What is "consolisation" and why does it exist? Or Simulated Skill v Player Skill

[SubJeff]

As some of you will know I've had this theory about what makes a game enjoyable for a while now, and a key component is something that I called the Interface, but which I'm now calling the Translation Interface until I hear something better (Interface is just confusing what with GUIs and whatnot).

Anyways, to c&p myself the Translation Interface (TI) consists of 3 main components that act in concert:
The TI is made up of 3 components:

1. Physical Control - mouse & keyboard, motion controls, control pad, etc.
2. Agent Control - the way the control system controls your Agent(s) in the game world - m&k in an fps in a way that feels natural (e.g. Thief), the way you move a 3rd person character (e.g. Batman Arkham Asylum) or your units in an RTS (e.g. Company of Heroes). This includes the HUD or GUI.
3. Agent-World Interaction - the way your Agent(s) interact with the game world. This includes all the skills/abilities your Agents have and ranges from just walking around to being able to mantle, jump, cast spells, fire weapons, etc.

I think that the Wii became popular with casual gamers because it offered them a Physical Control system that wasn't as alien as a SixAxis, and it's naturally important to get this aspect correct.

Agent Control is usually done pretty well these days. Analogue sticks have made FPSs doable on consoles and for the most part I think that game engines have this component sorted out. Games are crucified in reviews if the Agent Control sucks and is slow or unintuitive.

So back to the original point. Consolisation. Agent-World Interaction consists of those gameplay elements that the player learns to control and become (hopefully!) good at. In Soul Caliber it's learning the moves, the counters, the combos. Learning those things requires Player Skill, but when your onscreen Agent does them it's a Simulated Skill. You can't really wield a bo staff like Kilik but you can make him so all sorts of stuff with it if you have the Player Skill.

RPS has just done a big piece on Deus Ex Human Revolution and one thing they talk about is the cover system and moving from cover to cover. It sounds like it's a single button press, like in GTAIV, and this friends is the problem.

I believe that "consolisation" consists largely of getting the Simulated Skill/Player Skill divide wrong, of setting it too far towards the Simulated Skill end of the spectrum. I get no reward for pressing an "I win" button because it requires no Player Skill and so I get no sense of achievement from it. To give another example; 3rd person corner peeking in Thief DS. It feels like cheating because for a Thief 1 and 2 player, who had developed the Player Skill to deploy lean in the right situation, it was. Unified ammunition (DXIW in case you're wondering) is another example; I don't have to concern myself with ammo management as much and this was a (admittedly more abstract) Player Skill you learned in the first game.

I've got a PS3 so don't get butthurt when I say this console people, but what people call "consolisation" is really just moving the skill divide in favour of the Agent and away from us. It's designing a game more around "I win" buttons and less around Player Skill. It's not true of all console games, far from it (just look at Dead Space!), but it's the cancer that is destroying games because (as in the DXHR example) with cross platform development we'll get this skill leech on PCs.

Anyways, I was just thinking.

tl;dr? Console games are easier because your brains are a bit soft.

[Sulphur]

Mm? Consolitis is, basically, a function of simplified gameworld interaction mechanisms, innit? It's all right to talk about player/simulated skill divides, however the reasons I've found that console games lack verisimilitude are:

a) the input mechanisms (pads) may be lacking in simulating relatively granular levels of physical movement and interaction because there simply aren't enough buttons (imagine playing ArmA 2 or Stalker: SoC on a console), hence you have wonderful issues like the run and use actions being mapped to the same button/key in ME2
b) intellectual concessions like waypoint arrows, bread-crumb trails, and glowing frobbables/mission items/markers
c) heavy focus on QTEs that translate directly into 'doing cool stuff you'd otherwise only see in a non-interactive cinematic' by mashing buttons because the interface doesn't allow for fine manual control to pull off those actions by yourself or, as you call it, the 'I win' button.

DE:HR's cover system is an interesting case in that it automates switching from one cover point to another with a key press (possibly with you being able to choose the cover surface you want to get to by highlighting it in your crosshairs), and it's something the latest Splinter Cell did.

I can't really tell if I like or hate the system, because it works seamlessly and fluidly enough that you can concentrate on tactics instead of lumbering from pillar to post, but it's automated the 'crouch and run/roll/dodge/slide to next piece of cover' bit completely.

