Can every1 pls update his FM with a saveroom possibility on hardmode like in the Kingsals latest FM?

[esme]

I don't play games I don't enjoy & I don't enjoy games where I'm restricted from saving my progress when the phone rings

Like @AluminumHaste I have a life and it dictates how much game time I get

So if it's an option, fine, put it in as long as it doesn't detract from the mission for those who don't use it

But if it's not optional then that's a hard pass from me, put it in if you want, other people might like it, I'd just like to know before I download it

I know these things are free to the player & they involve months, sometimes years of work & I do appreciate that

I really hate complaining about all that hard work, because .. well I'm a talentless git who hasn't made a single TDM mission, but for me this is a mechanic that adds nothing but frustration

Edited February 1, 2022 by esme

[JackFarmer]

If the already available possibilities are used correctly, additional AI, alternative AI routes, less/more lighting, less/more light switches and less/more resources can be integrated at any level of difficulty making the game more challenging in much more than the saving aspect.

On top of that (as far as I remember from a post by Grayman) the AI also reacts more attentively on higher difficulties.

Getting all of these components together in a reasonable proportion is quite an achievement (if the mission maker really applies it) - and keep in mind that we're not professional level designers with limited time only...

That's why I don't feel like going through all my missions again, finding suitable save rooms for the highest difficulty mode (or even worse: having to design extra ones), and then also checking how many saves would make sense and eventually distribute corresponding memory items in the game - let alone checking whether it does not break the mission in a way I cannot or have not forseen or makes it too frustrating because I overlooked certain aspects.

It just occurred to me: How should I do this for example in HHTLC? I have four completely different sections there. Should I come up with a location fitting save item (like the gramophone in Hazard Pay) for each section and also suitable storage media? I am sure other authors would face the same problem.

For these reasons one cannot really claim (as in the OP) that it would be possible to add this simply later to existing missions.

Moreover, I doubt that this would automatically make every mission better for every sort of player when he/she choses the highest diificulty level depending on the preferences.

I beat Hazard Pay (great mission, no doubt) on Hard this weekend and it immediately reminded me why I don't like the mentioned save system - AH, dragofer and thebigh already described the concerns and problems above I have encountered as well.

I was like AH, I lost half an hour of play twice, both times because I fell from a great height and lost ca. 40 minutes one nite, because I did not find a save room before I had to quit. That's also the reason why I always preferred the old Tomb Raider games, Half Life,Thief or the newer Dishonored series: you could save freely and try out a lot of things.

Some players may love it, but there are surely also other opinions (as we can in posts above) out there and it's like all the other features of the game: some like zombies in the game, some don't, some like spiders in the game, some don't, some want lots of books to read, others find it too much, some want Ambient music, others hate it and switch it off... this list goes on and on and on making it very difficult for mappers to create something completely accepted by the entire community.

Plus, for me the original Thief gameplay is the benchmark and there wasn't such a thing as save rooms. Since I like my work to be seen as some sort of Thief-a-like work, the implementation of the said feature is a no go. Others may of course view this differently.

What we would need much more urgently would be additional AI for heathen or inventor missions, plus several appropriate AI vocal sets for each. It would also be nice to have additional vocal sets for mages/nobles and Builders for even more variation. If then also many new assets for heathens/inventors/mages were added to the mod, then this would surely give a boost in creativity and some mappers would surely find it easier to create much more varied missions - which I prefer over any other change in the saving system.

Unfortunately, it seems that this will only remain a dream as I do not have the skills to create the needed stuff and we are not exactly blessed with many active content creators.   

So, let me conclude with a short answer to the OPs question: Sorry, I will not update any of my missions and I will not use the feature in possible future missions for the reasons mentioned above.

 

[peter_spy]

2 hours ago, Dragofer said:

We should probably also offer some kind of cvar to disable the saving restrictions, no questions asked.

That would be a huge and firm no. If you want to cheat, you already have god mode, noclip, notarget, etc.

Limiting or removing saves in FMs is not only a new way to prevent save scumming and letting the emergent systems work, but it can also allow to create missions that are more akin to roguelike games: focused on short runs and replays. Overriding that with a cvar is taking control away from mission authors just to satisfy players who don't want to change their habits or can't be bothered to understand gameplay concepts other than classic Thief gameplay.

[AluminumHaste]

Dude,  our ability to bypass a feature has no bearing on your enjoyment of the gameplay or feature.

And there's no roguelike features implemented. If I die I don't get to keep the fire arrow I picked up etc.

