So, for the kisrael reader's benefit, I thought I'd summarize parts of the IM conversation that Kirk and I had about today's Funny Video and Quote OTM. I agree with both Kirk and Peterman-- it is a little one-note, but it did make me laugh. I don't agree that Liberty City is a city with its own agenda, but at least Kirk and I agree that it makes no bones about its failure to be deeply interactive. I figured I'd like to see some more general stuff that goes on in the town whether you are playing or not, but I suspect that it'll end up as a bunch of scripted events that'll end up listed in a FAQ somewhere.
Someday, though, games will be intelligent enough (and consoles and PCs powerful enough) that the Liberty Cities of the gaming world will contain thinking players, in essence Massively Multiplayer Offline worlds that feature open-ended paths for player activity and interaction as well as missions, narratives, and room for advancement.
--LAN3 Sun Apr 25 02:55:16 2004
My other big theme is, despite limiting the ineractions you have with pedestrians to punching, shooting, threatening to shoot, and running over so that you don't realize what dumb little bots they are, overall, the cities in GTA games don't feel carefully setup to just be an environment for a game...they're more or less just cities (with some fun ramps to jump over etc, but whatever.)
--Kirk Sun Apr 25 06:01:01 2004
Some might say that Morrowind already meets your criteria, LAN3.
--Max Sun Apr 25 07:26:28 2004
Well, that could well be, but there are two things that typically turn me off in games: fantasy themes and anything that calls itself an RPG; I just never got into either for some reason.
--LAN3 Sun Apr 25 17:11:18 2004
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