UnluckyKate
Member
Back in 2012, Bioware writer Jennifer Hepler (who wrote Dragon Age and Star Wars: The Old Republic) said she who'd like to see a difficulty in games where people could enjoy story and skip combat.
Of course, internet ruined her life, right about the time of Mass Effect 3 announcing a gameplay mode that would take conversation and choices for the player. This was seen as many as a huge dumbing down of the entire Role Playing experience.
Now, at the time, I loved her idea but, you can't really just take away ALL combat from a narrative heavy game like Mass Effect or Uncharted... But I loved her idea of making these great stories available to as many as possible...
I'm so thrilled at the huge sucess of Telltale games and the entire subgenre it more or less revived, because these are basically non gameplay games.
I also love how Uncharted in " Explorer " difficulty (see how they made it not " super easy for baby " difficulty, to not look demeaning to players who, lets say, are not used to play these game, are disable or who just don't want the challenge because they have only a short few dozen of minutes to play per night.
Explorer difficulty lower enemy detection range, marks, enemies for you, basically offer a huge aim magnet... It's really helping players, not really dumbing down the experience. It also lets you customize at any moments all assists in the option menu to tweak your experience as you see fit. It's really cool to have enemies be dumb and vulnerable but not having the aim magnet for example and still feel like a badass to properly align headshots on your own.
Last week Horizon added a similar easier difficulty setting and I think it's an amazing move because I have tons of friends playing with their girlfriends and falling in love for that game and Alloy but cann't play as the game is rather demanding and challenging.
Hell, Final Fantasy XII Remaster is offering a fast forward option to speed up time by 2 or by 4 on the fly, to make back tracking, farming, or exploring much faster ! I think this is, on its own, another form of options making the game more accessible and enjoyable for as many as possible
Now looking at the future, I'm really open to all form of alternative gameplay and I'm all for broader appeal of games, in general. The more options the better for the medium because it means the more players.
Of course, internet ruined her life, right about the time of Mass Effect 3 announcing a gameplay mode that would take conversation and choices for the player. This was seen as many as a huge dumbing down of the entire Role Playing experience.
Now, at the time, I loved her idea but, you can't really just take away ALL combat from a narrative heavy game like Mass Effect or Uncharted... But I loved her idea of making these great stories available to as many as possible...
I'm so thrilled at the huge sucess of Telltale games and the entire subgenre it more or less revived, because these are basically non gameplay games.
I also love how Uncharted in " Explorer " difficulty (see how they made it not " super easy for baby " difficulty, to not look demeaning to players who, lets say, are not used to play these game, are disable or who just don't want the challenge because they have only a short few dozen of minutes to play per night.
Explorer difficulty lower enemy detection range, marks, enemies for you, basically offer a huge aim magnet... It's really helping players, not really dumbing down the experience. It also lets you customize at any moments all assists in the option menu to tweak your experience as you see fit. It's really cool to have enemies be dumb and vulnerable but not having the aim magnet for example and still feel like a badass to properly align headshots on your own.
Last week Horizon added a similar easier difficulty setting and I think it's an amazing move because I have tons of friends playing with their girlfriends and falling in love for that game and Alloy but cann't play as the game is rather demanding and challenging.
Hell, Final Fantasy XII Remaster is offering a fast forward option to speed up time by 2 or by 4 on the fly, to make back tracking, farming, or exploring much faster ! I think this is, on its own, another form of options making the game more accessible and enjoyable for as many as possible
Now looking at the future, I'm really open to all form of alternative gameplay and I'm all for broader appeal of games, in general. The more options the better for the medium because it means the more players.
