How far to take realism in games

[bgillisp]

Yeah, it actually confuses a couple of people in the game as the MC is not familiar with this idea either. Leads to some lines like:

"How did you fit 50 loaves of bread in one backpack?"
"45 now"
"Did you just eat 5 loaves of bread?"

Wasteland is actually a video game from the 80's. I think it is buyable on gog.com or steam if you are really curious to see what it is like.

 

[FleshToDust]

@bgillisp hah i can guess you're game has a sense of humor! That would be a good time!

Oh yeah I'll check steam and see what it's about. so is it by the same company as fallout 1 and 2 or did they buy the rights to it or what's going on there?

 

[Caitlin]

How much realism to add to a game? It depends on the sort of game that you're making, actually. Mysteries, Crime Dramas, and such, you actually CAN get away with adding as much about solving crimes, forensic or even law if your character is a lawyer, or even in law enforcement. Of course, with those characters you'll have to have them act like they are in those fields. Horror games, no one acts like they do in real life. *Crash* Teen girl: Billy, I heard something... Billy: (game) I better go check it out. *Real life, Billy* Sarah, we better call the police and have them check it out. Or heck, they might go to the neighbors as the police officers arrest the person trying to break in.

Fantasy games are really open, because you have magic, summonings, so you can't have realism... Well, yes and no. I would say that as long as you create maps that are rich, full of life and is believable, you can add the most important part of realism to your game. Your characters reactions to things, they have to believe it, so that your player can believe it. Science fiction, on the other hand, feel free to add any science information within reason as it will add to the realism to the story.

But the most important part of realism is going to be your characters, their lives, their reactions and making it seem like they really live where they do. For example, small towns where most of your heroes are likely to come from. Everyone knows everyone. Stories and gossip are spread pretty fast and at times, people get into everyone else's business. You are likely to have farmers in your past, if you lived in the area long enough. Teenagers have their 'hang out' spots, while teenagers in the past, became apprentices in a field. (o_o) In the city where I live, teenagers used to drive down Main Street, while today, they mostly hang out at Walmart. What can I say? If you're not a wilderness buff, there really isn't much to do around here. It's the little things in life that you can add to make it feel real.

Status, class, where you grew up, family

 

[bgillisp]

I think they made Wasteland, Fallout 1 and Fallout 2, then sold the rights to the company that has them now. But I'm not sure. I first heard of the series at Fallout 1 as I was pretty young when Wasteland came out, and I didn't get into RPG's until about 1991 - 1992 with Quest for Glory and the Gold Box D and D games.

 

[FleshToDust]

@Caitlin Those are really good points. Your comment reminds me of the Ace Attorney games.
@bgillisp Ah cool. My first RPG was Lunar 2 on the first Playstation and then I had the first disk to FF9 before getting another copy with all of the disks.

 

[trouble time]

@FleshToDust What your describing here rrally woupd be better classified as detailed rather that realistic. As for skyrim you know what takes me out of the expirence, all of the swords look more like paddles, the people in the cities dont actually do anything and in both cases theres iirc the only dynamic crime happens to you in skyrim (bandits) or not at all in GTA.

 

[FleshToDust]

@trouble time those are little details. That's like saying call of duty isn't realistic because a burst shot of a rifle shoots 4 bullets at once instead of 3.

 

[trouble time]

@trouble time those are little details. That's like saying call of duty isn't realistic because a semi automatic rifle shoots 4 bullets at once instead of 3.

Well, it kinda is there's a reason that an automatic rifle specifically shoots 3 bullets instead of 4 and it has to do with accuracy and ammo consumption, this is actually why there are semi-automatic rifles in the first place, it's to improve rate of fire while discouraging spray and pray and 3 rounds was determined to be ideal for that. The swords in skyrim are particularly bad though, they're really fat and kinda like paddles, the character also swings their weapon like it's just a beating stick of some sort, most of the walls around cities don't have ramparts which sort of defeats the purpose as it makes you a sitting duck you can't really weaken the invaders or stop them from scaling the wall safely. Also the main palace in solitude sits on a physically impossible stone structure (it doesn't arch so it's quite likely that it couldn't support it's own weight). Those things are a lack of realism, and they're actually detrimental to the immersion of people who know how those sort of things. Don't get me started on COD either, that game is basically an arcade shooter when compared to actual firefights.

Aslo what I'm saying is that your criteria for realism seem to be setting details like stop lights and stuff. A lot of those things actually DO help with immersion, but I wouldn't refer to those things as realism. It's more like world building.

 

[FleshToDust]

no game will ever be 100% realistic. you'll always be able to nitpick something about a games and say "well the swords are too thick" or "the green lights don't last as long as they should" etc.

 

[trouble time]

no game will ever be 100% realistic. you'll always be able to nitpick something about a games and say "well the swords are too thick" or "the green lights don't last as long as they should" etc.

I know that, but in the case of a 4 round burst and the swords it's really noticeable if you know about the subject I personally don't care that much about it, but I do imagine a lot of people don't like how poorly designed the weapons in skyrim are (I mean there are mods to fix it so obviously someone cared.) And yes no game will every be 100% realistic, that's not what I was arguing. The reason I brought up the lack of realism in the games you mentioned is to highlight that REALISM isn't actually important, it's "reliability" or believeability. People play the games COD for the fantasy of being a soldier, they play GTA for the fantasy of being a criminal, and well...skyrim is pretty obivious.