[Manwe]

Console games are easier (or rather simpler) because you can't have the same control complexity and precision with a gamepad as with a keyboard and mouse. Gamepads were fine for platformers and action/adventure games but now they're trying to fit complex games like Deus EX, Thief or even fucking Oblivion on them. It's like trying to navigate the operating system of your PC with the remote control of your TV. It's just impossible. So they have to simplify everything for it to work. It's as simple as that. They don't purposefully dumb down their games just to annoy players, they are simply restricted by the controlers. Look at Deus Ex and the number of keys required to play it. Now look at the number of buttons on a gamepad. Without streamlining, you can't have the same depth on a console (unless you want to end up with an unplayable mess of a game, ie, any of the early PC FPS ports). Imagine trying to type keypad numbers with your gamepad in DX1. It would be a fucking nightmare. They have to make it automatic because there's no other way to do it.

RPS has just done a big piece on Deus Ex Human Revolution and one thing they talk about is the cover system and moving from cover to cover. It sounds like it's a single button press, like in GTAIV, and this friends is the problem.

The problem would be to have a leaning system like in Deus Ex, with one button assigned to leaning left and another one assigned to leaning right, and having to approach enemies stealthily, stand up, equip the right weapon and aim at their heads to knock them out. That would be totally unplayable on a gamepad. Whether it's a problem when played with a keyboard and mouse doesn't factor in their reasoning. It's an afterthought. It doesn't matter. Just think about those early PC FPS ports on consoles like rainbow six on ps1 or whatever. Nobody gave a shit whether they were playable on a gamepad cause nobody played them. They were just quick shitty ports to grab some money. Nowaydays the trend is simply reversed, the main platform is the console and the PC gets the shitty ports. It's like those old FPSs on dreamcast (Quake 3 arena, Soldier of fortune, etc...). They were straight ports from the PC that were almost unplayable with a gamepad. You had to use the mouse and keyboard to enjoy them fully. Well, again nowadays the trend is reversed, if you want to enjoy a game on PC you have to use a gamepad.

but it's the cancer that is destroying games because (as in the DXHR example) with cross platform development we'll get this skill leech on PCs.

Yes, it's the cancer that's been destroying PC gaming for 5 Years. It's not exactly a new trend and it's not about to stop.

Also it's true games in general are becoming easier, but I wouldn't necessarily correlate that with consolisation or whatever. Hard games weren't exclusive to the PC. Console games used to be challenging too. But now it's become this huge industry and I guess it's more profitable to make easier games. Just like books that are easy to read or movies that are easy to understand will sell more.

Edit : Took too long too write this, sulphur already said it all.

[Phatose]

Don't nearly all console FPS's provide considerable amounts of aiming assists, pushing the fundamentals of that mechanic towards simulated skill from player skill?

[Fafhrd]

DE:HR's cover system is an interesting case in that it automates switching from one cover point to another with a key press (possibly with you being able to choose the cover surface you want to get to by highlighting it in your crosshairs), and it's something the latest Splinter Cell did.

I can't really tell if I like or hate the system, because it works seamlessly and fluidly enough that you can concentrate on tactics instead of lumbering from pillar to post, but it's automated the 'crouch and run/roll/dodge/slide to next piece of cover' bit completely.

I think it's more likely that it's a Enter Cover -> lean out of cover -> tap jump button -> player character springs to next available cover in that direction (provided it falls within a certain range). Without this function it would be Enter Cover -> Exit cover -> run to next bit of cover -> enter cover. The thing that's interesting to me, is that based on one preview I read, entering cover is a press and hold, not a toggle, so the required button presses to exit/move/enter is reduced significantly.

[Wormrat]

@SubjEff
You never say why you think consoles have anything to do with it!

I think Sulphur's got it covered though. Consolisation/consolitis = simplification due to hardware constraints or to match the perceived tastes of the console audience. Of course, no one can agree on an example of the latter (one man's dumbing-down is another man's streamlining), and the devs are always coy about both.

I really don't see the point of introducing new terms to talk about this stuff, though. I mean, we already talk about controllers, HUD/GUI, and in-game actions. I see what you're going for with the Player Skill/Simulated Skill spectrum, but... well, it's not exactly a spectrum, is it? Can you think of games that would fall on either end? Or maybe it's not games that fall on the spectrum, but something else? Actions? I can't make sense of it.

