What do you want in an FPS?

Think of this as a wishlist. Jot down whatever you think would be nice, or perhaps you saw something used in an FPS that hasnt been replicated in other games and you think it should. Whatever comes to mind.

Myself, I would like a HUD-less user interface. With the emphasis nowadays being on carrying just two main weapons and regenrating health, do we really need a HUD? I was watching the Far Cry 2 trailers and the lack of a HUD really immersed me into it. It would also add a lot of suspense since you would need to either guess how much ammo is left in your clip, and how many clips you have left, and if you run into bad guys you dont know when to reload until you hear *click*

As for aiming, just use iron sights.

Maybe they could have a number signifying clips left...but thats it.

I would like the FPS to

A) Stop making so many of them in such a short period of time.. There are many other genres.

B) People stop hyping a month that its the best month ever when all it is, is a bunch of FPS's and thats it.

C) Have the fans stop leg humping the game for "zomg" graphics.

This pretty much sums up my feelings of FPS as of late.. And some of my favorite games are/were FPS's, but I am certainly getting annoyed at the orgy of releases of JUST FPS's and the fanatic fans of just playing those games.

If i read well about FAr Cry 2 is the kind of FPS i always dream of. But for now let see if Crysis deliver !

the no HUD idea would be good, except that there would have to be a clip-checking feature (just like in condemned:criminal origins) where you press a button and your weapon's drops in your hand and you check the remaining ammo. Of course this would be hard to do with an assault rifle or other guns....greatmax1

that would be tricky. I suppose if youre using more modern assault rifles and smgs you could have the clear polymer magazines, but for an AK idunno.

look up far cry 2

Weapon customization isa really nice feature inCrysis.

Physix w/o Ageia. Seriously. Better FPS and Performance for midrange vid cards

Physix w/o Ageia. Seriously. Better FPS and Performance for midrange vid cards

endtype

Bioshock had some pretty damn good performance with mid range cards.

FPS:

1. to not care so much about graphics , gameplay is more important

2. Very intense action like doom3 or brothers in arms

3.not too many role playing fps

4.be fun, not "innovative"

More elements to the side, setting the "hero" in a broader universe where he actually interacts with characters. Lately I feel in the end most FPS boil down to running through maps shooting anything that moves while getting some spoken orders.

Give me an FPS where you start as an assassin and rise through the ranks of guns for hire, interacting with other people in the city. Or Syndicate in FPS format...

STALKER was my dream of first person shooter until it came out... looked SO good on paper. inventory, free world, day and night cycling and all that stuff. well it still is good compared to other shooters, but it could've been much better.

i would like the shooter to be a mixture of Fallout and Stalker. almost like stalker, but with world map in it. lot's of different locations, and lots of side quests. that would be great.

i would like more all-in-one AI - if you look at AI types in games, the ai is always built around the particular playstyle of the game - compare a run n gun game with a slower paced tactical shooter with a stealth game, each has fundamentally different AI which is built around the particular game's playstyle, and if you try and adopt a playstyle not suited to the AI, it doesn't work

as an example, i'd like to play a run n gun game where i can hide, avoid enemies and take them down with stealth without everyone else being automatically alerted to my presence and automatically knowing where i am - and i would like the AI to facilitate that, by having realistic vision cones and hearing spheres, by patrolling, by not seeing me when i'm standing in pitch black darkness -and other techniques which would facilitate it... i would not necessarily want the focus to be on stealthing, just as an example, but i would like the AI to facilitate it if that was how i chose to play the game, rather than being forced into a particular playstyle - most games aren't very accomodating in this

abolition of the sheild system - i know it's no more of a computer game contrivance than health packs, but i like my health packs... i think shield systems are stupid... my personal favourite health system to date is probably in call of cthulhu: dark corners of the earth - you take particular wounds in particular areas, and use approprite health items (which you carry around with you) to cure your specific wounds... f.e.a.r had a kinda sorta similar mechanic, only more streamlined - i liked that, too

no more crosshairs - some games benefit from it (non-realistic games like, as an example, UT3) but i think firing blind from the hip or placing arrucate shots with iron sights is the best mechanic for a realistic shooter - i first experienced this specific style in brothers in arms, i thought it worked great, and i think more fps games should consider it

