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[denzgd]

Hello, TIGForums! Majora's Mask is one of my favorite games, and for those who haven't played it, it features this mechanic where the time in-game loops around, and you have to work alongside it in order to accomplish the game's objectives. I'm currently working on a game that uses a similar feature, although less action-adventure, and more adventure. I don't know of any other game that uses such a mechanic, and I wonder what sort of things can be implemented to prevent it from getting stale, and possibly even how today's devs could improve on the idea in general. And if any of you guys had issues with Majora's Mask due to this feature, what was it about the implementation that you didn't like?

[ActiveUnique]

Majora's Mask was great. It was too different from previous Zelda games to rake in the nostalgia fans. But it was original enough to prove Nintendo doesn't just beat around a dead horse.

The detail that will ruin it is you remember everything even if your character doesn't, amnesia is rarely a crowd-pleaser.
What the character brings with him keeps the story flowing, although this is the most obvious part it is essential.
Link has a companion who also shared memories with his time travels.
When characters experience deja-vu in a time-loop, the story can be more interesting, but it might just be 4th wall breaking, caution.

You could find some games that use time recursion if you Googled properly. It's a well-known trope, spoiler:
<SPOILER>

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GroundhogDayLoop
There are also indie flash games like Red Rogue (it's a roguelike) which use time-loops to give a sense that death isn't the ending.

</SPOILER>

[denzgd]

The detail that will ruin it is you remember everything even if your character doesn't, amnesia is rarely a crowd-pleaser.
What the character brings with him keeps the story flowing, although this is the most obvious part it is essential.
Link has a companion who also shared memories with his time travels.
When characters experience deja-vu in a time-loop, the story can be more interesting, but it might just be 4th wall breaking, caution.

I'll have to keep this in mind. I do intend to have the character semi-aware of what's happening. The way I intend to set it up is much like Majora's Mask, where time is very clearly looping, but the characters don't call too much attention to it, aside from the main characters. This will ultimately serve a greater purpose later on, in some mechanics and story features I have planned.

You could find some games that use time recursion if you Googled properly. It's a well-known trope, spoiler:

I checked the TVTropes page, but most of the games listed either only used looping time as a side-quest, or as exclusively a story feature. I'm looking more for games that use time looping hand-in-hand with the game's actual mechanics. Similar Google searches have led me to similar results. But if it's mostly uncharted territory, then there are advantages to that, too.

[SirNiko]

It's not nearly the same, but Radiant Historia for the DS does a thing where you travel back forth through the story of the game to solve puzzles. As in, you can travel back to earlier chapters and redo all the story quests to pick different choices which sometimes results in alternate endings, or influences future events to progress the story. The number of things you can influence is relatively small, but it does allow the game to design the towns so that some secrets require you to know not just where they are, but when they appear in the plot without making them missable.

The Stanley Parable is designed around replaying the same relatively short adventure multiple times but making different choices.

Ultimately, though, I'm not aware of any games that do things quite the same as Majora's Mask.

[Ammypendent]

Majora's Mask was great. It was too different from previous Zelda games to rake in the nostalgia fans. But it was original enough to prove Nintendo doesn't just beat around a dead horse.

The detail that will ruin it is you remember everything even if your character doesn't, amnesia is rarely a crowd-pleaser.
What the character brings with him keeps the story flowing, although this is the most obvious part it is essential.
Link has a companion who also shared memories with his time travels.
When characters experience deja-vu in a time-loop, the story can be more interesting, but it might just be 4th wall breaking, caution.
[...]

Actually that would be a brilliant expansion to what Majora's Mask does. Instead of having to do everything yourself, your quest is to find ways to get key people to realize the deja vu time loop and work with you to break it. You could then make it as atomic or systematically complex as you want.

[McMutton]

Actually that would be a brilliant expansion to what Majora's Mask does. Instead of having to do everything yourself, your quest is to find ways to get key people to realize the deja vu time loop and work with you to break it. You could then make it as atomic or systematically complex as you want.

