drafts

_drafts/bunker.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title:  "There is no secret vent: why \"Amnesia: The Bunker\" is not an imsim"
+subtitle: "It's a good game, but curb your enthusiasm."
+tags: [game-design, game-review]
+---
+
+![](/assets/images/shadows-to-the-left.png){:.centered}
+
+I saw [a great twitter video](https://twitter.com/computer_gil/status/1814368017440186662) where an indie game developer said:
+
+> goblinAmerica isn't some boorish, lowbrow "shooter."
+> It's actually a cerebral and complex "immsim" [sic], because it has:
+> 1. Crouching in a shadow
+> 1. Boxes move [physics interactions]
+> 1. Big hallway / little hallway [a vent next to a door with a massive sign above it saying "SECRET VENT"]
+> 1. Realistic AI [an NPC says "I just heard something but I'm too busy reflecting on my beautiful life to investigate it]
+> 1. Nonviolent tools [shoots NPC with a gun and a caption "not dead, just sleeping" appears next to the NPC. Proceeds to do the same but this time it's an assault rifle]
+
+This outstanding satire reminded me of something about Bunker that for me disqualifies it as an immersive sim: there is no little hallway.
+
+### Bunker's level design
+
+At one point after the game came out and there was actual discourse around an FG game for once,
+I had a realization; Bunker had painfully linear level design.
+I busted out the game's map, analyzed it, and compared it to Dishonored.
+
+Dishonored always offers multiple ways of getting places and bypassing obstacles;
+even in chokepoint parts of maps, there will usually be at least 2 ways of progressing.
+Levels are rather open-ended and interconnected.
+Bunker, asides from side rooms and 2-3 instances of a few adjacent rooms creating a sneaking arena,
+is largely a linear experience.
+
+You might say - comparing Bunker to Dishonored isn't fair because Dishonored lets you jump 4 meters high and teleport.
+While yes, Bunker can't have movement mechanics like that, it's simply a matter of level design.
+Deus Ex achieves open-ended levels without any fancy movement mechanics.
+Sometimes giving rooms and levels more than one entrance can be enough.
+Bunker does not do this, unfortunately; the entire game has less than 10 rooms with more than one escape route,
+and every level has a single entrance.
+
+Bunker is advertised as highly replayable, but if offers you no variety.
+There are no alternate skills or paths to try.
+At best, RNG will give you a different set of items over the course of the game.
+You might not be able to play the levels out of order!
+On my replay I wasn't able to because I got bad RNG and had no fire source to get through a tunnel filled with rats,
+and not enough other tools to get rid of all of them.
+
+There are barely any alternate routes even on a scale as small as getting into a room with different methods.
+The only examples I can think of are:
+* The hub wine cellar can be entered using either the bolt cutters or the wrench.
+* The break room in Maintenance can be entered by shooting a padlock through a whole in the wall
+or by unscrewing a vent.
+* A room in the hub can be entered through a hidden vent in the adjacent room rather than busting through the locked door.
+Which is less of an alternative and more a matter of door you try first, but let's say it counts.
+* The locker room in the hub is entered through an already open vent - while it makes absolutely no sense,
+you could blow out the doors instead, so I wouldn't actually count this.
+
+Other than that, the only choice you are given in level progression is how you open doors and padlocks,
+and whether you want to risk busting into optional rooms.
+
+### Gameplay options
+
+Bunker's gameplay revolves around bypassing various doors and rat nests,
+both of which can be dealt with in several ways, which is admittedly in the imsim spirit.
+The options for getting through locked doors are:
+* Heavy bricks which can break padlocks and wooden doors;
+it is only a particular brick type that can do it and it's limited to 2 uses before it breaks.
+Limiting this mechanic to only one type of item is also not very immersive or intuitive.
+* Padlocks can be shot off.
+* Wooden doors can be blown up (grenade or drag a red barrel and set it off).
+* Wooden doors can also be shot through, but this is too expensive to be viable because of the highly limited ammo.
+* If a chain is used, you can get bolt cutters to cut the chain off instead of dealing with the padlock.
