Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

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jeremyjh
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by jeremyjh »

Tillerman wrote:This is a problem I've been having with a lot of games recently, not just Silent Hill games or even Horror games (though especially for horror games.) It just seems like games have been getting so casual-oriented recently. What I mean by that specifically is that games are afraid to punish the player. The player must always be constantly rewarded and making progress, and heaven forbid there be any setbacks!

Usually the way this problem manifests is by having checkpoints all over the place, and basically letting the player respawn right after they die with little to no setbacks. Let me give a specific example... I tried a horror game recently called "Amnesia." I'm sure many of you, being horror fans, have played this game as it has received a lot of praise, and for good reason. It's one of the best horror games I've played recently, in terms of atmosphere it's awesome. But it has a fatal flaw... yes, you guessed it, it is infected with the "casual gamer" virus. In Amnesia, if you die, you respawn in the same room or close to it... you lose none of the items you collected... and finally, the monster that killed you despawns, allowing you to make further progress. So in effect, the monsters in this game are absolutely no threat to the player whatsoever. Once I learned that, my fun with this game was ruined.

So naturally, I'm worried that this mentality will infect Silent Hill as well. I am really hoping that this game goes back to the old fashioned method of save points, since this is the logical method for a horror game. Checkpoints only work for linear games, and letting the player respawn after death is the worst thing a horror game can do, IMO. What about you guys... anyone else given this any thought besides me?
Dude you have totally read my mind I too would like to be trained and punished more then getting something for good deed like the older survival horror games. Homecoming was looking that way but got way to easy getting to the ending middle to the end parts.
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redrum
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by redrum »

Brian Gomez said in a Youtube interview that he want save points to be far enough away for the player to worry about dying, so no worries about checkpoints
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Tillerman
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Tillerman »

jeremyjh wrote:Dude you have totally read my mind I too would like to be trained and punished more then getting something for good deed like the older survival horror games. Homecoming was looking that way but got way to easy getting to the ending middle to the end parts.
Well, I think the older Silent Hills were fine... they were not too hard, but there was just enough danger to maintain tension. But a lot of newer horror games (or just games in general) seem afraid to even do that... it's like there's a new theory in game design that says the player can never be faced with setbacks, ever. When I play a newer game like that, the lack of tension really makes me sad... especially if the game tried to have horror ambitions.
redrum wrote:Brian Gomez said in a Youtube interview that he want save points to be far enough away for the player to worry about dying, so no worries about checkpoints
That is excellent news, thank you!
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Doctor Eggnog
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Doctor Eggnog »

1 and 2 were easy. 3 was hard. 4 was medium. Origins was medium. Homecoming was medium-hard. Overall I would say the newer games are more punishing. ...Except puzzle wize.

May have already said this, but the higher the difficulty, the more save points there should be. And if you respawn in the same freaking room you die in, the Easy, Normal Hard bettter equal SH3's Extreme 1, 5, and X.
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clips
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by clips »

I think the newer games in general are more user friendly, but that is only because the tech is overall better than what we had years ago. The dev's are able to design more realistic and streamlined levels. The level design were what they were back then because of the technology. Don't get me wrong, you can still have new games today with horrible level designs, but the overall level designs in general are better and more realistic than what they were years ago...
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Skele »

Doctor Eggnog wrote:1 and 2 were easy. 3 was hard. 4 was medium. Origins was medium. Homecoming was medium-hard. Overall I would say the newer games are more punishing. ...Except puzzle wize.

