The Half-Life project was fundamentally incompatible with Carmack's philosophy.
After all, this is the guy who once compared the storyline of a game to the storyline of a pornographic film.
His attitude has been very clear from beginning to end.
The storyline should not be the core of the gameplay.
FPS games should focus all their efforts on refining the feel of the controls and creating a sense of exhilaration.
It is essential to provide players with ample and rapid positive feedback and to hone the engine technology to its optimal level.
To be honest, while Carmack highly approves of the engine upgrade, his opinion on Half-Life's design philosophy...
Indeed, there are some disagreements.
"You want a purely cinematic sequence in a train car at the start of the game? Just sitting in the car, listening to NPCs talk, and unable to do anything?"
Carmack looked at the design of the first act in the script and felt a chill run down his spine.
Because this was a severe blow to his values.
"This... this is practically reading a book! Can video games really be like this?" The plot shouldn't overshadow the gameplay itself, otherwise, what's the difference between it and a so-called "interactive movie"?
In fact, by carefully observing the works that Carmack handled, it is not difficult to discover his style.
Whether it's Wolfenstein 3, M, or Quake, they all essentially follow the same logic.
Engage in exhilarating battles with enemies in individual miniature gardens before moving on to the next one.
Even in modern sequels and remakes, this path has remained essentially unchanged.
It perfectly illustrates one of the paths taken by FPS.
However, this has also led to a somewhat rigid and formulaic framework.
Carmack advocated for upgrading games by starting with the engine.
Each generation of improvements represents a major iteration of visual effects and overall engine technology.
Better lighting, more detailed particles, models with higher polygon counts, smoother frame rates...
Indeed, these are all crucial things.
Players definitely want to see these things. Otherwise, the Quake series wouldn't have achieved such great success.
But it did indeed trap Carmack in a predicament from which he could not escape.
"No, Carmack, I never said we should focus all our energy on the show."
Seeing his expression, Lin Lixin wasn't worried at all.
Carmack was actually just a paranoid guy; he wouldn't deliberately deny the excellence of others just to be Authority.
What he really needs is simply to see clearly the hidden possibilities within this situation; that's enough.
In fact, isftare, which originally focused on timing, has suffered a lot from this kind of technical obsession.
As times have changed, Isftare has maintained its past style, which has led to players starting to lose interest.
In order to reverse this decline, Carmack honestly went to learn a lot about Alf-Life.
"The feel of the combat is equally important. Shooting and performance are like two ends of a scale; if either side is off, it will lose its perfection and its elegant balance."
If the combat itself isn't interesting, players will just want to end it quickly and move on to the story.
Conversely, players might skip the entire story and focus solely on the combat. If that's the case, they might as well have made Quake 3 and a purely narrative-driven game.
Since the goal is to organically combine storyline and FPS, the first step is to figure out the balance point.
"The first step is to slow down the high pace we've been maintaining."
Lin Lixin pondered and proposed the first, and most crucial, change.
Quake is definitely one of the fastest-paced games in Amenva's portfolio.
Even arcade games like Hotline Miami, which push speed to the extreme, don't offer this pure sense of speed.
Just watch the daily live broadcasts of the Quake exhibition match on ameline99 Television Station.
Let alone the professional tournaments with high prize money held at fixed times every year.
Even in recreational matches, these amazing players leap and bound as if the floor were burning their feet.
Throughout the entire game, there wasn't a single second that the game was still.
They are constantly on high-speed maneuvering and engaged in high-speed combat.
This is Isftare's most typical style. It's even more exaggerated in "m".
Before this, this was a very useful and widely accepted approach by players.
As long as the speed is increased, many visual defects can be automatically ignored by the brain.
At the same time, this is also a powerful way for Amenva to promote its own graphics cards.
3 Accelerator Cards!
With just one 3-card, you can enjoy the same gorgeous experience!
Given the opportunity, who wouldn't want to have a super gaming PC at home, the kind of high-performance PC found in Amenva-branded internet cafes?
But things are different now.
The first thing to do to establish Half-Life as a project is to slow down the game.
Upon hearing this, Carmack's brows furrowed slightly.
Half-Life is practically a project that involves dancing in his minefield.
First, they significantly enhanced the visual presentation, then slowed down the game's pace. Is the next step to add tutorials?
