Infinitap Games

Happy Halloween! Today, I'm discussing Silent Hill 3 - specifically the interesting choice to start with an exciting moment rather than a slow build up. Is this something we should consider for our next game? Let me know what you think.

I personally find being droppe dinto a lethal (albeit exciting) situation where you can potentially die in the first minute or so of gameplay is frustrating. Since I am not yet invested or enjoying the game, I find most games that do that with little to no lead in, set up, or chance to get acclimated, makes the game annoying, frustrating and (since I'm not invested) shelved almost indefinitely. I have a whole pile of games liek this that I really should go back and try again and see if I can get past the early headaches.

And sadly that, I think, is a possible bad bi product for starting on an intense moment. I rather like the slower and more moody start to say, silent hill 1 or 2 because it takes a few minutes to establish a lot of things and give you some stuff to enjoy before the creepiness sets in. If i can at least get drawn in by SOMETHING (whether it be a intriguing story set up, interesting characters, great visuals, haunting music, simple but satisfying gameplay, etc) then I will make it past the frustrating learning curve most games have. Suffice to say I will never EVER play through dark souls or demon souls..lol

when considering this I think it is good to consider the players Investment in the characters/story and how engaged/immersed they'll be initially, at least when thinking of narrative driven adventure/psychological horror/interactive experiences. Taking a long arduous journey to find all the answers and unlock all the secrets of a world is a big investment, and if from the first few steps it is difficult and frustrating, I think it'll be hard for most gamers to fight past it and keep going.

With NeN i think that's something you got right. you have a cutscene to check out and draw you in, then a more gradual build in intensity. It is slow, but if you ramped it up too fast you'd have to then keep the momentum and pace going at that faster pace and really find ways to escalate it (which is possible, but challenging).

Mind you for a sequal where there is already significant investment (hopefully) for the characters and story, it isn't necessarily bad to start in an action packed moment. Like Uncharted 2, which has the entire first game to really help flesh out the players affection for the gameplay, setting, characters and general design.

There is also the learning curve to be considered. if the game has a significant one to get all the abilities, controls and moves, starting off throwing the player to the wolves without a slower tutorial or practice test is going to just piss the players off royally. If there is a very MILD curve, with limited/no interaction aside from navigation, then it is not as critical to devote a lot of time to a slow quiet build (like in NeN the controls are very simple and intuitive so you can hit the ground running and not get immediately frustrated).

in terms of scary/psychological horror type things, even if there is no clear narrative, I find it much more effective and interesting to do things that creep into the player without them realizing it. Start them off curious, investigative, and as things progress they naturally grow in stress and tension and before they know it they're whipped into a terror and without knowing how they got there, are also less likely to quickly come down and let it dissipate. If you start off with "spooky" and JUMP SCARE from the get go you get this rhythm of 'engaged but not scared' to 'OH CRAP' and back to 'engaged but not scared' which is what i think a lot of cheap movies/games do because it's easier than the building terror. the downside is that most of those games/movies are generally forgettable and repeat viewings show they're far less effective. With slow burn style, even with repeat viewings the general atmosphere and creeping death that gets you in ways you can't really identify/understand means repeat expose still produces a similar reaction (and also affords the player/viewer a lot more nuance to discern from the imagery).

As an example, think of a typical monster from a game that is easily identifiable, like say the more recent 'nurses' from silent hill that keep popping up. Now think of some of the weird wriggling masses you can barely see behind glass or mesh in parts of say silent hill 2 that you can tell are "messed up and disturbing" but beyond that it's hard to know WTF you are looking at. After seeing the nurses over and over they lose their scariness, but those weird shapes you can't quite see... they'll always be unsettling and get under your skin.





I think going with something hard to understand (that maybe has to be imagined, or forces the player to fill in the gaps themselves to much more gruesome result) and not as wrote is harder but much more satisfying and interesting (especially for the long term) and with that kind of experimental design, you could go in a lot of interesting direction. Going with typical formulaic tropes.. not so much, because you have a set backbone to build off that is both familiar and also far more rigid.

