Take me to the Question of the Week Archive Recently, we've paid quite a bit of attention to games that have been based on movies and movies that we think should be based on original games. Purists from both media might say that filmmakers should stay away from games as their source of inspiration and that game developers should leave movies to the big screen. In practice, game developers already do well by drawing ideas from existing games. Sometimes games from one genre may work quite well in another. For instance, the blending of computer game genres is nothing new, as recent games such as strategy games have taken on role-playing elements. Genres are indeed seemingly arbitrary and broad divisions, and there's no practical reason to avoid crossing such boundaries. So what would happen if game developers took existing game concepts and made new ones in a different genre? Would this be something worth doing?

　　Instead of imagining the possibilities, we thought we would try to answer that very question this week. If you agree with one of our choices, vote in our Instant Poll. If you would like to share your ideas or suggestions about a game or game series that could cross over to another genre, please send us an e-mail. Your letter might be published in next week's feature.

　　And as always, if you've got a burning question about games or the game industry, please submit your question ideas today. Your question might be selected as our next Question of the Week!

　　First: Football shooters?

　　Senior Editor

　　I've always wanted to see the sports genre break out of its decades-old mold. As good as games like NFL 2K1 are, they still follow the same formula set by the original Madden and games like Tecmo Bowl. So how about a first-person football game? Just imagine, the game would be designed with the Quake III engine, and for the most part, it would be played from the perspective of the quarterback. I remember that there was a first-person football game in development for the Sega CD back in the early 1990s, but I don't know whatever came of it. Mind you, this wouldn't be a football-themed first-person shooter (like The Last Boy Scout), but rather a serious football game played from the first-person perspective.

　　Playing from the quarterback's perspective My football game would be played mostly from the quarterback's perspective. A small window in either the upper left or upper right would show the patterns that your receivers will run, and their current location superimposed on top of those routes. Since this would be a first-person game, it's only natural that the controls would borrow heavily from first-person shooters--the mouse would control the quarterback's head, but its turning radius would be limited to 180 degrees from the direction that your chest is facing. That way, it not only makes it true to real life, but it also makes a full-charge sack from behind all the more exciting. Like some football games, you can either highlight your intended receiver by moving in his direction or by hitting one of two or three corresponding keys that are mapped to specific plays. This latter technique would mimic games like NFL 2K and Madden, while the former would mirror NFL Blitz.

　　Imagine switching from a wide-angle point of view to the football's view. Now here's the cool part about my award-winning first-person football game: When you go to pass, the camera angle will automatically switch from the quarterback's perspective to a wide-angle lens on the forward tip of the football. Naturally, it wouldn't spin with the ball, but it would follow a parabolic arc and give you a complete view of the field in front of the ball. A perfect pass would have your receiver visible in the screen during the ball's decent, and the last thing you'd see would be his hands reaching up to snatch the ball from the air before the perspective and control switch to the receiver. The running game would be similar, but instead of throwing, the action key would be mapped to stiff-arming. Like other football games, you'd be able to map other keys to actions like jumping, juking, and diving. Likewise, the defense would also have similar controls, and you'd be able to switch to anyone on the D, from safeties to linebackers, using hotkeys.

　　But I suppose just because sports and first-person shooters are on my list of "cross-genre pollination" doesn't mean that it's a good idea for those two to mate. In fact, it's probably a downright bad idea. In fact, it's probably the worst idea among my fellow editors. Regardless, if someone were to make such a game, I'd certainly pick it up and try it.

　　Next: Through the eyes of a Zerg

　　Executive Editor

　　Of all current computer game companies, I think Blizzard Entertainment does the best job of creating interesting gameworlds consistently in all its products. That's why Blizzard's games have so much potential to cross genres--the characters, settings, and situations in games like Warcraft II, Starcraft, and Diablo II are all interesting enough to lend themselves to other types of games. In particular, I think it's high time that Blizzard produced a game in which you could see one of its intriguing worlds through the eyes of its interesting characters.

　　Interesting gameworlds have the best chance of making a transition. I think cross-genre first-person games such as Thief: The Dark Project have a great deal of potential to become an extremely popular genre in themselves. These are first-person action games with plenty of role-playing elements and a great overall sense of immersion, and perhaps more than any other type of game, these are the ones that truly let you suspend your disbelief and feel like you're involved in grand plots in fantastical settings. Blizzard could really do something remarkable with such a formula. Imagine a Starcraft first-person shooter, in which you could gather together with other marines in the Terran academy before rushing forth to take on hordes of enemy Zerg...and just as the situation becomes overwhelming, the Protoss arrive and save the day.