It's a bit of a red herring anyway, because even an action that seems like a game-doing-everything-for-you Simulated Skill won't be an "I win" button as long as the game is sufficiently complex in other ways. Auto-aim, for example, is usually derided as simplification, but you could design some crazy fast and complex FPS that requires you to use your auto-aim powers skillfully, with the game practically impossible to play otherwise.

We do examine specific mechanics all the time ("this weapon is overpowered," "this move is broken," etc.) but you end up looking at the complexity of the entire game anyway, because you have to see how each piece interacts with the others and fits into the overall picture. And since a game's complexity basically translates to "how much stuff the player needs to learn to do well," Player Skill is the only type of skill you need to talk about. I don't think this spectrum terminology has much going for it.

[Neb]

Moving away slightly from the question of consolisation, I think that games can be looked at as a balance between gradient and quantised interaction.

Gradients provide free movement, ranges of values with varying effect, randomisation, and uncertainty in the development or outcome of a scenario.

Quantised mechanics wrap events up into discrete, streamlined stages and can be used as building blocks to simplify details of game play - or as clear feedback, and eventually victory.

It might be kind of obvious, but it has helped me to look at why and how games are enjoyable, and I believe there is an art to mixing the two.

[EvaUnit02]

One thing that's important is that you do not confuse consolisation with mainstreaming. Consolisation would be having to make compromises for hardware and control limitations of the lesser platforms. Eg you have a mainly first person game, but you implement a cover system that pops out into 3rd person... you're compromising for the lack of keys necessary for leaning above all else. Rainbow Six: Vegas is the epitome of this example. You need leaning in a tactical FPS like R6, but you don't have enough buttons.

Mainstreaming is essentially the "dumbing down" that Angry Internet Men get all huffy about, which they often confuse with the former. Examples of "mainstreaming" include hand-holding, Bioshock's navigation arrows, the "bread crumb trail" featured in Fable 2 and Dead Space, forced tutorials, non-existent difficulty, the platformers with unmissable jumps (which maybe automatic), etc. Prince of Persia 2008 immediately comes to mind.

[Volitions Advocate]

I think the term "consolisation" is a bit of a misnomer anyway.

When i started playing videogames it was on a Sega Master System, then moved to Sega Genesis and NES / SNES. And those games had much simpler controllers than today's gaming machines.
(were also much harder than any games I can think of today that are AAA titles)

I think it's more a question of access to games. I was reading some fantasy role playing wiki earlier today looking for an old adventure book I used to have, and they claimed the demise of their popularity came about the same time that D&D pen-&-paper games stopped being popular, and the reason was the popularity of video games. So is this really a case of consolitis or is it just a continued form of gaming. Try playing a real non dumbed-down pen&paper style rpg and have it be as creative and difficult when you're playing with a gamepad. Not saying there aren't great rpg videogames out there, but very basic fundamentals of what made real life RPGs so great are completely lost when put in digital form. This could easily be called videoitis or something similar.

I have owned many consoles throughout my life and right now I have the gamut under my TV. I've found that the type of game it is, is what makes me determine to buy it on X-platform. I've always played ResiEvil on a console with a gamepad. It feels weird to play it on PC. so I bought RE5 on PS3 because that seemed to make the most sense to me. I guess it seems odd then, that I would want to buy Dead Space, which is basically a clone of RE4/5, on the PC. It's all about implementation. As far as I know Borderlands is identical on PC as it is on the consoles. And they have an inventory system that is easy enough for a gamepad to manage. So I would say that it's all about how the control scheme is implemented. Red Alert for PSone was awful, because it was identical to the PC version and it just didn't work well with a controller. the Halo RTS however was designed for use with a gamepad and the control scheme for that was fluid and worked perfectly. The only compalint I heard was from Halonerds who played it solely for their Waypoint stats and hated RTSs.

Worm rat made a great point about how making something easier in one way doesn't negate the ability to make something more complex in others. Take the first Rainbow Six for example. Even on PC with auto-aim on that game was a pain in the ass to finish. I got my butt handed to me so many times even with that quick snappy auto-aim that gave you headshots every time, if you managed to pull the trigger fast enough.

