Consider this a recommendations/brainstorming thread. I've been trying to think of games that have interesting gameplay, because homogeny annoys me and I'm sick of Bad Company 2's genericness (still playing it a lot, still don't see the appeal). I'm starting this thread because so far I can only think of six or seven games, and that's a depressingly small number. Here are a few well-known examples of what qualifies as interesting gameplay (as opposed to good gameplay, distinct but often overlapping): - throwing Magnusson devices onto striders in Episode 2 - using your legs to disarm someone in Mirror's Edge - using Boomer Bile to make swarms of zombies zerg onto a tank in Left 4 Dead 2 - Portal - The more unusual parts of Braid, that are too mind-bending to describe here - Planting a primed grenade in someone's pockets in Fallout 3 - Diving into straw from absurd heights in Assassin's Creed Yes, it was a little thing, and barely rates in terms of overall gameplay experience, but it was so counter-intuitive at the time that it made everyone wince. The criterion isn't good gameplay, because we've had a million BEST GAEM EVAR threads and the same titles always come up. I want to see how many genuinely different, fresh gameplay innovations we can call out - fresh at the time the game was released, that is*. Things that made you think about them, things that didn't immediately remind you of other games you'd already played. They often aren't good or well-known games - many of my favourite games, such as Bioshock and F.E.A.R., are actually totally generic in gameplay terms. They don't change the formula, they just give you new ways to shoot things, or new things to shoot at them. I'm very aware that my examples aren't even very good ones. Half-Life 2's various innovations are exactly that, just new ways to shoot things or new things to shoot, and Mirror's Edge basically sugar-coated the quick-time event. I'm honestly struggling to think of many examples, hence the thread. *For instance, the exploding barrels in Doom were technically a massive innovation because it was the first game to do it.
-Zombie Thresher in Ravenholm -Grim Fandango Puzzles -Giving a ring of fire(i.e a ring that has a constant damaging effect) to an NPC in oblivion and watching them burn/freeze/shock to death. -Timesplitter 2's inclusion of a Fire Extinguisher. -Timesplitters' series fire tag game mode(to this day no one has done this) Those are a few that come to mind when the word interesting is mentioned. That and the entire STALKER series for changing up how to shoot things, i.e making it annoyingly(but fun) hard to survive without tactics.
The uses of the ocarina in Zelda 64 Ocarina Of Time. Like changing the day to night and visa versa and being able to make it rain ect. Or the ability to go from being a child to an adult in the temple of time.
well has anyone heard of or played Starsiege: Tribes before? if not that game, a 1998 or 1996 game showed ALOT of interesting features for its day and age, look it up =)
Being the bad guy in Dungeon Keeper Dynamic level generation based off music in Audiosurf Limb dismemberment in Dead Space
I'll go with something recent; Shatter Excluding the main idea, which is basic and has been done dozens of time before, the whole game is a breath of fresh air. What makes the gameplay original is the ability to suck and blow (terrible choice of word here) to push or pull the ball towards/away from your ship. When you suck for too long (okay...seriously?) you have to pay attention to blocks that get sucked towards you. When they get close to hit you ,you can activate your shield It sounds very simple but trust me, it's harder than it looks. On a non-gameplay note, I must say the music is awesome and makes the game even more fun by being continuous A must have for fans of brick-breaking games PS: it's almost 4 am. I am sure most of what I said doesn't make sense. Please bear with me (I'm sure even that last part didn't make sense)
Sacrifice and Giants: Citizen Kabuto are two games which immediately pop into my head. Both wildy original, hilarious and overall just ****ing brilliant.
+1. I'd like to mention Demon's Souls (just wrote a review on it in the other thread lol). It's got an interesting gameplay feature: you can kill every NPC, including the one you need to complete the game. You can completely and utterly screw yourself over and it doesn't even try to stop you. I think that's pretty neat.
Yeah, Morrowind did that. I'm not sure how great being able to kill any NPC is: it's been a hallmark of MMOs forever and usually evolves into a form of griefing before long. Though there is nothing more annoying and immersion-breaking than a game not letting you kill someone you logically ought to be able to. I'm a giant fan of breakout games, so I'll be buying Shatter. Oh, Legacy of Kain: Defiance had you play two characters alternately through a protracted fight sequence, basically killing yourself. That felt pretty innovative. Initially I couldn't work out whether I was meant to 'win' or not.
I haven't played Morrowind in forever, but did it let you kill every NPC? Oblivion prevents you from killing some NPCs by only letting them get knocked out. And though MMOs typically do (****, they killed Thrall and I was really hoping to turn in my Outlands quest!) but that's cross faction. Try Mortal Online for an MMO with free range killing
Morrowind let you kill every NPC, it would just tell you that the future is doomed if you killed an important one.
Having to use the 2-player controller in Metal Gear to defeat Psycho Mantis. When fighting the end boss in Beyond Good & Evil there was a part where all the controls were back to front, making you have to think backwards to win. Bit like those bicycles at school fates when I was a kid that had handle bars which turned you the opposite way to what you expected.
The misadventures of pb winterbottom - record your characters movements one to make it do stuff you need it to do whilst you do something else
Whilst not perhaps as 'interesting' as some of those already mentioned, I would definately like to refer to the "strategic zoom" in Supreme Commander. Giving the player the ability to view the entire map and zoom in wherever they wanted at whatever zoom level suited them made it fantastic for unit management. It's pretty much the only RTS I can think of where the zoom actually played a role other than "oooh, look at the pretty units." I now find it annoying when I can't zoom out to view the entire battlefield. Yes, I realize that the minimap can mimic it, but the full zoom is infinately better.
Oooh that's a good one. I also liked how your units changed their display to little pseudo-military icons to display their roles. It brought real strategy to the Real Time Strategy genre.