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[droqen]

There's a DS game called Solatorobo and in it you have a big robot that you have to hop out of occasionally to do things.

I've been thinking about a game where you have a large weapon (maybe an overlarge sword) which you must drop occasionally to become uber-agile (but also worse at fighting and overall less powerful, meaning you do have to go back for you sword eventually).

Are there other games that do this?

Is it an interesting concept?

Do you have, or have you ever had, an idea involving something like this? I really wanna hear it o.o

[Relix]

Well, in Zelda: The Wind Waker, you could pick up enemys weapons and it was used at least in two puzzles. You just couldn't carry them out of the room and only could use basic attacks with them.

Not the same, but that sounds like an interesting idea. You could even add using enemys weapons for x reason to the mix. Like, if you're fighting a boss, you've to use your own weapon to get it to drop its own weapon, then pick it up and use it againts the boss to do damage or smash things to run away.

Did I understood your intents right?

Might contain broken english, I'm tired...

[droqen]

Ahh that's pretty cool, and I do remember that --

What I'm talking about, however, is a permanent and necessary piece of equipment that you have to leave behind in some situations but then go back to retrieve (and if it's possible to completely lose it, make it very costly to replace -- it'd be like losing a life).

Even in games where stealing stuff from your enemies is important, I've never played a game where they were anything more than cool power-ups. I'm talking about something that is core to the way you play the game and interact with the environment.

[LDuncan]

Sounds sorta like Blaster Master, which has one of the best premises for a game ever: "Jason follows his pet frog Fred down a hole in the earth. There he finds a tank and uses it to battle radioactive mutants."

I like the idea though. Your idea I mean. Not battling mutants with a tank. Though I like that too

[Tiderion]

This is actually pretty common and popular if done correctly. You can call this "escort the important thing/hostage" or "use this awesome weapon".

Metal Gear Solid 2 uses Emma Emmerich to slow down Raiden but is necessary to finish the level. Ocarina of Time does this with Ruto as well. Ocarina of Time also has the Biggoron's Sword which inhibits your defense to increase attack power and range. Similarly, your movement and speed are restricted in the Halo games when you elect to carry the 200+ round turrets. A lot of games that allow you customize your character's weapon loadout have a tradeoff between speed and agility and firepower and defense.

[droqen]

hmm

I was thinking about your post, Tiderion, and I think I realized what the difference is between that and what I'm thinking about.

Well, first off, there are escort missions/entities which are definitely not what I'm talking about -- those are useless things that are made necessary by the game, in general.

What I've been thinking about are items that you would rarely wish to be without, but which the game requires you to be without. A reverse-escort mission, if you will.

---> Possibly ones you would choose to be without occasionally for the bonus mobility, but you, for example, are greatly hindered in combat without this item/weapon.


Regarding the halo turret, it may be useful but it's a strictly temporary boon. You're limited to a location by your speed, and to a certain 'time' (so to speak) by your limited ammo.

The Biggoron's Sword, if it works the way you say (my memory is bad), is a simple stat tradeoff and not a core part of the way you play the game at all?


(SORRY IF I'M BEING REALLY PICKY)


It was really cool when some enemies in Zelda could completely steal your sword. I don't know if any of the games other than Majora's Mask did this.

[LDuncan]

I think one thing that bugs me about games like this is when there is no good reason to, in your example, drop your big giant sword, unless forced to. It's been too long since I played Blaster Master, so I don't quite remember the reasons you'd get out of your tank, but in the game Assault Heroes, you could get out of your little tank thing too if you wanted. But the only reason to do so would be to crawl through doors that the tank couldn't fit through. The tank was superior in every way--faster, more attack power, better defense. There was no reason to get out unless you HAD to. It'd be nicer, in my opinion, if you had some choice. Like... sure, you could kill this guy with the big giant sword, but you know you'll take a lot of damage, so it would be best to drop the sword and use your agility to dodge attacks. I dunno, maybe that defeats the main purpose of what you're trying to do though.

It was really cool when some enemies in Zelda could completely steal your sword. I don't know if any of the games other than Majora's Mask did this.

It's basically been around since the very first Zelda. The bubble dudes would "curse" you so that you couldn't use your sword unless you used the whistle or whatever.

[droqen]

Nope! LDuncan that's totally what I'm going for

and to be honest, I would prefer if both sides were totally balanced and totally different and variably useful for all kinds of situations.

Like if getting out of your tank meant you could dodge attacks better (and enemies wouldn't attack your empty tank, I guess) that'd be cool -- but as it stands I see how that could get annoying (especially if there's some dumb climbing in/out animation).


Yeah, but Majora's Mask is the only one I can think of that actually steals your sword, necessitating you actually go and buy it back from the pawn shop :D

Like I said, I'm going for something of the magnitude of loss of a life (dying), not a temporary power-up (or in this case a power-down).

Not to say the curse isn't cool too, but it's a very different feel and not what I'm going for here.


Right, so, to be more clear what I'm thinking of is

two distinct modes where one mode is 'heavy+slow' and the other mode is 'quick+light'.

Making the difference a big, hand-held weapon, is nice because it allows for:
- More puzzle stuff
- A very obvious visual distinction between the two modes
- Immediate swapping (pick up! drop!)
- Throwing it! (and... more puzzle stuff based on that too)


So for example if you preferred combat without the weapon, you could just throw it into a group of enemies before charging in with your fists (for example).

