By the time you’ve watched the same bus fall off the same ledge rising at the same angle for the umpteenth time, any suspension of disbelief has long since snapped like overstretched elastic under a flame.

I also thought it was interesting that the reviewers note that the game actually kind of works better when it’s working linearly.

1. When your character is going to die or be struck down and there’s nothing you can do about it, but the game forces you to play anyway (e.g., King Kong, beginning of God of War II, other games I don’t want to ruin).

2. When one of the supporting characters who has been helpful to you, and who you had time to get to know, dies permanently and there’s nothing you can do about it (e.g., Aeris in FFVII, other games I don’t want to ruin).

Playing through Gears of War on “Insane” mode with you (Jordan) the other night, I got to thinking that the scene early on where your commanding officers gets killed looks like it’s supposed to be very emotional—slow motion, close-up reaction shot with the protagonist, etc.—but I don’t really care about the guy. What would have made that scene really hit home is if he had been the only member of the squad, besides Dom, reviving you when you get shot to your knees. Then, when he’s gone, that loss is reinforced in both the story and the gameplay.

Escort missions: I think the general idea of escort missions is sound, but it just doesn’t work with current AI. I’d like to see more of it in multiplayer gaming. Some of the really fun parts of multiplayer strategy games are where you have to “cover” someone while they carry out some important task that leaves them vulnerable. You can see this is FPSs and real time strategy games. That being said, I would suggest Guild Wars as an example of a game where the AI-based escort missions are actually well done (i.e., not frustrating), and that might be because you have a group of players protecting the NPCs, rather than a single player like in the examples that consistently come up. Also, the GW AIs that you escort usually have some assistive role.

Passage: This was really cool. It relates to your “escort missions” topic too, because the maze is easier to navigate if you don’t pick up the girl, but you could argue that the game is more “rewarding” if you have a companion. Also, in case you didn’t see it, the author made a statement about the game.

Sweet Release of Death: As I know them, FPS games have very little penalty for death. In some cases death actually gives you a chance to “restock” on ammo or other resources. It’s not uncommon for people playing TF2 to die intentionally so that they can change classes, or get more ammo, or leave metal for their teammates to use, etc. This is in contrast to something like a MUD or MMORPG or adventure game, where there seems to be more “repeated” work when you die. Also, I skimmed the article very quickly and didn’t see whether they compared the subject responses to a case where they kill/wound AI characters, to tease out whether knowing there is a person on the other side has an influence (for example, maybe you feel more stressed about potential retaliation when you know you’re attacking a human controlled character).

Contemplating the Death Penalty: I can really only attest to Guild Wars as an example, but I definitely felt that death broke the narrative flow in that game. This was mainly because death during a mission often meant that you’d have to repeat significant chunks of the narrative again. Imagine if you were watching a movie and every so often you were forced to watch the same 5 minute scene over and over. It’s like that. There is a mechanism for skipping those cuts in Guild Wars, but everyone in your group has to agree to skip it for it to work. That being said, the majority of players I’ve played with tend to want to skip narrative scenes, presumably because they’d already beaten the game and seen it all.

Ok. long comment. :-)

I’d be interested in an article on that, actually. People who relentlessly go after their own teammates. I could be the case study, cause I do that all the time.

After saying this, I fear Jason will no longer want to play me in halo.