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Classic Games (Games) PlayStation (Games) Entertainment Games

Elite Creator On Attracting Mainstream Gamers 40

Posted by simoniker from the argument-straying-into-witchspace? dept.
Thanks to BBC News for their article featuring a counterpoint to the view that games are just for 'geeks and guys', a point of view recently given publicity by Microsoft's Laura Fryer. The respondent, David Braben, co-creator of seminal 3D space title Elite, argues for the importance of empathy, and suggests that "the 'shoot-it-if-it-moves' mechanic of games like Quake [is] a fundamentally empty experience, unless you're fighting people you know well", even commenting that "...in Elite, we made shooting another space craft illegal, so the player had to think before opening fire." He also discusses his company's forthcoming Sony-published PS2 title, Dog's Life, a mainstream-aimed title which "seeks to create [an] emotional bond with the player" through cute, endearing dog interaction, and, uhm, a 'Smell-o-vision' mode.
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Elite Creator On Attracting Mainstream Gamers More

Elite Creator On Attracting Mainstream Gamers

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  • Illegal? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Oddly_Drac ( 625066 ) on Friday September 19, 2003 @07:13AM (#7002596)
    "in Elite, we made shooting another space craft illegal, so the player had to think before opening fire."

    Unless you'd chosen the path of a pirate, which although risky did have the rewards you'd expect for trashing a Python inbound to a rich system.

    Mind you, I don't think that many games will reward trading narcotics in these slightly moral times.

    • Well, most Elite players I knew have chosen this way sooner or later, as trading didn't bring much income anyway.

      At some point in game you will realize, it is no longer makes sence to sell and buy goods, as your cargo bay has just 35 ton capacity, so you'll switch to gold/platinum/gems, while shooting down everything that you encounter in space - mostly because their presence jammed my J-drive (or whatever that thing was called - makes you faster, but only works if nothing is near)

      As you may see, gameplay

    • >Unless you'd chosen the path of a pirate

      Exactly. IMHO it's impossible to become "Elite" without breaking an egg. But its your call: think than shoot (at least initially). This judgement *does* add value to gameplay, isn't that his point?

      • Re:Illegal? (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Oddly_Drac ( 625066 )
        "But its your call: think than shoot (at least initially). This judgement *does* add value to gameplay, isn't that his point?"

        I think, without going back to the article in question, that he was criticising the 'if it moves' model of Quake and other modern games, which is like suggesting that there aren't enough motorbikes in Olympic Pole-Vaulting.

        Even in Counterstrike games, you do (assuming that your 'team' doesn't consist of fourteen year olds) start to find an evolutionary set of squad tactics appear
  • I'm not sure where they come up with the idea that mainstream gamers like going around sniffing other dog's asses.

    Surely they aren't basing their conclusions on the little amount of research they did at Slashdot HQ.

  • No death please, we're not normal women (Score:4, Insightful)

    by carndearg ( 696084 ) on Friday September 19, 2003 @07:38AM (#7002719) Homepage Journal
    I was lucky enough to work for the publisher of one of David Braben's earlier games, and in my opinion he is a rare voice of sense in an industry populated largely by vain sefl-obsessed tossers.

    However in this case I do not necessarily agree with him. I think his point of communicating emotion by body language is a very interesting one and I will certainly have a look at Dog's Life but I do not agree with him that "pointless killing and death" is keeping women away from gaming. He is right that games like the Quake series are not necessarily babe-magnets but he should watch women playing other games. Pocket tanks [blitwise.com] is the example that I always think of because my fiancee and her colleagues are hooked on it. No shortage of death and killing there but that doesnt seem to bother them.

    In my view the hurdle is not in the games themselves but in the delivery, quite simply the industry markets to young males not young females.

    • Watching my girlfriend use the flamethrower on passerbys in GTA, and score 200 kills in Dynasty Warriors 4 - I'd have to say there is wisdom in these words...