You could also look at the Janes flight simulators as another anomaly. The longbow/apache one comes to mind.. even with a keyboard and mouse you didn't have enough buttons to run that game. Its difficulty was completely artificial, it was all the controls. Every thing was a macro. Alt-Ctrl-Shift recycling, what a pain in the ass that game was.

I put most blame on the publishers for releasing sub-par games. Its just like the music industry. the masses like what they like because it's what they're told they like. plain and simple. If you dont like it... then why the hell haven't you bought amnesia yet? (maybe you have but my point stands)

When I think consolitis... I think Devil May Cry and Dynasty warriors. Not DX:IW and Fear2.

Besides. Mortal Kombat is a great game. So is Super Metroid. both of those games suck to play on a keyboard.


PS. Console game that got cover systems right: Killzone 2 Player skill vs I-win button .. perfect balance imho.

[june gloom]

Besides. Mortal Kombat is a great game. So is Super Metroid. both of those games suck to play on a keyboard.

Did it! Quite handily too! The Megaman X series as well!

Then it stopped being easy and started being hurty so I bought a gamepad and haven't looked back.

[Koki]

Console games are easier (or rather simpler) because you can't have the same control complexity and precision with a gamepad as with a keyboard and mouse.

We had this argument over at STALKER Steam forums the other day and, with a bit of clever Metro 2033 trickery, managed to fit the entire CoP control scheme on a 360 pad. The amount of immediately reachable buttons for WSAD and a pad is roughly the same anyway.

And hardware constraints can be overcome. Far Cry 2 was huge and open and it was both on 360 and PS3. Deus Ex was ported to PS2 almost completely unchanged.

The real problem with consoles is the analog stick, the TV and a different gaming culture. Analog stick sucks balls for precise movement forcing developers to use shitty menus and the TV's pitiful resolution forces them to make everything huge. Gaming culture... consoles are the fast food of gaming. Watching TV and friend on XBox live invites you for a quick CoD match? Pick up the pad, play a match or two, go back to watching TV. At least playing on the PC forces you to get off the couch, which in itself is a commitment.

[Aja]

You were doing good up until the last paragraph.

[Renzatic]

I have to agree with him on one point. The analog sticks do suck for precise 3D movement. People can make a billion and one compromises to try and make it work, but no matter what they do, it'll never be as smooth and natural aiming with the right thumb stick as it is the mouse.

The good news is that this is probably going to be the last generation that uses dual analog. With the Wiimote, the PS Move, and the Kinect, we're already seeing the future of console controllers. With something like the Razor Sixense, which is basically a dual analog wiimote/nunchuck mix with 6 buttons within easy grasp of your thumb and index fingers, you wouldn't need an oldschool gamepad. Not even for platformers. It's the best of all worlds.

The only advantage the kb/m would have over that would be the split second 180 degree turns we all know and love. And of course having access to a shitload of keys.

[Sulphur]

We had this argument over at STALKER Steam forums the other day and, with a bit of clever Metro 2033 trickery, managed to fit the entire CoP control scheme on a 360 pad. The amount of immediately reachable buttons for WSAD and a pad is roughly the same anyway.

The entire scheme? How easy was the game to play though? I don't think having lean and combining that with two levels of crouch/prone would have been very workable on a pad.

And hardware constraints can be overcome. Far Cry 2 was huge and open and it was both on 360 and PS3. Deus Ex was ported to PS2 almost completely unchanged.

You talking about the size of the gameworld? Because I don't think that's really a point of debate.


Edit: Also, something else about DE:HR's cover system -- you don't need to use it if you don't want to, I guess? Depends on whether the 'move to cover' button also lets you just attach to cover by itself.

[Briareos H]

You were doing good up until the last paragraph.

Actually he's damn right. The assertion "The real problem with consoles is the analog stick, the TV and a different gaming culture." encompasses the whole answer to the problem. The points about TV/couch distance and analog sticks? All true. About the culture? Well Koki knowingly takes shortcuts (as usual) as many games are made to require at least some part of core involvement (last examples which come to mind are Red Dead Redemption and Dead Space) - but there is no denying that console gamers who were not raised on PC approach games differently.

