Emotion- How Will We Make the Player Feel It?

So, I was playing my game earlier, and I looked at the way it evokes emotion in the player. It's the music, really, that gets you in the gut.

Anyway, I was wondering, how will we make the player show emotion whenever something terrible or great happens while playing as an organism? My solution would be what the game did and play a certain song whenever something important happens.

But then I thought of organisms that have not developed emotions. So, my solution to THAT was that until your species can feel emotion, the emotionally moving songs will not play.

EXAMPLES OF EMOTION-CAUSING EVENTS:

-Your friend, relative, or lover dies or gets terribly injured

-Your SC is under attack

-You almost fall off a cliff

-You see someone get murdered

-You kill someone

-You see a new TE (only if it is big, like seeing the first car or the first computer)

InvaderZim wrote:

So, I was playing my game earlier, and I looked at the way it evokes emotion in the player. It's the music, really, that gets you in the gut.

Anyway, I was wondering, how will we make the player show emotion whenever something terrible or great happens while playing as an organism? My solution would be what the game did and play a certain song whenever something important happens.

But then I thought of organisms that have not developed emotions. So, my solution to THAT was that until your species can feel emotion, the emotionally moving songs will not play.

EXAMPLES OF EMOTION-CAUSING EVENTS:

-Your friend, relative, or lover dies or gets terribly injured

-Your SC is under attack

-You almost fall off a cliff

-You see someone get murdered

-You kill someone

-You see a new TE (only if it is big, like seeing the first car or the first computer)

I kind of feel that because of the structure of our game, the player will already be very attached to their organisms and nations emotionally. I mean, they raised them from mere cells! But that said, music is a great way to evoke that extra bit of emotion in a game, movie, or any multimedia.

this would depend on:
a- either you are sentient or not
b- social traits
c- situation
d- society (in sapient biengs)


-Your friend, relative, or lover dies or gets terribly injured
i think general social interactions need to be worked out first


-Your SC is under attack
depends on society and individual; fear, hatred,patriotism....



-You almost fall off a cliff
fear



-You see someone get murdered
depends on society and individual;


-You kill someone
situation



-You see a new TE (only if it is big, like seeing the first car or the first computer
amaze, might make the creature folow a certain path.




the emotions can be transmited with music and maybe small visual changes

I know games where music played at the right time greatly enhances the feeling, but also games where silence makes a great feeling. I'm really torn.

I'm not too worried about this for now. Although you make a great point, I think this is something that should take the back burner untill the actual gameplay is worked out.

Tenebrarum wrote:

I'm not too worried about this for now. Although you make a great point, I think this is something that should take the back burner untill the actual gameplay is worked out.

Of course. Once we near "release", this will become more important.

@eumesmo: That's pretty much what I meant by the third paragraph of the OP, but much more detailed. Sure, I only mentioned the evolutionary side of things, but those will also be very important factors.

Commander Keen wrote:

I know games where music played at the right time greatly enhances the feeling, but also games where silence makes a great feeling. I'm really torn.

It's all about timing

~sciocont wrote:

Commander Keen wrote:

I know games where music played at the right time greatly enhances the feeling, but also games where silence makes a great feeling. I'm really torn.

It's all about timing

what is, the music? or when to start playing music?

toxiciron wrote:

~sciocont wrote:

Commander Keen wrote:

I know games where music played at the right time greatly enhances the feeling, but also games where silence makes a great feeling. I'm really torn.

It's all about timing

what is, the music? or when to start playing music?

When to have music and when to have silence. I think in org. mode there should be ambient music. Then, when a predator spots you there's silence and you realise you're in deep Belgium.

Didn't someone in the second forum propose a similar sound system as left 4 dead?

2creator wrote:

When to have music and when to have silence. I think in org. mode there should be ambient music. Then, when a predator spots you there's silence and you realise you're in deep Belgium.

Ah. I can see that not working.

Every singe time a predator sees you... Wouldn't you get constant on and off music? That just wont work well...

What if you're a plant?

Thrive wrote:

There is sudden silence, as the herbivore slowly creeps up on you... You try to run, but you have no legs! Alas, the vicious herbivore eats you alive! The sad, slow, reminiscent music starts to play and you mourn your poor plant...

Player (It could be you!) wrote:

I'll never forget you! I wish I could see your beautiful leaves and mushroomy taste just one last time. Why do such cruel things have to happen to innocent plants like you!?!? I'm so sorry, there was nothing I could do... The herbivore was too fast with those incredible, evil legs! I love you, alien plant thing without a brain!

I mean, :roll:!


(MEGA roflmao! Strange, creepy player guy person.)

Which begs the question, how will you survive as a plant? Make yourself poisonous? I rolfed at that quote. (Roll On Laughing Floor)

2creator wrote:

Which begs the question, how will you survive as a plant? Make yourself poisonous? I rolfed at that quote. (Roll On Laughing Floor)

poor us if all plants had to do that in order to survive. Plants usually folow a more victory by numbers, i mean since the amount of plants is always far greater then the number of herbivores, the problem doesnt rise. As a plant, the gameplay would have to be different, since a player would die a lot, but in that time seeds for many more plants would rise

The Uteen wrote:

2creator wrote:

When to have music and when to have silence. I think in org. mode there should be ambient music. Then, when a predator spots you there's silence and you realise you're in deep Belgium.

Ah. I can see that not working.