+
+The rat nests can also be dispersed with quite a few methods which fall into 3 categories:
+1. Burn the bodies which attract the rats (there are many quite fun options of doing this)
+1. Temporarily scare the rats away (meat, flares, gas)
+1. Kill the rats (waste of resources because you won't get them all with a single resource, but technically doable)
+
+When it comes to combat... there is nice variety, but most of the nonorthodox methods aren't effective.
+Carrying a gas mask to use gas safely could have been very interesting,
+but I found gas a quite unreliable in its ability to stop the beast.
+Similarly, you can do quite a lot with the pourable gasoline mechanic, but its ability to stop the monster is hit-or-miss.
+Exploding a barrel is effective, but it can be hard to time right and you will just end up wasting resources.
+I wish at least the first two were more effective, because they are completely overshadowed by bullets and grenades/molotovs.
+
+### Illusion of choice
+
+While there is a fair few options of getting past locked door, with most of them you will find yourself limited.
+Padlocked metal doors can only be opened with bullets and The Brick;
+wooden doors are usually locked from the other side (i.e. no padlock to shoot),
+so you need The Brick or an explosion to open them.
+RNG is also at the wheel here; sometimes you simply will only have one option.
+
+And when an actual choice has to be made, it is largely meaningless: from the standpoint of remaining undetected,
+all of the options come down to "loud noise = monster comes out".
+Breaking padlocks with The Brick is the only exception (breaking a wooden door with it is still very loud).
+The only thing you really have to consider is "which one of these is better left as a weapon?".
+To be fair, that's still a compelling scenario, but not something that screams imsim to me.
+
+### Missing links
+
+> If you think it's possible, it probably is.
+> 
+> -- Bunker's loading screen
+
+At one point I felt super clever because I thought to myself:
+"hey, I've got a fuel cannister and a lighter. I could set that door on fire to avoid alerting the beast".
+You can probably guess where this is going, but I did what I planned and... nothing.
+I suspect that FG couldn't balance such an interaction properly so they cut it out
+(wouldn't requiring a full canister to burn through a door be a solution?).
+
+This is not the only case either; you can't make fuel bottles or fuel canisters explode by shooting them.
+The exit door needs to be blown up with a pack of dynamite, but an explosive barrel won't do (understandable, but still).
+Reportedly, throwing The Brick at the monster doesn't do anything. Probably quite a few more such cases.
+
+And thus we arrive at my key points of this post.
+**First: Bunker offers many gameplay options, but ultimately a very linear experience** (which is not imsim-like).
+If you come across a locked door, 95% of the time there is no alternate way in, and you *will* have to break it open.
+And to do that, you *will* have to attract the monster.
+The only quiet method is very situational and relies on RNG, so it will rarely be an option.
+And when it comes to combat, each time I tried thinking out of the box,
+I was met with subpar results and had to stick to guns, grenades and molotovs.
+
+**Second: Bunker does not create opportunities for thinking outside the box or being observant,**
+which is a key characteristic of imsim games.
+It's not hard to come across something the game does not allow
+and the level design is linear, with no secret routes or clever hiding spots.
+
+### Bunker vs Darkwood
+
+Comparing Bunker to Darkwood is something that I have been itching to do
+because both are survival horror games which feature fire mechanics
+and keeping a generator alive to stay safe, which is a bit eerie.
+
+Darkwood also allows you to:
+* drag furniture to barricade
+* create traps with broken glass and poured gasoline, which can be lit with throwable matches and flares
+* has gas bombs, although these are better used as explosives after being set on fire than as a raw poison damage source
+
+// darkwood offers similar options and even more on top of that but is not considered an imsim
+
+### How do you even define immersive sims?
+
+
+
+### Counter-arguments
+
+To play devil's advocate - it's not really in Bunker's interest to offer many escape and entrance routes,
+because it's a horror game and those extra routes would allow the player to evade the monster quite easily.
+The lack of resources limits choice, but creates scenarios where you can barely scrape by with your ingenuity,
+which works very well in a survival horror game.
+Because yes, I'd qualify Bunker primarily as a survival horror,
+although it would be unfair to not acknowledge that it *does* have imsim elements.
+
+In fact, why does it even matter whether it's an imsim?
+I do admit that this is pretty much bikeshedding,
+but for me this categorisation,
+and the game bombastically telling the player "if you think it's possible, it probably is",
+lead to letdowns.
