an NPC, only the NPC was shooting at me and one of the bullets hit the weapon mid-air, knocking it away and saving himself from a flying weapon to the head. It was cool and a fine example of positive emergence. I didn't foresee it happening (even if it was an obvious possibility in hindsight) but such interactions are not the primary reasons I fell in love with LG design in the first place, although they do contribute. 

27. February 2016, 10:38:18

#288

KolyaQuote

Quote by Join usss!:

The original System Shock did away with friendly NPCs

In 1994 there weren't many games with friendly NPCs I think, if any. And if you're referring to SS2 then Levine made it clear many times that they didn't know how to do NPC interaction realistic and that's why they avoided it.
I would argue that apart from heavily scripted games NPC interaction still isn't being done on a realistic level and may not be for years. So it was to their credit to realise this AND come up with another story  telling technique that survived to this day: audio logs.

27. February 2016, 10:46:34

#289

Join2Quote

Ultima Underworld 1 & 2 (and its friendly NPCs) is where that comment has basis. Underworld is the design framework of the Immersive Sim and also the code framework of System Shock, so they "did away with NPCs" in that regard. And yes, I know why they done it. I was simply using it as one example of System Shock's less complex design compared to the likes of Ultima Underworld & Deus Ex, and how I don't see a System Shock 3 as being a good catalyst to further emergent gameplay beyond or even to the standard of what was achieved in those games. System Shock was intended to be more scripted and restrictive than DX or UW, there's not great potential for emergent gameplay given the setting, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. So when I see links like this:


Quote by Kolya:

venturebeat.com - Warren Spector wants to mine new ’emergent gameplay’ from System Shock’s nostalgia

...and read emergent gameplay mentioned frequently by Spector as the highlight of the immersive sim, I can't help but question Spector's intentions. Is he going to be happy making a more restrictive game with SS3 where you're doing a whole lot of cyborg slaying and not a great deal else (slight exaggeration)?