bodily animations - i don't like being a floating hand and gun, i like to see my body, i like to see my hands when i climb ladders (instead of climbing ladders hands free, which always freaked me out), i like to be able to kick stuff over, jump over stuff, when i open a door, i want to sling my gun down and extend an arm and open it - all with contextual animations... f.e.a.r really started this, but it didn't take it very far... project origin seems to be taking it further, but there's still far more capacity for immersion in so far as feeling like we actually are the character, through body animations, and i think more games should look into this

this doesn't just apply to FPS, but it's probably most prominent in FPS games - the locked door... which, frankly, is no different than an invisible wall... whenever i hit a door, a door i can't open, i get pissed off - because all i can think is, the developers don't want me going in there - i know from experience that good level design is a massive pain, and given that most areas would carry redundancy anyway (as they would just be periphery not connected with the primary route of the player), it is easier to just lock them off, but it still irks me to have these areas that i cannot get through because the door is locked, but my character is perfectly happy to blow some other door open, because i magically know that that's where i need to go

more story - again, this isn't just a problem afflicting FPS and yet, again, it's most prominent in FPS games - the story is usually a brief set of facts tying everything together - there's little to no character, there's little to no content, there's little to no development - a game like max payne is a perfect example of how well a shooter can carry a story - sure, it's hardly original as stories go, but the presentation and style makes it an utter joy to experience, and adds so much more to the game than simply the existence of a story

and you know, thinking about it - i think farcry 2 is promising to deliver on all of these points... just hope that game isn't all marketing BS

personally i'd like to see more fps's using the doom 3 engine like a modern shooter with m4's and whatnot, seems it kinda came and went especially compared to how many games that used the quake 3 engine.anyways... there is a fps in development called "alliance: the silent war" which looks pretty sweet, suppose to be like the gran turismo of fps's. what i want i a fps? hmm...smooth crosshair (no jerkiness), wide selection of weapons that are totally customizable, and 15 hours or more of unscripted gameplay. maybe i want too much.

Lots more bullet time... even if its really inapropriate. dbowman

lol, i love bullet-time too

Think of this as a wishlist. Jot down whatever you think would be nice, or perhaps you saw something used in an FPS that hasnt been replicated in other games and you think it should. Whatever comes to mind.

Myself, I would like a HUD-less user interface. With the emphasis nowadays being on carrying just two main weapons and regenrating health, do we really need a HUD? I was watching the Far Cry 2 trailers and the lack of a HUD really immersed me into it. It would also add a lot of suspense since you would need to either guess how much ammo is left in your clip, and how many clips you have left, and if you run into bad guys you dont know when to reload until you hear *click*

As for aiming, just use iron sights.

Maybe they could have a number signifying clips left...but thats it.

mrbojangles25

Crysis' delta mode will be hudless, even the cross hairs will be gone :D dont know if somone said that already.. but ya.

As for me, they need to get a good balance between health and realism. In some , and most FPS, u have to land a whole lotta bullets into somone before they die, especially with pistols. In real life youd be knocked out with only 2 or 3 lol.Especially if it hit one of ur vital organs, like ur braainnn -_-.

This is what I want in an FPS.

Them to stop making them for awhile. Explore other possible genre's and make money off of them. I'm tired of walking into a video game store and going to the pc gaming section and seeing like 2 isles dedicated to FPS games, and just small sections of every other genre. And then I'm like, why do you only carry the 2007 games of every other genre and every FPS ever created for the PC? Then they answer with, that's just FPS games from the summer and up of 2007. :(

I what i would like to see in a FPS game

1. Life like Graphics are a must

2. large maps not dull depressing ones

3. Photo realistic guns with smooth recoil and shell ejection

4. easy to use commands and features

5. should be able to destroy anything and use anything as cover I.e no invisible boundary's or building you can't enter

I would like more realism, the ability to choose the path or actions I perfer to take, very good story, more levels, not so-much destruction of environment(just enough to get job done), more thing to operate, less weapons(more survival tacts), more hand-to-hand combat, kill-or-not situations, and an ending that showed you accomplished something for the better. If company is using technical advisors, use only people with expertise in area(s) depicted in story.

