Analog Game Design
Today I got an email from my little brother, a dedicated Metal Gear Solid fan, about this sequence from MGS4. He explained to me how powerful the scene was due to the split nature of the cinematic on top and how you had control of Snake below. He said it amplified his emotional attachment and completely sucked him into the game.
Sadly, it didn’t have the same effect on me. Now, I easily recognize that I don’t have the emotional investment of all that came before the scene, but even then this is not a revealing scene to me. After all, the only thing the player is in control of is whether Snake lives or dies. In the end, how is that revolutionary game design if it’s the same control we’ve had since Pac Man?
We are constantly told we live in a digital world where everything is controlled by 1s and 0s, but truth is we have analog control. We don’t control just whether or not we go to work, but what time we arrive. There’s a world of difference between a minute early and a minute late even though it’s just a couple minutes apart. I’m hopeful that the next generation of games take this analog control into account.
Bethesda has announced that Fallout 3 will have over 500 endings. This is the sort of analog control we should be striving for. Granted, it may mean that going left instead of right means you have a red house instead of blue, but it’s the consequence of the decision I made. There’s none of that in the clip my brother raved over.
If I decide Snake should take a breather, does Meryl die? Does the ship sink? If I hurry through it as fast as possible could I save Raiden’s arms? There’s no way for me to tune the experience I have to my own playstyle and inflict my decisions in the world. Instead, I’m just pressing up on the analog stick and watching a barely interactive cutscene. While it may be great storytelling and a wonderful way to build up tension and expectation, it’s not the stuff of great game design. After all, all I ever did was press up on the joystick to get away from the ghosts trying to kill Pac Man.
