Depends on how you define depth. That in itself along with “balancing” are huge glittering generalities (especially on SRK) that needs to have an operational definition before we could proceed to have any coherent discussion about these terms. Even the opening statement of Sakurai talking about “balance” and “personality” is very vague and useless to have a discussion about until those terms are more defined.
In a simple way
Depth = meaningful options that the players have at their disposition + the amount of viable strategies/gameplay styles on the game via said options.
There’s no opinion in defining depth.
It’s the amount of useful mechanics you have at your disposal and what you can do with them. In terms of mechanics, MvC2 is barebones. It has a lot of glitches, but what you get is very barebones if you don’t count things like guard cancels, guard breaks, unblockables, fly screen deterioration, fast fly, unfly, manual super jump cancels, etc. They’re all glitches.
Depth can come from complexity as well as simplicity you know.
A lot of fighting games’ depth in general basically came from things that were once glitches. You could pretty much say the same thing about SF2 back in the day. Very bare bones if you don’t count things that were unintentional which makes SF and fighting games in general what they are now.
Complexity is not the same as depth!
Depth is a measure of how “deep” the game’s decision tree is, and how much processing is required to navigate the tree. This means presenting the player with as many decisions as possible, with the “correct” decision being reliant on dynamic information processing as possible. The information needed to make the correct decision should be available, of course. Depth is also hurt when players are reduced to just guessing and hoping for the best. If there aren’t that many decisions to make, or the correct decisions are too easy to find, or the information needed to arrive at correct decisions is not available, depth suffers. I see depth as a positive trait and I think games should seek to maximize it.
Complexity is a measure of how “wide” the game’s decision tree is. The more mechanics there are, and the more esoteric their interactions become, the more complex the game is. I actually find that increasing the complexity of the game tends to hurt depth, because players spend too much time and effort trying to grok just what is going on that there isn’t much left for the actual decision making.
Just putting this out here, regardless of if I get shit for it or not. Divekick is simple as fuck, and is really deep at the same time and it’s as barebones as you can get. You can’t sit there in your chair/bed/whatever and say MvC2 isn’t deep. The shit that goes down at high level, would utterly LAUGH at some current gen fighters meta games.
Either… I’m nit explaining myself clearly or y’all misunderstanding… either way, it’s too late for me to care right now. I’ll come back to it another time.
For the record though… I’m in agreement with all of you and the way I’m reading both yours and my posts, I’m reading yhe same things… obviously something isnt being communicated on my part…
Then that depends on how you define opinion. Depth in itself is an equivocal term that is used between different groups and professions, and the standards and criteria for depth is different between these different fields. Depth is also a glittering generality because it holds a strong emotive connotation that implies something is full of layers, complexity, breadth, and/or profundity and regarded positively because of those attributes. Just using the word itself is relatively vague and doesn’t clarify the standards in which “depth” is met, especially within isolated, specified fields.
When it comes to your definition of depth, you said, “[Depth is] the amount of useful mechanics you have at your disposal and what you can do with them.” This definition is still too vague for me because depth is determined by the “amount” present within the game, and “useful mechanics” in itself doesn’t tell me much. Just to what degree is a “mechanic” useful? What constitutes as a mechanic? What you implied with your definition is that a mechanic is a device within the game that the player has immediate control over to use where and when that was intentionally designed by the creators of the game. The game has options such as guard cancels, guard breaks, unblockables, fly screen deterioration, fast fly, unfly, manual super jump cancels, and etc. but are not regarded as mechanics because they’re “glitches.” A glitch is “a defect or malfunction in a machine or plan.” So because of the lack of intention, the would be mechanics or options aren’t really mechanics, thus lowering the “amount” of “mechanics” despite usefulness of the options. So, there is less or a lack of depth. Even with “useful mechanics” defined, there is a lack of clarity in regards to amount necessary to determine if something, or in this case a fighting game, has depth or not.
With Hecatom’s definition, depth has very different meaning. He said, “Depth = meaningful options that the players have at their disposition + the amount of viable strategies/gameplay styles on the game via said options.” Depth is, in itself, the options and the the amount of strategies/styles based on those options. Still, the amount necessary to determine if a game has depth is unclear. What’s different is that “meaningful options” certainly holds a different weight than “useful mechanics.” The examples in your definition implies that “mechanics” have intention by the developer while Hecatom’s definition of options just refers to being meaningful without any correlation to intention by the developer. So by Hecatom’s definition, “meaningful options” such as guard cancels, guard breaks, unblockables, fly screen deterioration, fast fly, unfly, manual super jumps cancels, and etc. could qualify as such, being “meaningful options.” Certainly, there is an amount of strategies/styles (and certainly viable) based off those “meaningful options” and the game has depth.
