/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.7991287]

But why did the tank controls work and age so well though? The first two games are 8/10s at minimum not in spite of but because they have it.

[Anonymous No.7991296]

Because tank controls are not "inherently bad" so much as "difficult to implement well".

[Anonymous No.7991580]

>>7991296
It's a common complaint zoomers have when first timing this game and even some players back in the day cuz it was already the era of free movement style being dominant. Really it's one big filter because it works perfectly for action-exploration puzzler platformers like this.

[Anonymous No.7991593]

>>7991296
Free movement is difficult to implement well that's why they coped with tank controls

>>7991287
Because the games are grid based

[Anonymous No.7991609]

>>7991287
Literally nothing wrong with tank controls especially in a game that favors precise jumps over action-movie tempo.

[Anonymous No.7991630]

>>7991287
... because the games were build around said controls

[Anonymous No.7991656]

>>7991609
>precise jumps
sick of this dumb meme, there is no "precise platforming" in tomb raider
the games are so rigidly based on an orthogonal grid they're basically cinematic platformers

[Anonymous No.7991662]

>>7991656
And yet you still can miss jumps if you don't position yourself in a precise manner or don't take a long enough run jump.

[Anonymous No.7991664]

We've reached the depths of contrarianism where we're gonna pretend people didn't say Tomb Raider controlled poorly even when it was new?

[Anonymous No.7991747]

Good controls generally allow you to play intuitively and improvise. Tomb Raider is the exact opposite of this.
All of this "precision platforming" talk really translates into "clunky and stiff".
Tomb Raider didn't age well. It was an ambitious series for sure, but ambition will only get you so far.
Having a camera that dynamically changes based on character direction was simply too much for the limitations of the PS1 controller.
There's a reason other PS1 action contemporaries like Crash Bandicoot, Resident Evil, and Metal Gear Solid all used fixed cameras.

[Anonymous No.7991752]

TR is pure jank

[Anonymous No.7991819]

>>7991664
Time to allow PS3/Xbox360. I rather see a Heavy Rain thread than this shit. Board deserves it anyway.
>>7991630
^

[Anonymous No.7991841]

>>7991287
I've sever seen that release before, but, if I had bought it, I would have assumed it was a bootleg and tried to get my money back as soon as I looked at those disc labels.

[Anonymous No.7991914]

tank controls makes perfect sense for a slow methodical explorer like tomb raider

[Anonymous No.7991923]

>>7991287
Pre-Crystal Dynamics Tomb Raiders are 5/10 at the best, and -5000000/10 at the worst.

[Anonymous No.7991949]

>Lara
>"tank"
Hell no. Hate this meme. Lara's nimble acrobatic can run circles around true "tanks". Check Indiane Jones Infernal Machine - this is slowass tank movement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jze74r0_gh0

Lara Croft was one of earliest 3D platformer characters able to pull acrobatics like noone else and she's nowhere near to tank.

[Anonymous No.7992027]

>>7991752
Euro jank for that matter.

[Anonymous No.7992112]

>>7991949
>nimble acrobatic
jump forward 1 cube
jump backwards 1 cube
jump sideways 1 cube
jump upwards 1 cube

[Anonymous No.7992280]

>>7992112
would you prefer the character's jump be random so you don't know if he/she will make it or not?

[Anonymous No.7992284]

>>7991656
Would your dork-rage be satisfied if he said "careful jumps" instead? Everyone knows what the fuck is meant by "precise", you have to line up Lara carefully and methodically and if you fuck it up it often means death. You can say Lara's movement is precise, like clockwork, rather than saying the player inputs have to be precise. Happy now?

[Anonymous No.7993009]

>>7991580
this is why i dropped angel of darkness when it came out. they got rid of grid system in favor of that free movement bullshit and i couldnt time any of my jumps anymore because everything was vague indication now

[Anonymous No.7993061]

>>7991747
>actually having to learn controls = clunky and stiff
I'm tired of this meme.

[Anonymous No.7993336]

>>7993061
see >>7993009

[Anonymous No.7993545]

>>7992112
and tumble, mid-air tumble, running jump that covers more ground, hit the ground running to do a running jump after only two steps, diving and jumping with/without grabbing that subtlety changes the trajectory, being able to keep a lock on enemies and fire on them during most of these moves
The term tank controls mainly apply to Resident Evil and other similar games where all you do is turn, go forward, go back, and aim weapon.

[Anonymous No.7994304]

>>7993545
TR has tank controls because Lara turns slowly, like a tank
Simple as

[Anonymous No.7994314]

>>7993545
I like TR and will defend its controls (I like the slow methodical pace), but I don't think we need to say they're not "really" tank controls. All people really mean by "tank" is that left/right rotate your character without moving, and forward/backward drive you in that direction. No need to get fussy about it.

Also, I feel like that's giving in to the haters--like you're trying to rebrand to avoid the stigma. Just own it. Old TR has tank controls and it works for the style of the old games.

[Anonymous No.7994325]

>>7994304
she can turn 90 degrees in a single fluid motion if you press back + direction

[Anonymous No.7994349]

>>7991656
pedantic pop tart snorter detected

go molest a pilow.

[Anonymous No.7994356]

>>7994304
Lara's quick and dynamic. The real tanks are crap like guy from The Mummy game or ironically Indiana Jones.

Just look at this. She moves her head when you look around, she's doing flips and handstands. Acrobatics and making her movements to be very dynamic was one of main gameplay factors of the original Tomb Raider game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJtim-PEGZI


Now comare it to crap like this. He's moving like he's having stick in ass. Total fucking tank - slow, requiring perfectly lined up jumps, and even still jumping like a fucking retard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lutfiqs0qv4

[Anonymous No.7994869]

>>7991664
>t. actual contrarian

[Anonymous No.7994871]

>>7994304
>t. no clue what tank controls even are
Every. Fucking. Time.

