Wozuwakü
...
|
Das Thema "Schlaf" und "Essen" ist noch nicht endgültig vom Tisch. Es gibt Hinweise darauf, das es in vereinfachter Form implementiert wurde d.h. auf großartige Animationen verzichtet wurde.
[quote][PCG] Stalker has been 'off the radar' for some time now. Presumably there were some elements of the game that you weren't happy with last year. What were these, and how have they been changed? What is better about the game now?
Yes, truly approximately a year ago, after we've prepared all the game constituents and brought them together, we realized that there is a necessity to do a good balancing in order to achieve the integrity of game play.
Not the quality of each separate feature is really important for the player, but how all it works together, whether the game is thrilling or not. Everything has to function in order to captivate the player at the intro and don't let him go till the very end credits data. Having played the game through from the beginning to the end, we've also realized which ideas of design document have worked and which haven't. Last year was spent on improving the storyline game component because play tests have shown us that the abundance of simulated and random tasks often led the players into the dead corner. Now we've achieved a good balance of storyline events, which lead you through the game, and random tasks and events that fill up the game world and give the opportunity to obtain many rare items and money.
[PCG] Was it simply one aspect of the game that caused a lot of trouble to balance - the blowouts, the AI? What was the problem, and what have you done to fix it?
It's hard to pick out a specific feature. The complexity for us is in the necessity to build up a large amount of features, which will therefore compile into an integral game play. Truly great AI was a particularly difficult task. As we have not only combat AI, which is responsible for "action" part, but a global AI as well - this is a simulation of life that ensures the life of all living creatures in the Zone and the events. We were striving for a qualitative step forward as opposed to scripted AI, and we achieved it. Even a standard "action" scene can be played differently and can be tried different tactics over - AI will always act with accordance to your actions.
We spend most of our efforts on AI, and hopefully the players will appreciate the result.
[PCG] According to the original story, something strange happens in the Chernobyl reactor on April 16 2006. That's this Sunday! Will you be changing the story, pushing the date back a couple of years?
No, the story won't be changed. April 16th, 2006 is the date when something happened in the Chernobyl zone, something that certain authorities are deliberately trying to hide from the rest of the world. The year of 2006 is the year of the Zone's birth, the moment when it began to spread out. I would like to remind that the player appears in the Zone only in 2012. And so the year of 2006 is a hidden beginning of our story and the world will learn what is really happening inside the Zone only by 2012, right when the game will be released (j/k J).
[PCG] One of the reasons why the game is so exciting to us is that the real world seems to be continuing pretty much as normal outside the Chernobyl area. Is that correct? Will you hear much from the rest of the world, and have much contact with normal (non-Stalker) people? How does the rest of the world impact on the player?
The Zone is isolated from the rest of the world both from inside and outside. Numerous military patrols along its frontiers block any attempts of stalkers, mutants and certain undisclosed forces to break out from it. That's why the player will travel solely within the Zone territory and deal just with those who are chanced to happen to find themselves inside for some reasons.
[PCG] Does the player ever leave the zone?
No, the player won't be able to leave the Zone.
[PCG] Does The Dealer, the first guy you meet, play a significant part throughout the game, or is he simply your starting point? Can you tell us a little more about his background? What does he mean to the player?
The Dealer is the first person the player contacts in the Zone. He is one of many traders within the Zone, but he has a characteristic feature. His location at the Zone's frontier maintains specific relations with the military cordon and he has external contacts, through which he receives provision, equipment as well as the tasks for stalkers. The Dealer is cynical in his own way; he has doomed many stalkers to death but yet many people in the Zone depend on him for it is impossible to stay alive there without food and equipment.
It is the key character in the first part of the game, he will assign tasks to the player (including the storyline ones), and you inevitably return to him from time to time when you have run out of equipment or after an accomplished task. Sometimes he will reveal important information, crucial both for the story and game progress.
[PCG] What about our own character? Is his personal history important to the game or the plot? Do we learn anything about him as the game progresses?
This is a person without the past, one of the survivals from the "death trucks". From time to time, strange trucks appear in the Zone; they are filled with dead and, occasionally, live stalkers; their memory has been erased, and they always have a "S.T.A.L.K.E.R." tattoo on their body. Stalkers call them "the branded ones". At times they are recognized as vanished Zone's veteran-stalkers, at other times they are just obscure characters, like the main hero. What happens in the Zone with the disappearing stalkers, what the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. tattoo means and many other mysteries are in for the players to clear them up together with our hero.