      Quake Deathmatch has grown boring not due to lack of socialization, but because it's simply grown boring. Most games don't make the effort to make it challenging with bots, and so humans become the only real target.

    • Re:No death please, we're not normal women (Score:4, Informative)

      by superultra ( 670002 ) on Friday September 19, 2003 @09:00AM (#7003368) Homepage
      Five days earlier, I may not have agreed with you. But I think there may some truth in your post. My wife is very much a typical non-video game player, like the type of person Braben is referring to. Oh sure, by mere association with me she's played a great deal of The Sims, dabbled in Super Monkey Ball and Animal Crossing, but has otherwise left all the video game playing to me.

      I picked up the surprisingly highly rated Simpsons Hit & Run. It's essentially GTA3/VC, but with Simpsons. She tries to play. So what does she do when she learns Homer can indiscriminatly kick people? She chases Ned Flanders kids around for five minutes kicking them around Springfield, laughing out loud every time the Flanders kid falls to the pavement.

      Although I'm no fan of GTA, she's seen me play it a few times and given no more or no less interest than any other game. But here she is, very much exhibiting the "spirit" of GTA, but within the confines of a Simpson game. And enjoying it as much as a 13 year old male shooting up Chinatown in GTA3.

      Maybe you're right? Maybe GTA4 should star a female character? What makes a game fun to women (besides being able to kick Ned Flander's kids around)?
    • In my view the hurdle is not in the games themselves but in the delivery, quite simply the industry markets to young males not young females.

      Good point, maybe SquareEnix should of run ads for Final Fantasy X-2 in girls and womens magazines, the thing is practically a girl game anyway (Dress Sphere system?).

  • Oh man, I am so looking forward to an updated version of Elite.

    Elite was groundbreaking...Frontier (Elite 2) was also an excellent game.

    But I want an updated version. I buy one, maybe two games a year: if Elite 3 ever comes out (and assuming it lived up to it's pedegree), it would be the one. There's just so much they could do with it now given the advances in hardware since Frontier. Gimme-gimme-gimme!
    • Independence War (1 and 2), X, the upcoming X2, Hardwar, Freelancer (cough, choke)...

      These are just some of the modern and recently modern games that continued the Elite legacy, albeit unofficially.
      • "Independence War (1 and 2), X, the upcoming X2, Hardwar, Freelancer (cough, choke)..."

        The independance wars were a tad too linear, and I exhausted a lot of interest hanging around jump points and taking out hostiles for cash and cargo.

        X was brilliant, but quite slow and you were cannon fodder from the get-go (Think Frontier starting with the Eagle MkII)

        I suspect that people's expectations of a game sequel tend to be coloured rose...Elite was basically wireframe graphics, and apart from the spreadshee

    • Man, Elite and Dungeon Master got me through adolescence. I'd certainly be willing to pay for an updated version, I just hope they don't try to 'update' the gameplay too much - they pretty much nailed it the first time.

      Does anyone know if Elite and Elite 2 are still available?

      • All the games are alive and well and available here [the-underdogs.org] I loved those games so much. I remeber when I was a kid with the first elite, docking your ship was a near impossible task to begin with. I don't think I ever worked so hard at a game as I did with elite.

        • Re:Elite 3 (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Asprin ( 545477 )

          Thanks for the tip, but I can't get them to download because I use Firebird, and apparently, this site won't take you to a page with an actual link until you switch to IE AND agree to download all the spyware ActiveX components. Don't even mention the popups. Firebird kicks so much ass it burns.

          However, despite that, Google answers all questions even though asking /. is more fun.