Then there is the issue of “how deep” a game is instead of “the game has depth or no depth.” Then what would be the standards/criteria to determine a particular depth of a game? What are the specific numbers or quantitative measurements? What if there are more meaningful options but somehow less viable strategies/styles? What if the opposite occurs and a game has comparatively less meaningful options but somehow has more viable strategies/styles than another game? How does one culminate the number of options and strategies together as a single determination of depth and how could it be compared to other rates and combinations of options and strategies? What determines if a strategy is more nuanced than a different strategy? Is that even relevant? Does all that matter is the number of viable strategies that occur regardless of the types/nuances of strategy? Is intention of design by the developer even a factor in determining depth? There are certainly more pertinent issues that could apply to the “definition of depth,” especially in consideration to fighting games. Surely, others could add to the list of critical considerations when it comes to defining “depth” within the context of games.
Then there is the issue that “there is no opinion in defining depth.” Within this context, “no opinion” is used to imply that the definition of depth is not equivocal and that the definition to be used, which followed, would be undisputed, or be an “undisputed fact.” “An ‘opinion,’ then, would be a claim in dispute. With this approach, whether a claim is fact or opinion can change can change with the time and participants, and whether they agree or disagree.” Such distinctions of being “undisputed”, or being a fact means to be undisputed, is fairly useless for our purposes since anyone challenging the so called “fact” with a prima facie case will automatically render the “fact” as an “opinion,” a claim in dispute. Even just presuming that you’re saying that the definition of depth is “undisputed fact,” saying that “there is no opinion” doesn’t mean that the definition of depth is unequivocal. Saying it is itself is a false dichotomy. So saying the “there is no opinion in defining depth” lacks clarity in what you’re trying to propose with your statement.
Also, in defining “depth” is a proposition of value because it’s proposing how something should be judged or valued, or in this case with depth. The interpretation of depth naturally is variable between people since personal interpretation and value are varied based on countless factors. So yes, it is important to define depth and that there is no “single” definition, especially within this world of context. What we need to have a discussion about “depth” is a working, operational definition that we could agree on in order to have better clarity to actually discuss about “depth.” The foundation of discussion is imperative to making headway.
Well, for the one proposing the meaning or value of depth, the burden of proof (in this case, making sure your evidence and reasoning is clear, accurate, relevant, sufficient) is on you. So yes, you need to provide clearer and more sufficient definitions and reasoning for those claims.
My purpose isn’t necessarily to engage in dialogue in determining and proving depth and extent of depth within games. I just fear that future discussion about depth could lead (to nowhere) without a proper/sufficient foundation for it, just as past discussions have before. I think that’s why discussion about “depth” hasn’t really progressed and people are tired of it, such as in regards to parries and “depth.”
For me, discussing depth is irrelevant to my intents and purposes when it comes to playing these games. It’s more constructive and convenient to discuss the options in games and variance in viable strategies each within the context of their own games than relegating both to such a broad and unfocused term such as “depth” and then using that insufficient, and almost arbitrary term to compare games for whatever reason to do so in the first place.
Oh well, fuck a response. Nobody on Srk is worth me reading all that.
I was agreeing with you until this 2
Nope, complexity doesnt hurt the game’s depth, what it hurts it is poor implemented mechanics or mechanincs that are tacked to the game without any thought behind them and how they will affect the gameplay in the long run.
So far the majority of games that have more mechanics add new layers of depth to the game because they allow to deviate into new ways of interaction with the players, specially because when they are well implemented they are simply a natural progretion of the basic formula.
Which bring us to the 1st quote and the last part of the 2nd one, more mechanics =/= more esoteric, the fuck is that shit?
I have yet to see a game where the mechanics present on it are so dificult to understand that the players can barely understand what is happening, GTFO.
You make it sound like if the addition of new mechanics only adds difficulty for the player, when in many instances is the oposite since it gives them more freedom on how to interact with the game and the oponent.
Everyone that knows me, knows that i am not really fan of mvc2, but i admit that the game has a good amount of layers of depth due how the game works with all its mechanics and glitches.
That is why my definition of depth is more oriented to the meaningful options regardless if they were intentional or not and how the impact the strategies of the player.
