Dead Space, Extraction, and the Value of Movement

Hey everyone! Long time, no see. I'm working on graduating this May and, somewhat unfortunately, have chosen to devote my time to things other than writing articles. That is not to say, however, that I've forgone my game playing, research and design. I am now the proud owner of a PlayStation 3 and am every so slowly working my way through Grand Theft Auto IV (finally). I've also been playing through Burnout Paradise, Flower, and MadWorld, not to mention keeping up with Super Smash Bros. Brawl. I'm making some pretty intensive analyses of above games and, in the not to distant future, will have posts here discussing them. I'm also working on a two very interesting discussions of Team Ico's Shadow of the Colossus. On top of playing video games, I am a firm believer in research of video games and game design theory. Naturally, I extensively read articles all over the Internet, but I am also quite enjoying Jesse Schell's The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses, lots of wisdom.

That's my update on life. But I want to talk for a brief period about Dead Space and its upcoming Wii incarnation, Extraction. Check out the trailer:

EA is aiming to label Dead Space: Extraction a "guided first person experience." And though the game is essentially an on-rails shooter, I think EA has a right to posit their games as they please. Anyone seeking to innovate, in whatever manner, deserves gold stars in my book. And, based on what we know, I think they are attempting improvements to the genre. The on-rails shooter has a meaty history, including Time Crisis and House of the Dead. I also think many would agree with me that Killer 7 is an on-rails shooter, and an excellent one at that. Wii particularly has received much favor from the light-gun genre. Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles was designed specifically for Wii, but games like Rayman Raving Rabbids, Call of Duty: World at War, and Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 feature specific light-gun modes. While these all may be fine and good, it's starting to get a little out of hand , actually. So when yet another on-rails shooter is announced for Wii, it's easy to say "pshaw" and move on with life (with full motion, zing!), Extraction bears a particularly interesting design.

My initial reaction to Dead Space: Extraction was "lame." I'd basically decided that the genre was of diminishing value and that Extraction was likely a cash-in on Wi''s 50 million units. I've since changed my mind, however. And here's why: Dead Space is perfectly suited to on-rails gameplay. Even more specifically, Dead Space is perfectly suited to on-rails gameplay on Wii.

I've played Dead Space, or rather, the first four chapters on hard mode (before my friend returned it to GameFly; I intend to purchase and finish it this summer). My friends and I actually had a blast playing the game. It is highly polished, quite beautiful, and fun. We would watch each other play, with much back-seat gaming, and weigh the pros and cons of the various weapons and upgrade paths. I do not believe the game was particularly scary, except for the fear of dying and having to restart. Fear and vulnerability is something I've been thinking about a bit and will introduce in another post. But Dead Space is an enjoyable game, and at the least very interesting, and is making a marked transition to Wii.

My cause for reconsideration of Dead Space: Extraction was two-fold: the plasma cutter and the value of movement.

The default gun of Dead Space is the plasma cutter. Because of the limb-dismemberment focus in Dead Space, the plasma cutter is truly the ideal weapon for facing the game's necromorphs. The plasma cutter fires a short line of plasma, the rotation of which can be adjusted with the alternate-fire button to be horizontal or vertical. Skillful employment of the plasma cutter comes down to manipulating the reticule's rotation and, obviously, aiming effectively. Do you see where I'm going with this? In Dead Space: Extraction, rotating or tilting the remote on its side rotates the plasma cutter vertically, as well as serves as the alternate-fire button for every other weapon. There is something extremely tactile about this mirroring of in-game action with real-world control.  It's amazing how such a minor change can have such a massively-damaging impact. Expounding the implementation of this control in Extraction is the other key element to fighting: aiming. Aiming via Wii's sensor-bar has proven to be quite effective thus far, and Dead Space: Extraction is likely to follow suit.

This adaptation of control got me to thinking about other potentialities about Extraction, which ultimately led me to an interesting thought: the value of movement. Dead Space is a third-person shooter and, unlike on-rails shooters, allows for full range of movement in the world. As Isaac, players are free to go where they please within the levels. Additionally, unlike Resident Evil 4 and 5, Isaac can move, albeit slowly, while aiming and firing. Let's examine a few basic reasons players move in the game:

1. To advance in the levels.
2. To pick up items.
3. To maneuver around necromorphs.

Obviously, advancing is an important goal, one achieved via movement. Picking up items may seem trivial but,  while playing the game, I found it to be a pointed aspect. Finally, and most importantly, tactically maneuvering around, and often fleeing from, necromorphs is essential to winning battles. There is a fourth reason for movement: exploring the game. The game's setting, the space craft the USG Ishimura, is a beautiful creation. Exploring and taking time to note its craftsmanship is fun in its own right. Therefore, I would indeed say that movement is, in fact, of value in Dead Space. Its omission would likely be a mistake.

