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> a notable example is the guards on the dam which can't see you until you approach their walkways and this is because the STANs at the top of the ladder can on

> a notable example is the guards on the dam which can't see you until you approach their walkways and this is because the STANs at the top of the ladder can only see those at the bottom. It's a credit to the game that I never noticed this and other AI shortfalls. Somehow the combination of fast paced action, tense stealth gameplay, level design, and good enough AI was enough to transcend any critical faculties I had. I guess the lesson there is whether it's CGI, VR, or game AI, when you understand your limitations and design to them, you can get the audience to do the rest of the work in their head completely unaware of the shortcomings that are not only hidden from them but that they may be compensating for.

jacobush 7y ago
"not only" --> "not even" ?
- tc313 7y ago
  The shortcomings are both hidden and being compensated for (“not only the one, but also the other”).
breck 7y ago
Did folks who knew how to program back then still love games like GoldenEye? I loved it and we played it all the time but I was a kid and didn't understand computers or programming yet. I'm wondering if understanding how something was made would have made it less enjoyable? Less addicting?
- amalcon 7y ago
  I knew a fair amount at the time (enough to write some really bad programs for my own personal use). I definitely still loved that game (enough to write a fairly popular though mostly wrong guide for it).
- JohnBooty 7y ago
  I didn't love Goldeneye in particular, but I was in college for CompSci and had done a little OpenGL. No, knowing (roughly, from a very 50,000 foot kind of view) how those games were made did NOT diminish my love for them. If anything, it really enhanced my enjoyment and appreciation for them. Having made my own simple programs I was very appreciative of the gulf between my weekly programming assignments and the massive amounts of technical wizardry and craft that went into something like a polished retail game. I don't think video games ever really fooled me into thinking they were anything but simulations operating according to some underlying rules. After all, even if you know nothing about programming, your goal as a player is to figure out those rules in order to beat the CPU and win the game! But those rules often delighted me anyway, and I always had a hefty dose of willing suspension of disbelief, so even something like a 16-bit RPG could really connect with me emotionally....
- blihp 7y ago
  Sure. As long as there is something compelling (whether game play, storytelling, graphics, AI... whatever) about a given game, it can still be a lot of fun even when you know how it's made.
- flukus 7y ago
  I was around the "hello world" level when this came out, but in some ways playing and programming are/were quite similar, a big part of playing was mentally de-compiling behaviors like this and part of the fun. One of the things that made Goldeneye stand out at the time was that this sort of complex behavior was used for all/most of the enemies, previously this was mostly reserved for boss fights.
- Agentlien 7y ago
  I was a kid, back then, but I'd taught myself programming with the intention of making games. To me, having an idea of all the tricks used to make the virtual worlds come alive really deepened my appreciation for games in general. Now, with nearly a decade as a professional software engineer split evenly between developing training simulations and AAA video games, I appreciate the craft and behind the scenes stuff more than ever.
- anon_cow1111 7y ago
  I played the pseudo-sequel (perfect dark) around then (early 2000s-ish?) and enjoyed it. The AI was humorous, but brutal on higher difficulties. I had no coding experience at that time. A few years after that I got a hold of Unreal/UT and there was a... "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" moment when I opened UnrealEd and everything just kind of fell into place. The way videogames were constructed was revealed, and I stopped seeing cool visuals and started seeing static meshes and particle emitters. I still enjoy modern games, but in a more 'what are they going to going to do with this idea/story' than 'how'd they do that effect?!' sense. Probably the last true "This is awesome!" videogame moment I had was banking sawblades off the walls of DM-deathfan or whatever the outdoor variant map was called. I suppose spending a day with amnesia would be worth it to experience that again. Edit: oh, and I should give a shoutout to Unreal 2 here, for what it's worth. It flopped big time in popularity, but still did amazing things in that era, graphically speaking. Seems appropriate the engine evolved to become an industry-standard later on.
- pjc50 7y ago
  I largely learned to program from a desire to write or modify games. Doing so was its own enjoyment and "addiction". This wasn't really possible on consoles, but on PCs and the home computer era it was a mainstay. I started with "type-in" games in magazines, and books on programming the BBC micro. In the PC era there was a huge explosion of this with DOOM editors (DEU), later Quake and so on. I remember tinkering with the level definition files in some games and reverse-engineering the file format. There is one life lesson from all this which could benefit anyone, though: cheating trivialises your own achievement and destroys the potential for more fun. But also it's not healthy to put too much weight on an achievement that's just a few easily flippable bits.
m12k 7y ago
In a similar vein, I never noticed how Half-Life 2's AI seems to have something in common with the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal from Hitchihker's Guide to The Galaxy - it believes that if you can't see it, it can't see you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0WqAmuSXEQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0WqAmuSXEQ

jacobush 7y ago

"not only" --> "not even" ?

