this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2024
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i like it when its diagetic to an extent but there's good reasons to not put an immersive way to transport at locations but still the player has to go there. balancing that with players not getting frustrated is a big pickle: 2 examples
Mojave Outpost in FNV, the corner of the map makes sense, not having a bus or teleporter makes sense, but you still have to go there a couple times and its a long fucking walk if you do it manually. i'd use console commands if i had to walk down/up that goddamn road more than once to discover the marker
Morag Tong headquarters in morrowind: ridiculous location that makes the finding of them kinda fun, but then your mark is going to live there on pain of going through 6 stupid vivec city areas to get back
I think the latter is something Bethesda has improved on. Most dungeons have a quick exit. But also, a lot of bases/settlement. Like Vault 88 in fallout 4. The main entrance is in the middle of nowhere in a radioactive quarry with a slow vault door, but you can unlock another exit that is slipping out of a Chemist shop, Northeast of Jaimaca plains.
that's a really interesting illustration of how weird the fast-travel conversation is, isn't it? like it's an infringement on "realism" if you can magically zap between locations, but a random convenient trapdoor that doesn't have to account for how big the vault map is or the geology of the area is totally accepted
when i fast travel i just think it's a cut in the film and nothing note worthy happens as i normally made a trip. it generally fulfills the believability for a food meter and game time to change. i can accept that not everyone will find that to be enough illusion, but my point is we're all functioning on a level of it, which has a relationship to real world circumstances. real places take hours to get between, it's completely unfeasible for a videogame, so we're all operating on a plane of 'what am i willing to believe'
I think could synthesize convenience with realism with smart fast travel. Like in the Mojave Outpost Example. A fast travel option might be asking the NCR garrison at Primm to escort you up. It makes sense it would be uneventful then. Silt Stridors make sense because Morrowind was a functional society and it was just like catching a greyhound bus.
Because I think it really ties also into what you're fast travelling about. There wasn't really montage in LOTR where Gandalf travelled back and forth from Edoras and Minis Tirith to buy alchemy ingredients from the same two vendors. Which is turn probably more a gameplay problem I guess.
I'm going to keep coming back to Morrowind, but zapping back and forth between Guild halls felt easy and cosmopolitan. Like I can believe this important person would utlize teleporting this way. But then having to go to Dagon Fel or somewhere felt like having to catch a series of connecting flights to the middle of nowhere, it did make it feel like a challenge.
i completely get this but it's felt weird for this to work on a magic-senseless barbarian character yknow? you can buy scrolls but it seems like mechanic creep into the roleplay kinda. i'm sure somebody has played morrowind as a nord magickless strength guy but if it isn't viable for everyone it feels like an imposition. giving me the option to accomplish the game with 4 hours more of walking is not what i consider good game design lol
I'm really jerking Morrowind off today. But that's another thing Morrowind did well. It had multiple redundant fast travels. You want to get to Vivec? You can arrive by boat, by magic or by Silt Stridor.
Also where Fallout 4 was almost getting there. The Brotherhood had the Vertibirds and the Institute had the Relay. The minutemen and the Railroad however were kind of lacking (unless you destroy the brotherhood with them). Like they should have had their own fast travel system too. Like the Railroad has underground tunnels to bypass thing. The Minutmen can transport you by wagon between settlements. Something like that. Especially as it had a survival mode without fast travel.