However, given these aspects of the game, exploration, puzzle solving, etc., in terms of challenge, Dead Space boils down to a serious of fights with necromorphs. And of the necromorphs, there are only a few, (slight spoilers perhaps) the standard zombies, the babies, the gorillas, the bat-stomachs, and a couple others. Zombies mob Isaac from all angles, and running to a more optimal firing position, so that the zombies group together, is vital. Gorillas need to be dodged, generally with the help of stasis, and backed-around to hit their exposed butts (line gun ftw). The difficulty of these enemies drastically changes with chosen difficulty setting. To kill a basic zombie, the number of shots to the limbs doubles between medium and hard. The need for maneuvering and/or fleeing the enemy, therefore, scales with difficulty. Even so, aside from the aforementioned, killing necromorphs by and large requires little movement. Aim, flip the reticule, and shoot.

I do not think this is bad. And, again, maneuvering around enemies is an important part of gameplay. But most of the player's time in combat will be spent shooting, standing still, not running around. This is to the game's benefit. With the camera, and with the the transition between aiming (bringing up your weapon) and moving (putting down the weapon), switching between the two too often would be tiring. I'm not saying that Dead Space is exclusively aiming and shooting, I'm saying that aiming and shooting is what Dead Space does best, and what it primarily features.

Dead Space: Extraction, though potentially perceived as a nerfed rendition of its big brother, is designed specifically to Wii. Wii has less power than the other consoles, it's fact; Dead Space in its original form could not run on Wii. So necessity calls for change, either in the form of significantly reduced polygons and enemies, or, better, via a complete overhaul. Dead Space: Extraction removes free movement (though it will reportedly allow for branching paths). We don't know enough yet to say whether players advance forward automatically point-to-point or move gradually on a line, ala Killer 7, but the limited movement will work well, I believe.

"Strategic Dismemberment" was a tag line for Dead Space, and rightly so, because it is certainly a high-point of gameplay. What EA is doing with Extraction, under the limitations of a less-powerful system, is to highlight the qualities of Dead Space and not offer movement for movement's sake. The phrase "a guided first person experience" is apt. Extraction looks to do offer all of the original's best aspects, and just maybe, improve upon them. From first-person, yes, with limited movement, yes, but Extraction retains what matters most: the challenge of properly dismembering limbs.

As I said before, light gun games are a proven genre; they're fun. Dead Space works so blatantly well as a light gun game, it's amazing nobody thought of it sooner. Dismembering limbs is the new head-shot. And within the confines of the genre, lack of movement loses nothing; indeed, controlled play, limitation of movement and options, may enhance the game. It's like tree sap. 97% of sap is water. By boiling down the sap, we are able to procure the sweetest 3%, the wondrous maple syrup.

The Umbrella Chronicles-Reloading

Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles was informally announced a long time ago, but Capcom finally officially announced the title at their Gamers Day Event. Umbrella Chronicles is a first-person-shooter for Wii similar to TimeCrisis or House of the Dead. Players aim a targeting recticule around the screen with the remote pointer. The viewpoint can be moved with the nunchuck analog stick to look around. However, the game is completely on-rails and therefore movement is predetermined and timed. As in any other arcade-shooter, players must manually reload their guns. Reloading in arcade shooters has tradionally been another layer of precision and timing required by the player. Umbrella Chronicles plays to this tradition as well, but to a variety of responses. Yesterday I read about five or so previews about Umbrella Chronicles from various acclaimed game websites. Some of editors like the reloading system, others don't, even when all are basing their judgment on the same reason. To reload any given weapon, all players have to do is shake the remote. Lets start off with the opinion of Chris Kohler, from his "Wired" blog, GameLife.

When the circle runs out -- or preferably, before it does -- you'll want to shake the Wiimote to reload. It's a great mechanic that feels really good, much like aiming off the screen to reload in traditional light gun games -- because just like in real life, reloading forces you to take your gun away from the target and lose your aim.

