All distinct at the top level, in a new category.

Yeah, this. Just like Community, Developer, and Player that we have right now. Those three forums should each be top-level in their own category (In-Progress? idk) for maximum exposure

I would actually prefer if devlogs/feedback/hall of fame were their own forum category.

I vote to change name to "Hall of Fame" and make it a root-level forum

It's unlikely there will be anything done about quoting big images. That's a culture thing.

John should do good as creative mod, he's a cool dude and knows his stuff. I'm sure he'll reign in the issues we've been seeing lately. If you see a particularly awful post, make sure to report it. Keep in mind that reporting isn't used because your feelings were hurt; use it to report posts or posters that are wrecking the discussion with their disruptive behavior.

We are here to serve.

Currently my biggest issue with Merc Kings is that it doesn't feel smooth.

Can you elaborate a bit? The controls don't feel smooth? The level design and enemy positioning doesn't feel smooth? The transition from one mission to the next doesn't feel smooth?

The overall flow of the game lacks the sort of smooth pacing you expect from a run-and-gun game.

Aiming is stiff, there is a pause between when you click jump and when you actually jump, weapons are static and unmoving, and the enemies often take quite a lot of damage.

Don't get me wrong, I like Mercenary Kings a lot, but this overall "stiffness" is the same problem that plagued Scott Pilgrim and I'm disappointed to see it return here.

Currently my biggest issue with Merc Kings is that it doesn't feel smooth.

create a book/youtube/ebook combination and sell it and become rich

I hate HW2's interface.

Part of the fun of HW1 is that the interface is so minimal. I hope they keep that. I loved just watching my ships move around without any screen elements.

It honestly makes me think of Monster Hunter over anything else.

Missions with the same enemy placement, with the objective being the only thing that changes. Gathering materials to craft new gear. "Boss arenas."

Lots of folk, but the only critics I have a link off-hand to are RLM.

Merc Kings is neato. Hangedman said my criticisms so yeah. The one thing that I feel it has issues with is fluidity of movement; I feel like I should be able to jump and grab onto ledges, for example, or jump while moving without a pause. No such luck.

I'm pointing out how character depth is intrinsically linked with how many characters there are. If you character list is wide and deep, it's confusing. If it's narrow and shallow, it's unsatisfying.

I brought up Romance of the Three Kingdoms because characters in it are considered to be well-flesh out.

Also, Star Wars (at least A New Hope) actually IS considered to be among the best in movie narratives in terms of characterization.

Sorry!

I wanna talk to you about this, but I know that it's gonna be very difficult to tell what you are saying.

I honestly think you need to take a few ESL courses to fix your English, because I can already tell you I'm not going to understand what you are saying thanks to how stilted it is.

The interplay of cutscenes and gameplay is design!

The reason why games such as Tomb Raider, Mass Effect, Uncharted, and so on work with shallower characters (although let's be real here: they aren't really that much more shallow than other media) is because people imprint traits onto the characters. This is because of the interactivity aspect, and also because people do this ANYWAYS regardless of medium; it's why mediocre science-fiction books sell really well despite being bad. You aren't so much selling a concrete story as you are the template for someone to inject their own feelings into.

Interactivity boosts this effect because you feel as though you are actually talking to the characters in question. Really, you are paying for narrative framework, setting, and one or two "good" characters. The rest don't have to be fleshed-out, because that's not their purpose.

The more fleshed out characters are, the more confusing the narrative grows. It's great if you want to read a literary epic - Romance of the Three Kingdoms and its staggering list of characters leaps to mind - but terrible for normal storytelling. Developers aren't aiming for literary epics on the scale of old mythology. They are looking to craft fun, accessible experiences in interactivity and narrative design.

Should games go for that "epic" feel with original IP? I dunno. The emergent narrative games already do; DF in particular is all about the whims and stories of large numbers of characters. Not entirely sure you can sincerely pull it off without causing significant confusion.

This topic has been moved to Design.

http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=34854.0

You're still basing your judgement of a game based on the critical reactions of others and videos. Even in games with strict delineation between cutscene and game, like Last of Us or Uncharted, there is an importance of interaction that can't be communicated by watching a "movie" version of the game. You touch upon this in the OP, but instead of discussing why people use interactivity to grow closer to a game's characters, you dismiss it. You were so close, Gimmy.

To use a game I'm playing recently, and one you mentioned, Tomb Raider is a game where the flaws inherent from watching it as a movie are overshadowed by the sense of interaction and exploration when playing it as a game. Most of the cutscenes are interactive in some way as well, although it's usually just "hold down specific direction(s)".

If you are trying to say there is a difference between games-as-narrative and narrative-as-games, I agree. I personally love games which lean towards emergent stories over determined ones; games like Dwarf Fortress (or really any management sim).

The issue is that it seems you are trotting out the same criticism with a new face: You don't like modern games, and your engagement of them is on a very shallow, superficial level. You also seem to misunderstand the psychology of games.

Edit: Moving this to design, it's more appropriate there.

I think judging a game's quality without playing it is like judging a movie because you saw stills from all the important scenes with the dialogue underneath.

It's missing the most important facet of the experience.

game is actually the verb for gamer