We’ve said a lot of times that cut-scenes and quick-time events should be avoided. A couple of days ago, we informed you about Crytek’s plans for Crysis 3 and in that story, we expressed – for one more time – our opinion about the quick-time and scripted events. And we are happy to see the developers of Amnesia: The Dark Descent backing our claims. According to Frictional’s Thomas the biggest culprit for the lack of agency in most horror games are the cut-scenes. Damn straight right.
Thomas said that it is a big waste that many horror games do not take advantage of the fact that they can make the player feel as they are there when the horror happens properly, and destroy the sense of agency in all kind of ways. The biggest culprit – as Thomas said – are cut-scenes, especially when they take away control at scary moments when the player’s actions should matter the most.
And Thomas is right. Games should offer players the complete control in epic or horror scenes. Cut-scenes and quick-time events should be overused, as they take you away from the whole gaming experience, no matter how cool they might be at first glance.
Thomas concluded that the way to go forward here is ‘to make sure that the player is involved in all actions that take place. The scenes that are so often left out (and replaced by cutscenes) are often vital aspects of the horror experience. Whenever possible, the playing should be doing instead of simply watching.‘
We’d advise you to read the complete post of Thomas at Frictional Games Blog as it contains 9 more ways to evolve horror games.
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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