Will HL2 take character empathy to a new level?

[Dr.breen]

Lip sync, eye contact, Superb voice actors, photo-realistic faces etc


While these factors are important for making you feel empathy towards a character they are not essential (one word **AERITH**)

But has Valve created a melting pot needed for these aspects to flourish? enough for a person to free such emotions over someone thats not even real?



What are your thoughts?

 

[SubKamran]

Lip sync, eye contact, Superb voice actors, photo-realistic faces etc


While these factors are important for making you feel empathy towards a character they are not essential (one word **AERITH**)

But has Valve created a melting pot needed for these aspects to flourish? enough for a person to free such emotions over someone thats not even real?



What are your thoughts?

Yah. In HL1 you got attached to characters, like Barney...this will be even better.

 

[Some_God]

Yeah... I cant wait till (hopefully) Opposing Force 2 comes out.. that would be awesome.

 

[ShadowFox]

Not compared to some RPGs, but in the case of first person shooters, I definately think so.

 

[NetWarriorDan]

Opposing Force 2? Would you play as a combine soldier or something?

 

[Lanthanide]

Lip sync, eye contact, Superb voice actors, photo-realistic faces etc

While these factors are important for making you feel empathy towards a character they are not essential (one word **AERITH**)

But has Valve created a melting pot needed for these aspects to flourish? enough for a person to free such emotions over someone thats not even real?

What are your thoughts?

They help, sure, but they aren't that big a thing.

In fictional books, you can't even see the characters (just have to try and imagine them), yet people can still become attached to them. And the flip-side, in action movies (Mortal Kombat comes to mind) you can see the people, but generally don't give a crap what happens to them.

I think it's more to do with the presense of actual characterisation and interactions between characters, and making characters actually seem alive and real, through dialogue and actions. Sure, facial animation etc helps, but without the dialogue and motivations to back it up, the character is forgettable.

 

[NB.]

I never have felt attached to any videogame character, i'm not sure if its a subconscious thing or what, because i'd like to think i keep my mind open to the possibility of it happening. I just think however well a character is conceived and 'fleshed out' there will always be glaring faults in their behaviour. Visually i think it makes very little difference what a character looks like, in respect of how i feel about them, they can have the most photorealistic face imaginable, with perfect lip-synching to every phrase they speak, but imo its how a character behaves that will really trick you into thinking theres something going on in their mind. Therefore i cant say that i can see myself being convinced by the HL2 characters, sure they will be fantastic to look at and will have somewhat realistic expressions etc.. But for me the AI will have to be something way above anything that we have ever seen before if i'm going to be emotionally affected by them.

I'm keeping an open mind about it though.

 

[Some_God]

Opposing Force 2? Would you play as a combine soldier or something?

Hopefully... yes. Many unofficial ones are going to come out after HL2... but the official one is going to be awesome... if it comes out.

 

[DoctorGordon]

Yah. In HL1 you got attached to characters, like Barney...this will be even better.

I always shot barney and took his gun. I work alone, less variables the better.

 

[iamaelephant]

I think it depends entirely on who is playing the game. I have a very superficial view on games. I don't care about characters, plot lines are only an excuse to kill more people/aliens, and I think graphics are an extremely important part of any game. I definately don't see myself getting attached to characters, but I imagine some people will.

 

[Ownzed]

I like getting attached to a character. It's good having a fun challege trying to keep yourself alive while protecting someone else at the same time(like Barney). Know what I mean?

 

[Bigcheese]

i have one thing to add to this. when the girl dies in SoF2 i laughed it was so funny. she died just like any other dude would with the stupid blood on the floor. now if they had done a pre-renderd cut seen or somthing else cool i would have cared. i mean evan in half life i cared more about the por sienctes that had to fall to thire death from the elivador

in hl2 i think they can make you care a hole lot more about them...

 

[kaf11]

even if you dont feel strong emotions for them, HL2 looks like its the closest fps that could. i know ill get sucked into the game and the story enough that ill have some sort of emotion towards some characters. thats just how i play games, i allow myself to get lost in them. i also think it works in the other direction. from the first bits of media and info, i could tell already that i hated the combine, and later dr. breen. those scenes of them harassing, beating, and arresting people have really made me want to pull a black mesa on them.

 

[B.Calhoun]

I always shot barney and took his gun. I work alone, less variables the better.

I'll remember that when your ass is pinned down by a strider and i got the last RPG.

 

[Asus]

I think the situation you were in, in Half Life made you care for the NPCs. They were in the same situation you were, so you were in it together.
Whether it was the begining after the accident trying to get out and coming across scientists in trouble or them helping you.
Even in oposing force they were right there with you under fire as they opened doors with a blow torch. etc
Part of the story telling, IMO.

Though the things Valve added for HL2 will help convey emotion better. Like the comical part in one of the videos where Eli pokes fun at Alyx.

 

[DoctorGordon]

I'll remember that when your ass is pinned down by a strider and i got the last RPG.

LOL

and, i like your sig

 

[NetWarriorDan]

i mean evan in half life i cared more about the por sienctes that had to fall to thire death from the elivador

That reminds me of when I played that part. One of the scientist said hello Gordon as he was falling. It was so funny.

 

[Geno]

when you have the last rpg and he's pinned down by a strider it doesn't matter, because there's another strider coming anyway, and i know you don't have enough grenades in your RPG.