The options can come from many things, glitches, mechanics, character move set, game balance, etc. How meaningful they are is based on how viable are them as valid options to be used, for example, Sengoku Basara X (a game that i actually like) has a lot of options for the player but in the end they don’t really have a lot of impact due the unfortunate glitches that allow the wall to wall infinite and the space race infinite which at high level play tend to be the most favored strategy to follow, so even when the game offers many options at high level play the game devolves as the match progress into only 2 or 3 strategies.
As for trying to define how depth a game is, i think that is something that depends of context though trying to be quantitative imo is simply worthless.
We can argue that ST is less depth than MVC2 for example by the simply premise that the number of options on ST are more limmited than the number of options on MVC2, would this mean that MVC2 is a better game than ST? Not really, plus this type of discussion would lead to nowhere.
This thread reminds me why there is such a disconnect between player and developer.
If we accept that depth in a game is produced when players “dive deeper” into the decision tree, then it is necessarily the case that anything which prevents or discourages them from doing so hurts depth. To be able to process the tree, players need three things:
- Players need to be able to understand what is going on.
- Players need to understand what options are available to both players, and how those options interact.
- Players need to have the time needed to actually make a decision based on that information.
Anything that goes against those three things hurts depth because it keeps players on the shallow end of the decision tree. Imagine a game with only two characters. If you give each character only one jumping attack and one anti-air the depth is low: you always punish the jump-in with the anti-air. If you give each character 3 jumping attacks and three anti-airs with each anti-air beating one attack, trading with one and losing to the other depth is increased. Now the player has more to think about and has to “dive deeper” into the decision tree while playing. Now give the characters 300 jump-ins and 300 anti-airs and what will happen? Players won’t even bother trying to go deeper. They’ll find the best anti-air and use it all the time (or if there is no “best” anti-air they will just go with a random one), because it’s impossible to process the interaction of 300 possible counters to 300 possible attacks in time. That is what I am talking about here.
Now of course that is an extreme example. I am not saying that there is such a game with a 300x300 decision tree (although anime fighters with 1001 systems come closer than most, as do Tekken games with their 50-80 item movelist). However, if we extrapolate from the extreme we can conclude that somewhere between 3 and 300 lies a threshold point where adding more options makes the gameplay less deep. I am not pointing to any specific threshold here and saying “at this point there are too many options/mechanics”. I am just saying that the threshold point exists.
I prefer games that either have more complexity to depth or more depth to complexity. And I like it even more when one is extremely powerful for the character that achieves “this” position. Such as a vortex character getting a knockdown, or a keepaway character establishing range, or a mixup character establishing frame advantage. I like littlegoalsfor my charcters because to me that allows me personally to play my best mindgames.
I personally define complexity as the interactions that happen “generally” at neutral or from afar.
Whereas depth to me is sort of a mixup/yomi tree.
On the outside I much more prefer complexity over depth. Complexity at neutral followed by shallow yet very strong upclose options are my favorite kind of fighting games. Lots of neutral to be had, and generally have to get past a characters neutral before getting a “reward” of a good upclose game.
Depth to me kills that mostly. But then again I’m thinking mostly of defensive depth.
It’s hard to explain, but to me, a character like Rufus or gief shouldn’t have an easy time getting in since there games are so devastating upclose, but likewise, they should also have tools to combat (in limited fashion) the midrange keepaway that they will come up against.
Imho, ST and funnily enough, skullgirls come closest to this for me, and maybe tekken, though tekken has to much upclose depth for my liking and I tend to just get confused against good players with the myriad of options they have to defend and offend against me.
Pick Law/Paul and do flip kick/throw mixups.
I mean, I love AK, but the shit he does is YOLO as hell.
Not really,that was mostly conditioning his opponent. He wasn’t really playing “YOLO” , it was more of an act if anything. Dude was solid.
Isn’t it possible that in that 300x300 decision tree, players would eventually boil it down to the 3 (or however many) best anti-airs/jump-ins and then rotate among those three as the situation warrants? Giving the players the extraneous options doesn’t necessarily remove the depth, it just makes it more time consuming in training mode/research to find the right set of answers that need to be used to cover your bases and then the extra options become niche options for the scenarios that aren’t covered by the basic set of answers.
Not if you ask on Tekkenzaibatsu, that shit after Tekken Global was shameful.
I rarely go on TZ anymore but most players I talked to pretty much agreed that the kid was fearless but solid at the same time. I highly doubt anyone of note on TZ said otherwise.
Alot did, he got some pretty fierce hate. Alot of OGs still mad that they gotta play the game not exactly like TTT1 so it’s a bad game. Its dumb.