14 replies to this topic

[braddollar]

Was going to reply to TwiTwi's thread, but figured I'd just start a new one discussing this.

Standing still next to a console to hack it is boring. Some sort of minigame would be super sweet.

A MMO I used to play called Neocorn had a really cool hacking minigame. Here is a screenshot of it. I know it's not great, but it's the only one I could find.


Basically the way it worked is you are on the left side, the computer is on the right side. You started with a number of "charges" based upon your hacking skill level. Your goal was to send these charges down the line, and.. if I remember correctly (it has been many years), get a certain amount of the middle area "activated" with your charges. There are pathways for the "charges" to travel down from the left side to the right side, some of then straight through, some of them requiring more "charges" to be sent down other lines to activate a sort of junction and push the "charge" on. While you are doing this and trying to get however many activated, the computer is also trying to send theirs across and either cancel yours out, or activate enough of their own to win.

Hopefully that makes some sense, if not say so and I'll try to elaborate some more.

[Twitwi]

I haven't tried Neocorn,

I was thinking more like moonbase alpha has welding procedure. draw a line from here to there before time runs out, If you succeed process speeds up with 10 seconds and difficulty on minigame evolves, if you don't you get no speed bonus and difficulty goes down.

I just thought of something.
Minigames are gonna be a one man task, how to decide who's gonna do it? If you look at it, if 4 persons stands near a console doing a minigame, who's protecting, it would be a much more team play if only one person hacked, so there is no need for more people on one console. (As far as i know the game as i played it last night were like that, so what I'm saying with this is don't "fix" it)

[Halsh]

I think this'd be both good and bad.

Good, as the Rebel team would have to send at least 2 people to the hacking console to not get killed in the minigame.

Bad, as unless everyone can have a go (which would be rather counter-productive, you'd defy the point of bringing more people) you could end up with a really bad player taking valuable time doing it; it would also become a "standard" if you want to play rebel. Maybe a mix of the current and proposed: you can sit on it all you want and it'll go up slowly. If you want it to go faster, you enter the little minigame. This way, even if you supremely suck at the minigame you wont be unable to proceed along the maps course, it'll just take a bit longer.

[Twitwi]

Halsh, on 15 July 2010 - 07:56 AM, said:

I think this'd be both good and bad.

Good, as the Rebel team would have to send at least 2 people to the hacking console to not get killed in the minigame.

Bad, as unless everyone can have a go (which would be rather counter-productive, you'd defy the point of bringing more people) you could end up with a really bad player taking valuable time doing it; it would also become a "standard" if you want to play rebel. Maybe a mix of the current and proposed: you can sit on it all you want and it'll go up slowly. If you want it to go faster, you enter the little minigame. This way, even if you supremely suck at the minigame you wont be unable to proceed along the maps course, it'll just take a bit longer.

that's the point of the moonbase alpha minigame, it's quick and if you do it you save time, if you don't, well you don't lose anything (you just don't get anything).

[PixilatedPunk]

This is an interesting idea and something we have discussed in the past.

[elite879]

I'm supprised no one has mentioned Mass Effect 2 yet.

The hacking system on that randomly picked between 2 different games and was always rewarding when you hacked it.

Maybe something like that if the hacking is put into the game?

[Pattom]

elite879, on 15 July 2010 - 12:53 PM, said:

I'm supprised no one has mentioned Mass Effect 2 yet.

The hacking system on that randomly picked between 2 different games and was always rewarding when you hacked it.

Maybe something like that if the hacking is put into the game?

If Mass Effect 2 is the model, it should probably be the circuit-board minigame. It seems more appropriate to HL2 to say you were able to cross a few wires that shouldn't be crossed, rather than that you watched the screen roll upwards until you found enough bits of text to get the password. But I'd like to see Neocorn's method tested out first: it's certainly an intriguing idea that hasn't been implemented too widely.

[Shisnopi]

Mass Effect 2's circuit board game would work great if that game isn't as fast pace as I think it is.

But the faster the game, the fast the mini-game needs to be in order to keep up with the pace.

maybe something like a slot machine. The harder the hack, the faster the machine spins. But if there are skills involved ( like speed, health, hacking, etc.) then having a high hacking skill would slow it down.

[Twitwi]

Have any of you even tried Moonbase alpha?

[Halsh]

I tried it after you linked earlier in the thread and I feel I should mention the minigame you refer to. It starts with a base difficulty of 1, and this increases as you succeed and goes down as you fail to do the minigame. The minigame consists of drawing lines between points within a set boundry, which sounds easy, but when you have 10 to do in a short period of time (not to mention if it was in Overwatch you'd have the pressure of dieing) it feels very frantic at times.

I feel it would be an interesting add to the game, and would like to see a mockup, but I don't know how much time would have to be spent generating the mockup.

