Allies?

[Redraf]

Do you think you should/are going to have allies in Rapture? (ie. people who escaped the chaos and the war who will be your friend; someone who you save, other than the Little Sisters, that really wants out of the city)

Almost all good games have allies in one sense or another. This ranges from simple storyline allies (the type that only talk to you in cutscenes or whatever, ex. Zelda or Halo for the most part) to in-game allies (either co-op or AI companions that fight alongside you, ex. Gears of War or Jade Empire). The whole idea of allies would make this game somewhat better in my opinion, because in a world like this, it can be incredibly lonely when nothing is on your side. However, it would have to be a less prevalent type of ally, someone who was either just in cutscenes or following you around without shooting stuff. Also I feel like who you make allies with would need to be optional.

I'd love to be the ally to some of the tortured citizens of rapture. So, what do you think?

[BioShockWins]

i was wondering the same thing... i was going to make a thread about this earlyer

[Jeff]

I'm not sure if you'll see "regular" humans and even if you do they won't necessarily be your allies. Keep in mind it's been hinted that anything in rapture has the potential to be your ally, from Big Daddy's to security drones.

[Hatesink]

I read somewhere that you probably will meet people who are trying to escape from Rapture (presumably relatively normal human beings), and that there's also a character that helps you to save the Little Sisters. Also, I think there are supposed to be faction-based missions etc. (the factions changing their responses to you depending on how you act etc.)

[LowEnergyCycle]

I would, for want of some better examples, LOVE a game where you are involved while the whole Greater Plan goes pear-shaped. Half-Life 1 did it, and to some extent so did Doom 3.

Teaming up with fellow survivors while chaos erupts from literally all around you, would - I think - bring games like this into the next generation. Games have too long being a proponent of a theory that decides "Single Hard Bastard Versus the Forces of the Unknown..." is somehow entertaining in the long term.

Pardon my language, but, Bollocks! For starters, not every game-player on this fair Earth is a freakin' Marine!

Forget being all stupid and "cinematic" too - the focus could easily still rely on your basic gameplay concepts of stat-increasing and baddie-shooting. After all, can you see any reason why not?

And even though it's a dangerous subject 'round these parts - it presents a decent and entirely acceptable co-op oportunity. I'm not saying that the green pastures of Bioshock need poisoning with such multi-player toxins, but it's certainly a thought for future reference.

[Redraf]

@Jeff: I know you can use security bots and Big Daddies as your temporary protector but I hardly consider throwing a plasmid at him making an alliance. I'm talking more about allies you can make within the story.

Teaming up with fellow survivors while chaos erupts from literally all around you, would - I think - bring games like this into the next generation. Games have too long being a proponent of a theory that decides "Single Hard Bastard Versus the Forces of the Unknown..." is somehow entertaining in the long term.

I agree that I'm not a big fan of the single hard bastard takes on the masses thing. However, I do know that advanced AI being on your side does take a little bit from the game experience. For example, in Crackdown, I was trying to get my driving skill up, so I tried to hit gangster with my car. Unfortunately the police aren't useless and they kill gangsters for you a lot of the time. I found this to be irritating problem in the game. I prefer to think that if my allies aren't useless, they're somewhere far away, like Australia or Antarctica.

Anyways, while I do believe the ally thing could potentially lead to co-op, I feel co-op in this game would be ruined by enormous difference in the ideas of strategy. Whereas one person wants to play stealthily, the other shoots his gun and flails his arms. It's just not the type of game. Though I wouldn't disagree to a multiplayer versus part of the game so long as they retained focus on the main storyline.

Back to the point though, what type of allies would people like to see in this game? More prevalent ones or more subtle ones?

[Hatesink]

One thing I generally want to do in games is delegate, so that I don't have to do the labour-intensive 'busywork' of dealing with all of the aggressors. One of the things that influenced me to stop playing Morrowind was the fact that I had to learn how to use all of those spells and deal with the clunky and ill-conceived combat mechanics.

In Morrowind I played as a Breton with maxed out trading/speaking/charm skills, and maxed out the thief skills so that I could basically make lots of money through the game, but I ended up with so many valuables I was encumbered. The game's economic system wasn't developed far enough to allow me to fully develop my character. I couldn't even unload the goods I'd stolen. I would have liked to be able to buy training packages so that I could concentrate on making money and level up all at once even for a high price. I would have liked to be able to hire characters to do the fighting for me, so that I didn't have to deal with that aspect of the game. It might be a little pointless to do that in BioShock (since it's primarily a shooter), but it might be a lot of fun to be able to hire one or two (or more) mercenaries to help you through some parts of the game (a little like Kingpin, but better).

Fable 2 is going to allow the player to buy more or less all of the buildings in the game and even to become the Mayor (if you're able to buy enough of the town) I'm looking forward to it a lot.

[LowEnergyCycle]

Interestingly, after playing the sequel to Morrowind recently (y'know... Oblivion, or something...), mainly it's expansion pack - The Shivering Isles - unless you are proficient in combat abilities, you are screwed.

Mr. Gimble (my good friend, for the uninitiated) developed a character out of magic and marksman skills alone. He can not get past the first few missions, simply from the technicality of not being hard enough.

To be fair, he raised a wimp.

But still, when you've paid good money for an expansion like this, you expect to be able to... y'know... play it?

And after 180hours of play on Oblivion, you kinda start to notice the cracks in their design. Unfortunately the gameplay systems start becoming too obvious - a key factor that I'm sure developers wish to avoid as it eliminates the suspension of disbelief. It's a great game, but in the long term it becomes a bit transparent.

Now if they took notes from Blizzard on a certain long-running MMO they've been running for a coupla years... Well, who knows?

I may possibly never leave the house.

[nmrahde]

Oblivion tried to do good with some of the allies (I love the series but yeah they fell short there), but there are two series to look at for GREAT control of over allies.

Mechwarrior and Fallout (including Arcanum). Mechwarrior had a great way to quickly give the other mechs in your star orders while on the run destroying stuff and Fallout 2 in particular had great options for deciding how you want them to act. Such as choosing for your allies how far away they'd be, when they'd use health items, when they'd use burst fires, etc.