          Ian Bell's Web Site [clara.net] has Elite and Elite Plus downloads, plus links to other k001 r0X0r1n9 sites...
          ...including this one [hooplah.com],
          • Plus, for added bonus fun, your second link will lead people to JJFFE, a rebuild of First Encounters that is available for Windows and Linux, so you don't need to faff around with DOS boot disks that have enough base memory to run the game; something of a nightmare to do.
    • gimme me too.

      i had high hopes for freelancer, but it turned out to be a piece of s***, even without plot elite2/ffe kick freelancers butt in all fields of gameplay except arcade shooting, in frontier you could spend hours and hours on just going between few systems and reading the newspaper and occasionally leaving for some other systems to get a new ship & etc, and oh the thrill when i took a trip from sol to some imperial outskirt system to buy an imperial courier from there, bought it and then notic
      • Well its not quite the same, but somebody has ported the engine of FFE to DirectX. There is even a Linux version and source too for downloading [demon.co.uk].
        The videos sadly (or luckily) don't seem to be available any more, but perhaps your nearest searchable P2P can be of more help.

    • Re:Elite 3 (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Yarn ( 75 )
      Ian Bell [clara.net] (the other half of elite) has indicated that he doesn't want to make a new elite until processors are up to real-time ray tracing, none of this cheating with graphics acceleration.

    • Re:Elite 3 (Score:3, Informative)

      by nelsonal ( 549144 )
      Elite 3 was called first encounters, and was pretty fun, with some impressive graphics for its time, it didn't get marketed well, and you pretty much had to find it in a bargin bin near you, there was someone who was hosting the British version of the game, (much better than the US release which had several major bugs) but I don't know if it is still around. I had it running under 95/98, but you'll need mo slow if you want to play it on anything close to new, or a Pentium one sitting around. They were wor
    • EVE owes much of its being to Elite. Multiplayer mind you, with player conflict sorting out space territories. It's not bad assuming you can handle the PK aspect of the game. www.eve-online.com for the official web presence.

  • "In Elite, we made shooting another space craft illegal, so the player had to think before opening fire."

    Works that way in GTA too, you shoot someone, you get arrested.

    You've gotta be somewhat covert.
    • No you don't. Just get loaded up with lots of hardware (get enough hidden packages to get the minigun at some of your houses for example), find yourself somewhere fairly high up but close to a pay and spray and with cars nearby. Proceed to create mayhem then when you look like getting into a situation you can't deal with get into a car, drive into the pay and spray, drive away free man.... (yes, this isn't easy if you get 5 or 6 wanted level stars)

  • Not all FPS are alike (Score:3, Informative)

    by oni ( 41625 ) on Friday September 19, 2003 @08:26AM (#7003065) Homepage
    the 'shoot-it-if-it-moves' mechanic of games like Quake [is] a fundamentally empty experience

    This is a discription of a deathmatch. Does anyone actually play deathmatch anymore? It gets boring very quickly.

    Quake 3 really shines when you play a team-based game like freezetag or CTF. There's a lot more to it than just killing. Hell, even a 1v1 game is deeper than just "kill it if it moves" because you've got to learn to work the map and time powerups. Anyone who just comes after me with no thought to strategy in a FPS is going to lose.

    Sorry, I just love quake.

  • elitist bastard (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bigbigbison ( 104532 ) * on Friday September 19, 2003 @09:14AM (#7003493) Homepage
    the 'shoot-it-if-it-moves' mechanic of games like Quake [is] a fundamentally empty experience

    So instead of promoting his own style of game on its own merits, he does so by turning up his nose at another style of game. I love it when people who are in a field like gaming that is looked down upon by elitists become elitists themselves by denegrating the work of others in the field.
    • So instead of promoting his own style ... on its own merits, he does so by turning up his nose at another style ... I love it when people who are in a field ... that is looked down upon by elitists become elitists themselves by denegrating the work of others in the field.

      Kinda like Eminem?
  • ...check out Void [pdabusiness.com], a PalmOS game patterened after Elite!

    It's pretty faithful to the original, and is very fun to play!
  • smell-o-vision?

    Samir Gupta [google.com], I'm sorry I ever doubted you!

    Just kidding. You're still a jack-ass troll.

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