May have already said this, but the higher the difficulty, the more save points there should be. And if you respawn in the same freaking room you die in, the Easy, Normal Hard bettter equal SH3's Extreme 1, 5, and X.
i pretty much agree with everything, except your difficulty rating of SH4. i thought that was the hardest SH (for me), mainly due to the terrible controls. SH2 i could beat if i played with one hand. no survival horror game should ever be that simple.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by KiramidHead »

Silent Hill 3 is only hard if you insist on fighting every single monster and not saving whenever you get the chance. Of course, the game forces you to kill monsters and take damage if you want to get the alternate ending, making dying that much easier.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Tillerman »

I would say that SH3 is the hardest of the original Silent Hills, but even so once you learn the monsters and how to deal with them, it's not hard at all. But that's as it should be... horror games aren't action games, so they shouldn't be truly "hard." They would lose their scare power if they were. What's much more important is that there feels like there is risk involved, not that the game is hard. Which is why I think Silent Hill games need a lot more randomness.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Harrys_Girl »

Ha ha... SH3 was hard? It is the only game in the entire series that I have played and beaten Hard. I am HardX6 or something now and it still isn't something I would consider "hard". I still go out of my way to fight any enemies I encounter and refuse to use health until I absolutely have to. None of the games were "hard" until Homecoming. Homecoming was difficult because of 3 reasons, IMO (spoilers for SHH):

1.
PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER_SHOW PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER:
The blocking the enemies did. Every enemy had some form of blocking
unlike any other enemy in any other SH game (save PH). All the rest of the enemies of the series just sort of stand there and take the abuse. Most enemies are either ground bound or have very, very weak attacks. And the are slooooooow.
2. The enemies were fast(er). Unlike the slow moving grey children or the blind mannequins, the enemies in SHH went after Alex
PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER_SHOW PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER:
for the kill and could unleash a string of combos that easily plummet his health.
3. The bosses had decent AI.
PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER_SHOW PRIME_BBCODE_SPOILER:
The Sepultcher used different attacks, relying on one when the other was being blocked. Scarlet was fast and easily hopped the fuck out of your view to attack. Asphyxia was a large enemy in a small area and easily snatched Alex up whenever she was close enough. Amnion was all over the place and one of the most challenging enemies in any SH game, IMO.
I think that if these elements were drawn upon in SHD it would make the game a lot more challenging and therefor, more interesting and entertaining.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by SPRINGS02 »

I would say that silent hill 3 seemed hard to me when i played it. It was the first one i played though, but when i played sh2 after playing silent hill 3 it seemed much easier. I guess in terms of difficulty for me it goes SHH>SH3/SH4>SH2/origins>SSM. I honestly don't care too much about challenge in silent hill games. I mean i don't want it to just be a breeze, but challenge isn't a main thing i play silent hill games for. If i want challenge i will play games like super meat boy or dead space. IMO challenge isn't really an important ingredient for silent hill games.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Mantorok »

Silent Hill 3 was the hardest for me the first time through. After playing all the games multiple times it no longer seems the hardest, probably because I know where to go.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Tillerman »

Harrys_Girl wrote:Ha ha... SH3 was hard? It is the only game in the entire series that I have played and beaten Hard. I am HardX6 or something now and it still isn't something I would consider "hard". I still go out of my way to fight any enemies I encounter and refuse to use health until I absolutely have to.
I agree, I don't think it's "hard" either, but I don't really think horror games should be hard. I would say that the challenge level in SH3 is perfect.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by The Adversary »

Of course Silent Hill 3 isn't hard on repeats when Heather is carrying an unlimited SMG, a lightsaber, a flamethrower, and the all-powerful Sexy Beam. . . .
This post is the property of its author and is not to be used elsewhere without explicit permission from the author.

. . . AND THAT'S THAT.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by clips »

As far as SH games go..SH3 was harder than most in the TS series....on your first playthrough with your standard weapons the enemies are incredibly tough...you couldn't go through the game and wipe out every creature...well in some sections you could and do a little exploration, but for the most part you had to avoid some to conserve ammo.

Even so the challenge level in that game wasn't annoying or irritating...the only time i became annoyed in a SH game was in prt4 when i would be escorting "forgot her name" around in those subway trains..and she ended up wanting to fight everything...:D...Sh3 still had a nice balance of difficulty and the disturbing imagery was amazing...
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Tillerman
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Tillerman »

Yeah, I wouldn't say that SH3 is "hard"... I would say it's hard enough to not be "easy," which is just right. In terms of challenge SH3 doesn't even come close to truly hard games like Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden or whatever... but if horror games were that hard, frustration would start to drown out the feelings that horror games are supposed to inspire. As I've said before, I think horror games need a balanced challenge.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Harrys_Girl »

I thought it was easy, even on the first few playthroughs and on playthroughs in which I refused to use unlimited weapons. I didn't start using the unlimited weapons until HardX2 or 3 I think. I thought it was the easiest, after SH: SM of course.

