Tell me how you play computer games

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1826802]

Today's poll suggestion is courtesy of bracknellexile who will no doubt be mining the data to see if his thesis is correct.

Edit: Please take a look at bracknellexile's comment further down, as he'd really appreciate your replies!

Comments

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

Shooters: Generally first-person, but conversely I had no problem playing the Max Payne games which were over-the-shoulder.

RPGs: Generally over-the-shoulder, but zooming into FPS where you can for archery or sniping, or those occasional times where your in a cramped space and need to see what is directly in front of you (such as picking items off a table).

Racing games: Cockpit view. (I especially like games like Forza where they make the effort to give each car a proper dashboard -when I got Forza 3, I still had my S2000, and it was a genuine thrill when I realised that they had properly modelled the electronic rev counter (see userpic)). I find chase cam difficult because the turn-in point feels wrong.

[bracknellexile.livejournal.com]

Interesting that you have that difference between Shooters and RPGs. I suspect it's simply a ranged vs. melee thing. I can never get the accuracy trying to do anything at range in an over-the-shoulder view but then I tend to play FP for both types so don't get the practise.

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

Ranged v melee is definitely a part of it. In melee, the person you need to attack next may well be to your character's side already hitting you, whereas in ranged combat you're only going to be firing at things in front of you.

It might partly be a speed thing - shooters are faster, so somehow my brain processes the change of direction quicker when the screen is showing what my character can see. Or something like that. Perhaps.

It might partly be a habit thing. I've been playing shooters since Wolfenstein 3D. (Actually, although you couldn't actually shoot anything, I've been playing 3D first-person perspective real-time movement games since 3D Monster Maze on the ZX-81 (see userpic)). And those shooters are usually first-person. Whereas with RPGs, there's an obvious progression from say Fallout (top-down isometric) to Fallout 3 (3rd or 1st person) and so my instinct is to see that sort of game as a third person game.





[I'm annoyed now that it's too late to edit out the ungrammatical "your" (which was a typo rather more than poor grammar) in my above post. I apologise. Normal service will be resumed at a later date.]

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

RPGs often have more character customisation options than in shooters, so your clothing/armour/character creation choices (whichever you're given in the specific game) might change how you look so give you a reason to want to see your character. If I reset the game mid opening cutscene three times just to tweak the shape of my character's nose, I damn well want to see it!