[Anonymous No.7995010]

>>7994304
Everyone turns slowly on a console. It's why gamepads suck.

Tank controls are like AitD/RE/MI4/GF (though there are options to make the last two screen relative like FF7-9).

[Anonymous No.7995802]

>>7995010
>Everyone turns slowly on a console
Not neo-Lara in LAU on console.

[Anonymous No.7996313]

>>7991664
TR controls were so good that even GTA used the same pattern with fixed camera for GTA3 and GTA VC. I think they chaged it in GTA SA so you could move camera freely.

[Anonymous No.7996335]

>>7996313
3 and VC were tether cameras, not follow like early TR.

[Anonymous No.7996365]

>>7996335
3/VC pretty much follow the protagonist and if you turn camera left or right it also rotates protag the same direction, very similar to TR, even if it is a different technology. The only addition was vertical camera movement.

[Anonymous No.7996369]

>>7996365
You could walk towards the camera. The main character didn't back up like Lara, but instead turned around.

[Anonymous No.7996370]

They work for the same reason they worked in Prince of Persia: Because they combine with the player animations sell the illusion of real-world weight and inertia. That's something that very few games can pull off, even today.

The problem with them is that they require grid-based level design to work, and that's an unnacceptable graphical limitation to normies today.

[Anonymous No.7996379]

>>7996369
I'm pretty sure you had to press 'look behind' button while running as otherwise it was impossible to have character facing the camera in GTA 3 or VS. This came in GTA SA only.

Going towards the camera resulted with Tommy or Claude simply walking backwards.

[Anonymous No.7996441]

>>7996365
You're describing the PC's mouselook controls. On consoles (and with an option setting on PC) the player moves relative to the camera and isn't locked facing forward ahead of the camera.

[Anonymous No.7998456]

Rare Lara

[Anonymous No.7999964]

>>7996370
>an unnacceptable graphical limitation to normies today
Why? And is it even possible to have engaging platforming with the ubiquitous industry standard camera / controls of today?

[Anonymous No.7999971]

>>7991287
I played the mobile port and even touchscreen controls are good.

[Anonymous No.7999975]

>>7991914
This is Cope. A game like Tomb Raider needs modern controls.

[Anonymous No.7999980]

>>7999964
Fortnite one of the most popular games in the world has more advanced platform controls than tomb raider.

[Anonymous No.7999984]

[Anonymous No.8000038]

>>7999980
Because you can create your own platforms? Not sure if that really counts

[Anonymous No.8000665]

>>7999975
>A zoom zoom like (Me) needs modern controls.

[Anonymous No.8001348]

>>8000665
Tank controls worked perfectly for early RE.
The TR ones are pure fucking garbage and that has always been the case.

[Anonymous No.8001404]

>>8000665
Technology is much more advanced. I can climb any kind of slopes nowadays, I can slide on countless surfaces and etc...modern technology is advanced enough to improve these games.

[Anonymous No.8001498]

>>7999975
It doesn't though.
Tomb raider's gameplay was designed around tank controls.
> A game like Tomb Raider
Games that are actually "like Tomb Raider" don't exist anymore, for good or ill (personally I don't care that much. I'm not a particular fan of the original games).

There are probably much better examples of games that use tank controls that might legitimately be improved by a more modern free-movement control system. MMOs come to mind. But even then, a game like Everquest is very immersive. There are many reasons for this, but the way the game is designed to be played in 1st person is part of that and tank controls are pretty good fit for 1st person movement. But trying to play a game like EQ in 3rd person is very awkward due to the controls and there's no real upside the way there is in Tomb Raider, as the gameplay in EQ is not especially designed around its particular control scheme.

[Anonymous No.8001567]

>>7991593
>>7991296
>difficult to implement
Is the point not just to imitate the Prince of Persia style of gameplay where movement has to be planned out and intentional? Giving the sequence of character animation priority and forcing your input to be a string of commands that get carried out by said character. Where making a mistake is on you because everything that happens is basically predetermined once you commit to it. There's no almost missing a ledge because of some weird diagonal angle, you're either looking in a cardinal direction or not. You either hit jump on the last tile or not. Etc.

This >>7996370
There's few games I can think of that have throttle and inertia mechanics for humans too. The only one that comes to mind is system shock 2 whee there's a bit of a ramp up/down on player movement.

[Anonymous No.8001590]

>>7991287
The grid based movement system always sucked and immediately became outdated once Mario 64 launched later in 1996.

[Anonymous No.8001615]

>>7995010
Correct. Tomb Raider’s controls were a workaround for the PlayStation controller only having a d-pad at the time.

[Anonymous No.8001872]

>>8001348
>>8001404
>everything should look and play the same
>everything should have one if two standard camera perspectives and the same standardized control scheme
Cancer

[Anonymous No.8001896]

>>7991287
>Age so well
lol. They aged like a 60 year old Tomb Raider

[Anonymous No.8002786]

>>7999984
Sauce? Reverse send me back to 4chan

[Anonymous No.8003090]

>>8001348
Why do you suck at TR?

>>8001404
>i can jump around in fortnite

[Anonymous No.8003118]

It depends if the player expected it to work like Mario, Spyro etc, or if they realised it was actually a 3d version of pic related and everything worked on a grid.

Even then, it's a very marmite game style, people either like it or don't. I enjoy it but I can only stomach it in small doses.

[Anonymous No.8003954]

>>8002786
Use yandex.
https://tombraider25.square-enix-games.com/en-us/tr3/blog/box-art-redesign/

[Anonymous No.8003960]

>>8001896
I know she looks 60 but Angelina Jolie is only 40somthing.