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The New Designer Diary....

MarkQuinn

MarkQuinn

Powder Monkey
Well here I was defending the Pirates! series for its realism and here comes Jeff Briggs of Firaxis writing this designer diary saying "reality" doesn't really befit their game of heroism and it's not really realistic, and maybe people play games to escape from reality.

Maybe what we have is a discrepancy in the language we're using. What one person might call realistic, another would call "having your facts straight".

Short of a Star Trek: The Next Generation holodeck pirate simulation I don't think we're going to see a completely realistic pirate game that contains all or even a narrow majority of the "facts". When I speak of realism, I mean to say Pirates! --- the old and probably the new --- have their facts straight, or at least consistent. If you chose to omit executions, moldy food and dysentary, wonderful! What you've left in is a beautiful, dynamic, consistent world where everything exists pretty much where it should, where towns have bustling economies and ships ply the trade lanes in search of the cheapest commodities. We, as budding pirates, are free to dive into this game world and pursue fortune or survival on a real map of the Caribbean with true contending forces. I refer back to an earlier post on macro vs. micro realism. In the macro department I stand by this product, and I don't care who is telling me it's not realistic --- whether that person is a POTC fan, a historian or a Firaxis employee. In the departments which I think are important, I should say, Pirates! is every bit as realistic as it needs to be. That it is filtered through a colorful, comical, almost Walt Disneyish vision is to the game's credit, I should say, not its deteriment.

By the way, I know it would be irresponsible of Firaxis (or just about any `game-maker`) to claim their game is in any way realistic. They almost HAVE to say it is fanciful and farcical. But don't tell me for a minute, Firaxis, that you didn't do your homework on this game because you did. You opened a book or two while other game companies didn't do much more than study a few ship paintings.

<img src="http://publish.hometown.aol.com/markquinn2k3/images/mqbw.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
 
Haha, yes, I was quite suprised by that statement as well:

<span style='`font-size`:16pt;`line-height`:100%'><!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><i>We also reread a bunch of the historical documents on pirates and piracy, which reminded us of a number of things:  

1. A pirate's life was usually wretched, brutal, and horribly short.
2. Many pirates were little more than common murderers, and some were obviously insane.
3. Sea voyages were tedious, boring, uncomfortable, and dangerous, and you often lived for months on rancid meat and rotten biscuits.
4. In the 17th century almost nobody had a full set of teeth.  

Much of this stuff is quite fascinating in its own way, but it reminded us once again of why our Pirates! game should take a less realistic and more fun approach to the life of a pirate. There are a number of gritty and realistic games out there, but Sid Meier's Pirates! has and always will take a more cinematic, lighthearted view of the world.</i><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--></span>

I am still, to this day, under the impression that Pirates! aimed for absolute realism. While contemporary games had colorful and sometimes cute graphics, Pirates! had a scaled back, sparse palette, with pictures of characters who never were beautiful, and always of correct proportions.

Sailing took a long while, walking even longer, and fencing felt terribly realistic at the time (I mean, the control system was so different than any other fighting game... not based on quick action, but rather tactics and cunning).

Nope, I still say that Pirates! was damn realistic, and I still say that I do not like what I see in this new game.

PS. Pirates! Gold for the Megadrive and CD32 did go the cartoony way, but I bet that was soften up the graphics for young people who bought the consoles... which further prooves my point!!
 
i was a little disappointed in the entire article as it seems like it may be a little too <i>"Captain Hook and Peter Pan"-ish</i> for me. i didn't play the original, was it like what the article says this one will be?

hey mark, you the Quinn from back in the RedLegg/Hot House/Cutthroats days? <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/par-ty.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheers" border="0" alt="par-ty.gif" />
 
I found it good that they don't make it "too" realistic.Diseases and ruthness from pirates we better don't see,we don't wanna make it another horrorgame.Better the romantic pirate.And in that way is the game really realistic.
 
Hi Mack. Yes I am! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/cheers.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":cheers" border="0" alt="cheers.gif" />:

I'm gonna stay away from the topic of realism for a while because it's been pretty `well-covered`. Instead I am just gonna talk about the merits of Pirates! as a good game. I know the graphics are a `turn-off` for some, but they honestly don't bother me one bit and here's why. I think a game should set down the parameters for their world and then stick to them. There's been a huge controversy (biggest I've ever seen on a game forum) over at totalwar.org over the fact that Creative Assembly have built their Egyptian faction to look like the <i>ancient</i> Egyptians, complete with silly Pharoah hats and all. The stink is all about the fact that these units, if units ever really looked like them to begin with, are about 1500 years out of place. Egyptian armies at the time resembled Greek armies. The effect is noticeable enough to cause a near revolution among their fan base. While Roman history is not my forte and I probably would not have thought anything of these units (except that they look a little silly) if not for the volume of posts written in protest, I will in all likelihood search for and download the first mod that adds actual <i>`Greek-looking`</i> units to the Egyptian faction (or if the game is as easily moddable as they say, I'll just make one myself).

