GTA San Andreas

On Mon, 21 Aug 2006 11:56:13 +0000 (UTC), bcd.RemoveThis@pvv.ntnu.no (Bent C
Dalager) wrote:

>In article <44e99653$0$34708$c30e37c6@ken-reader.news.telstra.net>,
>Highlandish <ckreskay1_CURSING.RemoveThis@dodo.com.au> wrote:
>>
>>now I have to account game-stop time into my game play allowance. and it
>>isn't that hard to make save-anywhere a part of the gameplay without
>>effecting the design so that ppl still don't use it as a cheat, but even so,
>>who cares if they do. for those who don't like it, don't use it.
>
>Save-anywhere simply wouldn't have been thought of at all in the
>game's code since it was originally programmed for a console (and
>console memory cards typically aren't large enough to allow for
>save-anywhere).
>
>I expect that retrofitting save-anywhere into the code for the PC
>version was simply too gargantuan a task for them to even consider.
>

Consider Riddick as the classic example of a game properly ported to
'multiple platforms', both PC and console. Obvious that Riddick's PC
"port" was laid out at the beginning of the design and not a cheesy
money-grubbing hack with a far-from-optimal PC UI ( GTA:SA, for
example )

John Lewis

>Cheers
> Bent D
>--
>Bent Dalager - bcd.RemoveThis@pvv.org - http://www.pvv.org/~bcd
> powered by emacs

On 21 Aug 2006 06:28:37 -0700, "mmaker@my-deja.com"
<mmaker RemoveThis @my-deja.com> wrote:

>i own a yacht wrote:
>> not everyone cares whether or not every single game has a save anywhere
>> feature.
>
>Lack of save anywhere is just a typical example of console-crippling in
>a PC game. Console gamers may be 12-year-old kids with no lives, but
>personally I absolutely hate being unable to save at any point, because
>I do have a life and can't always spend ten minutes or more getting to
>the next stupid save point. That's why I rarely buy console-crippled
>games.
>

At least the Splinter Cell series got the PC save-game features just
right. User-driven "save anywhere", plus a few checkpoints.

Save anywhere should be a MANDATORY feature of single-player games,
together with checkpoints as an option for the masochists amongst us
-- those who appear to have no lives apart from playing
video/PC/console games.

I personally have avoided ever being involved in a MMO. There are
other significant priorities in my life and I play computer games when
I have a few minutes ( or if very lucky, a few hours ) to spare. Thus,
my computer games are exclusively single-player, with either
save-anywhere or very frequent check-points ( or both ) and
SHORT-SESSION on-line multiplay, such as CS, BF1942, BF2 etc.

John Lewis

>> in fact, i wish less of them had it.
>
>Good for you, but fortunately most of the PC marketplace disagrees.
>
>>Seems to me it just gives
>>the developer an excuse to be lazy by making certain areas particularly
>>difficult knowing that a person can simply spam-save their way through
>>it.
>
>Whereas lack of save anywhere seems to be mostly used to try to hide
>the fact that the game has a minimal amount of gameplay content, by
>forcing you to do the same thing again and again and again and again
>and again and again until you finally manage to get through it. That's
>not my idea of fun.
>
> Mark
>

John Lewis wrote:


> Sorry, I forgot that you own a yacht. Do you ever get time to float it
> in the village pond between video-gaming sessions

Give it a rest johnny.

On Tue, 22 Aug 2006 03:42:50 -0000, i own a yacht <me.RemoveThis@privacy.net>
wrote:

>John Lewis <john.dsl.RemoveThis@verizon.net> wrote:
>
>> Save anywhere should be a MANDATORY feature of single-player games,
>> together with checkpoints as an option for the masochists amongst us
>> -- those who appear to have no lives apart from playing
>> video/PC/console games.
>>
>> I personally have avoided ever being involved in a MMO. There are
>> other significant priorities in my life and I play computer games when
>> I have a few minutes ( or if very lucky, a few hours ) to spare. Thus,
>> my computer games are exclusively single-player, with either
>> save-anywhere or very frequent check-points ( or both ) and
>> SHORT-SESSION on-line multiplay, such as CS, BF1942, BF2 etc.
>
>boy, you must have an exciting life if you're only able to squeeze in a
>few minutes of gameplay at a time. i'm really impressed and envious. do
>you read books two pages at a time as well? i mean, when you're not
>jetsetting around the globe foiling international conspiracies?
>

Sorry, I forgot that you own a yacht. Do you ever get time to float it
in the village pond between video-gaming sessions ?

