Improved First-Person Stealth Gameplay.

Last post I discussed theory that Chris and I laid out during our Monday design meeting regarding stealth game player reactions and states. This theory led to several changes in the Thief interface in the Co-Signers and even more on the Hacker side.

First, after spelling out exactly how several other stealth games have worked in the past, we were able to determine what our game needed and exactly why it fell short. In the current prototype, the Thief continues along until spotted, where the guard in question then practically flies directly to your location and captures you. This all occurs within 1-2 seconds, without warning, indication, or chance to react.

I'm going to be referencing this chart a lot, so I'll just stick it in here now:

Our Thief gameplay really only has two of the 5 states: normal, and game over. In other stealth games, the player is given a very clear indication that he is in danger of being noticed, and also that they are being chased. What our game doesn't have is that high-stress moment where the player has the chance to back out and not be chased.

We concluded that an 'attention indicator' would address this. The player would see an exclamation point filling from bottom to top when the player has been seen in the direction that the player is being spotted from. After 1-2 seconds, the exclamation point would fill up and change color from yellow to red, indicating that a chase has begun. The (now red) exclamation point will rotate around the player's screen to indicate what direction the player is being chased from. While the exclamation point is red, the player knows that he is both seen and being actively chased. These changes take care of both the seen and chase state, and give the player ample forseeable consequence to anticipate losing the game.

Should the player lose the trail of the guards during the chase sequence, the exclamation point will gray out and "drain" from top to bottom, but still remain on-screen in the direction of the guard--indicating the "searching" state. If the player is re-spotted while hiding the chase sequence will immediately re-commence. Should the player successfully stay unseen while the exclamation point drains to zero, the indicator will disappear from the screen entirely and the player will finally return to the normal state.

In reality, these changes aren't a drastic change from what we had before. The differences are a delay in guard awareness and how quickly they begin to chase the player, a change in guard speed (you should always be able to out-run them), and a UI element to indicate to the player what the guards around him are doing. The core of the game hasn't changed much, but the effect that it should have on the Thief player is dramatic. We're giving the player time to register moments of panic, see the consequences of their actions and anticipate them in the future.