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TIGSource ForumsDeveloperDesignTight gameplay
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Graham-
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« Reply #40 on: February 06, 2013, 11:43:14 AM »

It's much easier when you get the trick. Turn, brief pause, jump.
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baconman
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« Reply #41 on: February 06, 2013, 11:50:41 AM »

Yeah. That and bomb jumping. BUT! There's a predictable rhythm to it once you get it; which makes a weird, almost contradictory "loose tightness." Or "tight looseness?"

^.^

It makes a contradiction. There we go.
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Fallsburg
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« Reply #42 on: February 06, 2013, 01:43:47 PM »

I think tightness is a measure of responsiveness.  It's not a matter of instantaneous acceleration or deceleration.  Instantaneous acceleration feels twitchy and jumpy.  Instantaneous deceleration feels like being stuck in tar.  Neither is desirable.
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Graham-
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« Reply #43 on: February 06, 2013, 02:09:23 PM »

I think responsiveness is something different, though I do like that insight. I would say tightness is a measure of the "right amount" of responsiveness. Though I think that's your point....

For example, in a driving game if the relationship between steering input and actual steering is very strong - i.e. a small touch of the controls sends the car spinning - that would be an example of responsive controls, but not tight ones. A well designed flight sim may have very unresponsive controls (each action has a small consequence) but they may be considered "very tight" by expert players.

The player has a mental model of how they should be able to control their character. Then the controls provide an actual model of how they can. The smaller the difference between these two models, the tighter the controls.

The key idea here that is easy to miss is the role a player's expectation plays.
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Alec S.
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« Reply #44 on: February 06, 2013, 02:15:27 PM »

Yeah, and level design and visuals can play a heavy part in that feeling.  Part of the reason that Super Meat Boy feels tight is because the levels are designed around the movement system, and the visuals give cues to the player which influence how the player expects things to move.
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Graham-
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« Reply #45 on: February 06, 2013, 02:16:26 PM »

Yeah. That and bomb jumping. BUT! There's a predictable rhythm to it once you get it; which makes a weird, almost contradictory "loose tightness." Or "tight looseness?"

^.^

It makes a contradiction. There we go.

Loose with a tight core.

--

To Alec's. Yeah, tightness can't be considered without level design.
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J-Snake
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« Reply #46 on: February 06, 2013, 02:45:26 PM »

There is a clean concept behind the wall jump execution in Super Metroid. And when you understand it, you will never miss a wall-jump. But overall its movement-system is a disaster, at least for my standards. The system is filled with inconsistencies and overheads beyond sanity, it can also be raped to disbelief like shown in TAS-plays. I think I would feel bad for the rest of my life publicly releasing something in that state.
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baconman
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« Reply #47 on: February 07, 2013, 10:09:18 AM »

Then I suggest you take a hint of inspiration from the MegaMan X series, instead. Smiley
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J-Snake
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« Reply #48 on: February 07, 2013, 09:03:33 PM »

Oh, I don't need perfection for inspiration. All I see are ideas and concepts. It is for me then to execute it to perfection.
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Dustin Gunn
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« Reply #49 on: February 07, 2013, 09:32:28 PM »

That topic takes like most of my devlife's dedication. I am going even further by claiming that also most of the 2D games don't have the clockwork-perfection in mechanics. I guess it is because it can demand an extremely detailed and sharp understanding at times.

It may seem surprising at first but what is considered good programming-practice often goes against clockwork-perfection. For example I am pretty sure that every modern programmer who decides to clone TrapThem (the game created under my principles) will build in certain bugs (I exactly can tell which) he will never think of because he has the illusion that his abstracted high level code is always for the better. He has lost the understanding how the mechanical logic on the paper exactly (and I mean exactly) translates in the flow of a digital machine. That is the general problem in this field. People expect the machine adapt to the man. While it eases up a lot of things true control and exact expression can only be achieved when the man adapts to the machine. And that is the way I chose to go early on. The downside is that the road can be extremely hard at times, you have to condition yourself to be harder by principle. But that is the only way how I can achieve the absolute perfection in mechanics. It is like mapping the perfect world of rules in a static board game (you  can see the rules of a real-time game on paper like that when you freeze it in time and watch tick for tick how everything can progress) to the exactly corresponding real-time flow on a digital machine. This quality demand is as hardcore as it can get but I follow it by principle. TrapThem is going to be the exact representation of it.

There is one interesting thing though that will go against your intuition in TrapThem, but there is no other way around. The regular human is used to expect a continuous flow can change ANYTIME its direction/dynamics. But TrapThem combines the discrete grid-based world and the continuous world as good as possible while keeping the perfect puzzle-nature intact. The continuous world are the smooth visuals(and a certain part of mechanics dealing with visibility-detection) you perceive. Now what goes against your expectation is that you cannot change your movement inbetween the grid. But that is a thing where you should adapt to the game, that is not a flaw of the game but a flaw in your expectations, you expect rules that fundamentally cannot work for this type of game.

Here is an example of the finished game in action. Not sure you can tell by the look but it plays as perfectly as it can get. Keep in mind youtube only displays inconsistent choppy 30 fps here.







