Is this image true of today's level design?

james.miller said:
so youve got 'travel to one end of the map, get red key, travel to the other end of the map, open red door, get blue key, go back to the beginning of the map' ect ect VS Shooter on rails.


hmmm, yeah both have their cons dont they?
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There are multiple ways to get to the key/door vs. being 'funnelled' though.
 
gord said:
Right, lets be a bit more realistic though. Doom was linear. You moved from point A to point B. If you took a top down model of a single player level from Crysis and compared it by scale to that Doom map, it would be ridiculous.

How many truly non-linear games do we have? In recent times I think I'd classify Mass Effect as having a fairly decent go at being non-linear in it's structure.

So in answer to your question. No, that image is a complete dramatisation of how some individuals perceive the state of level design without any real rational thought into how far we have come.
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I thought the same when I saw it - they cant really be compared as one is a geographical representation of a level while the other one appears to be topological (unless its Doom 3 or something :p). You could quite easily represent Doom using the right-hand image - just replace the cutscene notation with '*colour* doorkey' and '*colour* door'..

ps3ud0 :cool:
 
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To be honest, who cares if it is linear or not? Yeah it's nice to run around and do what you want but not all games are about that. If you want to tell a story to somebody then you get them to act it out which means pushign them along the story path.

Besides, design != linear game. More action happened in the image on the left but if you break it down its no different to the layout on the right except your repeating going over the same place again as james.miller says.

I honestly don't know why people care so much over linear nor not...

- Pea0n
 
It's not the linear nature of the games that bug me, because I expect that from shooters. It's the constant cut-scenes. So yes, in that sense the OP is correct. It seems to have got mush worse in just the last couple of years.

As for the Doom map, I remember that level well, and can even spot which are the "secret" tunnels.


M
 
Meridian said:
It's not the linear nature of the games that bug me, because I expect that from shooters. It's the constant cut-scenes. So yes, in that sense the OP is correct. It seems to have got mush worse in just the last couple of years.

As for the Doom map, I remember that level well, and can even spot which are the "secret" tunnels.


M
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thinking of any games in particular?
 
There needs to be a nice balance of both linear and open.
Open enough to give you the freedom to move and use your own style of play (stealth vs rambo for example) But not so open that there isnt any direction.

Crysis was linear but you had some freedom of movement in parts, at least at the beginning.

basically both extremes suck.

Cutscenes are also nice but as a nice rare occasion that progresses the story. not as a time filler every 10 seconds.

I also like to see some element of thought being needed the odd puzzle or something helps.


Edit: Forgot to mention i despise ******* characters in any game fps or rpg. Tidus in FF10 did my nut in!
 
Maybe I'm missing the point, but really... does it really matter if the game is linear or not? As long as the game is good in all aspects, or as good as it can be, with regards to stuff like sound, graphics, story, gameplay and so forth why does it matter how linear the game is?

Just my 2c anyway.
 
It's to accommodate the casual player. Games are the biggest media seller out there, beating films, dvds and music and therefore have a huge audience which demand a lot more from the developer.

In 1993 it was your average geek playing games, in fact games were almost taboo in that it wasn't cool to spend a sunny sunday afternoon playing on your computer.
 
I prefer linear, HATE having to find the way to go and circle around and memorize the game world.

If you like more open level design, play idk, erm, Bioshock, Tomb raider, Stalker ?
 
i like cutscenes but i hate games where its bascily a movie. mass effect 2 as you could basically edit them with your choices :P
 
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