New Game Design/Gameplay needed for dealing with Enemies in future games

[Cranky Old Man]

I think Frictional themselves would agree that the run/hide/sneak mechanic is getting a bit played out

Well, let me put it this way: If all game developers would suddenly stop releasing sneak-em-ups and games that you can do a "pacifist run" in, I'll stop playing games. ...because sneaking around like a helpless ninja, is all that I enjoy doing.

1) I hate guns, and I hate killing. I've played those point-and-click games to death. Especially horror games, can't be done if you're armed. Well, technically they CAN be done, since F.E.A.R., Silent Hill and Dead Space exist, but those games would be five times greater if you weren't armed. In horror games, you're supposed to be weak and vulnerable. That's when you feel horror. That's when a monster is truly a monster, and not a target. Amnesia got this - it got what the players have been screaming for for years - and that's why it's such a famous game.

2) Using the environment takes much more intelligence than just pointing and clicking. It takes spatial awareness: Where am I? Where's the monster? Where am I supposed to go? Where is the monster heading? Where is it facing? To a skilled player, a common office becomes littered with items which you can throw as distractions or lures. A weapon can't change shape like the environment can.

[Newsman Waterpaper]

Silent Hill and Dead Space exist, but those games would be five times greater if you weren't armed.

I think those games are prefect enough without striping away weapons. No combat/defence worked in games like Amnesia and Penumbra but I hate this over-saturation of having no combat in most recent horror games as a cheap way of making people feel weak. The original Silent Hill(s) and Dead Space made feel weak against endless hordes of monsters by having clunky combat,powerful enemies that will drain your supplies,claustrophobic areas and limited visibility even if you had several weapons in your arsenal.

In general to this thread:

I said this too often enough but No, SOMA had awful monster encounters that were more predictable than The Dark Descent's, seriously they give away some of the gimmicks of an enemy the moment you met them e.g the note in the server room in Theta might well just said "this enemy cant see but only can hear you". They just basically split up the Amnesia monster mechanics in different monsters but some how made it less interesting. You call Dark Descent's monster encounters predictable all you want but atleast it took you several walkthroughs to notice that they were doing the same thing over and over again unlike SOMA were it's monsters were predictable the moment you encounter The Construct at Upsilon which was disappointing since I have read many interviews with FG just before SOMA released saying that monster encounters were going to more unpredictable and like Kein said some enemies start out passive/ non-aggressive towards the player. There is a fine art to monster encounters in horror games, Amnesia's monster encounters had it, SOMA's didn't.

I think there are solutions to juice up the sneak/run/hide gameplay and it's not just adding weapons.
Like some enemies will attack the player in different attack patterns, example one enemy will the classic "Grunt" and one instead of just patrolling, it will stalk the player while using stealth against the player and if close enough the enemy will unleash a fatal blow towards the player.
If you so against having weapons in horror games, how about having means of defence that don't kill enemies but rather stuns/slows them down in their chase e.g The Chaser from Slender: The Arrival cant be killed but can be halted by shining your flash light towards it's face. There are many examples of having defence in a horror game without actually having actual weapons.

I think Sneak/Run/Hide still has potential if given to the proper hands. With good AI programming(Alien:Isolation),a pretty good story reason for it(Among The Sleep) adding new features to it (Alien:Isolation again) and overall try to improve and avoid whatever problems that most horror games have with monster encounters.

[A.M Team]

I would have liked to have seen an enemy that would charge at you if spotted but then run away in fear if he/she sees you carrying a heavy and/or dangerous objects (like a knife, fire extinguisher, ect.).

If he/she gets uses to you carrying objects then the enemy would charge at you and when you wake up the object is taken away from you.

Now he/she will still charge at you regardless of what you are carrying.

Interesting, not by-the-books mechanics-as-metaphor gameplay would have probably won SOMA some extra praise.