John Lewis

In article <c1eke25ln3np0ttvj2eapr2fgjligmsis1.DeleteThis@4ax.com>,
Rob <noemailformethx.DeleteThis@jsjsaiiowppw.com> wrote:
>
>I'm a frantic "quick saver", I have to make myself stop doing it
>sometimes. I will play a FPS sometimes and reload the last save point
>just because I lost some armour and health.

I find that it is perfectly reasonable to let players do this if they
really want to. It's their game, they paid for it and it's their own
time they're spending on it, let them play it as they like.

You want to quick-save before and after each baddie you kill in an
FPS? Fine, go ahead. You want to reload after each battle you lose in
a 4X? Knock yourself out.

Personally, I don't find such an approach particularly enjoyable but
that's no reason to spoil the fun for those that do.

>
> (...)
>
>My own personal opinion and experience of games that have a sensible
>autosave feature instead of a save anywhere, is that they can make the
>game more exciting.

Perhaps, but it is well within your power to play a save-anywhere game
as if it had sparse save points - the excitement can be yours if you
really want it. The other way around, however, doesn't work.

Cheers
Bent D
--
Bent Dalager - bcd.DeleteThis@pvv.org - http://www.pvv.org/~bcd
powered by emacs

On Tue, 22 Aug 2006 08:21:02 +0000 (UTC), bcd DeleteThis @pvv.ntnu.no (Bent C
Dalager) wrote:

>Personally, I don't find such an approach particularly enjoyable but
>that's no reason to spoil the fun for those that do.

I wasn't suggesting that the fun be spoiled for anybody. I was merely
posting my own thoughts and musings.


>Perhaps, but it is well within your power to play a save-anywhere game
>as if it had sparse save points - the excitement can be yours if you
>really want it. The other way around, however, doesn't work.

Jolly good. I knew that already, but never mind eh?

--
Rob

FoolsGold wrote:
> There's no fun in redoing a large
> mission just because you flipped your car at the very end.

And don't forget the fun of having to steal another car, drive half-way
across the map to get to the person who starts the mission, sit through
a cut-scene you've already watched a dozen times, steal another car,
then drive half-way back across the map to get to the start of the
mission.

Mark

Quoth The Raven; John Lewis <john.dsl RemoveThis @verizon.net> in
<44ea3180.27833579 RemoveThis @news.verizon.net>
> Consider Riddick as the classic example of a game properly ported to
> 'multiple platforms', both PC and console. Obvious that Riddick's PC
> "port" was laid out at the beginning of the design and not a cheesy
> money-grubbing hack with a far-from-optimal PC UI ( GTA:SA, for
> example )

I have gone back to a lot of games I "got" but never played or abandoned
after one level for another more exciting game. however I did buy Riddick, I
had no complaints, I just went on to doom3 and ROE and needed the drive
space.

after so many disappointing games I will go back and give Riddick another
go.


--
Remove the _CURSING to reply to me

After all is said and done, usually more is said than done.

Highlandish wrote:
> Quoth The Raven; Andrew <spamtrap.RemoveThis@127.0.0.1> in
> <ucnie253dfnjn45kudo4a7jn5u94hdn5ka.RemoveThis@4ax.com>
> > On Mon, 21 Aug 2006 01:29:25 GMT, john.dsl.RemoveThis@verizon.net (John Lewis)
> > wrote:
> >
> >>The PC version of GTA SA is a cheap console port. And I mean REAL
> >>CHEAP 'N CHEESY..
> >
> > A cheap port is one that is identical to the console version. GTA:SA
> > can be played in higher resolutions, has higher res textures, further
> > view distance and better control system, so is a very good "port".
>
> cheap = no save anywhere, and a port non the less.
>

I usually hate not being able to save anywhere I want, but in GTA I
don't mind. It increases the immersiveness of the game. In a lot of
games without save anywhere, you don't know how much longer you have to
play before you can save. 5 minutes? 15 minutes? 30 minutes? But in
GTA all you have to do is make it back to your house and tomorrow's
another day. I normally play a mission, work out and/or eat, and then
go back home and save the game. And, you can purchase additional
houses around the city, and out in the small towns.

By the way, if you possibly can stick with the game until you get out
of Los Santos, once you get out in the county it's a whole new feel.

i own a yacht wrote:
> there's cars everywhere. it takes seconds to steal another one.