 

[Dead-Inside]

I think it depends entirely on who is playing the game. I have a very superficial view on games. I don't care about characters, plot lines are only an excuse to kill more people/aliens, and I think graphics are an extremely important part of any game. I definately don't see myself getting attached to characters, but I imagine some people will.

You will.

 

[Biozeminade]

I doubt it will be possible to kill Alex/Eli/Barney/Dr. Kleiner without the mission failing or something because they are required for the story, so no I won't be feeling sad for them.

As for the other scientists maybe. I think what made you attatched to the characters in Half-Life 1 was that you were alone a lot of the time, and because it was dark and you wanted your mommy

 

[Cybernoid]

While these factors are important for making you feel empathy towards a character they are not essential (one word **AERITH**)

She was Aeris in the European version. :imu:

But has Valve created a melting pot needed for these aspects to flourish? enough for a person to free such emotions over someone thats not even real?

Valve has the most advanced technology to date (in computer games) to make characters seem alive. They also need excellent writing, but we don't know enough about that, yet.

I should hope that they do a better job this time, some people were shooting Barneys in Half-Life to get more ammo.

 

[Cybernoid]

I always shot barney and took his gun. I work alone, less variables the better.

I rest my case.

I've always found it difficult to kill characters in games. When I played Red Alert, for example, my most important goal was to minimize casualties.

 

[Jakeic]

In fictional books, you can't even see the characters (just have to try and imagine them), yet people can still become attached to them. And the flip-side, in action movies (Mortal Kombat comes to mind) you can see the people, but generally don't give a crap what happens to them

That's not true, I remember when I first saw Mortal Kombat: Annilations, the part where Lui Kang does his Animality, I cried. I still get all choked up when i see it now.

 

[iamaelephant]

I wonder if the facial animation will be as good as they look in the videos. I say this because the early videos for Medal of Honour: Pacific Assault showed off some amazing facial expressions, but in the demo they just don't look that great. Don't get me wrong, they are better than most games, but still not overly impressive (nothing compared to the videos). Also, I never noticed anyone's expression during the game unless I specifically loked for it.

 

[Neutrino]

Lip sync, eye contact, Superb voice actors, photo-realistic faces etc


While these factors are important for making you feel empathy towards a character they are not essential (one word **AERITH**)

But has Valve created a melting pot needed for these aspects to flourish? enough for a person to free such emotions over someone thats not even real?



What are your thoughts?

I'll still kill them if I can.

I've never seen a video game that can make me feel something for one of it's characters. I doubt I will until they become completely photorealistic.

 

[affen]

The characters I care about in computer games are those that really do something constructive. I hate to babysit some guy through the level when the only thing he does is annoying me with his bad path-finding or when he keeps on shooting when I'm in his line-of-fire. That's the reason I liked the little mechanical robots in Doom3 more than those pale-looking scientists who don't do much more than opening a container or a door (or not even that).

I hope HL² can make characters behave more realistically. In most games the characters aren't very convincing and you just know they're a bunch of scripted polygons. I hope HL² offers characters that really do help you or really look and behave realistically. If I'm in a firefight with some other guys, I want them to hit the enemy and not letting me do all the work.

 

[KagePrototype]

I've never actually cared for characters in an fps, I don't know if HL2 will manage to do it, but I'd like to think it will.

 

[CrazyHarij]

This is the most anticipated part of the game for me, caring and fighting together with NPC's.

 

[Neutrino]

caring and fighting together with NPC's.

NPC's?

Oh, you mean the mobile body shields?

 

[CombineHarvester]

Develop feelings for an NPC? But I've already developed feelings for Alyx. Very strong feelings. Huhhhuhrhhurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...... *drools*

:E

 

[CrazyHarij]

Develop feelings for an NPC? But I've already developed feelings for Alyx. Very strong feelings. Huhhhuhrhhurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...... *drools*

:E

I think the word you're looking for is urges.

 

[piggy]

i was one of them shooting barneys for ammo...


mohaha

haha

ha

 

[el Chi]

In fictional books, you can't even see the characters (just have to try and imagine them), yet people can still become attached to them.

Actually that's the main reason you become attached to them. Although the author has placed the character down in words as a guideline, the character is essentially your interpretation of this and so is your creation.
This is why it's harder to empathise with a character who doesn't have too much depth.

I think it's odd - but really great - that so many people got attached to Barney. He's great.
However I don't know about anyone else, but I didn't get too attached to the scientists. I didn't really have too much of a problem with stoving their heads in if they were no use to me.
I agree that HL2 is going to make us even more attached to the characters. Although it's worth pointing out that this time round there are proper main characters - besides the G-Man HL1 didn't really have that so much.

 

[piggy]

ooh the scientists were great fun playin "execution" with

 

[Cybernoid]

I wonder if the facial animation will be as good as they look in the videos.

I wonder if the facials will be any good! Hahahahaha!!! Hahaha.. haha? Get it? Ah.

 

[oldagerocker]

I think character Empathy will be huge in this game, Valve making you go through whole levels just seeing the combine destruction and oppresion going on is really going to fuel to player to play through the game to the end. This time it isn't just to survive, it's to save people from the aliens and combine. And im sure there'll be plenty of random people around we can shoot at for ammo or just for fun

 

[NeLi]

I will try to kill everything killable during the SP.

On my second run through the game of course.