10-20-200711:40:27

i would like more all-in-one AI - if you look at AI types in games, the ai is always built around the particular playstyle of the game - compare a run n gun game with a slower paced tactical shooter with a stealth game, each has fundamentally different AI which is built around the particular game's playstyle, and if you try and adopt a playstyle not suited to the AI, it doesn't work

as an example, i'd like to play a run n gun game where i can hide, avoid enemies and take them down with stealth without everyone else being automatically alerted to my presence and automatically knowing where i am - and i would like the AI to facilitate that, by having realistic vision cones and hearing spheres, by patrolling, by not seeing me when i'm standing in pitch black darkness -and other techniques which would facilitate it... i would not necessarily want the focus to be on stealthing, just as an example, but i would like the AI to facilitate it if that was how i chose to play the game, rather than being forced into a particular playstyle - most games aren't very accomodating in this

abolition of the sheild system - i know it's no more of a computer game contrivance than health packs, but i like my health packs... i think shield systems are stupid... my personal favourite health system to date is probably in call of cthulhu: dark corners of the earth - you take particular wounds in particular areas, and use approprite health items (which you carry around with you) to cure your specific wounds... f.e.a.r had a kinda sorta similar mechanic, only more streamlined - i liked that, too

no more crosshairs - some games benefit from it (non-realistic games like, as an example, UT3) but i think firing blind from the hip or placing arrucate shots with iron sights is the best mechanic for a realistic shooter - i first experienced this specific style in brothers in arms, i thought it worked great, and i think more fps games should consider it

bodily animations - i don't like being a floating hand and gun, i like to see my body, i like to see my hands when i climb ladders (instead of climbing ladders hands free, which always freaked me out), i like to be able to kick stuff over, jump over stuff, when i open a door, i want to sling my gun down and extend an arm and open it - all with contextual animations... f.e.a.r really started this, but it didn't take it very far... project origin seems to be taking it further, but there's still far more capacity for immersion in so far as feeling like we actually are the character, through body animations, and i think more games should look into this

this doesn't just apply to FPS, but it's probably most prominent in FPS games - the locked door... which, frankly, is no different than an invisible wall... whenever i hit a door, a door i can't open, i get pissed off - because all i can think is, the developers don't want me going in there - i know from experience that good level design is a massive pain, and given that most areas would carry redundancy anyway (as they would just be periphery not connected with the primary route of the player), it is easier to just lock them off, but it still irks me to have these areas that i cannot get through because the door is locked, but my character is perfectly happy to blow some other door open, because i magically know that that's where i need to go

more story - again, this isn't just a problem afflicting FPS and yet, again, it's most prominent in FPS games - the story is usually a brief set of facts tying everything together - there's little to no character, there's little to no content, there's little to no development - a game like max payne is a perfect example of how well a shooter can carry a story - sure, it's hardly original as stories go, but the presentation and style makes it an utter joy to experience, and adds so much more to the game than simply the existence of a story

and you know, thinking about it - i think farcry 2 is promising to deliver on all of these points... just hope that game isn't all marketing BS

mfsa

Excellent post. I agree on most things you say about FPS.

Super Mario

Seeing your hands do the stuff you're supposedly doing, like picking up weapons and ammo, pressing buttons, opening doors, grabbing hold of something etc. And, like in Crysis, enemies that are doing something, not just waiting around in random locations for you to show up and fight them. Fixing a car, eating, chatting, sleeping, smoking, sitting, driving, patrolling or whatever, and they have actual conversations and it's apparent that they've been staying there, so there's bathrooms, food, drinks and things like that.