With console gaming, there is that looming atmosphere that you can put the pad down and forget about it altogether. When I think about PC - about my PC - there's a much closer relationship of which games are part on a personal matter. It's nerdy and quite more asocial, it's linked to the proximity of the screen and controls, to the fact that you use the PC for just about everything leading to a sense of entitled freedom. And when this freedom is arbitrarily restrained by forced distance from the game and your control over it, it feels unpleasantly touching and makes you moan over "consolisation" - objectively or not.

You wouldn't understand because it seems to me you were raised on console games.

[Malf]

I don't think "consolisation" is the correct term; it implies that the consoles themselves are to blame, when in actual fact, the blame lies at the feet of focus groups, the franchise mentality, developer laziness and the uninformed consumer.
I think it's better to criticise the bad aspects of a game for what they are and what guided the decisions behind them rather than blame it on one platform or another.

[Sulphur]

Actually he's damn right. The assertion "The real problem with consoles is the analog stick, the TV and a different gaming culture." encompasses the whole answer to the problem. The points about TV/couch distance and analog sticks? All true. About the culture? Well Koki knowingly takes shortcuts (as usual) as many games are made to require at least some part of core involvement (last examples which come to mind are Red Dead Redemption and Dead Space) - but there is no denying that console gamers who were not raised on PC approach games differently.

With console gaming, there is that looming atmosphere that you can put the pad down and forget about it altogether. When I think about PC - about my PC - there's a much closer relationship of which games are part on a personal matter. It's nerdy and quite more asocial, it's linked to the proximity of the screen and controls, to the fact that you use the PC for just about everything leading to a sense of entitled freedom. And when this freedom is arbitrarily restrained by forced distance from the game and your control over it, it feels unpleasantly touching and makes you moan over "consolisation" - objectively or not.

You wouldn't understand because it seems to me you were raised on console games.

Okay, I understand this thread was doomed from the start because it's inherently a 'PC Vs. Consoles' debate yet again, so it's going to get mired in the 'platform X sucks because it's inherently made of fail (liek you)' and so on.

But hang on. Most of every gaming generation was raised on console games - consoles were literally the starting point for gaming - except for the select PC nerds and geeks who were completely entranced by the PC and their C64s and Spectrums and Amigas and nothing else.

I don't know about you, but when I played Mario on the NES it wasn't so much about having fun as it was to be single-mindedly driven to the end of the level. Putting down the pad? My pad? Impossible, unless I wanted to fling it at the TV. When I played Descent on the PC, it was about being single-mindedly driven to find the mine reactor and blow it up. Letting go of the mouse and keyboard? My mouse and keyboard? Impossible, unless it was to snap the keyboard on my knee in a fit of rage as I got swallowed up in a great apocalyptic fireball five times in a row.

You're making the mistake of attributing behaviour to ownership. There's no doubt there's an impact that a system as isolating as a PC has, but it doesn't change a child's behaviour completely. A normal, socially active child does not become a closed-off geek by virtue of his interest in computer games. And vice-versa, if you a nerdy child who suddenly started liking console games it wouldn't make you more socially active either.

As far as 'looming atmospheres' go, I really don't see how the couch vs. chair argument works today. Some people prefer gaming on their couch, some people prefer gaming in front of their PCs on the chair. The couch people could be playing something like, well, Dead Space 2 on their couch. And the PC guys would prefer playing the same game on their PCs. The same goes for Bioshock, or Metro, or any other multiplat game du jour.

I don't see any forced change in atmosphere honestly, unless the game in question was fundamentally gimped to be easier and played in spurts on the consoles.

[Chade]

One aspect of this debate that has always puzzled me is the supposed desirability of a precise control scheme. I doubt that the ability to master dumb strategies like "aim better" makes the game more intelligent.

[Koki]

The entire scheme? How easy was the game to play though?

I never did, I don't have a console

But hang on. Most of every gaming generation was raised on console games - consoles were literally the starting point for gaming - except for the select PC nerds and geeks who were completely entranced by the PC and their C64s and Spectrums and Amigas and nothing else.

The select PC nerds being what, basically entire Europe(especially the eastern parts of it)? (S)NES might have been huge in USA because it has close ties with Japan, but in Europe it was far from being the primary gaming platform.

