gardenofwiids.wordpress.com — A lone blogger comes to Ubisoft's aid in attempting to explain why they chose to go with canned animations/techniques for sword moves in Red Steel for the Wii rather than freestyle play ... and why they were right to do so.
Jul 21, 2006 View in Crawl 4
kingthotJul 22, 2006
Well written logical look at the development decision to use "canned" moves. I enjoyed reading it.
neocitronJul 22, 2006
it makes sense, he's trying to remain practical.. but what would be awesome is "selective" freeform... say you strike the opponent off guard.... now you enter this "bullet time free form" and you can choose any spot you would like to hit. it doesn't damage progression or development at all.
gridbreadJul 22, 2006
You would think a way of doing this would be to hold a button for free-form, you then slash in a direction, the sword on-screen moves that way, you release, it resets to default position.Pressing it again before it resets pauses the position and allows you to swipe another direction.*shrugs*
atmofunkJul 22, 2006
Streetfighter, DOA, Tekken, et al have always used canned moves -- how is this any different on a fundamental level? At any rate, my guess is that once the Wii matures and developers get more experience and ideas based off released games, we will see a second generation where such gameplay mechanics are introduced..This *is* a new tech for everyone afterall -- even the developers. Where's the sense in asking them for perfection on their first attempt?
spidomanJul 22, 2006
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vholdJul 23, 2006
Very true. I think the first game to successfully get people to have to realistically move the 'sword' around will basically have the sword move lagged according to how the body would have to position itself to get that sword into the position of the controller.Once it does that, people will either just not move it so fast and play more tactically, picking and holding positions and waiting the split-second or so for the character to catch up, or they'll start following the natural movements of the character which will give them the greatest advantage since they'll always have minimal controller lag for small corrections that way.
vholdJul 23, 2006
Well, the key to that game is that it is entirely on rails, the only thing you worry about is the sword. Also, you are actually holding a sword, so you are limited by your own ability to manipulate that thing within it's little sensor towers.
kingfelixJul 26, 2006
yes, but what initially makes a fighting game possible for everyone to play (button-mashers included) is what ultimately renders it hopelessly boring. you speak of "fun" in memorizing and executing combos, and say "it wasn't about the fighting"...well, imagine a new kind of game that IS about the fighting. where you CAN do anything you can imagine, within the physical limits of the game's reality. now that is exciting!it's too bad that red steel has turned out not to be that game
vman456Sep 5, 2006
Good to see a lot of DBTS fans here! :DI'm currently in a beta test for a game called Determinance that uses free-form sword movement with the mouse. It's very intriguing and quite skill demanding. Control in this game is much easier than in DBTS. If you want to check it out here's the link:<a class="user" href="http://www.mode7games.com/">http://www.mode7games.com/</a>It's really fun and the developers are very involved and very nice. :)As for free form on the topic of Red Steel:You guys need to understand that it's not easy to become a 1337 ninja or swordsman, it does take years of dedication and practice, however it would probably be much easier in a game against A.I.Sword on sword dueling isn't just about knowing how to swing a blade, half of the combat is the footwork. Footwork is a very important factor in martial arts and it would be hard to replicate something so complicated in a game like this.So if you want free-form sword fighting buy a few longsword wasters and protective gear and have fun with your friends. I'm still waiting for the day of virtual reality. Seriously, how cool would it be to be able to fight a horde of orcs alongside many friends? I dream too much...
martinusDec 1, 2006
As a software developer and doing a bit of martial arts with bokken training, I can tell you that a real swords simulator would have been absolutely uber-cool and definitely possible with the Wii. For example, with the first easy opponents it is ok to just slash the sword from left to right for a kill. Later on you will have to learn to evade the first slash, step to the left, and swing the sword sideways. The opponents should get more and more sophisticated so that YOU (not the avatar) has to learn new techniques. You could even learn cool kata's with a swords trainer to fight two opponents at the same time. A game like this would have been a real hit.The only reason that Ubisoft uses "Canned" sword movements is that they want to reduce risk and development effort, because hey, they can market their game like it was an uber-cool swords game, and still sell you a simple and not innovative game.