Every singe time a predator sees you... Wouldn't you get constant on and off music? That just wont work well...

What if you're a plant?

Thrive wrote:

There is sudden silence, as the herbivore slowly creeps up on you... You try to run, but you have no legs! Alas, the vicious herbivore eats you alive! The sad, slow, reminiscent music starts to play and you mourn your poor plant...

Player (It could be you!) wrote:

I'll never forget you! I wish I could see your beautiful leaves and mushroomy taste just one last time. Why do such cruel things have to happen to innocent plants like you!?!? I'm so sorry, there was nothing I could do... The herbivore was too fast with those incredible, evil legs! I love you, alien plant thing without a brain!

I mean, :roll:!


(MEGA roflmao! Strange, creepy player guy person.)

That would not happen, due to the evolutionary and idealogical (spelling?) prerequisites needed to play the sad music.

That gives me an idea, actually..

We could have in the later stages [space civ maybe tribe] that the player plays in organism mode as a proper citizen, with a family, job ect so as to create an *emotional bond?* between the player and their organism, so they don't just stay playing in strategy mode...

I don't think we should force the player into entering organism mode, if thats what you're implying. Also, you can enter org. mode from stratedgy mode at any time with any organism in your species.

fredpie wrote:

I don't think we should force the player into entering organism mode, if thats what you're implying. Also, you can enter org. mode from stratedgy mode at any time with any organism in your species.

I beleive you misread what he said. He was saying that we should be assigned an organism that we can jump to at any time, so that we don't just throw our organism into a meat grinder the second we start playing- because it wouldn't just be some random organism, it would be your organism.

That may be so, but this topic is about making the player feel the organism's emotions.

I'm thinking that while in organism mode, something is monitoring your organisms emotions, and changes the music accordingly. There would be rather similar tracks for similar emotions. This would mean that the music for- lets say stress, agitation, and anger would all have different but similar music. The music could be done in a way so that the transition is done smoothly, it's a more slow or whatever change in emotions, and if it's sudden(eg. Something jumps out of the bushes at you and you get a fright. Or something else...), the change would be more sudden and obvious. Maybe for the more subtle(Is that the word?) emotion changes, there could be transition music or something... Yes?
-Waap.

In addition to music, we could also have the whole screen subtly changing. For example, if you are scared, you see everything darker and larger, if you are angered, you see everything in a slight red hue, ...

Music is a must. Of course people will turn it off, but screw them. On the idea of filtering, i believe we should do it if possible. And by possible i mean possible to do it well.

US_of_Alaska wrote:

Of course people will turn it off, but screw them.

Screw 50% of our players? Oh god...


Music is a must, but it should better be combined with something.

De-ja-vu...
I just read the above two posts on 'The Instinct Bar' thread.

I disagree with that, though. Seriously? Screw 50% of our players? Oh god... That includes me.
Huh? I've read that before...

If we're going to make it specialised, why don't we go for 100% realism and make it suited to hardcore players?

Anyway, I think the player will feel emotion for their organism if they want to feel it, even if they have the music turned off.. And the people who choose to have music on wont want to be made to feel emotion for a plant. I don't think I need to quote myself here (do I?)

The Uteen wrote:

De-ja-vu...
I just read the above two posts on 'The Instinct Bar' thread.

That's me screwing up. I had this thread and the Instinct Bar topic opened in two tabs next to each other, and when I closed the Instinct bar tab, Alaska's post appeared, without any response. So I wrote it again. /facepalm

The Uteen wrote:

If we're going to make it specialised, why don't we go for 100% realism and make it suited to hardcore players?

This is not any specialisation towards hardcore players, this is just giving them features casuals with music already have.

The Uteen wrote:

Anyway, I think the player will feel emotion for their organism if they want to feel it, even if they have the music turned off.. And the people who choose to have music on wont want to be made to feel emotion for a plant. I don't think I need to quote myself here (do I?)

Players will feel emotions more like a close friend of the creature, rather than the organism itself. In situations when the creature should be confused or panicking, players will know exactly what they are doing, and without any "help" in this way, all creatures cotrolled by players will be transofrmed into cold calculating minds.

Did people choose to only read the first half of my post?

If we can add filters, we should. If we can't, we can't. Then music-tuner-offerers will be screwed.

threads merged by ~scio

Okay, so I recently saw a certain movie and then I visited this site and woala, I made this thread. Why did I make this thread? I wanted to know/discuss how will the death of their character impact on the player? How will we make them actually care about their character rather then 'if I make it I win if I dont make it I'll respawn and do it again'?

With this, also, comes the aspect of fear. Exploring a deep dark cave creates fear, in the creature, and, if the game is good, also in the player. Hopefully there will be some awesome creepy music with organs and violins and all that jazz but also, what gameplay aspects will make the player more attached to their character? i mean, if the player wants their character to become rich, all they have to do is volunteer for a dangerous job, which usually pay well. Creating fear within the player will make the game itself seem more realistic. Also war. War is scary in real life [at least from what I've heard]. Few people go in guns blazing [or swords swinging or clubs clubbing or whatever], because it's scary, and dangerous, however in most games I've played everyone goes in guns blazing and either dies and respawns or wins and gets shot in the back by another sniper somewhere. In anycase, I hope I've made my point clear here. As always if I haven't and it isn't clear to you please ask and I'll try to explain it a bit better.