Contra III is a 30 minute game that has lasted me over a month. The game has 6 levels, and none of them will take a skilled gamer more than a few minutes. But that's an easy enough thing to say. Yesterday I was overjoyed when I made it to the fifth level for the first time.
So why have I stuck with it for so long? It's true that I am a more patient gamer than ever before. I avoid using the word 'hardcore', since I respect gamers of all types, but it's true that patience and diligence count for something with this type of game. Ten years ago, I dedicated myself to adventure games because I was sick of game overs, but now I can't get enough of them.
The real reason is that Contra III is very fair. Like the Castlevania series, it's very well-crafted. I die often, but each time I know where I went wrong and how to do better next time. Unlike the Castlevania series, it's also a great adrenaline rush no matter how many times I play it.
Like most classic platformers and run'n'guns, Contra III is as linear as a game could possibly be, for good reason. Each difficult boss such as the one above (which was the hardest for me so far) has one crucial weakness: it's forced to act the same way every single time. If it didn't, I'd have given up. Linearity keeps hard games like this replayable.
Linearity and Replayability
At the time, the most common reason given for the decline of adventure games in the late 90's is their linearity. Adventure games had strong, coherent narratives that play out like movies, and this kept the games from being replayable. Players wanted more agency in their games; the future of video games was more choice, more non-linearity.
But if nonlinearity equals replayability, then why are completely linear games like Contra so endlessly replayable? One could argue that I'm not really replaying Contra III, since I haven't beaten it yet. But I have beaten Castlevania, and I keep coming back to it. It provides challenging, hypnotizing gameplay with no real time commitment. That seems to me to be the definition of replayable.
As far as adventure games go, I've replayed the Gabriel Knight series more than any other games I can think of. I've played the third game at least five times. (In fact, they're more fun when you don't get stuck on every puzzle.) It's like rewatching a favorite movie.
Some games are not very replayable to me, even when there are choices involved. Silent Hill 2 is probably my favorite console game, and there was a time when I wanted to see all six endings, which requires you to play the game six times. To this day, I've only seen two of them, for a number of reasons. Firstly, the game gets less scary when you replay it; less to do with linearity than with the horror genre itself. Secondly, the game is unique in that the endings reflect how you've chosen to play the game (do you use first aid often, how close do you stick to Maria?) and so it's tricky to force the game to a specific ending.
The third reason is more relevant to this discussion, since I generally feel this way about games with choice. To me, my first ending will always be my ending. Even though I did not consciously choose it, it is how I would've wanted the game to end (it is arguably the 'best' ending for the character). Two of my friends got a different ending (a more tragic one) that they are both happy with. When I force the game to end a different way, it feels like I'm making that choice...well, not really a choice. So I choose not to replay it, and savor my version of the story.
So in certain ways, linear games are more replayable and nonlinear games are less so. There's more to be said here, so...next time.
Screenshots from MobyGames, as if it wasn't obvious.
So why have I stuck with it for so long? It's true that I am a more patient gamer than ever before. I avoid using the word 'hardcore', since I respect gamers of all types, but it's true that patience and diligence count for something with this type of game. Ten years ago, I dedicated myself to adventure games because I was sick of game overs, but now I can't get enough of them.
The real reason is that Contra III is very fair. Like the Castlevania series, it's very well-crafted. I die often, but each time I know where I went wrong and how to do better next time. Unlike the Castlevania series, it's also a great adrenaline rush no matter how many times I play it.
Like most classic platformers and run'n'guns, Contra III is as linear as a game could possibly be, for good reason. Each difficult boss such as the one above (which was the hardest for me so far) has one crucial weakness: it's forced to act the same way every single time. If it didn't, I'd have given up. Linearity keeps hard games like this replayable.
Linearity and Replayability
At the time, the most common reason given for the decline of adventure games in the late 90's is their linearity. Adventure games had strong, coherent narratives that play out like movies, and this kept the games from being replayable. Players wanted more agency in their games; the future of video games was more choice, more non-linearity.
But if nonlinearity equals replayability, then why are completely linear games like Contra so endlessly replayable? One could argue that I'm not really replaying Contra III, since I haven't beaten it yet. But I have beaten Castlevania, and I keep coming back to it. It provides challenging, hypnotizing gameplay with no real time commitment. That seems to me to be the definition of replayable.
As far as adventure games go, I've replayed the Gabriel Knight series more than any other games I can think of. I've played the third game at least five times. (In fact, they're more fun when you don't get stuck on every puzzle.) It's like rewatching a favorite movie.
Some games are not very replayable to me, even when there are choices involved. Silent Hill 2 is probably my favorite console game, and there was a time when I wanted to see all six endings, which requires you to play the game six times. To this day, I've only seen two of them, for a number of reasons. Firstly, the game gets less scary when you replay it; less to do with linearity than with the horror genre itself. Secondly, the game is unique in that the endings reflect how you've chosen to play the game (do you use first aid often, how close do you stick to Maria?) and so it's tricky to force the game to a specific ending.
The third reason is more relevant to this discussion, since I generally feel this way about games with choice. To me, my first ending will always be my ending. Even though I did not consciously choose it, it is how I would've wanted the game to end (it is arguably the 'best' ending for the character). Two of my friends got a different ending (a more tragic one) that they are both happy with. When I force the game to end a different way, it feels like I'm making that choice...well, not really a choice. So I choose not to replay it, and savor my version of the story.
So in certain ways, linear games are more replayable and nonlinear games are less so. There's more to be said here, so...next time.
Screenshots from MobyGames, as if it wasn't obvious.
I never really thought about it too much but you are absolutely correct. And I am not the most patient gamer. When something gets boring, I stop playing. I played three different characters in Morrowind to completion, but I never finished Oblivion.
ReplyDeleteBut the games I do enjoy playing multiple times, have concrete stories that I enjoyed entirely, and I don't like taking a different course so much as to just have that same experience again.