Freedom in Video Games

This might get a little complicated, but stick with me.

In the late 90's, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater , a skateboarding video game, was released. The format was you had a list of goals to complete and were allowed to skate for 2 minutes at a time to complete one or all of these goals.

For example, say the goals were 100,000 points and collect 5 items placed across the level. You could play for 2 minutes to find the items. Then play for another 2 minutes to try and get the points, or you could try and complete both at the same time. The system worked well and that was that. (There was also a free skate mode where you weren't bound by time, but you couldn't complete any goals either)

Then Grand Theft Auto 3 came out and changed everything. Previously, games like GTA had levels or missions that you played in order, and you couldn't do anything outside of those levels. But GTA created an entire city, with missions that you could choose to do when you want. You could play GTA for hours without playing a mission.

This format proved so popular that many games copied the format, including the Tony Hawk series. Now you could roam the entire area and then skate over to mission objectives and complete them in the order that you want. Of course when you start a mission there was usually a time restriction on it anyways.

Presumably, this move was to create more freedom. But it made less. This meant that you could now only attempt to complete one goal at a time, and it de facto forced you to play that goal until you completed it, since you were already at that spot.

Under the two-minute rules, you had more freedom as you could do whatever you wanted, including complete multiple goals at the same time. And you could change your objectives on the fly. If you're trying to collect 5 items and then you realize that you've got 90,000 points, you could forget about the items and then focus on points, etc.

Is there anything that could be learned from this? The way to provide the most freedom is by giving the goals that need to be accomplished, without setting any restrictions on the order or means to accomplish them.

Imagine a GTA clone that instead of having missions, there were just goals. Raise $100,000, kill these 10 guys, take over these businesses, control this neighborhood, etc.

The idea of "missions" has always felt a little artificial, with the arbitrary time limits and whatnot. I expect a game to follow my proposed format within the next 5 years. And I want a cut.

Copyright Dave Fymbo Jan 29, 2007.