Reading all of that and then clicking on the video of what is essentially Boulder Dash was hilarious. There's a word that's been misused a lot but it is pretty great so I'm going make an example of this to further everyone's vocabulary:

pre·ten·tious 
/priˈtenCHəs/
Adjective
Attempting to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc., than is actually possessed.
Synonyms
showy
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J-Snake
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« Reply #50 on: February 07, 2013, 11:07:21 PM »

clicking on the video of what is essentially Boulder Dash was hilarious.
Even when how does it violate the fact I am 100% representing what you have quoted.

I would aswell implement clockwork-perfect mechanics in boulder dash, if I would decide to clone it. May be you think games are easily perfect. They are not.
« Last Edit: February 07, 2013, 11:36:18 PM by J-Snake » Logged

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Dustin Gunn
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« Reply #51 on: February 07, 2013, 11:52:37 PM »

clicking on the video of what is essentially Boulder Dash was hilarious.
Even when how does it violate the fact I am 100% representing what you have quoted.

I would aswell implement clockwork-perfect mechanics in boulder dash, if I would decide to clone it. May be you think games are easily perfect. They are not.

I don't know what you're even saying! Your post is very buggy. Fix grammar glitches plz.
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J-Snake
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« Reply #52 on: February 07, 2013, 11:55:43 PM »

Then don't quote something you don't understand in the first place.
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Dustin Gunn
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« Reply #53 on: February 08, 2013, 12:05:34 AM »

Then don't quote something you don't understand in the first place.

You quoted me when you didn't understand my point. My point being that you are trying to make yourself seem important and special and have presented no evidence that you are either. You have 2 options:

1. Grow some humility.
2. Continue having no one here like you.
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J-Snake
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« Reply #54 on: February 08, 2013, 12:10:52 AM »

I can put you in the same bin with blademasterbobo, to me there is no value to be liked by those.

Don't hate on someone if you just don't understand his principles, you have no basis to feel better than me. I never claimed to be the best in anything you assume, I claim to do best following my principles.
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« Reply #55 on: February 08, 2013, 12:28:01 AM »

Whoa! I leave for three days, and a new page is created with each. Tongue Thanks for the response guys!

Alec: I'll definitely read this article. I got partway in and then realized how long it was xD figure I should reply here first.

J-Snake: Calm down dude! I agree that it's a bit presumptuous to assume others will clone your game, and the link was not what I expected, but I'm glad to see the UT'99 side of things. I was definitely wondering how PC controls would factor into this, since the ideal PC FPS has crazy responsive controls (too much for me, actually) and how that was interpreted as "tight". My PC friends have long said that fast controls are better than slow ones, and it sounds like that is the same case here. Also: I do like Super Metroid's controls, but they are not the top of my list for tight. I would put them closer to OoT, where they are a bit more context designed, and exploring the world is a higher priority than strong level design (which is a wonderful genre of game design itself, but not the one for "tight" gameplay discussions).

Graham & Alec: Thank you guys for focusing on level design so much! I'll look to Super Meat Boy as an example more since it's referenced so much, but I really do need to learn more about level design and its relation to gamefeel and tightness. I have a book on gamefeel... guess I should get around to reading it... (definitely liked what I saw so far of it)

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Alec S.
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« Reply #56 on: February 08, 2013, 12:32:32 AM »

Is it Game Feel by Steve Swink?  I've been reading through that (after a recommendation in another tread), and really enjoying it.  It does a really thorough job of breaking down what goes into a game's feel (including how simulates space, ie. level design influences how a game feels)
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J-Snake
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« Reply #57 on: February 08, 2013, 12:34:03 AM »

I agree that it's a bit presumptuous to assume others will clone your game
Never assumed that in my post, I made a case example.
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J-Snake
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« Reply #58 on: February 08, 2013, 12:41:17 AM »

Wonder what this book would say about contra3 opposed to mario world.
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« Reply #59 on: February 08, 2013, 12:42:37 AM »

Is it Game Feel by Steve Swink?  I've been reading through that (after a recommendation in another tread), and really enjoying it.  It does a really thorough job of breaking down what goes into a game's feel (including how simulates space, ie. level design influences how a game feels)

Yep! I was sold on it after I read the part about the map stamping puzzle from Phantom Hourglass. That puzzle stood out to me, and to see it analyzed on such a level got me instantly hooked on the book. I have it, Rules of Play, A Theory of Fun, and Game Design Workshop waiting for me to get through them. I think I'll be set for a few years ;P

For example I am pretty sure that every modern programmer who decides to clone TrapThem (the game created under my principles) will build in certain bugs (I exactly can tell which) he will never think of because he has the illusion that his abstracted high level code is always for the better.

Your lack of "ifs" and "woulds" and instead using "decides" and "will" made it sound very definitive. Apologies for misinterpreting you, but my brain actually told me that you had used the word "when" because it sounded so certain of it happening. There are no conditions stated in the sentence, just that it will happen in every instance of the case... only without specifying that there may not be any instances.
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