My Shotgun Love Affair

With the GDC revving up topics for armchair and indie game designers and players everywhere to waffle on about, I had locked onto the luncheon panel involving a fair few representatives of industry giants where they skimmed over a variety of topics.  In particular, one quotation stands out, by a certain Rob Pardo of Blizzard:


Now, in terms of the whole games industry, I disagree (very strongly; we need innovation, not just iteration and execution), but for a lot of individual games, I think he's spot on.  But rather than try and justify this entire statement through investigation (because, quite frankly, it is such a broad statement that trying to break it down into its constituent parts and analyse them is a Sisyphean task), I thought I'd just take an example that's cropped up a few times recently for me, and that is guns, or more specifically, guns in FPSes.

When Call of Duty 4 came out, I wasn't at all impressed on seeing gameplay videos of it because it did practically nothing new for the genre.  When I played it though, I loved it, because it did almost everything that it did better than other games before it.  Aside from the great visuals (which add greatly to the immersion), and the SAS squadmates (actual likeable teammates in an FPS?  Inconceivable!), the guns were simply a pleasure to use.  There are three qualities in particular that make them so.

The modelling of all the guns is wonderful, ranging from the way the animations convey recoil (something that I'd say has previously only been done really well by Counterstrike) to how heavy the gun appears (the slower animations for picking up and/or setting up heavier guns) to the actual model detail itself (I'm more a swords person though, don't mistake me for someone who calls guns 'beautiful' and showcases their collection: if I wanted a pretty pistol, I'd tie a pink ribbon to it).

The sound effects in particular are stellar; all the rifles sound like they're firing actual bullets and not the ratatatat of toy guns (hello Fallout 3 Assault Rifles) or the horribly tinny ping-ping-ping you get from many of the older games (I'm looking at you, Quake and GoldenEye).  The environmental noises made by the collisions of the bullets, particularly with an enemy, are very pleasant on the ear, a much better reward than games that don't give you any audible recognition or give too much (Quake's plastic plunks indicating a successful shot still annoy me, even if they are good game design for a twitch shooter).

The modelling of enemies getting shot seals the deal, with hit detection being put to full use to cause enemies to stagger, slip, fall and generally take the full brunt of force that our imaginations desire.  It's hard to suspend disbelief and stay as immersed in a game when someone - decked out in the finest power armour or not - takes a rocket or a handful of buckshot in the chest and doesn't flinch, or is hit mid-air without effect.

Death animations are also well done, not falling prey to the problem of too-light rag dolls that plagued certain other games (Doom 3's apparently featherweight Mancubus being the very worst offender of this, with Left 4 Dead's Hunter following close behind in endless amusing cartwheels) and do seem to take some hit detection into account.

With fan-mode not yet firmly off, the last part of this blog is devoted to my three favourite weapons, for making enough of an impression that they stay've with me despite being done with the game or simply being almost always enjoyable, starting with, as the title of the blog might hint, the shotgun.

The shotgun - specifically the pump action shotgun for me - remains one of the most enjoyable weapons across all games.  It is rarely done badly, mostly done well and sometimes is exceptionally enjoyable to use beyond all other guns available.  In particular, Left 4 Dead's shotgun, coupled with some truly cinematic zombie deaths, flying back as their torso starts moving faster than their limbs can keep up, courtesy one cartridge of buckshot, is a five star experience.

Fallout 3's Fat Man, aside from being the most powerful weapon in the game (Experimental MIRV excluded), sends its payload flying in an almost graceful arc, before resulting in one of the most satisfying gaming explosions I've seen, far beyond that of other more run-of-the-mill ordnance in both this game and others.  Though its model may seem more like something you'd find in a scrapyard challenge punting footballs into nets, there is no denying that it fits Fallout's post-apocalyptic scavenger theme perfectly.

Painkiller's Stake gun, interacting in a truly visceral manner with the physics engine and ragdolls, is more a weapon of art than of destruction, allowing players to leave their very own macabre museum of corpses attached to levels.  Pinning your victims to walls was one of Painkiller's many guilty pleasures (alongside many other innovative weapons, not to mention the mini-gun/rocket launcher combo).  And that's all before you get your hands on the alternative firing mode.

With my three favourite weapons done, I do feel the need to add one dishonourable mention: Fallout 3's laser weaponry.  This is not the first time I've seen curious cases of recoil on futuristic weaponry (while modern military science works hard to reduce recoil), but recoil on laser rifles in particular really does feel like a bit of a buzzkill for me, especially since I have great nostalgia for the 1990s dogma of plasma > laser > slug/bullet.  With all that said, this is my invitation for you all to share your preferred tools to victory, as well as any comments you have on the topics before.