[braddollar]

Really wish I had a video of the hacking from Neocron still around :\

While I understand what everybody is saying in regards to having to send people to defend the hacker, a noob taking too long to do it, etc, I think that it would inspire more of a cooperative play. Everybody has to go and defend the hacker, or the hacker will die and the game has to be started over. You counteract the noobs taking way too long, by requiring it to be done in 30 seconds, or using the Neocron method the computer fighting back, and then you are kicked out and required to try again.

Dystopia was mentioned before, and even that sort of minigame would be better than the current. I'm not so much talking about the actual cyberspace play, but the use of programs in cyberspace. You slap down an encryption program, and then it runs its course doing things like generating an algorithm, encrypting, etc. You can just let the program run and it takes X seconds, or you can choose to manually start each process by clicking on the buttons for that process. The sequence is always the same for each program, but the location of the buttons is random. So you can memorize the sequences and get pretty quick with it, but there is always a random element. Similar to the Moonbase style that was suggested, but something that I think makes a little more sense in the context of the game, rather than just "draw a line." (Admittedly I've not played Moonbase and I'm not in a position to do so currently, but "draw a line" sounds simplistic to me, and nothing like hacking.)

[Halsh]

braddollar, on 16 July 2010 - 04:40 PM, said:

Really wish I had a video of the hacking from Neocron still around :\

While I understand what everybody is saying in regards to having to send people to defend the hacker, a noob taking too long to do it, etc, I think that it would inspire more of a cooperative play. Everybody has to go and defend the hacker, or the hacker will die and the game has to be started over. You counteract the noobs taking way too long, by requiring it to be done in 30 seconds, or using the Neocron method the computer fighting back, and then you are kicked out and required to try again.

Dystopia was mentioned before, and even that sort of minigame would be better than the current. I'm not so much talking about the actual cyberspace play, but the use of programs in cyberspace. You slap down an encryption program, and then it runs its course doing things like generating an algorithm, encrypting, etc. You can just let the program run and it takes X seconds, or you can choose to manually start each process by clicking on the buttons for that process. The sequence is always the same for each program, but the location of the buttons is random. So you can memorize the sequences and get pretty quick with it, but there is always a random element. Similar to the Moonbase style that was suggested, but something that I think makes a little more sense in the context of the game, rather than just "draw a line." (Admittedly I've not played Moonbase and I'm not in a position to do so currently, but "draw a line" sounds simplistic to me, and nothing like hacking.)

The Moonbase Alpha minigame is soldering points on an item to speed up repairs - the point of Moonbase Alpha is to repair everything pronto, so the minigame seperates the good players from the bad (not including player co-operation, job designation, general game sense). I'm not saying "This minigame is the one minigame to rule them all, impliment it!", just the general premise behind how it functions and how it benifits the gameplay over there, and how it could then enhance gameplay over here.

The problem with the Dystopia model, imo, is that the mapper has to make the area the hack occurs in, rather than just a pop-up screen as proposed through the Neocron or Moonbase Alpha suggestions.

On the subject of the terminal fighting back, it could be interesting to see the Overwatch player being able to counter-act the hacking attempts by the players by engaging in a minigame of their own, trading the ability to spawn units or move them into tactical positions to slow down/reverse hacking attempts (reverse only on unattended consoles). Alternatively, if the Overwatch player being able to directly do it is against the game that's aimed for, there could be a specific unit that could be introduced that would be able to counter-act the hacking attempts, lightly armed and would have to be positioned next to the terminal much as the players do to lower it back down.

I found a quick video which displays the hacking in Neocron twice, I've never played the game so I don't know how well of a demonstration this is, but anyway:
http://www.youtube.c...=en_GB&fs=1

[braddollar]

That video shows a hacker with a high skill level hacking something simple.

In regards to the idea of using the Dystopia style, I don't mean using the actual cyberspace, wholly different map idea. Just using the actual programs that you used. Like when you go into CS in Dystopia, run up to say the turret control and there it is encrypted. You hit 1 to toss down the decryption software, then either let it run its course or hit the sequence of buttons to speed up. The plopping down of the decryption program is more so what I was talking about as an idea. Similar to the Moonbase stuff where you can speed it up if you want, but you don't have to either.

[Shisnopi]

I agree with Brad, something that you place on a console sounds really cool. And if you add a upgrade element to the game, you can upgrade your hacking ability so that it's simpler to hack manually and speeds up the encryption tool.

Of course, if the console is left unguarded, the OW can send a combine over there to take of the encryption tool. Taking a bit of time to do so.

[AndY]

Shisnopi, on 18 July 2010 - 12:48 PM, said:

I agree with Brad, something that you place on a console sounds really cool. And if you add a upgrade element to the game, you can upgrade your hacking ability so that it's simpler to hack manually and speeds up the encryption tool.

Of course, if the console is left unguarded, the OW can send a combine over there to take of the encryption tool. Taking a bit of time to do so.

Seems like a good idea.