As far as 'looming atmospheres' go, I really don't see how the couch vs. chair argument works today.

Right, half-lying on the couch few meters away from the screen in the living room and hunching 50cm away from the screen in your room with headphones on. Barely any difference.

The good news is that this is probably going to be the last generation that uses dual analog.

That's what they said about Wiimote. Hell, I said that about Wiimote. And look how it ended up - silly gimmick, if it's in the game at all it's obvious the game was made for the pad and "ported" to the Wiimote later. How is Sixaxis going to be any different? And Kinect? I remember when it was called EyeToy.

[Briareos H]

@Sulphur
First, any 'behaviour' I'm writing about is gaming-related behaviour. I never said gaming had an impact on general-related issues, I was discussing the 'gaming culture' aspect.

Your post confirms that I'm a traditionalist and my opinion is skewed in this manner - yet I'm sure many, many 80's born gamers are in the same case. I grew up with an Amiga, then a PC. All my console experience comes from friends. Recently, I played RDR with a friend of mine. It was great, enthralling, immersive and I didn't want it to stop but when came the moment to get ourselves drunk and kick off a jam, we just stopped the console and grabbed a beer.

So basically, I'm one of those people to whom consoles are inherently social and just don't click the same way as the asocial pleasure of computer games. Dark room, alone with your game - the kind of experience you had with Super Mario when you were a child. For sure, the line between social and asocial gaming is getting blurred by the ability to play anywhere with whatever platform - still - through everything that's been said before about the interface and design, consoles and console games seem to encourage a lot more that open and lean behaviour which I find so less immersive.

[Manwe]

Deus Ex was ported to PS2 almost completely unchanged.

You mean except for the huge levels being cut into tiny little fragments, with huge loading times between each sections ? Although I agree that's not an issue anymore on the current generation of consoles. But I wouldn't say this is "almost completely unchanged". In fact I'd say this is precisely what completely overhauled, and streamlined is. Which, again, was completely necessary for the game to be even remotely playable on a console.

[Koki]

Guilty!

spoiler:

Though not as guilty as the guy who calls Deus Ex a "PS2 underrated gem". What the fuck?

[Sulphur]

I never did, I don't have a console

Who's asking about you? I'm asking if whomever mapped the pad controls actually tried playing the game with them. A thought experiment for something like this is a pretty but useless thing by itself unless there's empirical data to prove it works.

The select PC nerds being what, basically entire Europe(especially the eastern parts of it)? (S)NES might have been huge in USA because it has close ties with Japan, but in Europe it was far from being the primary gaming platform.

Fair enough, I have no idea about Europe's gaming history, though I'd find it hard to believe that even Atari didn't gain a large foothold there while it was still big.

Right, half-lying on the couch few meters away from the screen in the living room and hunching 50cm away from the screen in your room with headphones on. Barely any difference.

Yeah, barely any difference apart from the fact that it's far better playing on a bigger screen and a good 5.1 set. I've played the console versions of Dead Space and Far Cry 2 and CoD 4 as well as the PC versions, and apart from the pad there was no immersivity taken away from either when you turn the lights off and play at night.

Seriously, what the fuck has a couch got to do with anything - if I played PC games with a wireless keyboard and mouse on my couch, what would that do to my gaming experience? I'll tell you: zilch.

I don't hunch into my screen, I prefer sitting straight at the desk. If that's your preferred way of using a PC, good luck to your spine.

@Briareos: Here's the thing: a TV in your bedroom connected to a console is just as asocial as a PC. If you were playing RDR without your friends around and you had no other pressing activities, would you still have turned it off to go chug a beer with someone because the console somehow forced social contact on you?

Well, you wouldn't have been playing it anyway because you don't have a console. So yes, your opinion is skewed towards one platform because by your own admission you've had an extremely stilted and limited experience with them in comparison to PCs.

Apart from that, I'd buy the 'console gaming isn't as deeply engaging as PC gaming' (not your words but what you seem to be implying) thing if console games were a completely different and more casual beast than PC games, but they share far too many games, game types, and experiences in common for that to be true.

[Koki]

Yeah, barely any difference apart from the fact that it's far better playing on a bigger screen and a good 5.1 set.

Hahaha.

[Sulphur]

You're so adorable when you laugh like that.