The question: why go through so much pain and effort to create an otherwise realistic game and then throw in these fantasy units? Will R:TW be a great game? Certainly. Will the fact that they have built an otherwise serious, realistic gameworld but added sheer fiction detract from its overall goodness? Absolutely.

Same applies with the upcoming Brothers in Arms, a World War II shooter set in the first days of the Normandy invasion. The gameworld has been modeled to look exactly like the real places, down to practically each blade of grass (in the demo video the narrator says "You see that fence? That fence is actually there.") I watched the video and was amazed by how realistically the AI soldiers in his squad acted and reacted. I play a lot of tactical simulations and it looked to be better than anything I've seen. The problem? All this realism but Brothers in Arms is NOT a tactical simulation. It is a shooter, and there are differences. In BIA you get to carry and flip through half a dozen weapons. You get a health bar and powerups. Now my question: why build this game world where every building, every tree, every speck of dust is where it should be and all the units are modeled accurately and the tank engines are recorded from the actual thing and the soldiers act the way real soldiers should act, etc. etc. etc., but at its heart make the gameplay no more realistic than friggin Wolfenstein?

Remember, I'm NOT talking about realism here. Realism is not the issue. The issue is consistency=a good game. I just purchased Unreal Tournament 2004 and I can assure you guys I have not had this much fun with a game since Morrowind, and that's saying something. I simply love it. It is spectacular. My AI units are smart and the action is frenzied and challenging. The graphics are spectacular and I have played more `nail-biting` finishes than I could write about in 20 posts. Is it realistic? Hell no. Not even close. But the point is, I know going INTO it that it is not realistic --- what would you expect from a game called "Unreal"? But they built a game universe and stuck to it. It's like Jackie Chan starring in a Bruckheimer remake of Aliens. Just totally `over-the`-top. It's believable because the WHOLE THING IS <b>UN</b>BELIEVABLE.

Does that make sense?

Pirates of the Caribbean? Unbelievable because some is believable (the ships and the sky and the water and the look of teh towns) and some is unbelievable (the politics and the quests and the combat and the map). Bottom line? The screw with my belief system. I don't know which way is up and which way is down. One minute I am thinking I have stepped back into history and the next minute I see skeletons and strange islands that don't really exist anywhere and are inhabited by Portuguese and Spanish who have miraculously decided to inhabit the same waters.

Skeletons and strange islands and even stranger bedfellows are totally believable in Morrowind because before you even open the box you know it is a fantasy.

So, the bottom line is <i>consistency</i> makes for a great game.

Why is "The Sims" a great game? Because they are small, simulated lives that don't for a moment try to make you think this stuff is really happeneing. Aliens land and children grow up in three days `game-time`.

Why is "Singles: Flirt Up Your Life" such a bad game? Because they have taken all of the elements from The Sims and tried to install them into a gameworld where `ultra-realistic` graphics and adult situations point toward a more realistic approach. And it simply doesn't work because half the time you think it's supposed to be real and the other half is obviously fake and in the end it's all fake.

And what does this all have to do with Pirates!, either old or new?

Firaxis will give us a gameworld with certain rules that I know they are going to stick to. You know going into it that you won't die and the effects of skurvvy probably won't deplete your crew too much. You know it is a colorful, cartoony, `larger-than`-life approach taken directly from the film reels of Erol Flynn. Realistic in much of its macro approach but totally `off-the`-wall everywhere else. You'll quickly know the rules of the game, not the <i>gamerules</i> per se that can be read in the manual, but the <i>vision</i> of the designers who know the world they want to give us and stick to that world. When you stick to the rules it usually makes for a great game. When you DON'T stick to the rules and start throwing Egyptian Pharohs into a battle with utterly convincing Roman legionares then people start visiting fansites to download fixes and mods real quick.

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Quick addition to the above....

Age of Empires and many other notable RTSs. Good or bad? Well, they DO allow armies from various different parts of the world and perhaps different times to fight against each other. Same with Civilization. But I say they are good because <i>from the outset</i> you know it is fantasy. The maps are randomly generated and the gameplay, construction of units, funny little characters and `off-the`-wall approach indicate from the very beginning that it is merely `psuedo-real` elements thrown into a completely fantastical world. Lack of realism, yes, but consistently so.

