CVG was lucky enough to get some hands-on time with Electronic Art's upcoming space survival horror title, Dead Space, and they think it looks promising. But that's not a hot story, this is: the game's developers are toying with the option of omitting the game's pause functionality. Does that take some sack, or what?
In life, there is no pause button. When your boss walks in on you posting a Cblog instead of finishing up those TPS reports, you can't hit start and assess your best excuse. Why should it be any different when a drooling space monsters jumps out of the shadows to have its way with your space engineer?
While there's a chance the devs will ultimately decide to include the option in the final build, I'd like to see this in action. If anything, it'll make for a great "Good idea, bad idea" discussion. On one hand, I can see how something like this could up the intensity of a survival horror title. On the other hand -- considering the assumed diets of many gamers -- the lack of a pause to allow for a bathroom break could be disastrous.
As a culture, we've been spoiled with the ability to allow ourselves to pause the "action" and be distracted -- in our homes we can pause movies, music, videogames, and even television. You can even put down a book mid-sentence if you needed to. Would sitting still and seeing a task through without interruption be that bad? I can hardly remember what it's like.
Contest:
8:48 AM on 02.11.2008
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If these are the kind of gimmicks they are already relying on to make their product unique, I see a bad future for this game.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/omit
It is understandable in multiplayer games where
pause" would be an impossible feature to implement. But, when a game is a solitary experience, there is no good reason to eliminate pause. I can't think of a single piece of solitary entertainment in history that you weren't able to put down at your leisure.
Perhaps the player can use the Guide button to 'force a pause,' but I don't think it works that way, does it?
But then again, Dead Rising accomplished the same feat by limiting your ability to save to bathroom visits and sleeping locations.
@boolean
David Lynch doesn't put chapters in his DVD's for this same reason. He feels that the movie is the movie, not a waystation of starts and stops.
A perfect example of why this is a bad idea is the MGS games. I've had to replay several of those fourty minute long cutscenes that can't be paused because of something coming up ten minutes in. In one or two cases I've actually said the hell with it and didn't bother watching the cutscene again.
You are more useful than spell check. Thanks.
Omitting the pause feature would be a mess. It sounds almost like a gimmick to sell games, rather than a well-thought-out inclusion for the sake of the game. No pause would be great if we never had to use the restroom, answer the phone, or stop playing for any reason whatsoever. Seriously, guys. No Pause = Bad, Bad idea.
Oh hey, you beat me to it.
I would never buy a game that you couldnt pause.
The pause button is there because people have lives, bodily functions and potential distractions.
Anyway, there will be a pause button, I guarantee it. It's a stupid, hairbrained idea that they won't have the balls/cheek to see through.
But on the flip side, it is something different.
In the context of a survival horror game, anything that increases suspense and the feeling of "no way out" is a good thing. This is doubly true if trying to use a menu to select healing items doesn't pause the action, because you can't screw around in a menu umming and ahhing about whether to use the spray or the herb or whether to switch to the shotgun or the grenades. You're on the spot fighting for your life.
And I think that is the whole point, and I think it's a good thing.
I don't believe that for one minute. So instead of pausing Super Mario Bros, you let yourself die, then let the clock tick at the start, hoping a spiny or errant goomba doesn't put Mario in the ground while you go pinch one off? I mean, I've heard a lot of gamers say a lot of stupid stuff to come off as "hard" or "badass" but this little bit of idiocy takes the cake.
However, I think that some people are missing the point here. In an earlier update, I think that it was mentioned that you don't even meet an enemy in the first 20 minutes or so of gameplay, if when you met that first enemy and you knew that there was no way to stop it from coming at you, I think that it would be a terrific tension builder.
Anyway, the way that this game seems to be panning out, it appears that you wont be faced with a constant onslaught of enemies (not master chief, just a regular guy, etcetera), so in all likelihood, there should be plenty of places that you can just stop moving around and take a break from the game.
On a side note, have any of you whippersnappers been to an arcade? Back in ye olde tymes we didn't have no fancy pause buttons. Sheesh.
THEY WILL OWN OUR SOULS..
That being said, if Dead Space actually includes so few enemies that I could find a safe space to hide within the first two rings of a telephone at any point in the game, I'm no longer interested.
There are many games out there WITH pause features that still interrupt the game, should you have to lose them. I know for a fact that simply having to pause Viewtiful Joe during the last boss for a phone call or bathroom break meant that my timing was screwed up for the unpause and generally left me for dead. Lot of memorization in that game. Does that mean that VJoe shouldn't have a pause feature because it just gets in the way when you actually do have to use it? No.
No pause = Bad idea. As much as popular media would like you to believe it, gamers do have lives, and many times, those lives intervene when we're playing games. Not letting me pause the game and forcing me to replay 15-20 minutes of it because I had to take a shit and got eaten by a face-hugging, mutated alien of some sort is just going to make me stop playing altogether. Because lets face it, any dev who would think about doing away with the pause feature to "up the intensity" already has a brutally unfair save system to implement, too. Start searching for those ink ribbons now, because since there's no pause, it's the only way to stop the aliens from eating your face.
Dumb, dumb dumb idea. I hope they drop it so I can buy this game.
"if when you met that first enemy and you knew that there was no way to stop it from coming at you,"
Who the hell does that anyway? I can't think of a single time where something made me jump for the pause menu instead of slamming down the fire button in pants filling fear. Simply this idea does not make the game any more scary AT ALL, it just makes it annoying. But like Sterling said, there is no way in hell this is ending up in the game, I think it's just a publicity stunt.
they should see this big grin i have on my face right now.
if they manage to make the game as intense as theyve said they have this could be the coolest thing ever.
Dead Space & Army of Two, looking good!
Kudos to EA, NO?
"As a culture, we've been spoiled with the ability to allow ourselves to pause the "action" and be distracted -- in our homes we can pause movies, music, videogames, and even television"
Nick, do you really want to turn this into some soapbox issue about American culture? Really, this one? And from the post it seems you think this could be just the shot in the arm we need, huh?
Jog the fuck on. There's a very real reason games have a pause feature - many of us who do play games do not have hours to sit and cock-about playing the same section of a game over and over again.
We aren't all "chocolate milk" kids who can scream at our moms and beg for more snacks on Xbox Live day in and day out - some folks actually have *gasp* careers or families who are prioritized well ahead of whichever game we're currently clicking our way through.
The "pause" might be one of the most necessary and fundamental aspects of gaming - frankly, games might not be "games" without it.
It certainly shouldn't be sacrificed in the name of those of you who are incapable of focusing on something for more than 5 minutes.
AKA I'm a gigantic pussy.
WE HAVE LIVES
THEY TOOK OUT JOBS!
then you wont miss the pause button?
I really think this is a good idea, maybe they will even work it into the auto saving, like you have to barricade yourself in a room first then it will save...
and maybe even have enemy's that are virtually impossible to kill except within certain situations (alien anyone)
I like it.
I just hope it's actually scary and not just Doom 3 in space.