+Instead of being pleasantly surprised with how many options there are for a survival game,
+I kept waiting for something cool and emergent to happen and it never really did.
+
+The sad part is that Bunker gets really close to being an imsim.
+The ingredients are here; all it really needed was an extra push in the level design
+
+
+### Summary
+
+// why does it matter whether Bunke is an imsim
+
+JUST LIKE YOU SAID, LIZARD MAN. IN THE SHADOWS TO THE LEFT.

_drafts/criticism.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title:  "Game critique pitfalls"
+subtitle: "Addressing the difficulties, fallacies, implicit elements and failings of game critique"
+tags: [game-design, game-review]
+---
+
+I am bothered by my inclination towards negative points in my writing.
+I also see similar issues pop up in other people's reviews.
+As I don't see myself doing forced positivity, I wanted to give context to my style of writing,
+as well as ruminate about issues with game critique at large.
+
+### Personal inclinations
+
+I'm an engineer. I have been trained to notice flaws, address them and seek improvements.
+As a result, I naturally gravitate towards findings issues in the things I enjoy,
+rather than formulating compliments.
+
+### More to say about flawed games
+
+As a result of the above, I usually have the most to say about games which
+I found to be amazing, but flawed.
+These reviews come out sounding highly critical despite me really enjoying the game in question.
+
+A great example of this is comparing Amnesia: Rebirth and Amnesia: The Bunker.
+Bunker was pretty damn good; but after the initial hype died down,
+I find myself and my friends rarely mentioning it (
+although that's partially that game's fault - there's not that much to discover in it,
+and the gameplay is much shallower than advertised).
+Meanwhile mentioning the severely flawed Rebirth is almost guaranteed to spawn
+discussion about what exactly causes it to be not-that-good,
+a topic so elusive that we still haven't found an answer. But we keep trying.
+
+### Reviewing games like movies
+
+I love solid gameplay, but as long as I have a bunch of tasks to keep me occupied,
+I likely am not gonna complain about mediocre gameplay.
+However, when a story-based game gives me no good story incentive, I start to think about it a lot.
+And find flaws.
+
+I do wish to write more about gameplay, but it's often the plot that I have the most to say about.
+
+## Other reviewers
+
+Some unfair stuff done by players and professional reviewers.
+
+### Not a game developer
+
+You shouldn't need to be a game developer to review games.
+
+But if you aren't, don't tell developers how to do their jobs,
+that they were lazy, or that something should have been easy to implement.
+You probably aren't knowledgeable about game development enough to even begin to understand why you're wrong.
+
+### Impatience and not meeting the game halfway
+
+I can imagine many have been in this situation;
+you show someone a game, they skip tutorials, ignore hints and/or rush,
+and then complain that they don't know what to do or that they aren't winning.
+Sometimes you can tell they're trying to play another game;
+fighting their way through a stealth game,
+or spamming attacks in a game where deliberate inputs are the way to go.
+
+Some people just refuse to engage with a game on its terms and still expect it to be fun.

_drafts/godot-plugins.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title:  "Godot plugins"
+subtitle: "a"
+tags: [game-dev, godot]
+---
+
+why are godot plugins bloated / messy
+code smells
+complexity
+writing own solutions

_drafts/grinding.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title:  "Grinding"
+subtitle: "Reviewing every texting app I know of in terms of future-proofing and features"
+tags: [game-design, game-review]
+---
+
+grindy survival games - valheim / zomboid and is it fun
+
+compare them with subnautica and darkwood
+(or more specifically, SN vs Valheim and Zomboid vs Darkwood because of shared similarities between each)

_drafts/prey.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title:  "Prey (2016) and why Arkane games come short of masterpieces"
+subtitle: "Discussing crucial weaknesses of Prey and the Dishonored games"
+tags: [game-design, game-review]
+---
+
+prey, dishonored and how arkane games come short of masterpieces;
+basically write about how they drag on too long and how little attention is paid to the story and its ending
+
+prey's detour plot structure
+
+![](https://shared.akamai.steamstatic.com/store_item_assets/steam/apps/480490/header.jpg?t=1594910513){:.centered}
+
+So I have finally gotten around to and finished Prey.