That's a really cool idea, there.

To answer your question, I think that Majora's Mask was able to make it work without getting stale by having a hell of a lot of stuff to do and being able to change outcomes to see different stuff.

[HyMyNameIsMatt]

Majora's Mask allowed you to see the entire world in detail over that 3 day period.  There were a lot of dynamic things in the game that would occur over the 3 day cycle, and with the time looping you could see literally every event if you wanted.  I don't think it would have been as interesting without all that dynamically changing stuff.

[denzgd]

To answer your question, I think that Majora's Mask was able to make it work without getting stale by having a hell of a lot of stuff to do and being able to change outcomes to see different stuff.

This is my intention with my game. My biggest hurdle right now is deciding what carries over between loops. It has less combat that Majora's Mask, so it's not as simple as carrying over weapons and stuff. Much of the appeal of Majora's Mask, at least to me, was all the little side quests. Many of the side quests I played didn't require many items from late in the game, so it felt like I could accomplish more independently from the main story. That's a big part of why I like Fallout 3 and New Vegas - even later quests are still available even from an early level, though much harder. It felt like the game put more of the responsibility of what happens into my hands. Most other Zelda games, especially recent ones, have been very "Go here, do this." Majora's Mask does this to an extent, but the reins are much more loose.

Majora's Mask allowed you to see the entire world in detail over that 3 day period.  There were a lot of dynamic things in the game that would occur over the 3 day cycle, and with the time looping you could see literally every event if you wanted.  I don't think it would have been as interesting without all that dynamically changing stuff.

This is definitely true. It's like, most games just have a whole bunch of static NPCs in the background, but Majora's Mask gave them their own little stories.

[LightEnt]

Here are some of the reasons I loved the time loop gimmick in Majora.

1) There was a very clear goal to accomplish in the time frame (stop armageddon) and no matter where or when you are in the game, it's always a factor. The ominous earthquakes and music changes as you approach the final day are honestly nervewracking.

2) They used the smaller hub world to their advantage in setting up the sidequests with NPCs. The NPCs really felt more like actual characters, not the disposable dialogue dispensers like in every other Zelda game.

3) The world was smaller but it just felt so much bigger than Ocarina because there was limited time to devote to things.


I usually don't like time travel as a plot element though. It's so frequently lazy in execution and chocked full of logic holes, especially for stories that take themselves seriously.

[Ammypendent]

To answer your question, I think that Majora's Mask was able to make it work without getting stale by having a hell of a lot of stuff to do and being able to change outcomes to see different stuff.

This is my intention with my game. My biggest hurdle right now is deciding what carries over between loops. It has less combat that Majora's Mask, so it's not as simple as carrying over weapons and stuff. Much of the appeal of Majora's Mask, at least to me, was all the little side quests. Many of the side quests I played didn't require many items from late in the game, so it felt like I could accomplish more independently from the main story. That's a big part of why I like Fallout 3 and New Vegas - even later quests are still available even from an early level, though much harder. It felt like the game put more of the responsibility of what happens into my hands. Most other Zelda games, especially recent ones, have been very "Go here, do this." Majora's Mask does this to an extent, but the reins are much more loose.[...]

The things that carried over in Majora's Mask break down to essentially access keys & shortcuts & milestones. Here's a list off the top of my head:

• - 3 transformation masks give you access to later quest content.
  - 20 minor masks are milestones usually for finishing side quests, some provide shortcuts
  - Dungeon items, which gives access certain areas and provide shortcuts to finishing dungeons in a new cycle if you didn't finish.
  - Owl statues, literally shortcuts you activate. also provide temp save points.
  - Boss masks, milestones in main quest line.
  - Bank Account, Nintendo teaches kids bank fraud~ a money shortcut
  - Bomber notebook for keeping track of the citizens of Termina

I'm sure you can model some of your carry over things after the ones above and make up some on your own.

[BorisTheBrave]

Is it the time travel or the reset mechanic that is important to you?