[esme]

Fair enough, just let me know that my "scumming" & classic thief gameplay isn't allowed so I don't download the mission

"Scumming" such a nice term, gives me a warm glow

[kingsal]

Yeah I would recommend being very careful trying to retroactively fit save rooms into a mission.  I designed Hazard around the mechanic and even then its hard to balance it out.
 

Having it on Expert seems fair,  but for larger missions it would need to be accompanied with auto saves or other ways of saving.  Also things like mandatory jumps, rope arrow mistakes, and deadly traps are brutal.  

Anyways, I would encourage authors to try it but only if it works for their mission and they’re willing to do more testing than usual. If balanced well, I think it can be really fun for players looking to do a challenge run. 

[AluminumHaste]

That's a good idea @kingsal, having autosaves in certain areas would really help.

[peter_spy]

5 minutes ago, AluminumHaste said:

Dude,  our ability to bypass a feature has no bearing on your enjoyment of the gameplay or feature.

And there's no roguelike features implemented. If I die I don't get to keep the fire arrow I picked up etc.

It's not about my enjoyment, it's about author's intent. If someone wants to create an FM with different saving methods and resulting gameplay, they should be able to do it. They don't always have to cater to everyone.

7 minutes ago, esme said:

"Scumming" such a nice term, gives me a warm glow

Save scumming is a term decades old and it's commonly used; "compulsive saving", if you need to be so formal.

[esme]

Authors don't have to cater for everyone - And players don't have to play their missions, we play these games because they are unique, there's nothing else like TDM & Thief out there

You want to make missions that play like every other game on the planet, go ahead, I just want to know which ones they are so I don't play them

Yeah save scumming has been in use for over a decade, I remember when it first came out, I got a warm glow then too, didn't affect my play style then & won't now

Edited February 1, 2022 by esme
screwed up a quote

[AluminumHaste]

Funny you talk about Author's intent then in the same paragraph talk about emergent gameplay.

By definition, emergent gameplay arises outside of the intended scope or design of the original authors. Author's placing a locked door and key on the other side of the map, just to have players stack crates to get over the fence, would be an example of emergent gameplay.

If a mission author thinks of all possible situations and accounts for them, then there is no emergent systems possible.

[peter_spy]

Can we skip sunday school for im-sim level designers? I believe everyone here knows that, and that we're talking about saving system, which is higher in the game systems hierarchy than level design tools, while obviously influencing everything down the line.

[AluminumHaste]

You're the one that brought it up....

But I forgot the golden rule; don't argue with peter_spy, so I'll humbly bow out of this discussion, I've already thrown my 2 cents in.

[Fidcal]

Another way of doing this is using something like the save potions in Kingdom Come. They're not cheap or easy to get early on, but you need them to save.

In Dark Mod they could be expensive 'magical time devices' that count as part of the objectives to obtain a certain number. But the more you use them to go back in time (save the game) the less you have at the end. So you balance it against your ultimate achievements stats, e.g., objective is to secure at least 50, and thre are only 100 to be found. Having all 100 at the end would mean you never saved at all! But you can still finish the mission even if you only have 10 left at the end - just not such a good stat.

More realistically, a hybrid with save rooms, so you reserve the temporal devices for serious emergencies when you're desperate.

[marbleman]

I really hope this'll be an occasional gimmick rather than a feature every mission has from now on.

[kingsal]

2 hours ago, Fidcal said:

Another way of doing this is using something like the save potions in Kingdom Come. They're not cheap or easy to get early on, but you need them to save.

In Dark Mod they could be expensive 'magical time devices' that count as part of the objectives to obtain a certain number. But the more you use them to go back in time (save the game) the less you have at the end.

Funny, Goldwell brought up Kingdom Come as well. Wonderful game .  A hybrid system of autosave locations and save items gives a lot of flexibility to the player and the mission designer. There are still level design considerations, but its not as heavy of a lift as building save rooms. Im going to try this  in my next release on a custom difficulty setting. 
 

[thebigh]

Another possibility would be respawn points like the quantum entanglement body scanners in System Shock 2. Get killed, get resurrected there. The problem is guards remaining alerted, that's going to be a bigger problem than running into the same shotgun zombie again. You'd have to script it so that getting killed calms the guards down but without letting the player cheese it by throwing himself off a cliff or something just to de-escalate a guard that caught him.

[Oktokolo]

12 hours ago, Fidcal said:

Another way of doing this is using something like the save potions in Kingdom Come. They're not cheap or easy to get early on, but you need them to save.

If i remember correctly, the "Savior Snaps" save system was the very first target of mods in that game...

Maybe, that is the real solution to the whole save/kill/blackjack/ghost/minloot/whatever restrictions problem:
Mods for fan missions.