So? It takes a lot less time to load a save game at the right point.

Oh, except you can't, because the developers made the game for console
kiddies, and therefore had to add a ten-minute turnaround between
attempts at missions so they could pretend it had a lot of gameplay.

> there's probably less than 5 missions in the entire game that would
> require you to drive "half-way" across the map in the event of a
> failure. you're greatly exaggerating.

You may be right about SA, but only because the map is so large. There
are plenty of missions in earlier GTA games which require you to do so.
It's nothing but a means of wasting play-time, and serves no rational
purpose.

> > sit through a cut-scene you've already watched a dozen times
> the cut-scenes are skippable.

How? Again, it's possible they're skippable in SA because it's a long
time since I played it, but I certainly never found a way to skip them
in Vice City or GTA3.

> yeah. have you even played the game?

Have you? I don't see how anyone can deny the fact that the developers
deliberately force players to waste lots of time restarting a mission
that they then fail in 30 seconds: what possible reason is there to do
so, other than sadism or to cover up a lack of actual, real gameplay?

Mark

Quoth The Raven; Mr. Stabby <control_z.DeleteThis@hotmail.com> in
<1156436643.224852.274140.DeleteThis@p79g2000cwp.googlegroups.com>
> Highlandish wrote:
>> Quoth The Raven; Andrew <spamtrap.DeleteThis@127.0.0.1> in
>> <ucnie253dfnjn45kudo4a7jn5u94hdn5ka.DeleteThis@4ax.com>
>> > On Mon, 21 Aug 2006 01:29:25 GMT, john.dsl.DeleteThis@verizon.net (John Lewis)
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >>The PC version of GTA SA is a cheap console port. And I mean REAL
>> >>CHEAP 'N CHEESY..
>> >
>> > A cheap port is one that is identical to the console version.
>> > GTA:SA can be played in higher resolutions, has higher res
>> > textures, further view distance and better control system, so is a
>> > very good "port".
>>
>> cheap = no save anywhere, and a port non the less.
>>
>
> I usually hate not being able to save anywhere I want, but in GTA I
> don't mind. It increases the immersiveness of the game. In a lot of
> games without save anywhere, you don't know how much longer you have
> to play before you can save. 5 minutes? 15 minutes? 30 minutes?
> But in GTA all you have to do is make it back to your house and
> tomorrow's another day. I normally play a mission, work out and/or
> eat, and then go back home and save the game. And, you can purchase
> additional houses around the city, and out in the small towns.
>
> By the way, if you possibly can stick with the game until you get out
> of Los Santos, once you get out in the county it's a whole new feel.

i've stuck with it so far, i just do a mission and save (got cheats on so i
dont have to worry about the rest). i'm just casual gaming while i am
studying, just grabbing an hour twice a week so far.

--
Remove the _CURSING to reply to me

A clean house is a sign of a misspent life.

i own a yacht wrote:
> mmaker.DeleteThis@my-deja.com <mmaker.DeleteThis@my-deja.com> wrote:
>
> >
> > How? Again, it's possible they're skippable in SA because it's a long
> > time since I played it, but I certainly never found a way to skip them
> > in Vice City or GTA3.
>
> escape? or spacebar? or enter? i don't remember the exact buttons, but
> it's the same as any other game with skippable cutscenes. try playing
> the game.
>

Yeah, if I'm watching a cutscene I don't want to see, I'll damn well
hit every key on the keyboard to try and skip it. Why you'd sit
through the cutscenes over and over is beyond me.

In article <1156510240.589453.213360.RemoveThis@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>,
mmaker.RemoveThis@my-deja.com <mmaker.RemoveThis@my-deja.com> wrote:
>
>You may be right about SA, but only because the map is so large. There
>are plenty of missions in earlier GTA games which require you to do so.
>It's nothing but a means of wasting play-time, and serves no rational
>purpose.

The rational purpose is that consoles have very limited space on their
memory cards and it's generally too expensive to do full saves on
them, and they most likely didn't want to spend the resources on
changing this for the PC version (they knew it would be a hit anyway I
suppose so why bother).

Just because something isn't entirely in your favour doesn't
necessarily mean that the world is out to get you, you know.

Cheers
Bent D
--
Bent Dalager - bcd.RemoveThis@pvv.org - http://www.pvv.org/~bcd
powered by emacs