Quote:I don't think it would be THAT hard to make 162 different abilities...

A Black Falcon Wrote:No. What would be hard would be actually making them unique.

Quote:But I think I've seen it called 2.5d for stuff like Doom and Duke 3D...

Quote:Exactly. I doubt we'll be seeing 162 abilities.

Quote:"Quasi-3D"? I don't remember hearing that term much...

Quote:Doom was not simply considered 3D. I read PC gaming magazines in 1996. One of the big things about Quake was that unlike Doom or Duke Nukem 3D the game is really true 3D...

Quote:Oh, and I played Pandemonium some years back (PC version demo). I considered it what I have been saying: a 2d game that uses polygons. I don't understand why they should be considered so different that they need a totally new label... there isn't much of a difference if there is any at all (I'd probably argue that there is functionally no difference).

Quote:You can call it a ham sandwich for all I care. 2.5D is how most people describe those types of games, whether you want to or not.

Quote:Oh yes it was, it was hailed as the first 3D game. Of course, people who knew better didn't consider it as such, but the main gaming community considered it to be a 3D game. There was none of that 2.5D talk. When Quake came out it was like "ok wait now THIS is 3D".

Quote:But it designates a big difference in a place where I would say that there really isn't one...

Quote:Maybe when it came out people thought Doom was 3d, but they realized not too long after that it wasn't... and technically of course I don't think it ever was. Duke 3D (the Build engine) is much more "real" 3d, but it still has aspects that 'fake' it as well...

Quote:while "2.5d" platformers are not different in play from 2d ones...

Quote:But if I was telling you about a platformer the two terms would make a difference in how you thought of the game. Example: If I said "2D sidescroller" you'd think of a sprite-based platformer, but if I said "2.5D sidescroller" you'd probably say "Oh, so it has polygons?". Of course, I could tell you that along with saying that it's a 2D sidescroller, but by using descriptions I could get you to tell the difference between a car and a truck only using the term "motor vehicle".

Quote:RPG, by the very words that comprise, could be just about every game that's ever been made since in each of them you play a certain "role".

Quote:But at least "RPG" designates a group of games that are noticably different in play from other kinds of games, while "2.5d" platformers are not different in play from 2d ones... they are only different in art style.

Quote:And yes, of course it seems to me that all games are 2d when displayed... I'm not sure why DJ says that they're all 1d. Explain?

Quote:No, "2.5" makes me think of some aspect of depth -- given that 3d means a world that expands in 3 dimensions, then 2.5d should be something in between... like one with some 2d and some 3d aspects, or limited 3d (isometric?) that you could pass off as "2.5d", etc... it doesn't really make me think of something that happens soley on a 2d plane... "2.5d sidescroller" does, but then again I'd say that that is an at least somewhat contradictory defintion.

Quote:Art style?

... *slowly backs away from ABF*

Quote:I believe I already did.

Quote:"2.5D" is a hellovalot more easy to say that "3D game that uses typical 2D platformer gameplay", okay? This is the same situation as RPG, where the name doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Everyone calls 3D games with 2D gameplay 2.5D games, so live with it.

Quote:Drawn 2d art, polyagonal art, sprites-in-3d art, etc... that's what I mean there...

Quote:Yeah, I see that quote now... and that probably is what DJ meant (everything's stored in a 1d list). And that's correct, but as you say that's just representing a 2d image...

Quote:It's just '2d platformer made with polygons', really... if there is no third dimension in gameplay it shouldn't really be getting the label, I think... unless, of course, you're talking about the graphical style the game uses.

Quote:Sidescrollers like Kirby 64 have a third dimension, but it's an unusable one. HOWEVER, let's look at a game such as SSBM, which also has an unusable third dimension, EXCEPT when you pause the game and use the analog stick to move the camera around, giving you a view from many different angles. This is something that simply could not be done with a traditional 2D graphic style. Therein lies the difference.

Quote:... There can be 3D games that have more similar art to some 2D games than some 2D games to some 2D games. The technology does not change the art, it only changes how you go about making it and the amount of freedom you have.

Quote:...