Does TDM already support mods overriding mission behaviour?

[peter_spy]

22 hours ago, AluminumHaste said:

You're the one that brought it up....

But I forgot the golden rule; don't argue with peter_spy, so I'll humbly bow out of this discussion, I've already thrown my 2 cents in.

I brought that up because there is no polar opposition here or contradiction. I thought it's obvious and not worth discussing over and over again that there is an authorial intent, even in sandbox or im-sim games. It's just that the author is giving players toys in a controlled sandbox environment, and they're just not authoring the experience in a linear way, minute per minute, as in other games. But authoring the experience is still there, just in much broader sense. Again, obvious things for im-sims and sandboxes.

And I was opposing the cvar for overriding the save system, because it can be more much more influential than just level design tools; as in both Kingsal's mission and other games using different approaches saves (or lack thereof), you can see that there is a potential to create basically a new gameplay type, or at least adding some fresh elements. Roguelike/time trial levels for speedrunners, adding old Resident Evil kind of pacing and resource management to the mix, etc.

Adding a cvar to override this is like adding a save system to Quake deatchmatch, or a fighting game.

[AluminumHaste]

Not a big deal, even if it remains this way, it's a simple thing to edit the map and remove the feature if we really want to play the mission.

[Epifire]

Considering the fact any of the developers (to my knowledge) interested in adding this save room feature, are just going to bank on adding both difficulty sets; none of the cvar stuff would be necessary. As then people could play the standard difficulties or just stick with the hardcore saveroom mode. Hazard Pay was simply a test bed for this but clearly there would be a different approach were this implemented in future mission releases.

Let me remind folks, nobody during testing was ever advocating for all out replacing the standard difficulty mode but rather more exploring a new feature. This feature if implemented further, will just be offered alongside existing ones so that nobody is forced to go without.

[ChronA]

As someone with a propensity to ruin my own experience by compulsively save scumming, I am delighted to hear TDM can give this level of control over saving to level designers. I'm looking forward to taking advantage of it in my future play-throughs!

That said, it's not feasible for level designers to cater to every minority ludic preference, especially if it means editing and republishing old projects that were designed before the feature ever existed. If anyone wants to add a new save mechanic to old missions, I think the proper way is to open up the editor and add it in oneself!

For myself, I think my preferred mechanic would be a variation on the save potion: the item is only consumed when you reload the save. This way there is not very much of a penalty for saving frequently as a precaution against glitches or interruptions, or even for dying over and over again at the same spot. But it strongly penalizes relying on save scumming as a outcome optimization tool. 

Edited February 2, 2022 by ChronA

[Anderson]

Of all the console features I loved the checkpoint save systems in games. That way, a sort of autosave system allows not to break immersion when everything is good, but also allows you to stay focused. But only if checkpoints can be often found and if it doesn't make the game stutter or freeze.

Safe save points are ok too and they could be part of the checkpoint save system. But for those who are not as masochistic as me, simple autosaves and manual saves are just fine. Especially when you don't want kinky hardcore stuff. When you have lots of things to do AFK.

[Oktokolo]

1 hour ago, AluminumHaste said:

Not a big deal, even if it remains this way, it's a simple thing to edit the map and remove the feature if we really want to play the mission.

No need to edit maps as there now is a mod for that: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/21267-mod-save-at-will/#comment-469781

 

[peter_spy]

25 minutes ago, Anderson said:

Of all the console features I loved the checkpoint save systems in games. That way, a sort of autosave system allows not to break immersion when everything is good, but also allows you to stay focused. But only if checkpoints can be often found and if it doesn't make the game stutter or freeze.

Yup, and at this point it's not even a console feature, as these games are on PC too. In general, in last ten years or so, game designers got really good at making the checkpoint systems almost invisible to the player, who doesn't have to think much about saving their progress.

At the same time, there are devs experimenting with both im-sim genre and e.g. rogue-lite features. Prey: Mooncrash did that really well, ditching manual saves, but carrying some of the things throughout your progression. To me it was one of the most fresh experiences back then, and I've heard Deathloop is going further down that road as well (can't wait to play it!).

[datiswous]

56 minutes ago, ChronA said:

If anyone wants to add a new save mechanic to old missions, I think the proper way is to open up the editor and add it in oneself!

Maybe one can make a mod that adds a bunch of save potions, but using them ads a penalty to your game, like decreasing loot (so you need to get more loot to have more possible saves), then disable all saves with the mod (so the potions replaces the regular save system). I don't know if this is possible, but this way authors don't need to alter their missions.

Edited February 2, 2022 by datiswous