So yeah, slow burn, complex layered effects that disturb and creep out the player over time, unsettle them into a sense of fear and terror in ways they don't understand, avoid doing what they expect but don't over-frustrate them with a tough learning curve control scheme and game logic too quickly.

I think it could be a fun thing to try, as long as the fast paced start section doesn't last too long and isn't too punishing. It could definitely make for a good demo segment to show off the more intense aspects of the game.

I don't want to make a challenging game, and I definitely wouldn't want to start with something hard and frustrating. My thought was that giving them a taste of what comes later might get more buy in for the gameplay than if we started with a slow burn.

Either way, the demo we make for kickstarter probably won't be the first level (just like it wasn't for Neverending Nightmares) since we'll want to prototype our new mechanics and some enemy stuff, so I guess we can make it and see if it serves as a good intro or if it is something we need to build towards.

matt wrote:I don't want to make a challenging game, and I definitely wouldn't want to start with something hard and frustrating.

Well the second part I am glad to hear. The first part.. umm.. Why not? Challenge is often one of the big reasons a game is satisfying and "fun", because you rose to the challenge and beat it. If the game was designed so that there was no challenge, that you would always win no matter how rock-stupid you were, you'd fee unchallenged or tested, and there is a lot less reason to feel compelled to play the game again in the future. As well, lack of any challenge kills a lot of built tension in a game once you realize the atmosphere and creepiness is superficial and doesn't actually equate to losing in someway.

Hearing you say that makes me again think you don't want to make games so much as "interactive entertainment" or "immersive experiences". Because those don't need challenge, gameplay, or really ANY game-y mechanics, they are there to immerse, evoke, and impact the viewer. Whereas I believe it is possible for a game to do this and still be a game, you've said a number of times that injecting game-y elements of any kind destroys/reduces immersion and the effect of it, so you try to avoid it whenever possible. So there is still this conflicting idea of creating a game that is not gamey. I guess I am not grasping how one would go about making a game that is not a game?

Because I want to make game that everyone can play. If you make a game too challenging, then you limit the number of people who can enjoy it. I suck at games, so I personally don't like challenging games, so I don't want to make games that are too challenging.

To me, horror games are about the experience, and while challenge can create tension, I would much rather not rely on it because it can turn off gamers. Granted - the LACK of challenge turned off gamers for Neverending Nightmares, but I think that is an easier problem to fix than the other way around. You can create a bunch of difficulty settings and try and balance them all, but that can be quite challenging from a design perspective. I'd rather focus on making the core experience great than to divide my efforts between a bunch of different difficulties. Granted - this is exactly what we did on Retro/Grade including making a ridiculously easy difficulty level, but there really isn't a way around it for a rhythm game...

I think you are really hung up on the concept of a "game". I don't really concern myself with labels. I try to focus on creating scary experiences. I think immersion and removing game-y conventions is the best way to create a terrifying experience. If people want to call my products games, that's fine. If people don't think they are games, then that's fine too. That being said, the next "experience" will probably be more game-y than the previous one, but I don't think I'm going to make it challenging.

I was playing an preview build of "That Dragon Cancer" today, and it was a really amazing and touching interactive experience. It was so powerful that I was holding back tears most of the time while playing. However, it is even less game-y than Neverending Nightmares. It is almost like an interactive poem. Does it matter that it's not a game? Does it really need to be? I'd argue no.

I find that most arguments about whether something is a game or not usually just break down into arbitrary definitions and semantics, which I don't think is important. If it runs on my computer or a console and I can interact with it in some way, and more importantly, I get something out of the experience, then that's what matters to me.

I'm not so much worried about it being a game as I am trying to properly define what it is you want to make.

Asking for input on how to make a box, but you want to make a box that isn't "boxy" is not being very succinct. In a way it's almost a puzzle unto itself.