[Cranky Old Man]

I'd like an enemy that you can't HEAR. The hammerhead shark would have been a great chance to make such an enemy, or any kind of marine life. You have to spot it to be able to avoid it. Sure: The angler fish is such an enemy, but you can spot it a mile away. The reason why people feared the creeper in Minecraft, was because you could barely hear it.

[Newsman Waterpaper]

I'd like an enemy that you can't HEAR. The hammerhead shark would have been a great chance to make such an enemy, or any kind of marine life. You have to spot it to be able to avoid it. Sure: The angler fish is such an enemy, but you can spot it a mile away. The reason why people feared the creeper in Minecraft, was because you could barely hear it.

That's why I would like to see an enemy that also uses the sneak mechanic not just the player, I see great potential in that idea but it would a hard task to program.

[Lazoriss]

Since the monsters in SOMA are victims of the WAU, it would have made a lot more sense for them to be passive entirely. Like... you're supposed to feel sorry for them, but at the same time, they're trying to kill you. Also, since most of the monsters have different gimmicks and patterns, there's so much exposition dedicated to explaining that, which could have instead gone into the backstory of the monsters.

The initial playthrough of TDD was terrifying. The ambiance, sounds, and chase music added A LOT of the scare factor as well. There was also the very important mechanic of how damage/death worked. In SOMA, when you're hit, the screen instantly blacks out. You wake up a few seconds later in a nearby location. Death just has the clip reel and "YOU DIED". In TDD, you can take a couple hits before dying. There's nothing that made me more pants wettingly scared than having one of those abominations catching up to you with that screeching sound in your ears, or the scraping noise the brute's blade makes along the ground as it closes in. You hear it gaining before being slashed. Your screen is now red and you can barely hobble away; you're scrambling desperately for escape before that fatal blow. In some areas, you may be inclined to jump to your death rather than let it catch you.

The thing is, we barely know what the monsters are. A lot of the story is kept vague, at least in specifics of the WAU, which is like the main antagonist. SOMA had me on edge, and there were creepy moments, but the storyline was not one that benefited from roaming monsters as obstacles.
There are games that utilize patrolling enemies that don't despawn very well. Outlast (IMO!) uses this amazingly. All the enemies work the same, but they're scary because of the amount of story they're given. You KNOW what they're capable of, and you can only concoct in your mind the awful things they'll do to you if they catch you. They're smart, they talk to you, and the dialogue can make your blood run cold. We barely know anything about the specific monsters in SOMA, and there's a reason that the Crawler was my favorite monster in the game, and why Aker's appearance disappointed me.

I know Frictional was trying to be creative with the monsters by having more models and mechanics. But it doesn't mesh well with the story, and ends up taking away from it. Don't get me wrong, I really do love the game. But I also think it could have been a lot better as well if it had been more story focused and had more passive "monsters" that you could communicate with, like Carl and Amy. Like Kein said, you could have ones that were only aggressive when provoked. I really really like the first Crawler you encounter because of this. His brand of scary was from his personality and desperation. This is why I'm hoping there'll be DLC for this game. There's a lot of characters and backstory that weren't fleshed out. A good DLC would shed some light and make me appreciated the original game a lot more, too. It wouldn't even have to be a game. Short stories, comics, animation. I'd take any medium, really. I mean, the Transmissions miniseries was really cool! I really liked the directing and how the characters were handled.

[Cranky Old Man]

I'd like an enemy that you can't HEAR. The hammerhead shark would have been a great chance to make such an enemy, or any kind of marine life. You have to spot it to be able to avoid it. Sure: The angler fish is such an enemy, but you can spot it a mile away. The reason why people feared the creeper in Minecraft, was because you could barely hear it.

That's why I would like to see an enemy that also uses the sneak mechanic not just the player, I see great potential in that idea but it would a hard task to program.

How would it be difficult to program? You could just remove or lessen the sound, and let it loose inside a maze. Also give it fairly good sight so that if you can spot it, it will come for you.
How to beat it? Simple.
There are small items scattered about the level. Scatter more on the floor at strategic locations to improve your chances. The monster will sneak into them and make noise. ...and maybe there's broken glass on the floor at some places too. If you know which way the monster is taking, you can sneak the other way.