[PCG] Tell us about how the PDA functions. Does it help you to remove interface elements from the normal view, allowing us to become more immersed in the game? In addition to keeping track of missions and maps, what else does it do?
PDA is a multifunctional and handy device which can be used to stay in touch with the key characters of the game. It will contain the most essential information obtained throughout the game, which will include a diary of the main character, as well as info on the stalkers in the contact zone, Zone map, constantly refreshing rating of stalkers in the Zone, player's statistics, frequently extending encyclopedia and many other stuff.
[PCG] What are the physical effects of radiation? Does your vision or physical ability become impaired?
If the player walks for a while in the areas with high radiation, an image on the screen becomes unclear and gradually loses its color. With continued exposure, it starts to be flashing in the eyes. After the player leaves the area with high radiation, the problems with the eyesight disappear. Depending on the degree of irradiation, the player starts to lose health, until he lowers the level of radioactivity in his organism. Or until he dies.
[PCG] Does your radiation level increase simply by walking around in the zone, or through touching/being near irradiated objects?
The main threat for the player is caused by radioactive dust. Therefore, it's possible to receive a great dose of radiation by being near to the contaminated objects such as dumps of radioactive garbage are. There are also places in the Zone where the perilous hotbeds of radiation occupy vast areas, so the player should try not to linger there for too long.
[PCG] Do you drink vodka to lower your radiation level? Does this mean you can also get drunk?
Yes, vodka is one of the methods to get rid of the radiation. Of course, this approach to the issue has its drawbacks. For example, having drunk too much, the player begins to stagger; losing part of control over the character, thus shooting in such condition is problematic. However, perhaps even in this condition it can be possible to acquire skill in hitting the bull's-eye.
[PCG] Please help us explain to our readers what it will be like to play Stalker. Are there various people inside the zone who ask you to carry out missions, and can these be carried out in any order you like? Or is there a strict story at work? Can you talk us through a specific mission - something that illustrates the choices available to the player?
The player will have to have a journey through the world of the Zone, which locations are combined into one global map. He can choose any route and will not be constrained to move from one location to another. The player follows the storyline, accomplishing obligatory plot tasks, secondary ones, and can also be engaged in the Zone's investigations and fulfilling random tasks.
The game implies an intense economical part. Stalkership is not an easy way to go, in Zone you're outlawed, and the surrounding world is hostile. In order to survive, you'll have to earn money searching and selling artifacts, various scientific trash, killing the Zone's mutants, and even performing missions to eliminate other stalkers. And for the proceeds, it will be possible to purchase equipment, weapons and protective suits, which will enable the player to penetrate the areas inaccessible earlier.
The game world will involve different characters' groupings, each with its own goals and motives: these are numerous bandits, stalkers of different ranks, groupings members, military stalker, scientists and traders, unique characters and heroes.
Several grouping are initially hostile towards the player, the others - are neutral. How many friends or enemies you gain during the game depend solely on your actions. Your actions will influence on the attitude of the faction to you. Good attitude will avail in reducing prices. Your actions will as well have an effect on the end of the game.
The game has both simple missions and complex quests, where the player's variant of solution will entail particular consequences in future, like changing of the factions' attitude towards the player.
Let me describe a mission at the abandoned military warehouses as an example. So, starting points is: The level has the old abandoned military warehouses with the Freedom faction settled there. This is the central base of Freedom, which is well protected and heavily guarded. Duty faction is the main enemy of Freedom, but it's members have found the base and prepare an assault. The Duty squad is hiding not far away from the store ready for the attack. The player appears on the level with a rather simple task - find RG-6 (a weapon). Searching for RG-6 will bring the player both to the Duty faction detachment and to Freedom's base. The player will have a choice to make:
- accept the offer from Duty and storm the Freedom's base together with the group
- tell Freedom's leader about the imminent assault and participate in Freedom's attack on Duty's squads
- set both factions on to fight and try to eliminate both of them
There is a wide selection of the following actions to make and of ways to carry out the task.
[PCG] To what extent is the game's world divided into 'levels'? Will we notice when we move between loading areas (like in Oblivion)? Or are these areas geographically divided by bridges, tunnels, etc.? Will quests/missions cross areas? Having a big area to run around in sounds cool, but can you explain /why/ it's cool? Why's it so important?
