Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
puzzles and problems unrelated to the player's stated role. Indiana Jones is suppos-
edly an archaeologist, but we don't see him digging very much. The role of the
player in an adventure game arises not out of the challenges (unless you specifically
want it to), but out of the story. The player can still be a pilot, if that's what the
story requires, but that doesn't necessarily guarantee that she'll get to fly a plane.
And she might be anything else or nothing in particular—just an ordinary person
living in an extraordinary situation.
A good many adventure games do connect the player's role with the game's activi-
ties, however. Almost all adventure games treat the story as a journey (see the
section “The Story as a Journey” in Chapter 7), mapping the plot of the story onto
physical travel through the game world, so the player's role often involves travel or
investigation: explorer, detective, hunter, conquistador, and so on.
Be sure that the player's role is suitable for the genre, however, or it could be frus-
trating for the player.
Heart of China
, an otherwise straightforward adventure game,
included a poorly implemented 3D tank simulator. To get beyond a specific point,
the player had to use the tank simulator successfully. This created a real problem;
adventure game enthusiasts seldom play vehicle simulations, and many could not
get past that point. The obligatory action element spoiled the game for them.
Story and Spatial Structure
Because adventure games map a story onto a space, they establish a relationship
between different locations in the world and different parts of the story. Over the
years, the nature of this relationship has evolved. The earliest adventure games,
including the original
Adventure
, emphasized exploration at the expense of story.
The game provided few cues that could give the player a sense of time passing—
that is, of making progress through a story toward an ending. The game simply
gave her a large space and told her to wander around. Structurally, the game looked
rather like the drawing in
Figure 19.6
.
FIGURE 19.6
The structure of early
adventure games. Each
circle represents a
room. S is the starting
room, and E is the end.
E
S
