Choices are not (only) dialogue lines.

We settled, at least 10 posts ago, that the best games master most kinds of systems: physics, logics, ethics: a game where you choose from violent actions, stealth actions, science actions, engineering actions, diplomatic actions (dialogue), or puzzle style actions which are like this: i found this item, so i give it to you, you give me another object, i use it or give it to another person and i completed an objective and can move forward; or: i need to open a door, so i look around, i turn a picture and there's a key attached to a sticker. A game that simulates systems is better than one that doesn't simulate anything but appearance with good gfx.

We settled with this ideal game because it's heaven for our degrees of interaction, the promised land, the Utopia. Now let's build on it, fortify our monument and decorate it with flowers.

There's something perfect about this scheme in its harmonious complexity. It gives complete freedom. Not limited to one type of reasoning, it embraces everything, creating the ability to fully experience human perception, it recreates life in alien worlds; it manages to do something unimaginable, then, that will lead us to great discoveries and explorations that are unprecedented and unthinkable in novels and movies.

Lesser complex games are less complete life forms but they are good enough for us: let's stick with the example of an alien planet. In most videogames an alien world is nomore than a treat for the eyes, but there's also a wide range of emotions that hit a player, and he processes them while he watches the world open. There's also a captivating story, drama, feelings, the usual routine of a movie show; plus there's excitement during the action sequence, flying, shooting, jumping, he needs good reflexes and such. That's a game like Halo, like Unreal, like Doom, like Dead Space, like The Dig, like Space Marine 2.

So? Those games are good enough because there's simple entertaining g and there's good movie-like drama.

It's good enough for all, the increasing visual realism, well balanced challenging action gameplay and a good story make for the perfect entertainment product.

So what about freedom? These games prove that we do not need freedom, because they are fun, exciting and even realistic in so many ways that makes you forget the above mentioned choices.

End of story.

...



Uhm? What? Oh did it sound like i wasn't okay with it? Well i can survive. A less complete interactive experience is a sufficient compromise, for now. Maybe in a hundred years games will finally, always, give a complete simulation of human interaction: the player will be able to touch and grab every piece of the world, like a rock, a branch, a chair, a pen, and use them wherever he wants, and game designers will maybe conceive reasons for that interaction, hence again there will be "puzzles", so non-violent ways to overcome situations. For example before landing on a hostile planet, you may be reading a book on alien botanics and find that some creatures love a type of plant... so you pick it up somewhere on your ship, put it in the inventory, then when you face a band of those creatures you toss the plant and they forget about you. That's a puzzle hidden inside an action sequence. Or maybe "puzzles", which are clever ruses to better overcome problems, will emerge from the sheer complexity that the makers are able to infuse to the product.

But today the complexity of choice must be designed before hand, like in Deus Ex and Fallout.