The game world consists of locations-levels, the average size of one location is 1x1 km, and all the levels are combined into one global map. When the player goes to another level, the entire level is being loaded. Level changing spots are implemented as the roads, tunnels, bridges etc.
Accomplishment points of some missions are distributed among multiple levels. While the player is fulfilling this task, he can digress to local minor ones.
In the beginning the player is limited in his movement throughout the Zone over the lack of special equipment, which can afterwards be bought for the money earned.
Large areas produce an impression from the game world, not from the set of small location-corridors. As mentioned before, the game levels will contain obligatory storyline tasks, fulfilling which makes the player move from point to point, from task to task. If you want to play only through the plot line - that's okay. You can do it. At that you won't visit 60% of the game's territory. But if you'd want to dig deeper and go in for exploration or accomplishing random tasks - the game also may give you this possibility. Large areas also enable going through the scenes in different ways - you can either try to attack from different sides, use opportune height or avoid the battle.
[PCG] You've mentioned 'zonecraft' before. Can you give a few examples of how you can use skills and knowledge to get an advantage or survive a serious situation?
Let's imagine a situation when you are attacked by a pack of dogs, and so you've flown into anomalies while trying to escape the pursuit. If you show enough skill, you will be able not only to survive in this situation but to ensnare the dogs. Therefore you can get rid of your pursuers without a single shot. Or, for instance, you can walk around a glade for thousands times and notice nothing special, but having got there at night, you will find a rare artifact invisible in daylight. Like that we focus more on the player's skills, rather than the skills of his game character.
[PCG] Does our character have any RPG-like skills which improve over time? Does he become stronger, more resistant, more stealthy as the game goes on?
Our game is built in a way that the success entirely depends on how the player acts. You will find no skills in it. The success is completely in the player's hands. It depends on how efficiently he hides, on how good he is in shooting. It depends on whether he knows how to escape anomalies and where to find the necessary equipment.
[PCG] How do we make friends in the zone? Are some fellow Stalkers naturally friendly, and others aggressive? Or can we influence their behaviour?
There are several large groupings in the Zone; some are open for enrollment while the others are initially hostile towards the player. The Zone lives according its "wolfish rules" that's why you won't succeed in convincing enemy stalker grouping that you bear no ill will. But you can easily quarrel with initially friendly groupings, and there will be no way back then. You must think over your actions thoroughly when living under such extreme conditions.
If you help the neutral stalkers however, you reputation will be improving. And if you are trusted you can count on a certain discount at the dealers.
[PCG] How long does the day/night cycle last? How long is 24 hours in game time? What impact does the day and night cycle have on the player? Can you explain how the day and night cycle forces players to improvise/adapt their gameplay?
The time in the game goes 10 times faster than normal time. 24 hours in the game come practically to 2,5 hours of the real time. The day and night cycle influence on several points of the game. For example, all stalkers see worse at night, which is natural. But the majority of beast sees perfectly at night. Also, night is the time for some monsters to get out to the surface, while they prefer to spend daytime in their dens and underground vaults. On the other hand several artifacts can be seen only at night. Whether to compromise the risk of nocturnal journey or to wait the night is over in the protected nook - is up to player's decision.
[PCG] How big is the zone? How long does it take to walk across it? What equipment do you have when you begin the game? After, say, ten hours, what kind of equipment might you then? What limitations are there on what you can carry? Can you have a 'safe house' where you can keep spare equipment, ammunition, etc.
The Zone in the game is a cutout sector approximately 30 km lengthwise and about 10km in width. The player can walk through the Zone rather fast, in about 3 hours real time (the character mostly moves slightly jogging, that's the reason for such a speedy movement). However, the Zone has no straight routes and a real walk may take even a couple of days.
Initially the player has only PDA - a pocket PC, which is his best helper for the stalker in the Zone. This was the only thing left on the player when he was found unconscious. Yet the Zone is the battlefield, and the battlefield has never got the lack of weapons. The player can get a good machine-gun and armor pretty quickly to survive in the Zone on his own. We don't limit the player on what he can or cannot carry. The only limitation is the maximum permissible weight.
Stalker are the heroes without homes, they have no place to get back to "after the work". The entire Zone is their home. The player can hide the equipment under an unnoticeable bush, and if no one finds it, it will continue lying there.
[PCG] What happens if you run into an anomaly? Will it simply kill you? We've read about a few different types of anomalies - can you describe what they'll do?
