Free form, unfolding storyline - is that all?

criticalmass

criticalmass

Vice Admiral
After looking at quite an handful of current and older releases of spacesims I've been wondering if that sums up the "success" formula for the genre: You fly where you want to, you have a dynamic universe around you that reacts to your actions (somehow), and you get drawn into a storyline which is steered by your performance and your decisions.

Good concept.

But I haven't seen anything added to the idea since, say, Elite.

Privateer definitely was a model implementation, there were some good games around it (Terminus, I-War2, Aquanox), but a lot of it just feels like more of the same.

Now I ask you: What would you like to see added to the concept?
What do you miss in the games that exist today?
 
Don't forget Hardwar. I'd actually say it is the best implementation of the concept so far.
Personally I enjoy storylines more then freeform, so the more story and the less dynamic universe the better. What I'd like to see would be some sort of either dynamic storyline (dynamic in a sense like the Lucas Arts Desktop Adventures or like a Diablo dungeon) and or a larger scale dynamic where the whole universe changes in the course of the game as a war is won/lost depending on your actions.
 
criticalmass said:
Good concept.

But I haven't seen anything added to the idea since, say, Elite.
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Well, don't get into the habit of thinking that story structure is something that has to be re-invented every five years or something ;). Classically-structured movies, for example, have been the dominant storyline structure in cinema for as long as cinema has existed. Thing is, as interesting as weird alternative structural forms can get, you only watch movies like Memento or Magnolia for a change - if such films were all that came out of Hollywood, people would stop watching it.

(which, incidentally, is why nobody outside of Cannes gives a shit about European cinema :p)

Anyway, getting back to your formula, I believe you've merged two different formulae into one. You can't talk about free-form and storyline in one sentence - well, I mean, you can, but not if your big example is gonna be Elite (which had no storyline). The free-form Elite-style game and the storyline-oriented WC-style game are two completely different things. You very rarely get anywhere if you try to merge them into one product (Privateer managed to do it competently, but still not that well; later games, like Freelancer, failed utterly in this regard, reducing the free-form part of the concept to "you can go anywhere and do anything, as long as you're going where we tell you to go and doing what we tell you to do").
 
Unfortunately you have no opportunity to play the russian game "Space Rangers" right now. But believe me you will find there alot of new features that were incorporated into Elite-type games. Quests on the planets, fights in hyperspace, fights on the surface of the planet, in other words, all those additional features that make the game really global.

I would strongly reccomend to all of you, to buy this game when the english version is out. Right now it's the best selling russian game. I'm playing Space Rangers 2 right now and it drives me away. (Space Rangers 1 took 3 months of my live, i played 3 months non stop every day)

Cyb
 
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Quarto said:
The free-form Elite-style game and the storyline-oriented WC-style game are two completely different things. You very rarely get anywhere if you try to merge them into one product...
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As other people have mentioned, Terminus and Hardwar are pretty damn good flying thing sims (because Hardwar isn't technically a space sim ;)) in this regard. Since I love both games, I'm gonna have to advertise them once again.

Hardwar is closer to Freelancer in that there are certain points in the storyline that, when reached, change the game world and allow no turning back (ie: everyone starts permanently shooting everyone else) - but you can still disregard the storyline from the start and do whatever you want within the game world... which is small as hell, and that's the major drawback I see to this game. There are other excellent aspects to it, such as the totally dynamic economic and item production models and the ability to purchase buildings and set up shops in them.

Terminus... damn, that's just the best damn game since Privateer and Elite 3 (FFE). It is closer to FFE, however, in that storyline missions aren't really glued to one another, they're more like a general set of events which directs the universe towards someplace (ie: war :p)... and also there's the fact that missions can be "missed on". You don't report to your post in time, and some time later the game will act as if someone else had performed the mission you were called to. It may sound great, and more realistic than Sandoval waiting at New Detroit forever until Brownhair comes along... But the storyline will advance automatically without you being out there clicking NPCs to watch it develop, so what it does mean is that you'll miss out on parts of the game (you will probably prefer to reload an old save and leave that cargo run for later, because you know you have to be at Mars in 2 days or you'll miss out on a storyline mission). The fact that Terminus allows you to play as a member of 4 different factions, giving you essentially 4 totally different campaigns, more than makes up for this, though (and even if you miss a mission once in a while, you usually have enough time to respond to when people page you). Terminus also has the best damn flight system ever, which you can scale between Arcade and Newtonian at will.
 
Can't agree to the flight model of Terminus. I always felt it far too newtonian for me to enjoy. Also the game seemed kinda sterile (all judging from the demo).
 
@Quarto: As much as I see the logic behind your reasoning, I'm tempted to use it against you: It's true that classical combinations have shown their continuing marketability in all kinds of media, and that'll never change.
But maybe I haven't stated my point clearly: I'm not advocating a reinvention of storytelling (although avant-garde productions have revolutionized whole genres again and again); I'm just aiming at the drabness that's being presented to us as the market. Which also has happened again.

After countless soap operas, hospital, or even SF series, the studios have reacted in offering more "features" to their products to keep a good formula interesting - such as the humor in Farscape, the silliness in Scrubs or the CGI elements and surreality in Ally McBeal (just to round off my examples).

Those extra "features" (which are nothing else but storytelling devices borrowed from other genres) have revived those otherwise sinking stars - in Ally McBeal's case even for a pretty long while (regrettably), if you count Sex & the City as next evolutionary step.

So, to close that long explanation, my question simply is: Can this be done to the Space Opera genre?

The titles that are currently out all still rely on the formulae designed in the 80s: Combat, mission-based storyline, research&development, resource management. Storylines divulge around well-trodden SF paths of aliens, struggle for superiority, or quest for *something* to save the universe. I've looked expectantly for a while into the Anime corner (Macross was nice), but as far as game/concept I haven't seen much news yet (still, I'm placing hope in the DYRL mod guys).



So, maybe that explains the question a bit more. As to comments: Maybe Elite wasn't the best example, but it did combine free roaming with mission-based storyline, even if the storyline wasn't consistent and very short to boot.

And to hijack my own thread: I had my differences with Terminus too, but liked it - and did anyone ever realized that the old trader guy who gives you your first mission has exactly the same voice as the bartenders in Privateer?
 
How come no one talks about X2: The Threat from Egosoft ? I had the chance of reviewing it for a games related website and I was very surprised. The game it's a bit complicated at first, but then it gets very interesting. The plot is good and the economic system works very well. A worthy sucessor of Elite if you ask me.
A game that lets you command an entire fleet can't be that bad !
 
I agree with Eder, Hardwar was a heck of a game. It had the open ended approach of Privateer combined with a decent plot which (surprisingly) I never was really interested in...which is surprising considering how big I normally am into game plots. Definitely recommend this game if you can find it out there somewhere.
 
I'd like something of a fallout style kudos system, add an extra dimension to your standard "take mission A for team x which may or may not annoy team y dynamic"
 
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