"You see, Carmack, sometimes slowing down isn't necessarily a bad thing."
"Slower speed means players have more time to observe the map, locate enemies by sound, aim at them, and even formulate tactics."
"Imagine a Headcrab lurking in a dark corner, capable of flying right up to your face, or a barnacle hanging from the ceiling that can devour you alive..."
In terms of immersion alone, Half-Life is actually incredibly well done.
Its approach is completely different from Carmack's.
What Carmack did was to get players completely focused on the battle, leaving no room for extra thought.
This naturally keeps players fully focused, resulting in a good sense of immersion.
This is an experience derived purely from the sense of control.
But Half-Life...
It excels at environmental storytelling and atmosphere creation.
Many people were probably terrified by the creatures from the Xen world when they first played it, especially the Headcrab.
It could suddenly appear from any inconspicuous place.
If you're not careful, they'll eat your head alive and then parasitize your body.
This fictional world, with its surprisingly logically sound biological design, makes these little guys even more terrifying than the pure demons in "M".
"Ait, you mean... this is a horror game??"
Carmack was suddenly taken aback upon hearing Lin Lixin's description.
Isn't that wrong?
FPS games made into horror games?
This is a completely contradictory theory.
Unless it's a game like Biohazard, which is designed around resource management challenges.
With limited ammunition and very limited means of attack, the monsters will naturally create a sense of pressure.
If he understands correctly, while the shooting in this game might not be as exhilarating as Quake, it should still lean towards freedom. What kind of FPS game is it if players only have a few bullets available throughout a match?
Let's just turn it into an action -Adventure game.
As we all know, fear stems from insufficient firepower.
If Uncle Leon starts the game with unlimited rocket launchers and grenades, what's the point of being "crisis-free"?
It would be a waste not to plow Raccoon City.
"Hey-hey..."
Lin Lixin grinned and chuckled strangely twice.
This is also the most ingenious aspect of Half-Life.
A game where shooting is extremely free, with almost unlimited firing, has somehow managed to create a surprisingly good sense of horror.
This highly counterintuitive design has ironically become a hallmark of the entire series (although there are only a few movies in the series).
"Remember that advanced lighting engine we developed for Quake 2? Now it's time for it to shine."
"You mean... using lighting systems to design the environment to create a sense of horror?" "That's pretty much it. When Kojima and the others come back from the forest, he'll understand what I mean."
Lin Lixin nodded.
Leave professional matters to professionals.
That massive color mixing station has been moved into the new headquarters.
As a narrative-driven FPS game, Hideo Kojima, Amenva's go-to "game director," plays an unprecedentedly significant role.
" Carmack, fear isn't always about lack of firepower. Just because you can defeat it doesn't mean you won't be afraid of it. Because you don't know where it will come from, or how many there will be. You can only... listen."
This is where the physical sound field comes into play.
Carmack raised an eyebrow slightly, his eyes unconsciously scanning the inside of the building.
The interior has already undergone at least some basic renovations; it's not a completely unfinished apartment. It's just that the belongings haven't been moved in yet.
He was picturing in his mind, imagining himself as the protagonist of the game.
He is currently alone in the center of the map.
From all directions, there were those who could take his life at any moment. "Rustle, rustle..."
Some kind of arthropod moved its multiple pairs of legs rapidly, swiftly passing behind the wall.
Something is moving inside the ventilation duct.
There seemed to be a sticky sound of slime coming from the ceiling, and a faint sound of countless bubbles gradually forming and then bursting.
These are just imaginations.
It was merely a simplified scenario he conceived based on some simple in-game enemies that Lin Lixin had just illustrated.
but...
Carmack slowly opened his eyes, looking at the goosebumps on his arms and feeling the fine white sweat on his neck...
He suddenly understood what Lin Lixin was trying to say.
"Is this the meaning of sound...?"
To be honest, when Lin Lixin first told him that he wanted to create a physical sound field, he completely applied this concept to the world of " Quake " to understand it.
In Carmack's mind, it should have been a violent and spectacular explosion, with the clear sound of the shockwave sweeping through, and the sound of enemies being torn apart echoing continuously in the narrow, empty passage. He had never imagined it.
Simply giving sound a sense of direction can create such a terrifying sense of immersion.