[Lazoriss]

A sneaky monster would be difficult to program because you'd have to spend a lot of time balancing the encounter. It'd be too easy for it to end up frustrating or tedious, especially if you end up dying a lot. For an indie game company, that's a lot of effort for a single enemy encounter. Although it might be find having a few memorable and well-done enemies, than just a bunch of short encounters with a mixed bag of monsters.

One game that does use super sneaky monsters is Monstrum. It's actually a pretty scary and fun maze-ish game. The map is randomized, as well as the monster you get, and they're all pretty well balanced out.

[Newsman Waterpaper]

I'd like an enemy that you can't HEAR. The hammerhead shark would have been a great chance to make such an enemy, or any kind of marine life. You have to spot it to be able to avoid it. Sure: The angler fish is such an enemy, but you can spot it a mile away. The reason why people feared the creeper in Minecraft, was because you could barely hear it.

That's why I would like to see an enemy that also uses the sneak mechanic not just the player, I see great potential in that idea but it would a hard task to program.

How would it be difficult to program? You could just remove or lesser the sound, and let it loose inside a maze. Also give it fairly good sight so that if you can spot it, it will come for you.
How to beat it? Simple.
There are small items scattered about the level. Scatter more on the floor at strategic locations to improve your chances. The monster will sneak into them and make noise. ...and maybe there's broken glass on the floor at some places too. If you know which way the monster is taking, you can sneak the other way.

I was more talking about a more advance sneaking technique for the enemy, one that would use shadows to hide itself,hiding every nook it can find and attack the player when it's less expected or wait in said nook and wait for the player to come by and ambush them, an enemy that is more cunning than dangerous and plans their attack.

[Cranky Old Man]

A sneaky monster would be difficult to program because you'd have to spend a lot of time balancing the encounter. It'd be too easy for it to end up frustrating or tedious, especially if you end up dying a lot.

The problem is that there's always one fanbase that you risk displeasing. On one hand you have the seaoned players who are bored with things that they already know and can easily deal with, and on the other hand we have new players who get frustrated if they die a lot. Some of these players are young outright tards who will run head first into monsters, and then complain about not being able to tackle it or something.
...but there's a way to solve this: Difficulty settings. Most games have them by now.
Granted, some people (like a certain game critic on the internet who shall remain nameless) are so dumb that they think that they're man enough for Hard settings and THEN complain about the game being too tedious "because I just keep dying, so it's no fun" (or that the game is "too dark" after having set the gamma too low, and then REFUSING to adjust the gamma when told) but there's nothing that can be done about those people.

For an indie game company, that's a lot of effort for a single enemy encounter. Although it might be find having a few memorable and well-done enemies, than just a bunch of short encounters with a mixed bag of monsters.

During the making of SOMA, I think that Frictional Games has outgrown the indie label. They must have hired new story writers and modellers that proved to be super good. They're capable of anything they set their minds to at this point. ...or maybe I just liked SOMA a lot - I dunno.

One game that does use super sneaky monsters is Monstrum. It's actually a pretty scary and fun maze-ish game. The map is randomized, as well as the monster you get, and they're all pretty well balanced out.

But isn't Monstrum an indie game? That shows that it can be done.

---

If Frictional Games REALLY wants to program a revolutionary monster, I have an idea based around quantum physics:
Not only make the monster soundless, but make it branch off at every junction, and have it be at the last possible location that it can be in.

Have the unseen ENTITY branch off into two entities representing possibilities, for every junction it enounters, exponentially increasing where the monster COULD be. ...and as the player looks at these places, remove these invisible entities, until only one entity remains.

The effect of this, is that monster will always be approaching you from the corridor that you DIDN'T look down.

...and of course once it sees that you have spotted it, it charges at you. You can outrun it, but once you've lost sight of it, the branching algorithm begins anew...