There are various anomalies. Both by type and power. For example, the player can take a speed run over a weak gravitational anomaly, having received minor damage. However, a strong anomaly of the same type may kill you in few seconds. In any case the player will have time to react and attempt to avoid the threat. Some types of anomalies have a number of the other attributes besides damaging the player. Some anomalies can hold the player up, and some contrariwise - push out. There are anomalies that react upon movement.
[PCG] What are the military patrols' orders? Are they tasked with killing you and killing mutants? Or just preventing people from traveling into and out of the zone?
The role of the militaries is to protect the Zone from the eternal world. They are hindering stalkers from getting inside it, sometimes performing punitive raids against the most successful groups of stalkers. Besides, the militaries privately support the researches over the Zone. Thus the activity of the militaries is concentrated mainly at the borders of the Zone and on the territory of the formerly secretly-guarded laboratories. Either way, there is no peace between stalker and militaries.
[PCG] We've heard that there are some super-high-tech weapons and devices in the game, such as a gravity gun. Given the game's real-world setting, how does this technology appear?
Gravi-gun has become hackneyed long ago, no each new game must include a gravi-gun. Yes, we confess that the early S.T.A.L.K.E.R. concept had a gravi-gun, but, thanks God, we've turned it down. We have futuristic weapons, all in the frames of development performed by the militaries, and which involves weapons that can really appear by 2012, no plasma guns J
[PCG] The nearest competitor to Stalker seems to be Elder Scrolls: Oblivion. Do you think it's fair to compare the two games? Have you learnt anything from playing Oblivion?
Oblivion is a great game, somewhat similar to S.T.A.L.K.E.R., we even had a title "Oblivion Lost" once, but we've decided to replace it. Perhaps it would be pretty amusing to leave it. A large world, freedom, life simulation, the similarity is more than enough. But, in fact, these games are very different, slightly alike, yet very differing. Oblivion is a leisurely role-playing game, while we have a survival shooter with role-playing elements, high-strung atmosphere and very high events dynamics. These games have a different scope of the world and different ration of the plot- and free-play, so it will be at least useless to compare them.
[PCG] Tell us more about the reactive AI. On what basis do monsters and humans make their decisions about you? If you're carrying lots of weapons, are they less likely to attack you? If you're wounded? If you're moving slowly? Can you talk us through a monster's decision tree?
In the decision making block we use two models - FSM (finite state machine) used by monsters, and planning of actions by human characters. As FSM is a rather common used model of decision-making in gaming, we'll review rarer planning model, which analogue was used in F.E.A.R.
In order to demonstrate the process of decision-making, we can take the training situation, when two humans have a goal to survive and a have a knife placed between them. Each of the bots reflects nearly like that: I have to survive, but I see the enemies So I have to get rid of them, but I don't have weapons So I can flee, but this is a very hard action So I can try to kill the opponent, but I don't have weapons I see a weapon lying on the ground and I can reach it I have to reach it So there is a certain order of actions built, with the first action "run to the object - knife". After one of the NPCs grabs a knife, another will have no variants to kill him and will run in panic. The first one in his part will follow the one running away.
We can take a situation when three humans with weapons see two enemies - a beast and another human with a weapon. Using the function of evaluating the degree of enemy's danger, threesome will divide in two parts - two of them will deal with the human with the gun, and one with weaker monster (considering the fact, that it can be dangerous only in close combat). The battle starts, humans break up to seek for covers, and a monster, depending on the level of aggression, internal state and available information (whether he knows about all battle participants or not) either flees or strikes.
[PCG] What is the purpose of the blowout, from your perspective? Is it to keep pressure on the player to keep moving, to remind him that he is vulnerable? Does it cause huge problems from a programming perspective - or does it actually help, wiping clean all the results of interactions and starting fresh each time?
We gave up the original blowout idea, as we hadn't taught stalkers to avoid it. And blowout factor usually led to the death of part of stalkers in the scenes that disrupted those scenes.
Blowout now implies storyline events.
[PCG] The blowout suggests that the whole world is randomly generated to a certain extent. What structures or elements are permanent, and what is actually changed by the blowout? Where are you safe from the blowout, and how long does the storm last? How do you know when it is about to happen?
The Zone is changing constantly, but beyond the radius of player view.
Tim Edwards
Features Editor, PC Gamer UK
01225 442244 ex 2515[/quote]
|
Da freut sich das Zockerherz 
Anmeldung