FPS games that are "on rails" or "interactive movies"

[inertianinja]

Since signing up for GameFly, I've taken the opportunity to play some of the older FPS shooters that I didn't feel were worth a $60 purchase back when they came out. I'm a big FPS guy, I'm big into single player campaigns, and generally I wish they'd just make the single player better rather than tack on multiplayer (unless there's some interesting mechanic you'd like to do online, like FEAR's slow-mo). I just played FEAR 2 and Resistance 2, immediately after spending months playing Fallout 3 (78 hours!).

Initially, I was frustrated by how "on-rails" these games were. One path through the game, one way to solve puzzles, no variation in how events unfold. I've heard that frustration echoed by other people saying that it's just an "interactive movie" and that the lack of open-world-ness makes it boring.

After putting some thought into it, I changed my opinion for two reasons:

(1) the open world thing can actually make things weirder than reality. in Fallout, i'd start a quest that was "urgent" (the Super Mutants took my friends!), but it didn't matter if i went and dicked around the Capital Wasteland for a week before taking care of things. that's not really more "realistic," it's just "open."

(2) the lack of options guaranteed a specific and consistent experience, and didn't allow me to ruin it by bugging out and running to the other side of the map whenever a big enemy force showed up. it made sure that i took the *interesting* path, rather than the *chosen* path (plenty of times in Fallout i'd hang way back and leisurely snipe people rather than battling up close). It's closer to a "movie" in that the tension is controlled by the director.

i guess the trick is to leave the world open enough that the player can explore a bit, keep it on rails to control the experience, but make the player feel like HE chose the path, even though he really didn't :)

what do you think?

[icu]

I think it all really depends on the "director". More and more I am becoming a fan of the "open world" type games, but again these have to be done right as well.

It does come down to personal preference and the "open world" games have their weaknesses for sure - down time, confusion over what you are supposed to be doing, lack of motivation to do said stuff.

In the same way highly linear games can just come off terribly and make you feel like your hand is being held. It's hard to feel immersed in a fictional universe when you're only allowed to move forward down an obvious path sprinkled with even more obvious triggered events.

My favorite games now are open world games thanks to efforts like Far Cry 2 and Mount and Blade (not really a FPS per se). In these cases the "director" is me and as long as the fighting is fun I'll enjoy the film.

There are superb examples of "linear" games in which the devs/directors "do it right" such as Half-Life2 and Bioshock.
At the same time a game which I can see is very well done like CoD4 just turned me off as I didn't like the feeling like I was being rushed down a narrow alley and I'm someone who usually loves a good military shooter. I guess the difference for me is that I'd rather play a game that makes you feel like you're are participating in a war not a war movie.

As with so many things it comes down to personal preference, but so much of it comes down to execution. I mean, I can dig some country music if it's done really well.

[dolson]

I will agree whole-heartedly with the comments about multiplayer. I think Resistance 2 *really* suffered from that. The co-op was good, but was still missing something, so I didn't put much time into it. I have grown out of most competitive multiplayer, except I do dabble with Battlefield from time to time. I think games like that are built for multiplayer first, and should probably stick with that. Aside from co-op, there are far too many multiplayer modes tacked onto single-player games that could have used the disc space / development time/talent to lengthen and improve the campaign.

It is rare that a game has such good multiplayer that it would rip people away from the staples... Whether it's COD4, WoW, Battlefield, Warhawk, Halo, or whatever. There's no need for multiplayer in a game like Chronicles of Riddick, FEAR, Uncharted... Except, Uncharted 2's MP is surprisingly good, I still won't play the competitive mode much. Just my tastes changing. I'd much rather have a new Elder Scrolls or Fallout game where I could optionally play with a friend or two and go questing together. Looks like Borderlands is exactly what I want.

[aerodash84]

I like open world games to an extent. I think it depends on how you can explore the world. WoW felt quite boring and slow before I had a mount. I got frustrated with Oblivion (tho I may try the 360 version since my PC kept crashing). Games like GTA I had more fun messing around then actually doing the main story line. Those seem to be my problem with open world games is I may lose interest in progressing through the game. I also dislike having to take long breaks only to come back and forget what I was working on. I'm now more of a fan of linear games with worlds to explore. I really enjoy exploring little areas in Batman: AA and being rewarded for it. Having an open world and very little encouragement outside of "oh this is neat" doesn't draw me anymore. I could be jaded or it could be my lack of time to play, but those are my preferences now.

[vegan]

I prefer the more "directed" experience of linear games. I'm not into "making my own story" or what-have-you; I want the developers to show me what they've got.

I think a lot of that stems from my dislike of feeling as if there's something I'm going to miss. If I'm going to spend a long time playing a game, I'd better be seeing everything that's in it. There's other games to move onto after finishing one, so I'm not going to turn right around and start a New Game+.