Hi Tom.
After playing something like Metroid I actually do wonder if we have been
quite literally barking up the wrong tree as far as vertical positioning in
audio games goes.
One reason the enemy movements in metroid work is the design of the game,
sinse Metroid as a series is one of the most truly two dimentional of 2D
games, everything from crawling through narrow passages and mazes to
virtually flying, and when I compare this to say the trouble of a
comparatively miner 2d enemy like a bouncing skull giving trouble in audio
it just shows what the gap is, particularly sinse we've been debating this
issue and bouncing it around for years and not come up with an answer.
On the other hand, the first person perspective in audio has the most
natural feel to it and allows the most free exploration of complex terrain.
I have said before that I actually feel audio packman with it's first person
perspective is an improvement on the graphical version.
I do wonder if this is a case where, rather than trying to emulate the views
and perspectives of mainstream games, it'd be better to go with what works
best in audio.
Imagine for example something like an audio first person Castlevania. The
player could walk around a creepy castle in first person 2d. You could
include pretty much all of the monsters, skeletons that patroled up and
down, bats that dived at the player, heck you could even accurately simulate
all the weapons, the whip being a close range attack and limited use long
range weapons, (particularly sinse if enemies moved in set patterns rather
than coming to get the player getting in range for a short range attack
could be an interesting audio challenge. You could have some nice mazes and
creepy corridors, maybe some gaps to jump, ---- although platforming in a
first person view is still a little hairy as Monkey business proved).
That could be quite a diverse and playable game, and preserve much of the
original's gameplay and enemies, even if the 2d vertical mazes and stair
cases had to be turned into 2d horizontal mazes instead.
If I considder the land mark audio titles from the last few years, the view
which seems most successful at giving the player enough information to make
tactical judgements rather than just playing boppit is the 2d first person
view, possibly with Aprone's seemonkey 3d first person might be equally
possible, though that is a hole other ball game.
While I'm certainly not against experiments, I do wonder if there is also
something to be said for playing to the strengths of what is doable in audio
and what works to just create some really solid games.
Beware the Grue!
Dark.
Take them to the refirbished chamber that was once bad!
---
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