<img src="http://publish.hometown.aol.com/markquinn2k3/images/mqbw.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
 
<!--`QuoteBegin-MarkQuinn`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MarkQuinn)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Pirates of the Caribbean?  <edit> One minute I am thinking I have stepped back into history and the next minute I see skeletons and strange islands that don't really exist anywhere and are inhabited by Portuguese and Spanish who have miraculously decided to inhabit the same waters.  [/quote]Yet it is presumably a `tie-in` with a movie that has skeletons and strange islands that don't really exist anywhere &tc. Why should your expectations for this game be any different?

Actually I think the question here is, is it absolutely necessary for a fantasy game to have fantasy art? Or can it be a fantasy game AND look realistic, like PotC? OR conversely, should a `reality-based` game be REQUIRED to have realistic art, or can it rely upon fantasy art?

Who makes these choices? What is acceptable in these differing degrees of fantasy/reality? I think the "bottom line" (profit) is the biggest factor in these decisions - the gaming companies need to cater to the people who are buying the games, and it's quite clear that most gamers are in their teens. What is acceptable to THEM? Are they more willing to suspend their disbelief to have a little fun? IMHO, HECK YEAH! <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/yes.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":yes" border="0" alt="yes.gif" />

I am not one to quibble about graphics - nor precise reality - in a computer game. It's a game... The eye candy is very nice in PotC - AND I also like what Atari has done with Pirates! - bottom line for me, is that I want `play-ability`, I want to be able to immerse myself in the game and have some fun.

I don't play a lot of games... USUALLY I don't have a lot of time for them. If I spend time with a game, I want it to be more of a challenge on an intellectual level than the "beat the enemy bloody, kill kill kill" kind of mindless slaughter gaming that seems to be quite popular these days. I am glad that Atari is "keeping the faith" with the original Pirates! game and making it an intellectual challenge - while also making sure to have some silly fun in it like swinging from a rope during a fight...

Sometimes serious intellectual challenge needs a little absurdity to keep it from being a chore, don't you think? <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />
 
Wow, everyone but Mack avoided to comment on that developer's strange vision of the old Pirates! game.

Was I the only one who thought that the original Pirates! went for realism instead of flashly graphics?
 
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yet it is presumably a `tie-in` with a movie that has skeletons and strange islands that don't really exist anywhere &tc. Why should your expectations for this game be any different?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Skeletons existing in an otherwise `quasi-realistic` gameworld are just one in a very long list of reasons why I think POTC is an overall bad game. Fun at times, but overall bad. As for the standards of that game and others catering to a teenaged crowd, I don't doubt you for a moment. But that doesn't mean I personally have to think they are good games or judge them on some kind of more toned down curve. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=";)" border="0" alt="wink.gif" />

<img src="http://publish.hometown.aol.com/markquinn2k3/images/mqbw.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />
 
<!--`QuoteBegin-eobet`+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(eobet)</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Wow, everyone but Mack avoided to comment on that developer's strange vision of the old Pirates! game.

Was I the only one who thought that the original Pirates! went for realism instead of flashly graphics?[/quote]

Well, the original game was written in 1987, there was no such thing as flashy graphics back then <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tongue.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":blah:" border="0" alt="tongue.gif" />

Sid Meier's games have always been a blend of realism and fun, and as Sid has said on several occasions, if the choice is between realism and fun, then fun will always win out in his designs. I think Pirates! is a great example of the perfect blend of both aspects. He included many realistic aspects of pirates life that according to their research, actually happened. OTOH, he also put in the 'fun' things like romance and buried treasure, which according to everything I've read about pirate history may have been more myth than fact. The bottom line, it was (and still is) a great game that was educational and a blast to play.
 
Well for me, Pirates! 2 is getting better and better.
Since the Monkey Island Series I'm waiting for a Pirate Game wich mainly goes for fun.
I love Comic Style Graphics and think that they fit perfectly into a (not so realistic) Pirate Theme. That's why I liked the PotC Movie. It wasn't realistic.
Can't wait to see Pirates! 2 in action.

Now don't get me wrong, I also like more realistic Pirate Games (and hope for an eglisch Seadogs 2), but the I prefer the Fun ones.
 
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Now don't get me wrong, I also like more realistic Pirate Games (and hope for an eglisch Seadogs 2), but the I prefer the Fun ones<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Donkey, Donkey, Donkey....

Pirate realism is more than just 3D ships and `pixil-shaded` ocean waves. In the waning months before Pirates! is released may I recommend you read UNDER THE BLACK FLAG by David Cordingly. There's also a newer book about Kidd which contains a lot of great historical information. It is called THE PIRATE HUNTER by Richard Zacks. Or, if you can find it (I THINK it is still in print) look up PIRATES OF THE WEST INDIES by Clinton Black: my personal `all-time` favorite. I think you will be shocked and pleasantly surprised when your ideas of what is realistic and what is not are suddenly expanded. You will open the gamebox and install Sid Meier's Pirates! to find that it provides the perfect balance of realism and fun.