A lot of the features in Crysis are like a dream come true for me. But unfortunately, my GeForce 6600 won't run it and I can't afford a proper card. :(

Deformable terrain and buildings. And I'm talking truly deformable, not the kinda crap where you shoot a rocket at a building and some script blows a neat little hole in it for you. Think Source engine, only... everything. Building, floor, trees, everything. And none of that crap where you shoot the wheels out of a car and that's it - the remains just split into neat little pieces, bounce off a few times with a weight of what looks like 5 grams, and disappear after a few seconds. I want everything that's loaded at a start of a level to stay there, and be fully interactive, down to the bolts on that wheel or knobs on that door. And I want them to get the physics right - pebbles don't weigh much but when they fall but when they hit the ground they stay there, not just roll down some invisible hill; when those pieces of wall fly through the air after an explosion they get flung upppppp, and then downnnnnn, and STAY there until some other considerable force moves them; and when they get moved they still look HEAVY, the friction between them and the ground trying hard to keep them in place. And bullet penetration and mass also factors into this, of course. Basically I wish they'd relax on getting brighter and shinier graphics and concentrate more on the physics and realism side of things.

That is all. The rest can wait...

Enemies that are challenging in ways other than just having tons of hitpoints

Playing a story and not being TOLD a story by NPCs. Today it's like, you do something then somebody explains stuff to you

AI that can actually outsmart me.

Guns that actually take skill to use.

Maps that are real places on Earth, not fictional.

Huge Maps, like playing in all of NYC.

No invisible walls, how about something that makes sense? I can't get across the river because the bridge is out, and the crossing is defended by a brigade of soldiers and tanks, which I eventually kill when I get the right weaponry.

NON Linear story (quite hard to do though)

No Zombies/ Aliens

Fully Destructable enviroment, HOW AWESOME would it be to shoot an entire building down? With proper equiptment of course, I don't want it easy. But possible.

Puzzle-Ish. I'm somewhere blocked off, I have to find my own way out.

I'm not rambo, make me killable.

QUOTE="mrbojangles25"]I want more deformable environments. This tech has been around for a long time, at least since Red Faction, but it is not used as extensively as it should be. I want to be trapped ina building, then blow holes in the wall (make my own "exit") and then flank my attackers. I want to shoot the pillars out from underneath a deck, toppling it into bad guys underneath. IF I am trapped on the second floor of a house, I Want to shoot the floor beneath me and plummet to the first floor.

yes good point. the odd time in games you have to do the something like blow the wall open but its the fact that you have to and have no alternative option. it would be awesome to make your own route through a house. crysis looks like it has a bit of this, in a video i saw the dude shooting ropes holding a bunch of logs together and letting them roll over the bad guys. i found it in farcry as well (with barrels)but it was too late, i had already killed all of them!!

also even if this is in games, you want it to actually be useful. i cant stand when games have something really neat in them like the logs thing and its easier to just shoot the guys. you need a bit of necessity. not too much though.

nice thread

Enemies that are challenging in ways other than just having tons of hitpoints

Playing a story and not being TOLD a story by NPCs. Today it's like, you do something then somebody explains stuff to you

kyrieee

Ya, I think a game that had insanely smart enemies, and fewer of them, would be better. I think a gunfight in an office complex, for example, with two or three really smart enemies would be far better than just plowing through the building killing 20-30 bad guys.

The smart ones would duck, run away, hide, and then flank you. Plus, they would have to be as physically tough as the player. I guess to simplify it, you could say it would be like singleplayer deathmatch.

Hud-less interface (enter Farcry 2), customizable weapons, Awesome graphics, and most importantly ultra realistic gore. Not like SOF2 or SOF:PB gore which is over the top, but insanely realistic gore. Like if a 7.62 round hits an enemy in the forehead the entire head wont explode. Like a small entry hole, then a massive exit wound with brain skull and hair blown onto the wall and ground behind it.

Realistic gore immerses me into a game, and a good physics engine (Havok).

JET PACKS!

like in good old tribes 2 =)

The thing with lots of AI though is that for it to be fun the player has to be aware of what the AI does. Like Bethesda talked about having the AI breaking into your house and stealing stuff but that wouldn't be appealing were it to be implemented because all you'd see was your stuff being gone. I think that in many games too good AI would just make it impossible to play :P because realisticly, you can't be a one man army. If the enemies worked togethed, set traps, used sniper baits and stuff, you wouldn't win. Still, it's an area which has room for massive improvement and I think that it can provide immersion that goes way beyond that of superficial graphics.kyrieee

Yes, I remember that was yet another part of Oblivion that disappointed players, the poor AI. THe truth is, at least from what I read, that Bethesda had to ultimately scrap the AI because it was too real and, as a result, too frustrating for the player. Sure, it sounds cool to have an NPC steal stuff, but when the stuff stolen is your hard-earne rewards, thats no fun. Not to mention you could be pickpocketed, etc.