　　If Blizzard games have ever had a weakness, it's been in their graphics, which have been rather formulaic because of their isometric perspectives. A more cinematic approach, or at least a first-person approach, could take the creativity found in Blizzard's games to the next level. Take a heavily scripted, cinematic game such as Valve Software's Half-Life and combine that with the kind of character and detail found in Blizzard's most recent games, and you'll have the makings of a huge hit.

　　The Warcraft and Starcraft games are clearly inspired by the Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 miniature wargames. I wouldn't be surprised if Blizzard tried its hand at massively multiplayer gaming, either. Their designers are huge fans of EverQuest, and as any Blizzard fan could attest to, the company openly borrows ideas from games and other media that the designers happen to like. For instance, the Warcraft and Starcraft games are clearly inspired by the Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 miniature wargames by Games Workshop. How great would it be to build up a powerful character in a persistent Diablo world, where legions of players are constantly trying to fight back the encroaching forces of hell?

　　Diablo II is already popular as an RPG. Blizzard has tried to cross genres before, in the ill-fated Warcraft Adventures game. It was cancelled shortly before completion for a number of different reasons, and in hindsight, that decision seems fairly sound. Compare the relative popularity of strategy games and role-playing games (that is, Starcraft and Diablo II) with the popularity of adventure games, and you can see that Blizzard's been fairly savvy in making the sorts of games that a lot of people care for. Still, I think we'll see Blizzard take another pass soon enough at using one of its existing licenses for a new type of game. The originality in Blizzard's games lies mostly in how all their elements come together, rather than in the individual elements themselves.

　　Blizzard has already revealed that it will announce an all-new product in the coming months. Needless to say, I'll be trying to guess at what that product will be until it's finally revealed.

　　Next: Dragonlance, the RTS game

　　Media and Downloads Editor

　　I better start by explaining what I think genres are. I think some genres have subgenres, similar in name but completely different in game experience. For example, you have real-time and turn-based strategy games. Age of Empires II besides resource management. Simulation is also a similar genre. So crossing subgenres might be as interesting as crossing main genres.

　　Dark Queen of Krynn, 1992 That said, I'd definitely like to see a Dragonlance real-time strategy game. There was a turn-based strategy game released in 1989 called the War of the Lance, and it was based on War of the Lance. I never played the game because I didn't have a powerful enough PC at the time, so I can't comment on it. But the subject matter would be great for a modern RTS game. For those not familiar with Dragonlance, it's a D&D realm that takes place on the world of Krynn. The War of the Lance is the story told in the Chronicles books. The balance of the world is being upset by the rise in evil. The Dark Queen's armies conquer the divided lands one by one. A group of heroes must stop this by rallying the good races and finding the fabled Dragonlance.

　　War of the Lance, 1989 Several games inspired by the War of the Lance have been made in other genres as well. Dragon Strike is a flight combat simulation where you ride on a dragon's back and attack other creatures or dragons. There are also quite a few role-playing games, of course, mostly centering on the Heroes of the Lance. None of these games truly captured the overall picture, however. A game with huge armies crossing the land fighting vicious battles is great material. The books only focused on the major battles that heroes participated in, so who knows what relatively minor skirmishes occurred. A nonconflicting story could be told through the campaign, perhaps through a journal of a soldier.

　　Riding on the back of a dragon in Dragon Strike With so many races in Krynn, it'd be hard not to come up with plenty of units. The Knights of Solamnia would be the basic infantry of the good side, while draconians would be the grunts for evil. The options are endless for races like dwarves, elves, minotaurs, and gnomes. Dragons would have to be included, of course, though it would be tricky to implement. Dragons are supposed to be incredibly strong creatures and are fairly abundant. Therefore, having them as unique "super units" wouldn't work. Each side would need a dragon slayer unit to protect infantry. Other welcome units would be flying citadels and death knights. The last thing the game would need is heroes. Games like Starcraft have done a good job with hero units, so I'd imagine heroes working in the same manner. All the characters from the series would be nice to see, but Raistlin would be great to play. Maybe not at the start of the war because of his health, but at the end of the books he is insanely powerful.

　　Next: Fallout, the first-person shooter

　　Assistant Previews Editor

　　Let's just get my first answer out of the way since it's probably the most obvious. Starcraft is probably the most suitable game for doing any sort of crossover, but it would probably work best within the action genre as a first-person shooter. Just imagine walking down the dark and eerie halls of an abandoned Terran base with a few other marines by your side, and all of a sudden, you see a massive gang of Zerg charging right toward you. Or conversely, try to imagine being in a group of Zerg that's trying to overtake a Terran or Protoss base. The variety of units in Starcraft provides an excellent opportunity to add specific character types in a first-person shooter that have unique abilities and access to weapons that only they can use. It's not as though any of this hasn't been done before. In fact, I could easily imagine a Starcraft first-person shooter resembling something like the Aliens Versus Predator games mixed in with a little of Team Fortress. But the point is that the Starcraft universe offers so much content that Blizzard could adapt it in any manner it sees fit, and it would probably work well.

