I have been playing Centipede (info, screenshots) on my Atari 2600 for the first time today. It is amazing how well it stands up in gameplay to modern games (I guess there is no reason why it shouldn’t really, but it is still suprising). What caught my attention most with the game is the clever gameplay mechanic it uses. Every element of the game puts the player in the position where they have to balance risk against reward.

Do you want 900pts for shooting a spider? Better shoot the spider point blank. Don’t like the risk of a point blank shot? Shoot from a distance for 300pts.

Want to slow down the centipede? Then shoot the mushrooms in its path - but get less bonus points when you lose a life. Want more bonus points? Then leave the mushrooms on screen and handle the centipede’s rapid descent.

When you die you usually feel that is is your fault. You were too greedy and took one risk too many. Note that this feeling plays alongside the more typical feeling of either the game being too hard or that you are not good enough to beat it, but it has a very different effect on the player. Almost always it gives players the “just-one-more-go” syndrome. Not many games manage to get this across well and it is nice to see such a perfect example that was originally released way back in 1982! (I was just one year old then!).

While many modern developers talk of the risk-reward balance, very few games made lately seem to show a good approach to working with the risk-reward balance in-game. Many games present players with a choice of performing an action with a fixed risk-reward balance: Should I go down the pit with the spiders to get the gold or not? What is great about Centipede is that it takes this binary descision and makes it analogue: (In the case of the earlier example) How many spiders can I take on in a pit, given that I’ll fine 1 gold coin for each spider. This acts to involve the player more in the game as the player himself (or herself) becomes the one defining the difficulty landscape of the game.

I really enjoy playing games based around a core mechanic, and Centipede is one of the best examples of this I have seen in a while (even though it is 22 years old!).

Right, back to work!

I haven’t really paid as much attention to nVidia & Epic’s Make Something Unreal contest as I should have, but at the moment I’m checking out a few of the entries. I’m not really into online games at the moment so delights such as Red Orchestra will have to wait until I have the time (and motivation) but I am trying to check out the singleplayer entries. They are all very impressive but I was drawn to play Damnation first.

Damnation is a first and third-person action game (with platform elements) running on UT2004. Graphically it is initially very impressive with a good “steampunk” style to it and some nicely modelled characters. Animation is also good but with a few glitches especially with things like one of the player characters coats passing through his legs etc… I was expecting straight forward FPS style action from the gameplay but it is more like a mix between Prince of Persia: Sands of Time and a console FPS of some kind. While playing Damnation is an enjoyable experience the clash between it’s first and third person modes is a cause of many annoying problems. Third person view is used for moving about, negotiation some of the more platform style areas and interacting with things like ladders and switches. Combat is entirely reserved for the first person view, which makes sense as the weapons are all projectile, but for an unknown reason you cannot climb ladders or throw switches while in first-person view (unless I missed something obvious).

The platform elements are the moments that will make most people sit up and realise Damnation is something different. Players can hang from ledges, climb ropes and ladders, jump across large gaps in a very “Tomb Raider” manner and initially you feel a little “led by the hand” but nothing seems to bad. After playing for a bit longer you find the platforming elements just break the flow of the game too much. Fixed cameras implemented in some places when in third-person view cause the usual problems with buttons suddenly taking you in the opposite direction when the fixed camera cuts it. Also the jumping seemed to me to be a bit hit or miss with the camera placement of the fixed cameras or the third-person view never allowing you to judge distance quite accurately enough for my liking. That’s quite alot of negativity! Yet I still enjoyed playing it so if you have 15 or so minutes to spare give it a go!