 

[FleshToDust]

the swords in skyrim are pretty normal sized, at least for the iron, steel and silver weapons.
I consider realism and believability to be the same thing. if something acts as it should then it is realistic or it is believable. I think this is an argument over semantics.

i'll use a dragon example since most people here refer to it as fantasy and therefore not realistic. if a dragon is massive but has small wings that you the player look at and say those wings couldn't carry the mass of that creature you would say that's not realistic, or that's not believable.
I hope this example helps people understand my way of thinking better. realism isn't anti fantasy. fantasy is a setting, realism isn't.

 

[trouble time]

the swords in skyrim are pretty normal sized, at least for the iron, steel and silver weapons.

The swords in skyrim are absolutely not normal sized, and I suppose that it is ultimately semantic argument. The thing is that the meanings of the words are different and refering to believeability as realism is misleading.

 

[Benny Jackdaw]

Personally, I don't like realism in games. I feel it takes away from what games are supposed to be, a source of entertainment and escapism. I often play games to get away from the things I don't like in real life: the destruction, the narcissism and such. Playing as a Space Marine or a Monster Hunter in a game where all non-human life is out to kill you doesn't allow me to escape from those things, but instead puts the qualities I try to get away from right in my face: destruction and narcissism. I tend to play a lot of games with anthro heroes in them for this reason, and there's nothing realistic about them, and it gets me away from the narcissistic side of my real life species. I also tend to prefer bright, colorful, simplistic graphics to detailed but realistic and drab in color, or worse, monochromatic in color type graphics. I feel like the more I'm entering a completely different world, the more I can immerse myself in the game and its story.

the swords in skyrim are pretty normal sized, at least for the iron, steel and silver weapons.

Speaking of Silver weapons, I kinda chuckle every time I see gold and silver weapons and armor in games as really high-ranked armaments, despite gold and silver being terrible metals to use for those things. Gold's too soft and silver's too fragile. I kind of liked how FF3 did it. They had a hall filled with gold swords that were generally quite weak and mostly only useful for selling.

 

[Ebontope]

Well... It depends.

If you decide to make a game set in the real world, then naturally you should stick to real-world standards as much as possible. If you decide to make a game set in a fantasy world, you have to stick to the rules you've previously established in that world. Being unable to do this makes you a bad writer.

For gameplay purposes however, you should make sure that your game stays playable and enjoyable. Sure you can set an FPS in the real world during WW2, but there's no fun in storming the beaches of Normandy and being rendered incapacitated before you can even reach the beach just because one stray bullet pierced your leg.

When it comes to fantasy games, it's really not much of a problem. You can just write something into the story that explains your ability to take damage or get healed. When it comes to games set in a realistic setting however, you have to find a compromise between realism and fantasy. Adding too much realism will make your game unfair and unenjoyable. But adding too much fantasy will make the game unrelatable and rediculous. There are many ways how a compromise between the two can be found, but failure to do this can often result in a bad game.

 

[FleshToDust]

@Benny Jackdaw You could have a steel sword overlain with silver and gold.

Remember, realism as a setting (meaning no fantasy elements and realistic science) isn't the only way to do things. Burnout doesn't have realistic driving mechanics but it sure is fun playing destruction derby with the cars. There is a market for a simulator and a market for an arcade racer. There isn't one philosophy every game has to play by.

 

[trouble time]

@Benny Jackdaw You could have a steel sword overlain with silver and gold.

The problem with that would be weight, god is a very heavy metal and also soft. Silver also causes a problem with weight, but not as severely. Then again I always justified it in my head as just being some gold colored fantasy metal. A lot of people do this with certain elements in games and tends to lead to some interesting fan theories.

 

[FleshToDust]

@trouble time I would be interested in seeing if any kings of the medieval age ever had ceremonial gold overlain swords.

 

[Niten Ichi Ryu]

There was a cool RPG where you played a modern spy called Alpha Protocol. No fantasy in that.

Maybe give it a try, should be on Steam.

I consider Fallout is a kind of fantasy too. It is post apocalyptic SF based on uchronia.

Depends if you consider star wars fantasy as well, but Knights of the old Republic 1 is awesome and 2 is even better when modded.

 

[FleshToDust]

@Niten Ichi Ryu Yeah I played alpha protocol. That was actually the last game I bought from blockbuster before they closed down.

 

[Failivrin]

Fantasies work when you start with a unique premise and stick to it. Lots of bad games and movies break rules that were established in the beginning. (Even JK Rowling ignored some rules of the Harry Potter universe in the Fantastic Beasts movie). But the worst thing is when writers flatly refuse to make rules. Games like FFX in which water is a popular theme, but sometimes it makes rivers and sometimes it floats in balls, and sometimes people swim in it, and sometimes they move normally, and decompression or the impossibility of breathing are never even addressed... Games like that bug me big time. I also hate when "because it's magic" is stated as a reason for anything. That's just sloppy. If you won't make rules, at least a sense of internal consistency and narrative coherence.