I think that some of the horror comes from the gameplay being a little challenging. That was one of the few things that really worried and stressed me out in SHH was the fact that I was running around w/ only the bullets I had in the gun and I knew that most enemies took 4 or more rounds/shots to take down, so ammo was constantly on my mind. I never worry about ammo in sh1-Oringins. Not even in SH4 because I only ever used the pipe/ax to fight everything. On occasion, for funsies, I'll use the gun on Walter in the final boss fight, but over all, melee. SHH forced you to use melee on some enemies and guns on others. It is almost impossible to use the knife on a Siam w/o dying. The Schisms were difficult too. Asphyxia and Amnion made it near impossible, or at least difficult enough to were I didn't want to bother using melee until I had to.

And I am really not much of a battle-based gamer, my I remind you. I don't play battle or fighting games... ever. But I've never had problems or anxiety from the battle parts of SH. I've played the games as they came out (save for SHH which I only just got back in Jan of this yr.) and I've never died on on first playthrough. I've never died in SH1, SH4, Origins, or SH: SM in any of my playthroughs. I've died in SH2... damn PH swinging around and ending James 'cause I was tailgating him. Yeah. >>' And Well, HardX6 is being diffcult. Of course, I've also never played Hard on any game but SH3, so that has to be taken into consideration too. Maybe I'll do that--Yeah, I'll go dust off my PS2 and play all the games on Hard, come back and maybe I'll have a different song to sing.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Doctor Eggnog »

I didn't say that SH3 was a hard game or hard compared to Devil May Cry or crazy sh*t like that. I meant it was hard compared to the other games. I was just comparing the games to each other so one had to be hard. I wasn't going to say:

SH1: Incredibly Easy
SH2: Incredibly Easy
SH3: A Bit Less Easy than 1 and 2 but not nearly as hard as many games
SH4: A Bit Easier than 3, A BIt Harder than 1 and 2 But Still Overall A Pussy Game
SHO: Having a Difficulty of Which is in the Zone of Easy but Has a Difficulty Higher Than

You get the picture. :p
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Mantorok
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Mantorok »

I'd rate Silent Hill 3 and 4 as the hardest in the series.

People talk about Homecoming because of the lack of a lot of ammo, but the games melee system was pretty decent and the combat wasn't too hard except for probably Scarlet. It was pretty easy to avoid getting hit.

I haven't played 3 and 4 since IIRC my first semester in college in 2006. I remember I bought 1-4 brand new online before they went out of print. SH3 seemed harder to me than the first games because SH3 was the first one where ammo was pretty scarce and the game had a lot of pretty strong monsters. SH4 was a cakewalk in the beginning where you could just go back to your room and heal, after the second part where you have to escort eileen and deal with the ghosts that just can't die, it got pretty hard. I also remember the monsters that attacked through the walls.
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Patman »

What I liked about the first four games was the ten star ranking challenges.
Casual players could enjoy the games for what they were, they could even pick easy difficulty settings, while hardcore players could aim for the ten star ranking special treats.
I really wish that Vatra brought such a kind of challenge back (with in-game features as a treat, not just an utterly useless platinum trophy).
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Re: Worried that Downpour will be too "casual."

Post by Aerith Gainsborough »

I get the vibe that Downpour is going to be like Homecoming. I think it's the atmosphere and character design that makes me think this. I honestly don't really know what to think at the moment. The trailers and gameplay don't really indicate the game being very disturbing, but one character's view of Silent Hill is different than another character's. The real thing that is important is that they can make the character and his view of Silent Hill work and keep that atmosphere throughout the game. I really didn't like the shift to the Otherworld. It looked like dissolving pixie dust, but meh.
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