You're really dense, did you know that? How many examples do I have to give? The RPG one should have been enough.

Quote:So what I mean is Doom is 3D because it looks 3D to your eyes. Now the fact that, in playing it, you realize that there are NO "underneath the stairs" areas, and that whenever you go up or down, elevators are used or other things since it's impossible to have two different height levels directly on top of each other, shows you that in some ways the gameplay is 3D (a wall can get in your way and you can take stairs to get over it), but in a major way it's 2D (If you are on the "second story", the floor below you can't possibly have monsters on it, not until you, ego, lower the active floor TO that level, so in other words no creepy climbing down stairs and then suddenly a monster hiding under the stair case comes after you moments). Purely graphically, it's 3D because that's what it looks like except for the actual sprites, which are 2D layered in a 3D environment.

Quote:Now with Duke3D, they actually allowed true 3D because, even though everything was still sprites layered in 3D space, you could actually be a floor above some real action instead of a floor above null space until you lowered the entire floor. Thus, they could actually add a spiral staircase that eventually looped above itself! Amazing!

Quote:And big guy yeah I'm fine with 2.5D. Kirby 64 was like that in gameplay terms since while it was all just running in a single plane, sometimes it curved around mountains and stuff, and when you shot bullets, they also curved around. Also, if kirby tried using a straight edge to measure the curve, it woudl curve too, because ether is something that's intrinsically impossible to prove.

Quote:That's a good example of where a game does something 2d really couldn't do very well, like GGA and its 3d towns... there aren't NO differences, but they really are minor. That's just a camera trick and it has quite limited applications since it can't be used during the game...

Quote:Of course, if you're talking about the style it is done in, but what does that have to do with my point? I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about the medium it's drawn on... in this case, polygons or sprites (or sprites and polygons).

Quote:Exactly. Oh, it's also 2d because there is no height element to the game... that is, you don't actually have to aim up or down at things to hit them, only left or right...

Quote:It's just a curving 2d plane... the polygons let them do fancy graphical tricks but don't actually effect the gameplay. In Kirby 64 it doesn't even have the impact of Goemon's Great Adventure, I'd say, for how much the polyagonal graphics affect the game...

Quote:Kirby 64 uses all three of its dimensions. The math is still 3D. Just because you don't move along the z axis doesn't make it 2D. There are still three visible dimensions in the game.

Quote:The way you differentiate between 2D games and 3D games is by looking at the math. Any 2D game can kinda look 3D (like Doom), but Doom's engine does 2D math while Mario 64's does 3D math, which tells the graphics hardware to do 2D or 3D things, respectively.

Quote:Yes, there are three visible dimensions. But the actual gameplay is just 2d that weaves around in this 3d environment... it probably would be harder to do than a standard 2d game, and it makes it look more unique (with curving and branching paths that split from eachother and stuff), but calling it almost a different genre? I'd definitely not say that. It's just a somewhat different take on the same genre.

Quote:Hmm... that is a good question, about how you would go about designing it. I guess you would just make the level and then later set the camera and path (like for GGA where it splits and the different paths seperate into totally different areas)... so from a technical perspective yes it is 3d. But from a gameplay perspective it isn't really. Like take Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth (the one topdown scrolling ship-shooter for the n64) for the N64. It's "3d" as in it uses polygons, ships fly down into the field, guns below the area you can shoot shoot up at you (and you can't hit them), etc, but all you can do is go along on this plane... obviously it's using a 3d engine as there are all the bullets and ships that use the third dimension, but for you yourself it might as well not be there (and those things I described aren't things that would be impossible in 2d either, of course...).

Quote:It gets fuzzy for cases like Duke Nukem 3D, though... that is more 3d than non but it still is using some of those 2d tricks.

Quote:Some of Duke's engines are 3D, while others are not. There's not just one "graphics engine".

Quote:I'm not saying you can't call it that if you want, you certainly can, I'm just saying that I don't really use the term "2.45d" and don't really like it. Either call them 3d (graphics) sidescrollers or just sidescrollers...

Quote:As I said, trying to define that game in terms of graphics engines gets fuzzy...

Quote:No it doesn't. It's the most precise way, actually.