I love his last statement about losing your aim. Just based on this, shaking the remote to reload seems like an effective yet strategic gameplay mechanism. But lets read other sites opinions.

Gamespy:

We also noticed that the controls need tuning, as the reload doesn't work as often as it should, and the reticule bounces around the screen a bit much.

GameInformer:

On paper, everything sounds good, but in practice it was obvious that they still had a number of kinks to work out. Reloading weapons with low ammunition was quite laggy, and when you need to reload a pistol or shotgun quickly there was a noticeable delay. When you have a number of hungry zombies homing in on you, this proves to be quite frustrating. Sure, shaking the remote to reload is one way to accomplish this action, but there are ways that could make this easier and responsive. Our ultimate control scheme would be for Capcom to map the scrolling of weapons to the Nunchuck buttons, and pressing down on the d-pad for reloading. The gameplay is quick, and we want to be on top of everything.

1up:

All you really have to do in the game is point and shoot, but the hardest part about grasping Umbrella Chronicles' controls in our early test was unfortunately the most important: reloading. Flicking seemed to be the best option in our play session (shaking didn't work too well), but we also tried pointing the Remote down for a brief moment a la traditional light-gun games. It worked, but that was a bit too slow for the quick pace of the game.

Essentially, most people feel that reloading simply isn't responsive enough. However, Kohlers comment still rings true in that the current system forces players to lose their aim. Another things about the control is that it is difficult to steady the pointer. Once again Kohler is the optomist saying that this is the whole point behind arcade-shooters. If shooting is all you will be doing, then shouldn't the aim be as realstic (difficult) as possible? Kohler contrasts this with Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition. RE4 is an action heavy game where players must run around frantically avoiding ganado. The Wii Edition, therefore, has a more steady aim than Umbrella Chronicles. There is also a gameply video available for viewing at IGN if you so desire.

Reloading Chronicle
What do you think of the reloading mechanism in Umbrella Chronciles? How about RE4: Wii?

Rails: The Train Runs Both Ways

Jerry Holkins knows games. Representing Tycho over at Penny-Arcade, Holkins' experience frequently proves him a rather knowledgable video game intellectual. Penny-Arcade has criticism in spades; name the game and they've got words to analyze. However, their criticism is usually founded, resulting in many top-class game and industry editorials. Today, Holkins discusses the Sonic series and its most recent entry, Sonic and the Secret Rings. The Secret Rings is an on-rails action/platformer, and being of a genre often "sneered" upon, was attended to by Mr. Holkins:

The term "On Rails" is typically used a pejorative, often produced with a sneer and accompanied by a snort of derision. This is all according to some Gamer Law whose origin isn't clear to me. I think it is because the human spirit yearns for freedom, and they feel as though the rails amount to a kind of "Man" who is "coming down" on "them." All games are on rails, and these rails are of varying thickness and ornamentation. Characters that never change. Environments that shunt players. Severely constrained interactivity. Punitive gameplay mechanics. All of these things are acceptable. But when you restrain certain classes of player movement, oh ho, then the game is on rails.

And may your statement ring true. I really can't say it any better then that, but I'll try anyway, if only for purposes of writing practice and refinement of the concept in my mind. "On-Rails," as Holkins points out, is usually defined as restriction of character movement. However, movement is not the only gameplay element of an on-rails nature, just the most obvious. The true defenition may be more like "the restriction of gameplay or its aspects." Now, we see On-rails as refering to a linear or constricted aspect of gameplay. Of course, theres nothing wrong with this in itself. But as Holkins says, in games like RPGs where story is critical, lack of dynamic characters can be as on-rails as it gets. Even games of the free-roam variety can harbor on-rails elements; how about a derivative combat system, or a repetitive mission structure?

What Holkins really wants us to see is this: Perhaps linear movement isn't the aspect of games we should be shunting. On-rails movement can work when it serves the purposes of a game, as it has in games like Killer 7. What we should be more critical of is the features of games that force us to play in a narrow, boring, or repetitious manner.

Get on the Train *woot! woot!*
Lets say you were tasked with creating a game where the player character is oriented along an single or sometimes branching path (on-rails)? What elements of gameplay would you focus on to keep the game enticing, dynamic, and fun?

Think about some of the games you've played. What aspects of the game do you feel were too constrictive? How did it hurt the game or hinder fun? How would that aspect be imrpoved upon to avoid this?

Source: Penny-Arcade