Leaping Bounds or Taking Flight? (Gaming Desires)

[Big Jack McBastard]

Which?

This is on the proviso that you're a superhero, a bloke in a Gundam suit, or a genetically modified tool of oppression and general destruction. In short not sat in a jet.

Leaping has been done so much I can't remember the last decent 'oh I'm flying, oh I've landed' game. Prototype touches on it but it's not a sustained ability and you can't really take off from the ground. (not that important I suppose)

I'd like to see a flying protagonist, I'd like to see/be involved in training your berk or berkette to gerrup in the clouds, being taught to fly in-game with actual repercussions, falling off buildings and the like in the early stages adding to your hospital bill[nb]You could be blinded or loose a limb but then work towards a power that overcomes that setback, it could be your own bespoke origin story[nb]Learning to fly, over a radioactive dump could increase the chances you'd grow a new one, or several! [/nb][/nb], possibly killing you in the extreme or destroying property in the process (What if you land on a car? What if it's the Mayors car?! What if by dumb luck it's a pillow truck but you bounce off the roof because you're too scranwy, being lighter makes flying easier after all) while doing good deeds or devilish acts raises and lowers your standing in society and bank balance accordingly. Could have all manner of outcomes depending on the decisions you make.

Anyway: Jumpy, flighty?

[Big Jack McBastard]

and general stuff you'd like to see in a game actually, why not? Go nuts with it.

_{Disclaimer: Sadly I am not thieving subsequent ideas to then bastardise and adapt into a future title.}

[HappyTree]

Crackdown has a good feeling of jumping freedom when you bounce from rooftop to rooftop. Spiderman slinging webs is close to this flying idea. Superman had you flying but was not very good. Best idea was in Second Life when I configured a USB controller to mimic the keyboard presses for flight, but the graphics are so bad and it's full of idiots. One day they'll make a game of free-flying that works well. Hopefully with the next generation of consoles they'll be able to give you the detail required to allow you to do it properly.

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

I think the Spider-Man/Prototype way is more fun anyway. If you can just fly over the scenery, then why even have it there?

One thing I've wanted to see ever since Sonic and Knuckles was released, is the ability to cross games with each other. Imagine how much fun you could have in FIFA if you could shoot Wayne Rooney with a BFG9000.

[eluc55]

Flying is one of the best bits in the new Zelda game, Skyward Sword. Everything about it is just great. Beautiful blue skies, simple, accurate controls with various ways to speed up and manoeuvre, and a soaring orchestrated theme as you swoop over the world below. But the best bit: sky diving. Leaping off the back of your bird with a touch of a button, then tilting the wiimote to swoop your character left and right, back and forth, lunging into a dive, speeding faster and faster towards the ground and then seconds before you hit the island below, calling your bird and shooting off into the sky.

Here's the theme:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRbROTdOgj0 

[mook]

Imagine how much fun you could have in FIFA if you could shoot Wayne Rooney with a BFG9000.

not many. i'd like to be able to dead eye that yelana(?)cow from deux ex HR for starters. and that chainsaw gun thing from GoW 3 would come in handy on skyrim on occasions.

[Nik Drou]

I think there's yet to be a proper flying superhero game, so part of me hopes that rather than doing another Arkham game, Rocksteady just go ahead and do the equivalent with the Superman franchise. Extremely unlikely, but hey ho.

Another thing I'd like to see in a game, without any cutscenes, is the ability to get in a spaceship from the ground, have full control over it, fly it up out of the planet's atmosphere, enter space, fly to another planet, enter its atmosphere, land and explore another area.

[Zetetic]

Another thing I'd like to see in a game, without any cutscenes, is the ability to get in a spaceship from the ground, have full control over it, fly it up out of the planet's atmosphere, enter space, fly to another planet, enter its atmosphere, land and explore another area.

Noctis, although it's decidedly elderly in its feel. Precursors? Although I might be misremembering that.

[Big Jack McBastard]

Another thing I'd like to see in a game, without any cutscenes, is the ability to get in a spaceship from the ground, have full control over it, fly it up out of the planet's atmosphere, enter space, fly to another planet, enter its atmosphere, land and explore another area.

Yes! Why this idea has been left in a dusty corner for so long is beyond my ken.

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

Super Mario Galaxy had you jumping between planets, albeit extremely small ones. There's also an add on for Garry's Mod that lets you build ships and fly between planets, but, in addition to being small, the planets are flat, rather than spherical.

[Zetetic]

I think Noctis illustrates the main problem with this - content. Noctis' procedural generation is actually pretty neat, but notably the game is 'about' nothing more than exploration, and the graphics are really very primitive (although not charmless). If you're going to be bouncing around planets, you're going to want them to be capable of differing quite a bit - even if you just go Star Trek and have 'The Ancient Roman Planet', 'The Nazi Planet', 'The Jungle Planet' - and there being a reason for this to be the case.

[Big Jack McBastard]

Doesn't have to be galaxy-wide, a solar system would do, bit of conflict between the worlds, different cultures and races, all manner of stories could be told with it if anyone had the stones to knock it up.

[Zetetic]

If you can really freely fly between the planets, you can presumably land anywhere you want on them. Which means either truly tiny planets, mostly empty planets, or a helluva of a lot of very competent procedural generation (which'll still most likely need to be backed by a lot of decent art assets for the bits that are truly hard to generate).

That's what I mean by there being a pain in the neck over content. In most games of this type, the joins between space and planets are a neat way of hiding that the planet is very small/empty, right?

[WesterlyWinds]

Super Mario Galaxy had you jumping between planets, albeit extremely small ones. There's also an add on for Garry's Mod that lets you build ships and fly between planets, but, in addition to being small, the planets are flat, rather than spherical.

Is Garry's Mod still around in some incarnation or other? Last I remember they released Garrys Mod 07 (or something similar) but it seemed a bit shit way back then.

[Big Jack McBastard]

In most games of this type, the joins between space and planets are a neat way of hiding that the planet is very small/empty, right?

True, maybe it's something for the next gen to have a pop at, utilizing some hybrid of on-disc/on-HD resources and accessing online servers containing more fleshed out worlds, the best looking thing that even scrapes it at the minute would be, I suppose, Mass Effect and those worlds are dinky and the in-space stuff is a bloody farce.

Oh well we can but dream.

[The Boston Crab]

Flying is one of the best bits in the new Zelda game, Skyward Sword. Everything about it is just great. Beautiful blue skies, simple, accurate controls with various ways to speed up and manoeuvre, and a soaring orchestrated theme as you swoop over the world below. But the best bit: sky diving. Leaping off the back of your bird with a touch of a button, then tilting the wiimote to swoop your character left and right, back and forth, lunging into a dive, speeding faster and faster towards the ground and then seconds before you hit the island below, calling your bird and shooting off into the sky.

The best 'getting from A to B' game mechanic I've ever experienced. I could swoop and dive all day long to that music. I've just done

Spoiler alert

Flooded

[close]

Faron Woods too and I can't remember ever playing something so fluid and beautiful. Doing a tailspin

Spoiler alert

out of the water

[close]

, seeing the sunlit impressionist watercolours in the distance and then

Spoiler alert

plunging back to the swirling underwater forest

[close]

is just so beautiful.