Hud-less interface (enter Farcry 2), customizable weapons, Awesome graphics, and most importantly ultra realistic gore. Not like SOF2 or SOF:PB gore which is over the top, but insanely realistic gore. Like if a 7.62 round hits an enemy in the forehead the entire head wont explode. Like a small entry hole, then a massive exit wound with brain skull and hair blown onto the wall and ground behind it.

Realistic gore immerses me into a game, and a good physics engine (Havok).

huejass

Why do you want gore? It's not realistic. Some gunfire can cause dismemberment but in most cases it won't. You don't play games because you want to feel like you're actually killing people. Adding lots of gore is just glorifying the suffering the guy you kill goes through and making people suffer isn't my idea of fun just because it's in a video game. Having combat in a game works well as a game mechanic and ties in well with heroism etc. and shooting someone is an easily identifiable 'win' situation but the point of it isn't actually killing people, you don't think of it as killing people. The more you focus on the actual dying and suffering the further it gets from the reason to have combat. It's like in an action movie the hero might kill lots of anonymous bad guys, but it's not portrayed as him being a mass murderer, it's just that the combat can be exciting. Then you have sick stuff like hostel and saw which are just sadistic.

That's the way I see it anyway. The only fun you can have with shooting people's limbs off is some sort of sadistic pleasure and that's is TOTALLY different from just killing a guy in say HL2 which is more like jumping on a mushroom in mario. I don't think it shouldn't be allowed or anything, it's just that it's sick IMO and I don't see the point of having it.

[QUOTE="huejass"]

Hud-less interface (enter Farcry 2), customizable weapons, Awesome graphics, and most importantly ultra realistic gore. Not like SOF2 or SOF:PB gore which is over the top, but insanely realistic gore. Like if a 7.62 round hits an enemy in the forehead the entire head wont explode. Like a small entry hole, then a massive exit wound with brain skull and hair blown onto the wall and ground behind it.

Realistic gore immerses me into a game, and a good physics engine (Havok).

kyrieee

Why do you want gore? It's not realistic. Some gunfire can cause dismemberment but in most cases it won't. You don't play games because you want to feel like you're actually killing people. Adding lots of gore is just glorifying the suffering the guy you kill goes through and making people suffer isn't my idea of fun just because it's in a video game. Having combat in a game works well as a game mechanic and ties in well with heroism etc. and shooting someone is an easily identifiable 'win' situation but the point of it isn't actually killing people, you don't think of it as killing people. The more you focus on the actual dying and suffering the further it gets from the reason to have combat. It's like in an action movie the hero might kill lots of anonymous bad guys, but it's not portrayed as him being a mass murderer, it's just that the combat can be exciting. Then you have sick stuff like hostel and saw which are just sadistic.

That's the way I see it anyway. The only fun you can have with shooting people's limbs off is some sort of sadistic pleasure and that's is TOTALLY different from just killing a guy in say HL2 which is more like jumping on a mushroom in mario. I don't think it shouldn't be allowed or anything, it's just that it's sick IMO and I don't see the point of having it.

Because it adds realism. In HL2 your revolver is based off of the Taurus "raging bull" line of revolvers, it comes in varying calibers .357, .454 to name 2. Now, in HL2 when you shoot a combine grunt in the head with it he does a double backflip from the kinetic impact of the round. Now, in a realistic setting, the combine guy would simply drop but he'd be missing about 1/8th of his skull.That sort of realism immerses me in a game.

I'm looking for realism, I dont want a game that makes you feel like a super hero, I want a game that makes me feel like a small part of something bigger, with realism to back that up.

I would like to see a Heavy Gear 3.. Heavy Gear series was great in every way, mixing the Mech and FPS genre perfectly.