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School of Stealth, Episode 1 (Patreon)

Published:
2020-03-24 15:49:57
Edited:
2020-03-25 19:43:23
Imported:
2020-07

Content

Hello! 

After finishing my Gloo gun video, I decided I wanted to finally make a GMTK episode about stealth games.

So I wrote a script called "What Makes a Good Stealth Game", recorded it, and then... threw it all away. 

I realised that there was no way I could sum up an entire genre - one that encapsulates everything from Splinter Cell to Untitled Goose Game to Alien Isolation to The Swindle - with one, pithy "do these 5 things" video, without it being completely subjective, and pretty slim on detail.

So, I've gone for a different tact! School of Stealth is a new GMTK mini-series that will go through the main mechanics of stealth game design to talk about how that stuff works, and the considerations you need to make when choosing them. 

So episode one is about guard awareness - from fuzzy, analogue, invisible vision cones in The Phantom Pain, to clear, binary, on-screen indicators in Mark of the Ninja. How do these different systems work, and what are their pros and cons?

Future episodes will be on the tools of the trade (everything from silenced pistols to Bayek's eagle to the trusty Distracting Rock™), level design, and what happens when the player gets detected (Game over? Run and hide? Go full Rambo mode? Quickload?)

I'm probably going to alternate between stealth videos and other topics for a bit. I want to keep the pace going so it finishes up in a couple months, but not bore people who hate stealth games.

Anyway! First episode is above for your viewing pleasure. Any feedback, ideas, critiques welcome and appreciated. I'm going to give it another polish pass tomorrow, and maybe swap out the music here and there, before the final release. Plus: thumbnail, description, etc.

Cheers!

Mark


Files

How Stealth Game Guards See and Hear | School of Stealth

Welcome to the School of Stealth, a GMTK miniseries on how stealth games work. In episode one, I’m going to tackle guard perception and awareness. How do guards see and hear, and how do different solutions lead to different game experiences? Subscribe to ensure you catch future episodes. Support Game Maker's Toolkit on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/GameMakersToolkit Sources Modeling AI Perception and Awareness in Splinter Cell: Blacklist | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1020436/Modeling-AI-Perception-and-Awareness Spaces in the Sandbox: Tactical Awareness in Open World Games | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1018038/Spaces-in-the-Sandbox-Tactical Building an AI Sensory System: Examining The Design of Thief: The Dark Project | Gamasutra https://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/131297/building_an_ai_sensory_system_.php (Audio) Building AI Sensory Systems | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1022627/Building-AI-Sensory The Last of Us: Human Enemy AI | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1020338/The-Last-of-Us-Human Mark Of The Ninja And The Business Of Stealth | Forbes https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2012/09/07/mark-of-the-ninja-and-the-business-of-stealth-how-klei-entertainment-set-out-to-make-the-perfect-stealth-game/ Dishonored Badass Stealth High Chaos | StealthGamerBR ™ on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKyT19o-Nl8 Find out more Can You See Me Now? Building Robust AI Sensory Systems | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1026497/Can-You-See-Me-Now How Thief's Stealth System Almost Didn't Work | Ars Technica on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzD9ldLoc3c Game Design Deep Dive: Dynamic detection in Shadow Tactics | Gamasutra https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/290733/Game_Design_Deep_Dive_Dynamic_detection_in_Shadow_Tactics.php Of Choice and Breaking New Ground: Designing Mark of the Ninja | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1017791/Of-Choice-and-Breaking-New Creating the AI for the Living, Breathing World of Hitman: Absolution | GDC Vault (Free Access) https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1019353/Creating-the-AI-for-the Games shown in this episode (in order of appearance) Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (Konami, 2004) Splinter Cell: Blacklist (Ubisoft Toronto, 2013) Dishonored (Arkane Studios, 2012) Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes (Kojima Productions, 2014) Assassin's Creed II (Ubisoft Montreal, 2009) Batman: Arkham Knight (Rocksteady Studios, 2015) Mark of the Ninja (Klei Entertainment, 2012) Marvel’s Spider-Man (Insomniac Games, 2018) Invisible, Inc. (Klei Entertainment, 2015) The Last of Us (Naughty Dog, 2013) ECHO (Ultra Ultra, 2017) Metal Gear Solid (Konami, 1998) Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (Ubisoft Montreal, 2005) Thief: The Dark Project (Looking Glass Studios, 1998) Hitman 2 (IO Interactive, 2018) Far Cry New Dawn (Ubisoft Montreal, 2019) Aragami (Lince Works, 2016) Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (FromSoftware, 2019) Dishonored 2 (Arkane Studios, 2016) Horizon Zero Dawn (Guerrilla Games, 2017) Batman: Arkham Asylum (Rocksteady Studios, 2009) Assassin's Creed: Origins (Ubisoft Montreal, 2017) Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (Kojima Productions, 2015) Volume (Mike Bithell, 2015) Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun (Mimimi, 2016) Deus Ex: Mankind Divided (Eidos Montreal, 2016) Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus (Sucker Punch Productions, 2002) The Marvellous Miss Take (Wonderstruck, 2014) DOOM Eternal (id Software, 2020) Outlast (Red Barrels, 2013) Alien: Isolation (The Creative Assembly, 2014) The Swindle (Size Five Games, 2015) Styx: Shards of Darkness (Cyanide, 2017) Music used in this episode Splinter Cell: Double Agent soundtrack - Michael McCann Systematic - Lee Rosevere (https://leerosevere.bandcamp.com) Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory soundtrack - Amon Tobin & Jesper Kyd Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes soundtrack - Harry Gregson-Williams and co

