The Details of Dead Bodies in Gaming

Via Stephen Totilo's Second Player blog, his most recent post at MTV concerns dead bodies in videogames. This rather morbid topic may seem like a small concern, but it's a big deal for the people making the games. From the article: "Dead bodies have been vanishing in games for decades because of technical difficulties. Old 2-D games -- like just about anything on the original Atari, Sega and Nintendo systems -- could only display a limited number of character graphics, or sprites, on a TV screen at one time. Letting a zapped enemy lie prone on the playing field caused problems, limiting the amount of new things, like new on-rushing enemies, that could be drawn onto the screen. 'You would end up sacrificing one of your precious moving objects to display an essentially useless dead body,' [game designer Ralph] Barbagallo said." With the advent of the newest generation of consoles, Totilo explains, we now have the luxury of corpses as far as the eye can see.

The luxury of corpses as far as the eye can see...

[It doesn't come easy]

Ah, that makes it all worthwhile...

Kerrect!

[way2trivial]

try playing the level 30 of doom with monster respawn in god IDDQD mode.... in about 10-20 minutes it will crash.. too much information..

Re:UOZaphod

[PFI_Optix]

"The Lich lunges forward and...trips over a dead kobold."

"I pick up the dead kobold and hit the lich with it."

"Eww"

Re:UOZaphod

[hal2814]

In my DM opinion, if a player comes up with a novel solution, it's at least worth a roll. I had a player one time convince me that letting his character scream like a woman would surprise the enemies for long enough for the other players to each get in an attack. The idea surprised me so I allowed it. I let him roll against charisma/4 (the div 4 was for the small likelihood of such a thing really working). He hit it. I let him repeat it with exponentially diminishing odds. Eventually it wasn't worth wasting a turn over, but we still occasionally talk about the group of fire golems he stunned by screaming like a woman. The DM is there to create and/or interperet an exciting world, not lord power over everyone.

Re:Total War.

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

> Persistent corpses was one of the early improvements for Dawn of
> War. It's actually an important strategic resource for the Necrons now.

Persistent corpses are an important strategic resource for the Neocons now, too.

Hah! Beat you to it!

Re:UOZaphod

[Cervantes]

One of my favourite moments came in a game of Magic a few years ago. The DM was a dick whom we shortly thereafter stopped playing with, but at the time we were giving him the benefit of the doubt... so he decides he wants to kill us all, for some unknown reason. So he sends us into this large, open field, with only a small shack and a few trash cans to hide behind, and then pops a Black Ops helicopter with mega armour and 6 turrets of chain-gun goodness up from no-where. One of our mates tries to shoot it. "Whoops, no natural 10, your bullets bounce off harmlessly. Now, let's calculate your damage taken from being shot by it." (picks up 6d10)...
Yeah, he was a real winner.
So, anyways, bullets don't work, rocks don't work, apparently the structure of the chopper is magic-resistant so melting it or turning it into a giant donut isn't an option. So, with half the party shredded, up comes my turn. Me, the mental/hand-to-hand guy.

Me: Can I see the pilot?
DM: Yeah, I suppose, through the bullet-proof canopy.
Me: I plant a suggestion in his head.
DM: Hah! He's a trained soldier, getting him to go back to base or crash into the ground is gonna take a natural 10! Pfft, go ahead, what's your suggestion?
Me: You know his control panel?
DM: Hah! He's a trained soldier, you'd need a 9 to get him to think snakes are coming out of it! Give it up!
Me: The "engine fire" light is on.
DM: ...
DM: ...
DM: ...
DM: ... crap ...

We broke up that gaming group shortly after, but I'll always remember with great relish and glee, the moment that he had to grudgingly admit that getting someone to believe some simple tiny light bulbs was on wasn't really that hard, and that the absolute, unavoidable consequence of a pilot seeing all his Engine Fire lights on would be to stop fighting and immediately land somewhere close and safe to inspect the aircraft.

I'm sure this is completely unrelated to the article, but your story just reminded me of that, and how much I enjoy finding novel solutions to problems.

Re:Realism

[markh1967]

I was always glad that, when playing Doom, none of the monsters thought to make armour out of whatever the doors were made of.

Re:Thief

[VultureMN]

That'd explain all those meatloaf dinners he kept inviting people over for.