Player Notes: Feedback

[Fidcal]

Yes but that would be all or nothing like a walkthrough and you still need to quit the game. My method can be used in different ways by different types of player:

 

Player A likes a challenge and hates what he sees as hand-holding. He just plays as normal and does not enable player notes. If he gets stuck he quits the game, asks a question on a forum, and I copy and paste the relevant player note in spoilers.

 

Player B likes a challenge but would be delighted to have an extra clue when needed if he seems to be getting stuck. He enables player notes but ignores them mostly.

 

Player C likes a challenge but is a novice (or the game is too hard.) He tries to just use the normal clues but frequently refers to the player notes.

 

Player D hates readables. They breakup the flow of what is after all an action game. Stopping the action and reading what is often poorly written irrelevant fiction is a distraction at best. He mostly skips them. He does not enjoy having to work out what to do but wants to get on with the game. He always jumps to page 3 of any player notes.

 

Player E does not understand English well and finds lengthy fiction in a scrawled hand almost impossible to follow. He finds the player notes bold, clear, short, and straight to the point.

[Aprilsister]

Player X likes a challenge and hates what he sees as hand-holding. He just plays as easy, normal or expert depending on the restrictions and extras (if there are extras bound to difficulty levels and restrictions too which is bad design -- very bad! -- in Player X's estimation)....

 

Player X does not enable player notes and hopes that this system remains absolutely single-step-permanent toggleable.

 

If Player X gets stuck he quits the game; he ponders; he thinks on it; he may even sleep on it... yet if Player X is baffled for weeks but still has enjoyed the FM enough Player X asks a question on a forum; if Player X deems the solution to the problem an example of an entirely illogical or otherwise exasperatingly stupid "solution" Player X abandons said FM; if Player X applies face to palm or vice-versa because the solution was something he should have been able to reasonably figure out, Player X admits this to one and all, praises the Builder (FMA) and slips back into shadow.

[Fidcal]

I'm really looking forward to Player X come begging and crawling for help. hehe Of course it could backfire and players point out that even with the player notes it was impossible to deduce that it was the 4th rat not the 7th that had swallowed the key and you had to find the microswitch on top of the chimney of the other house to activate the electromagnet to retrieve it. Seemed obvious to me if you read the butler's secret note backwards under the blue light on a Wednesday.

[Aprilsister]

Genuine .

[Jesps]

Generally clues are not something I would personally want to use, unless I was completely stuck. If they must be implemented I would suggest something like Springheel suggested, adding them to the end of the readable. Or simply just giving the clue-containing readables a different inventory icon.

 

 

[fllood]

I think fragmented player notes are a good idea to help some people Fidcal!

 

Like some other people I also would like to see them only included on Easy and excluded from Normal and Hard. Even with the arguments you said. And I wouldn't like to have to ignore them in the inventory (immersion!) or to fissle with config files to switch back an forth any settings for that.

 

... also please guys be very careful with things like adding an extra hint page at the end of normal readables!

 

Any solution that do not feel part of the gameworld do break immersion.

 

... of what is after all an action game. Stopping the action and reading what is often poorly written irrelevant fiction is a distraction at best.

Really ?? ...even there are of course bad FM's in that aspect overall I disagree. There are lots of Thief FM's that did fascinate and suck me into the story and gameworld via excellent readables . I see Thief more like an adventure-stealth game with it's (slow) pace, it's exploration and some challenge of thinking at times in contrast to action-stealth games like for example Splinter Cell ecetera.

Therefore I like everything that adds to story, atmosphere, tension and thinking. and don't like anything that take away from that (like TDS did).

Edited December 20, 2010 by fllood

[Fidcal]

Thanks for input. Yes I should have said 'Player D regards it as an action game.' or 'To Player D the action part is paramount and the readables of little interest.' But it's not that black and white. Probably many players in other groups sometimes feel this at times: In an exciting section of an FM finding themselves spending several minutes trying to read an indulgence of fiction can feel frustrating and be skipped. This is especially true if they do not even know if it is completely irrelevant.

 

I'm almost certain now to make this a two level difficulty FM. My feeling is that three levels is often too many anyway. So, Easy with notes then two Expert levels, one with notes.

 

In addition, to cut out the clutter in the inventory I am considering a single icon that adds/removes the notes as needed or, if I can do it, completely switches the inventory to just notes and back again. If I can do this then a hot key could be defined to switch. But I think I'd rather have the 'scroll only within a category' I posted elsewhere.

[grayman]

I'm on the side of no hand-holding.

 

So I would probably opt-out of player notes, or never opt-in.

 

As a mapper, if I felt players needed a hint, I'd build something into the storyline so that it felt more natural.

 

That's my 2 cents.

[LEGION]

Difficult, but still a good idea. I would be completely fine to add it to EASY only, or a cvar-thing that is deactivated at mission-start.

 

But I fear most mappers wouldn´t use it anyway...

[i30817]

I think it is more of a question of the way that notes are a crutch now. I've seen so many missions use readables for clues, that i know the "clues" are in the readables and not elsewhere. For instance instead of readables, a mural in a temple specifying the correct way to worship (or the wrong way) could be a "clue".

 

Sound (sound of a opening for instance) could be a clue.

Following a AI and watching what he does could be a clue.

The movement of a AI, following another could be a clue.

A conversation (is it possible already?) or eavesdropping on one could be a clue.

A pattern in a tile could be a clue.

Even a object in a incongruous place could be a clue (though that is pushing the limits of a acceptable ingenuity).

 

"Problem" is, the thief gameplay is quite non-linear. There is the quite plausible notion the player will loose the thread if it ephemeral, unlike readables that are "obvious". In most cases it matters little since the player can recover from almost any setback if skillful enough. Room full of haunts? Climb somewhere and wait, or noisemaker up a corner and flee. The maps, although big, almost never get to the level of puzzle challenge of even a action-adventure, much less a "Dark Heart of Uukrul" (in this old rpg game, famously full of puzzles, all of the maps you moved around in was a clue/puzzle.)

 

A suggestion: i like secret objectives. The secret objective in Ominous Bequest was brilliant for instance. Rewarding player ingenuity is very nice.

Edited December 29, 2010 by i30817

[Fidcal]

My notes will act on every level for every type of player:

 

No notes at all. Figure it out in the normal way from game clues.

Notes alert you but don't read them - they just alert you so you know there is a clue somewhere - either in the readable you just read or something you just heard or saw (even if the player didn't notice, the player character did.)

Read the notes to 3 different levels optional either when desperate or for players who are not interested in working out clues or reading fiction.

 

Currently I don't know of any way of making the notes available but without the alert because they always go to the top of the inventory.