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Let's make a Game Design Doc, guys!

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Sox:
How about a scripted version of the game you guys are talking about, with set pieces. Would kill replay value, but that doesn't really diminish the first playthrough.
First imaginary monster helps you out. Second one steals your items. Another saps health. Next one does nothing. One can be used as a platform. Not every 'enemy' would have to behave in the same way. Infact, that'd make a pretty boring game. Keep it fresh. They could all look equally terrifying. I'm sure that through the eyes of a child, many things are. But then you find that maybe something isn't quite as scary as you'd expect. Sometimes, you're gonna have to actually face the monsters.

As for the idea that getting caught would be ultimately more frustrating because the end result is the same as winning the game (being reunited with your parents), that idea is crock. It'd be a videogame. It'd fade to black and you'd get a game-over screen. Not the same result at all.
I'm not a fan of the idea of a pedophile you have to avoid. Seems lazy. Pedoholes are everywhere in the media these days, do they have to be in videogames too? Why even have 'real' danger? In what way does that make the game more interesting? From the perspective of the player, who knows everything isn't real, sure, it wouldn't be scary. But videogames tend not to be from the perspective of the player, but the respective protagonist. And the protagonist of this game does believe what she is seeing, and to her, it is terrifying. You'd better believe, than when I'm trying to jump on top of a giant robot dragon so I can hit a switch with my butt, that I find it exhilirating. You'd better believe that when I am surrounded by walking balls of dust and I'm down to my last spare 1-up that my heart is beating out of my chest. Videogames require the suspension of disbelief. Always have. Videogames never have, and never will make complete sense. The day they do, I will stop playing videogames entirely. Why can't the 'villain' be something more interesting, such as a disconcertingly large shoe? The protagonist has an overactive imagination, we can go absolutely nuts. Let's not pick something boring.
Okay, does anybody remember the TV show, Rugrats?
I remember Rugrats. The monsters were never real. They were always the result of overactive imaginations. We all knew that, but it didn't make Rugrats any less fun, and it didn't make the creepy episodes any less creepy. SWM posted a neat little idea and then there's comparisons to Silent Hill. I'm with Jordan. Zero imagination, the lot of you.
Why can't 'child-friendly' media be scary? I haven't heard a good reason why not. One of my biggest fears is still the Groke, from the Moomins. Sometimes, when it is dark, and the air is cold, I can almost see the Groke, slowly marching towards me. Saw the TV show as a kid, stuck with me ever since. You tell me that shit can't be scary, I'll tell you that you're full of crap.

I have a lot of weird beliefs. I have the belief that Nintendo consistently make some of the best videogames of all time. I also, for the life of me, can't recall the plot to any Nintendo game ever made outside of "rescue the princess". This is because the plot is secondary to the game itself. Who cares what the girl's motivation is, who cares why she is running away from everything in sight, who cares about the little bits that don't currently make any sense?
There's a cool idea here, run with it.

Sox:
"Pedohole" was actually a typo, but that's such a good typo, that I'm going to leave it in there and draw attention to it with this follow-up post that points it out.

KvP:

--- Quote from: Sox on 07 Mar 2010, 14:48 ---As for the idea that getting caught would be ultimately more frustrating because the end result is the same as winning the game (being reunited with your parents), that idea is crock. It'd be a videogame. It'd fade to black and you'd get a game-over screen. Not the same result at all.

--- End quote ---
Don't be thick. Gamers notice these things. Couple of examples - At the end of Fallout 3, there's a choice, either you sacrifice yourself, or the paladin who's with you. There's a button that needs to be pushed in a room full of deadly radiation. What Bethsoft failed to take into account was that most players, by the end, had taken on a companion, Fawkes, who was there when you made your choice. The funny thing was that just a few hours prior, Fawkes had done pretty much the same thing you were tasked with doing - he walked into a room full of deadly radiation and came out unscathed with a GECK. Players (and not just the Codex guys) were angry, because the developers had given you a false choice to manufacture drama. You had to choose to kill either yourself or the Paladin, when standing right behind you was a guy who was clearly capable of pressing the button without anyone dying. They blatantly presented the best choice to the player and left it out of consideration for no reason. They ended up correcting their mistake with the DLC, but it proved a point - you can't pull one over on the player like that without him noticing. If you're presented with a less severe choice (submitting to a security guard to reunite with your parents instead of playing through several hours of running around) only to have it snatched away from you arbitrarily, that's annoying. Players of your badly-thought out game will likely keep playing, but they'll be thinking "Huh, you can lose the game by winning. That's stupid." One of the cardinal rules of game design is that how awesome you think your ideas are is not nearly as important as how the player will experience those ideas.

Another case in point - In Modern Warfare 2, I believe (haven't played it) there's a sequence in which the player character is betrayed and shot to death in a semi-scripted sequence. I've read game forums where people have seen this coming, so they run away from the betrayers, only to be hit by a "magic bullet" that kills them dead, despite not being in the line of fire of any other character. That's a failure of game design - If you're going to force an outcome in a situation, you need to at least present it such that it's apparent that it's the only way it can possibly happen. If reuniting with your parents is the goal of the game, then you need to justify why a perfectly reasonable avenue to that goal - getting caught by a security guard - is the wrong choice.


--- Quote ---Seems lazy.
--- End quote ---
You know what's lazier? Not justifying anything you have to do in a game. You know what's even lazier than that? Crying "sour grapes" so that you don't even have to try, like this

--- Quote ---Videogames require the suspension of disbelief. Always have. Videogames never have, and never will make complete sense.
--- End quote ---

KvP:
Also

--- Quote ---I have a lot of weird beliefs. I have the belief that Nintendo consistently make some of the best videogames of all time. I also, for the life of me, can't recall the plot to any Nintendo game ever made outside of "rescue the princess".
--- End quote ---
Okay, here's the thing. Lots of games have no plot. Most of those games have gameplay. Doom didn't need a story because it was a first person shooter. Mario didn't need a plot because it was a platformer. A survival / adventure game needs a plot, because running around in a Silent Hill type game with no weapons and no real purpose beyond "look at our pretty environment design" isn't as viscerally stimulating as shooting things, or jumping on and around things to advance through a level. I remember playing Myst as a little kid and being completely mystified by the plot. It might as well have had no plot. It was incredibly boring. Your game is like that.

I don't know why I have to explain why it is that Nintendo games are fun without plots.

est:
I really dislike scripted events, because I want to play the game, not be a passenger in it.  I thought they were done OK in Dragon Age, but there were still a couple that bugged me. 

I would definitely be annoyed at losing the game you guys are talking about due to being caught by a security guard.  After a couple of such events I'd probably stop playing it, because I just wouldn't care enough anymore.  It would be like sitcoms where a person will select the stupidest fucking option possible in a scenario just so it puts them into a "funny" situation.  Contrivances have no place in good storytelling.

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