Comments

Will Kommor

Hope you're holding up alright 💪

GameMakersToolkit
>>34128778

I'm doing good, thanks - not so bad to stay indoors when Doom Eternal, Animal Crossing, and Half Life Alyx are all coming out! Silver linings and all that ;)

Anonymous

Glad to see some more lighthearted games like Sly Cooper and Miss Take show up in here -- it's nice to see stealth games that avoid some of the gritty murder elements that show up in the predator-oriented games. Along those same lines: I hope dearly that Monaco shows up at some point in the series! It's one of the better entries not just in silly-stealth, but also in how play develops *after* you've been spotted.

GameMakersToolkit
>>34135758

Will definitely be looking at Monaco in the detection episode, yeah. And was absolutely important to look at stealth beyond just spies and ninjas - so you may also see a naughty goose in future eps ;)

Anonymous

Great video! I'm creating a small, 2D stealth game myself and you exactly described how I implemented the hearing of the guards – using my path finding, to create a path between the noise and guard and using that path, if the guard is supposed to react to the sound. I was never sure, if that might be the best solution, but I figured it might be close enough to simulate the movement of sound. (It has also the problem, that a guard can only hear sound, when he can walk to it. If he “hears” something through an open window, he won't react.) I don't know if that might be interesting to anyone, but just writing a little bit more specific how anyone could implement the seeing: You can take the direction the guard is looking as a vector and calculate the angle (using dot product) between that vector and the position of the player relative to the guard. If you also calculate the distance between the guard and the player, you basically have what Mark is showing in the video with the field of vision. I also enjoyed the part of refuge spaces. If you boil down stealth games to their basic forms, they are a lot like The World's Hardest Game, as in, moving through the level and trying not to get touched by the vision cone. So it's great to have some safe space for breathing. Here's a link for reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LR3MT2GdYtc After the discussion of the previous posting I thought more about what a stealth game can do, to prevent quick saving and I think the best solution might be, to have the game still be interesting after being spotted. But I can't think of a game, that does that. Someone mentioned the Batman games and they are a great example, as there might be three outcomes when you're spotted. 1) You can escape, but now the guards are alarmed. That means the game is harder, as the guards are more attentive and move in a more unpredictable way (maybe even glitching out). Or 2) you can punch the guards, but then you play Batman: The beat 'em up instead of Batman: The Sneak 'em up. Or 3) you're shot and dead. So when you're spotted, games will be harder (like in the first Splinter Cell, after beeing seen guards will put on bullet proof vests), switching genres (the newer Wolfenstein games just return to shooting) or instant fail. Neither of them is an interesting solution, that prevents me from reloading the checkpoint, but I'm curios, if there might be another solution to that problem.

Anonymous

Once again, Mark, you prove your worth as one of the best youtubers out there! Proud to be your patreon, you really change the way i think about games

Will Kommor

If I made a stealth essay series I think I'd call it "Must Be the Wind"