tc313 7y ago
The shortcomings are both hidden and being compensated for (“not only the one, but also the other”).

breck 7y ago

Did folks who knew how to program back then still love games like GoldenEye? I loved it and we played it all the time but I was a kid and didn't understand computers or programming yet. I'm wondering if understanding how something was made would have made it less enjoyable? Less addicting?

amalcon 7y ago
I knew a fair amount at the time (enough to write some really bad programs for my own personal use). I definitely still loved that game (enough to write a fairly popular though mostly wrong guide for it).
JohnBooty 7y ago
I didn't love Goldeneye in particular, but I was in college for CompSci and had done a little OpenGL. No, knowing (roughly, from a very 50,000 foot kind of view) how those games were made did NOT diminish my love for them. If anything, it really enhanced my enjoyment and appreciation for them. Having made my own simple programs I was very appreciative of the gulf between my weekly programming assignments and the massive amounts of technical wizardry and craft that went into something like a polished retail game. I don't think video games ever really fooled me into thinking they were anything but simulations operating according to some underlying rules. After all, even if you know nothing about programming, your goal as a player is to figure out those rules in order to beat the CPU and win the game! But those rules often delighted me anyway, and I always had a hefty dose of willing suspension of disbelief, so even something like a 16-bit RPG could really connect with me emotionally....
blihp 7y ago
Sure. As long as there is something compelling (whether game play, storytelling, graphics, AI... whatever) about a given game, it can still be a lot of fun even when you know how it's made.
flukus 7y ago
I was around the "hello world" level when this came out, but in some ways playing and programming are/were quite similar, a big part of playing was mentally de-compiling behaviors like this and part of the fun. One of the things that made Goldeneye stand out at the time was that this sort of complex behavior was used for all/most of the enemies, previously this was mostly reserved for boss fights.
Agentlien 7y ago
I was a kid, back then, but I'd taught myself programming with the intention of making games. To me, having an idea of all the tricks used to make the virtual worlds come alive really deepened my appreciation for games in general. Now, with nearly a decade as a professional software engineer split evenly between developing training simulations and AAA video games, I appreciate the craft and behind the scenes stuff more than ever.
anon_cow1111 7y ago
I played the pseudo-sequel (perfect dark) around then (early 2000s-ish?) and enjoyed it. The AI was humorous, but brutal on higher difficulties. I had no coding experience at that time. A few years after that I got a hold of Unreal/UT and there was a... "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" moment when I opened UnrealEd and everything just kind of fell into place. The way videogames were constructed was revealed, and I stopped seeing cool visuals and started seeing static meshes and particle emitters. I still enjoy modern games, but in a more 'what are they going to going to do with this idea/story' than 'how'd they do that effect?!' sense. Probably the last true "This is awesome!" videogame moment I had was banking sawblades off the walls of DM-deathfan or whatever the outdoor variant map was called. I suppose spending a day with amnesia would be worth it to experience that again. Edit: oh, and I should give a shoutout to Unreal 2 here, for what it's worth. It flopped big time in popularity, but still did amazing things in that era, graphically speaking. Seems appropriate the engine evolved to become an industry-standard later on.
pjc50 7y ago
I largely learned to program from a desire to write or modify games. Doing so was its own enjoyment and "addiction". This wasn't really possible on consoles, but on PCs and the home computer era it was a mainstay. I started with "type-in" games in magazines, and books on programming the BBC micro. In the PC era there was a huge explosion of this with DOOM editors (DEU), later Quake and so on. I remember tinkering with the level definition files in some games and reverse-engineering the file format. There is one life lesson from all this which could benefit anyone, though: cheating trivialises your own achievement and destroys the potential for more fun. But also it's not healthy to put too much weight on an achievement that's just a few easily flippable bits.

m12k 7y ago

In a similar vein, I never noticed how Half-Life 2's AI seems to have something in common with the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal from Hitchihker's Guide to The Galaxy - it believes that if you can't see it, it can't see you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0WqAmuSXEQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0WqAmuSXEQ