Asking for a vessel that is not boxy, is much easier to understand and opens a lot of doors for input.

Asking for input or discussion about making a game that is not gamey seems like opening the door to a lot of wasted energy.

I am seeing a lot of people offering suggestions and ideas on here and because they think you are making a 'game' they are offering a lot of typical game logic/rules/ideas and so it is not necessarily going to offer you much in terms of fruit.


Asking for input to make an interactive experience that doesn't feel too "gamey" allows people to offer input that is not focused on game elements and strategies and stuff you don't want, and instead think more about other mechanics, story, experiential elements and themes that COULD prove useful during your development phase. I mean really, of all you have currently for the next project, how many gameplay mechanics and elements have you devised on your own vs suggestions on the board? If you split the known ideas as they are now would you say the majority came from fans and not from you and your team? This was my point. Pinpoint what you know about the project so others can best collaborate and inundate you with fresh and interesting ideas you can pick and choose from, not disparate ideas you have to filter through because many are missing the point.

I have no ill will for games vs non-games. I love both and I think they both have a space to exist. I'd prefer proper identification of them so people don't get the wrong idea/expectation. Intentional ambiguity when creating/selling/marketing a product is usually a way to exploit the consumer's ignorance of said product, or in some way take advantage due to that ambiguity. Yes being ambiguous may be necessary when the contents of the product vary (like a grab bag type thing) but in most cases, why would you try to be vague about it? I guess there may be legitimate non-sinister reasons but I'm blanking on them at the moment.

One thing I think was interesting in looking at what you said about challenge, is that it seems to be considering challenge in terms of gameplay and difficulty(and rightly so, that was part of the topic at hand). What i think was a noticeable challenge that was in NeN and in many horror/scary games is the emotional/mental challenge that can be had from the atmosphere and content. When I played SH2 or Rule of Rose, aside from some minor combat moments, I was far more challenged emotionally, made to feel uncomfortable, scared, nervous, or disgusted by the imagery/themes/conversation/characters that anything else. I think NeN also took that to heart, even if unintentional, in that it challenged the player and their notions of mental health and mental illness, disturbing imagery and scenes, and being immersed in a oppressive, creepy environment that would accost their senses and their feeling of well being. THIS i think is where the experience excels and remains flawless. It is not about jump cuts and scares, it's not about the story or the adventure. it'd about challenging the audience's feelings. It is both evocative and provacative in how it displays itself.

And with that in mind.. is that a challenge you don't want to be too great? Are you afraid making a game that challenges such things might turn people away? do you think it HAS with NeN? And how would you gage this kind of "level of challenge" in the next game so it is not so much it turns away your audience, but still enough it is ineffective?

Did you ever look over the kickstarter page for Neverending Nightmares? I felt like I was pretty clear about what I was making and why. I think a lot of the other forum goers participated in the kickstarter and knew what they were getting.

I don’t set out to make a game or a non-game. I have goals for each project, and I try to figure out the best way to achieve them. With Neverending Nightmares, I wanted to create an immersive experience that really makes you feel fear and anxiety like I feel with mental illness. The design choices were shaped by that.

The next project doesn’t have the same goals and is still in flux. I think the commitment to immersion worked really well for Neverending Nightmares, so I’d like to continue with that. It limits the game-y things we can do, but I think it is worth it for the benefit of not taking you out of the game world. I think we will be making other gameplay changes that will feel more “game-y” or at least less “walking simulator-y”.

I don’t want to lay all my cards on the table and would prefer to get everyone’s blue sky suggestions because that might shape the design.

As far as emotional challenge, that is a tough question to answer. I want the game to be terrifying and tense, so I don’t think I’ll want to compromise that. However, we did some other emotionally challenging things experimenting with frustration and feeling lost and aimless. I think we’ll probably cut back on those emotions a bit because I think it limited our audience too much.