Craft randomness

[Mark Rushow]

I wasn't thinking anything time consuming or complicated just a quick and easy challenge to make it my fault if I end up with some crap or something different stats still playing a vital roll of determining difficulty or if an action can even be attempted. but whatever it doesn't frustrate me too much the way it is usually done. I may have talked the guys working on Frontiers into it. Lars the dev really seemed to like the idea and we are toying with it now. I also suggested it to the Sui Generis forum to see what they think. but I know it isn't for everyone or every game.

[yarnevk]

The entire problem with putting mini-games on is you will get forced to play them when you don't want to, even if you are the guy that wanted them in the first place, you realize you just want to make some planks and not in the mood for a silly game even though it is your game! No matter how much you say make it optional you insist on a reward, which means you will insist the rest of the game be balanced accordingly, which means it is not optional.

There is no possible quick and easy challenge when you have a big stack of crafts and have to do it on every single thing you make, it is nothing more than an annoyance. Imagine you are cutting planks and have to use your hammer to knock out all the knots (classic 'whack the mole' mini-game). Sounds fun, and is fun for the first tree. 1000 planks later with a cleared forest you needed to make your house and fence, you realized that was no longer any fun, so you stop doing it then get mad when your porch collapse because of all the notty wood. Even games that force you to only click the mouse just to make every piece get annoying, the game designer thought they was smartly simulating human actions there, but very quickly relented and implemented to hold the button down to increase the make count (if single player) or add a timer to increase the make time (if multiplayer) having learned that spam clicking is bad GUI design.

Imagine if the standard 'hold W to run' was done like it is in Olympic games, with you having to spam click left/right as fast as you can to determine the stride and speed of your legs. Very fun if you are playing Olympics, not so fun when you are trying to run away from a spider. Mini-games have a time and place, and the very same game can be made not so fun when you have to play them when you do not want to. Of course you say make it optional you still press W, but you know the game designers balanced the game so that the only successful escape is spamming the mouse buttons so you have to do it or die. Sounds annoying, but trust me when you are on your knot number thousand you will be thinking the same thing.

You seem to think crafting is boring without any action, good crafting games are about collecting resources, learning complex recipes and the strategy of making what you want with what you do not have, it is an interesting game on it's own. Of course if you use the Wiki to find out all the resource locations, know all the good recipes, you have indeed bypassed the crafting game making it boring, but that does not mean you add an action game to it in place of actually playing the crafting game.

Anyways Frontiers has already pulled some features that sounded good at the time, yet initial play testers found them incredibly frustrating, Guess I missed you spamming forums with your idea, not many people are willing to tell someone when your idea does not work. Lars is smart enough not to keep something just because he wasted time coding it, for example he threw out way more complicated survival mechanics that he thought he would be a fan of yet he hated it on implementation.

A good place for mini-games is in a bar with some gold on the line. When it is a bar game then when you feel like wasting some time on an entertaining game then you go to the bar, roll some dice, play some cards, get taken, get drunk have fun. They do not seem out of place at all there.

[Mark Rushow]

I wasn't thinking anything like that. I was thinking a real quick reaction test just to determine quality or success. Gears of War when reloading you have to quick timer meter in the corner of the screen one button press within maybe a second to hit the mark the closer you are the better the quality you miss by enough you fail. Your stats determine the speed and the size of the mark. Or something like Tony Hawk balance meter. For a couple seconds try and keep the balance. Difficulty determined by stats. Or a couple second as the hammer swings hit the button now thing. Real short real simple real sweet.

[yarnevk]

(11-07-2013 03:19 PM)Mark Rushow Wrote:  Real short real simple real sweet.

And real annoying on your thousandth dagger. Crafting is not about reaction and action. That is not why crafters craft. They do not want it to behave like a sports game or a combat mechanic, it is entirely the opposite type of game crafters like to play. Ask yourself why Skyrim or Minecraft do not do this, when they certainly have the resources to do such a thing. It is because they know it will never survive playtesting, thus both implement just click on the recipe and click on the resource systems.

The action part of crafting is in the gathering of resources and taking risks to do so. When it comes to the crafting part of stocked up resources, crafters just want to relax and think about what they want to make with what they have and figure out what they still need. They do not want to play a rhythm game, which will be forced upon them because crafters always want their crafts to be the best they can be and not suffer any missed bonuses. Do not take my word for it, go research the Skyrim crafting mods which will clearly indicate what crafters want. They are all about more resources, more recipes, more stations, more perks. They are not about more twitchy action.

[Jalister]

MMOs incorporated QTE for crafting to create a time sink.

[heelydavid]

Explore Tia Harmon's board "Craft beer and other randomness" on Pinterest, a visual bookmarking tool that helps you discover and save creative ideas

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