[laserdracula]

That's a really solid idea.  The important thing is that both modes have an aspect of advantage.  So in the case of the sword,  You would have the large(magical maybe) cumbersome sword that's good for fighting heavies, but impairs movement. 

If you drop or throw the big one, you have a smaller one as a strategy against large numbers of popcorn enemies. 

Also the big sword could be used as a powerful shot or maybe as passive
defense as in the R-type force module.  Instead of having to go back and get it, there could be a key that calls it to you(magic sword/psychokinesis or whatever).

I might steal this.

[iffi]

In Vindictus one of the classes (Karok) carries a giant pillar as his primary weapon, but he can throw his pillar (

) in this video) and fight unarmed (

in the same video) which does less damage but has faster attacks.

If you do something like this, make sure both forms are useful - from my experience the unarmed combat in Vindictus isn't quite fast or strong enough to be useful (though the pillar toss itself does damage and is useful for taking out enemies that happen to be in a straight line).

[SundownKid]

Metal Max! It lets you engage in turn based battles and fight with or without your tank!

Also, Steambot Chronicles, which shares a lot of similarities with Solatorobo. However, you can only fight with your mech.

[LiquidAsh]

This sounds like an interesting direction to investigate.  A couple more games it reminds me of include: TUMIKI Fighters (http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~cs8k-cyu/windows/tf_e.html) where you pick up enemy parts which gives you more fire power but also makes you a larger target (so the down side is pretty nominal), and Dragon's Curse (http://wii.ign.com/objects/897/897236.html) where the different forms your character can take on restrict their movement and attacks in different ways.  So choosing one form requires you to leave behind the others.  Neither of these is exactly what you're asking about, but may be helpful in exploring this space(?).

[baconman]

Metal Warriors for SNES was highly designed around this concept. There were 6 mecha styles, each with some unique functionality including a wall-crawling spider-scorpion one and a rolling ball that became a turret when idle. You had to move quick and keep the enemy population under control too, or they could steal your mecha and make life difficult on you rather quickly. A lot of times, completing certain mission objectives or activating doors/hangars required you to hop out and enter a small room.

[Headless Man]

Ranger X:





In Ranger X it's real versatle - you can hop inside it, ride on it, and it follows you and gives support.  You are much more mobile without it - you can fly, it can only jump.

[BattleBeard]

 My game actually has a similar concept, except your ally is mechanically alive.

[Xion]

there are a few mech games that allow you to exit your mech (Metal Warriors, Front Mission 2: Gun Hazard). Usually to get another mech, or enter a place your mech was too big for. There wasn't too much advantage in doing this though, besides maybe being harder to hit and being able to fly forever with your jetpack, but both of these are pretty useless things since without your mech you can't accomplish much regardless, and you moved way slower. I also don't recall being forced to leave your mech (although it was sometimes necessary in Metal Warriors to briefly hop out and transfer to another if your mech was nearly destroyed anyway) except maybe once or twice in FM:GH. I never beat either game though so maybe it becomes more essential later on.

In any case, it's a feature I liked in both games, and I'd sometimes hop out and run around just because I fucking could (until I realized that it was pretty much completely useless).

I'd like it if the out-of-mech human actually had some useful skills, maybe even for combating piloted mechs (hopping on them and taking them down sotc style?), or if there were more situations that demanded doing so - even if only optional. A building that can only be entered as a person that contains some bonus items or extra story info or something, for example, or as another more covert way to approach a situation than blasting in with a mech (planting demo charges on a bridge to take out the army crossing it? Assassinating a target without alerting the whole facility?)

This doesn't seem to exactly coincide with what you're talking about though, because I'm imagining something more optional that allows you to come at things in different ways, rather than being mandated to come at it from either one way or the other.

Anyway, back on to what you were talking about,

what if the gun were also a giant key that you'd have to use to open doors, but you had to leave it in the door for it to stay open.

[Tumetsu]

Instead of having to go back and get it, there could be a key that calls it to you(magic sword/psychokinesis or whatever).

This makes me to think about a fast paced game where there is weapon spots over the map with hordes of enemies. When player reaches one of the spots, he gets to use one huge weapon, lets say a sword. When holding the sword, player is slow but powerful and can use it to clear the enemies in the vicinity. However, if he drops it, it can be acquired only via same spot. Essentially player could run between spots avoiding the monsters until he gets good weapon. He could have a weak defense ability to help the running though. Idea is though that weapons have limited "range" due their large size.

Not sure how that would play out, it just occurred to my mind.

[SirNiko]

There's also plok, where you had to sacrifice your limbs to activate switches, giving you fewer ways to attack and eventually restricting your movement.

Or Banjo Tooie, where you sometimes had to split from Banjo to operate separately with some loss in capability.

I thought about a game concept once where you had a human-sized suit of mecha armor that the human player could wear to be more powerful, or you could split up and the mecha armor could follow and fight in tandem. Maybe go for an action route where joining up and splitting up were mapped to quickkeys, and while split up you have some hotkeys to direct the robot on how to fight, so you can split your focus, or maybe send the robot to delay a time bomb while you race to the next room and rescue hostages before the bomb goes off, leaving you vulnerable.

[Xion]

that sounds awesome, niko :0