<img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/bookish.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":mm" border="0" alt="bookish.gif" />

Mark these words, because I think this is the only lucid tought I have ever had on the subject:

<b>I think Pirates! will be defined as a game that has a healthy respect for history but never takes itself too seriously.

I think the series by Akella is exactly opposite: not one iota of respect for history but boy they sure did mean to get those ships right.</b>

Read on! Cheers!

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<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Soo i will not be able make the crew of a vanquished ship walk the plank?!?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Everything we know about Pirates! 2 is either taken from previews from E3, designer diaries or the original game which is our primary source of information. Having said that, it's doubtful that you'll be able to make prisoners walk the plank. I think their strategy is to OMIT a lot of otherwise realistic things (a far cry different from making prisoners walk the plank, real pirates might have taken great pleasure in disembowling a particularly hated enemy). However the realism of Pirates! IMO lies in what they have INCLUDED. I think if you really break down a game of Pirates and look at it piece by piece, any of the things that happen in the game could happen in reality. Shmoozing with the governors daughter could happen if a privateer reached a high enough rank and had good rapport with the governor. Certainly the division of plunder happened. Civrules once mentioned an article he read about a pirate escape that seemed very much like those we have seen in preview clips. I imagine a pirate even swung from the mainmast on occasion, mirroring the dynamic albeit insane boarding actions we have witnessed. Taken as a whole, Pirates! does get pretty `far-fetched`, but therein lies the fun of it.

Not to get off topic from the post (but speaking for myself anyway I need to take a break from the realism issue and wanted to know....) does anyone know if we can buy and sell outfits like in Morrowind? Half the fun of Morrowind is getting money to reoutfit yourself. That would be great.

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The ability to clothe yourself without having to do so thru reskinning would push this game from impending legend into the stratosphere of "BEST THING EVER".
<img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/onya.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":onya" border="0" alt="onya.gif" />

Regarding realism, there is one other crucial area of importance: travel. In the Akella line of games, events are handed to you individually as small vignettes. A battle here, an island there. None are truly connected in the way Pirates! will be. In Pirates!, you'll form a much stronger bond with your crew and ship, because you will rely on the strengths of both (AND your own) to get you from point A to point B, all in real time. In the Akella games, it makes no difference if you have 3 or 50 sailors, you just click a destination on the map and the game cuts you out of the loop. In Pirates! however, YOU are the one who needs to successfully navigate your ship among the islands, and your ability to do so will depend on your crew and ship. This is real, where Akella is not. Bear in mind that I'm not saying that the actual sailing in Pirates! will be even close to real. It won't. I'm saying that Sid places every moment of your character in YOUR hands. It's real in that sense, that you are there every step of the way and must respond accordingly if you are to survive to a ripe old age.
 
Don't you worry I did some research on Piratehistory myself. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/pirate2.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":p:" border="0" alt="pirate2.gif" />

When I talk about realism, I do think mostly of graphics, of Ship manouvering and other things.

I agree that the Player will have more posibilities in Pirates!2 but that doesn't necesary make the Game more realistic to me, since you'll also have some posibilities which aren't realistic in any way.
I don't now how often I captured a War Galleon with a Pinace. You couldn't do this in Seadogs (well I couldn't).
 
In <i>reality</i> no pirates ever captured, captained or commanded anything remotely close to a war galleon in size anyway. <img src="http://www.piratesahoy.com/forum/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />
 
Buccaneers have been known to capture galleons with little more than a piragua. But not in the way Pirates! has handled it. Instead they boarded the vessels while they lay at anchor and hijacked them, taking captain and crew (who were probably drunk) captive.

But there you have found one way in which Akella's design is more realistic: sloops would normally be blown out of the water if they tangled with galleons (I revert back to micro vs. macro realism).

Any of these games require the good use of imagination if they are to be tolerated by the `historically-minded` players. I find myself using much more imagination tolerating Akella, however.

Yankee you bring up a problem I have often thought about but could never articulate. Namely, the interconnectivity of the SeaDogs series. Your use of the word "vignette" explains it well. Whereas the Pirates! and Cutthroats method make you feel as if battles are just a matter of zooming in on your otherwise free roaming vessel, SeaDogs gives the impression of two completely seperate games taking place, the very close and the very far.

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Yup...it's what I hate about the Akella games.
[q]Buccaneers have been known to capture galleons with little more than a piragua.[/q]
This is true, but was RARE as all hell...in fact there's only one or two recorded incidents. I should have been more in clear in that no pirates captured and kept big fat lumbering galleons for their own use. At least not for longer than it took to sail it to port and sell it....
 
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