There are quite a lot of games that don't explicit invoke time travel, but still expect you to reset the game multiple times in order to complete it successfully, carrying only what you've learnt from the previous run. A lot of visual novels, for example. And then there are "legacy" games where you have to reset the game a lot, but you don't start quite from where you did the previous time (Rogue Legacy, Binding of Isaac).

Majora's mask had both elements (you carry over both player knowledge and key items), but I think it is the former that everyone remembers and enjoys.

One other benefit to the time travel is that it is an extremely good handwave for the non-existant AI of the NPCs. They seemed more alive than normal NPCs thanks to that justification, (and their careful day-by-day scripting).

[Blink]

Majora's Mask has the best world and ai feeling of any game because of the consistency within a time period and your ability to impact their lives. It is my favorite game, so I can't wait to see what you come up with.

It's like a rogue-like with no variation or randomization, but you play as a character outside the game. You keep things between sessions even though you're constantly restarting. I think it draws a lot from roguelikes: how do you make restarting a thousand times interesting? (a good hub and learning new shortcuts) How do you make ai interesting when you see it a thousand times? (they've got a lot of depth and your choices have serious consequences)

Groundhog's day is still the best comparison to MM, but I think there's a lot that can be learned from Megaman and roguelikes as well (since you also restart Megaman a lot). MM just does something entirely different with that foundation by letting you bring one or two things between sessions.

[denzgd]

Is it the time travel or the reset mechanic that is important to you?

There are quite a lot of games that don't explicit invoke time travel, but still expect you to reset the game multiple times in order to complete it successfully, carrying only what you've learnt from the previous run. A lot of visual novels, for example. And then there are "legacy" games where you have to reset the game a lot, but you don't start quite from where you did the previous time (Rogue Legacy, Binding of Isaac).

Majora's mask had both elements (you carry over both player knowledge and key items), but I think it is the former that everyone remembers and enjoys.

For me, it's definitely the reset. Although I don't want to go the inspired-by-roguelikes route, like Binding of Isaac and Rogue Legacy. These games tend to throw everything out the window between playthroughs, whereas Majora's Mask had a more defined, planned-out experience.

Majora's Mask really did this well, too. It was a constant repeat, similar to roguelike-likes, and it had content that was consistent through the game and each playthrough. Yet the gameplay didn't feel like you were constantly backtracking. I think that Ammypendent had it right as to why.

The things that carried over in Majora's Mask break down to essentially access keys & shortcuts & milestones. Here's a list off the top of my head:

• 3 transformation masks give you access to later quest content.
• 20 minor masks are milestones usually for finishing side quests, some provide shortcuts
• Dungeon items, which gives access certain areas and provide shortcuts to finishing dungeons in a new cycle if you didn't finish.
• Owl statues, literally shortcuts you activate. also provide temp save points.
• Boss masks, milestones in main quest line.
• Bank Account, Nintendo teaches kids bank fraud~ a money shortcut
• Bomber notebook for keeping track of the citizens of Termina

To me, it seems like it needs to be extra clear that the player is making progress.

[rek]

This might be deviating a bit from the focus of the thread, but:

In Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle, the player controls three characters in different time periods. At a few points in the game a character in the past needs to deliver an item to another in the future by hiding it (in the grandfather clock?) where it will sit for centuries before the other character receives it. (Didn't Chrono Trigger also have this mechanic?)

I felt this sort of cross-time delivery was missing from Majora's Mask but probably could have easily been worked in – Link retains select inventory items anyway, but loses others when he loops back to Day 1 (and then you literally drown in bombs/rupees/arrows/etc to replenish what you lost).

[Ammypendent]

The things that carried over in Majora's Mask break down to essentially access keys & shortcuts & milestones. Here's a list off the top of my head:[...]

To me, it seems like it needs to be extra clear that the player is making progress.

If you want to be extra clear, what you can do is an extensive time journal. Which actively states your progress in the game. If the player is stuck, such as gone through a loop without any progress, you could have hints added in that journal via side notes such as your character guessing what might happen IF ___.