+I don't want to spoil plot details, so this will be a bit vague, but bear with me.
+
+## Prey's pacing
+
+Prey starts off super strong.
+The intrigue introduced at the beginning is gripping,
+and the set up manages to turn the basic premise of the game,
+something that's advertised about it everywhere, into an awesome reveal.
+After exploring the first area and entering a hub area, the game game begins several plot threads,
+each one adding to the intrigue and making you more curious about what went down on the Talos I station.
+
+You visit a new area to get access to a recording that progresses the story.
+Cool, standard game stuff.
+After watching the recording, you learn that to get to the next plot thread, you need to take a detour.
+You go through a new part of the station... and then another...
+After reaching the destination, you once again learn that the next plot points are inaccessible.
+Time for another detour! You start following urgent matters and the moment-to-moment story takes over.
+Meanwhile, the main plot just... dangles there.
+
+Of course, you learn plenty of side-stories and various going-ons of the setting;
+while enjoyable, they explain the mysteries from the beginning in a rather mundane way.
+Tension slowly deflated and I found myself disengaging,
+just going through the gameplay motions and dealing with the immediate events on the station,
+like rescuing others, dealing with a treacherous convict and getting yourself out of hairy situations.
+
+About 60-70% into Prey, I realized that mystery from the beginning got unraveled through
+all the emails and audio logs I've read, and that there was not much left keeping me interested.
+In the gameplay department, I acquired most of the powers which I found interesting and was consistently wiping the floor with the enemies.
+I just wanted to get over with the quest that has been unresolved for 30 hours (!) of gameplay.
+And then as I think the game is about to end, it throws another log under the protag's legs (in the form of Dahl).
+After being done with that chore, you finally reach that initial goal,
+and get to go back and forth across the entire map to finish the game. Yay, backtracking.
+Just what you need to ramp up the excitement for the ending.
+
+## Prey's ending
+
+You can make several choices which make the plot end in different ways.
+All endings are very short and there's a hard cut to the credits;
+they were so abrupt and unsatisfying that I actually laughed in bemusement.
+I couldn't help but feel like the writers went "yeah whatever I don't know".
+
+Thankfully, there is a post-ending that's quite interesting, however I would not call it satisfying.
+Furthermore, some people will be upset about it for reasons I can't bring up not to spoil it.
+Predicting this, the final choice gives you the option to, in a way, lash out against the game;
+however, the story being aware of its ending being weak does not make it less weak, in my opinion.
+
+## General thoughts about Prey
+
+All in all, my criticism of Prey's pacing comes down to this:
+* The detour story structure sucks.
+There is many things which happen in the game, but the main plot should not be something you only experience in the very start and the very end of a 35 hour game.
+* Related to the above, a simple goal of entering an office (Alex's place in Arboretum) should not be dragged out for 30 hours.
+I have later learned that I could have reached this area basically immediately,
+but the method (GLOO gun stairs) felt like cheesing the game mechanics.
+This issue is exacerbated by the location being just barely out of reach.
+You get an elevator code for this area at the very end of the game,
+so this seems intentional, not just my oversight.
+* The endings should have at least *some* resolution.
+There are characters which you can save. The protagonist is voiced (well, sort of - they never speak in the game themselves, only through prerecorded messages and a robot which uses the protag's voice).
+One can argue that this is done through gameplay, but this doesn't change the fact the game ends painfully abruptly.
+
+This wasn't supposed to be a review per se, but I do want to mention some of the positives,
+because this game is pretty amazing in the gameplay department.
+It has so many clever interactions you can come up with,
+lots of scavenging, various routes to achieve your goals,
+the setting is awesome and all of this is beautifully presented.
+I also loved the space walk mechanics and its fantastic sound design,
+which come together in really make you feel like you're outside a space station.
+The game also uses several ingenious environmental hints to teach you new mechanics;
+again, I don't want to spoil it, but I don't think I've had a bigger eureka moment than in this game.
+
+However, Prey was not a financial success, and some even call it forgettable.
+While I don't fully agree, I believe the pacing issues I described above are a key contributing factor to that.
+And this is not the first time that Arkane has fumbled endings.
+
+## Dishonored
+
+
+