　　Starcraft is an obvious choice for a crossover game. Starcraft isn't the only game that could make an excellent transition into another genre. Fallout, with its rich universe, could just as easily become a first-person shooter with different types of characters and a large assortment of weapons to choose from. It would actually be really interesting see how a Fallout first-person shooter would turn out just to see how the developers craft the postapocalyptic environments. In any case, a Fallout first-person shooter would definitely be interesting.

　　The Fallout games could be first-person shooters. Obviously, not every game is quite as suitable as Fallout or Starcraft for jumping between genres. A Warcraft first-person shooter probably wouldn't work too well because it isn't really in line with the current state of the average first-person shooter environment, but a Warcraft RPG could work very well. However, some games already span at least two different genres. Quite a few people think that games like Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale are some of the best strategy games available even though they're widely classified as RPGs. In those games, the members of your party essentially act as units with specialized abilities. When you pause the game and move your characters to different points in the environment or order them to use specific attacks, you're essentially using the same tactics as you would in a real-time strategy game, but at a much closer level.

　　There are so many games that could easily cross genres, with some being a little more adaptable than others. But what it really comes down to is a developer's ability to recognize what makes a game fun in the first place, and then attempt to translate that same essence into another genre.

　　Next: A Counter-Strike RPG?

　　Features Editor

　　At first I was going to suggest that role-playing games like Disciples II reminded me that such blends already exist and that maybe straight role-playing game conversions of those games wouldn't be very compelling.

　　Wouldn't you like to play as Kerrigan in an action game? Thus, it seems that strategy games such as Starcraft might make really good action games, especially first-person action games. Along with some of the other editors, I think that a shooter based on Starcraft is a good idea, and in such a game you might play each race from its perspective as you progress through the missions. There would be an overarching story, of course, and it could be based on the main storyline or perhaps be a narrative offshoot of the original game and the Brood War expansion. In addition, there are so many fans of Starcraft both here and abroad that a first-person action game would not only attract a lot of existing fans, but it would also be such a recognizable brand that even players not attracted to first-person shooters might be intrigued enough to play it. Finally, the multiplayer game could be pretty fun to play, and although Aliens Versus Predator features three races that you can play, this Starcraft's multiplayer mode could offer a lot more game types and units and emphasize cooperative team play on a much larger scale.

　　Various roles will exist in PlanetSide. On the other hand, it might be interesting to see first-person action games take on a role-playing side. Games like Counter-Strike are already more complex than typical first-person shooters in that you have to communicate with your team, buy weapons and ammunition, and complete your objective without getting killed. The upcoming PlanetSide, which is an upcoming massively multiplayer first-person shooter, will offer players the ability to specialize and customize their characters. These aren't characters in the traditional role-playing sense, but they're definitely persistent avatars whose strength and characteristics will increase over time. To me, this is very much like a role-playing game in which your personal investment in building up a character is a crucial part of the overall game-playing experience. It might sound a bit ridiculous to try to convert Counter-Strike or Unreal Tournament into an RPG, but with class roles and individual items or equipment becoming more prevalent and more important in first-person shooters, it seems almost logical that this type of game could become a role-playing game.

　　Next: Rainbox Six as a strategy game

　　Hardware Editor

　　I'm generally skeptical when I hear about games that try to carry a series over from one genre to another. There's something about the way a good game's setting and gameplay come together that makes it tough to transplant the former into a completely new body of game mechanics. Call me a purist, but I'm also not one for comic book crossovers. Two great tastes don't necessarily taste great together. Just because I liked fighting the orcs in Warcraft II doesn't mean I wanted a whole story-based game centered on that, like Descent: Freespace and Ultima Underworld, that stand out as great games on their own.

　　A precursor to Rainbox Six Tactics One thing I'd be interested to see is a tactical strategy game based on Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six . The series' planning phase may be one of its less popular features--trying to preplan everything in detail is rarely fun--but it does hint at the potential for an isometric strategic take on the game setting. The key would be to keep the realistic weapons and damage modeling that initially set Rainbow Six apart while still making the game playable in real time to keep the action flowing. The removed nature of isometric combat pushes most games to send many disposable enemies against the player instead of a squad of well-armed terrorists, but this doesn't have to be the case. The tone and style of gameplay would have to keep that Tom Clancy feel, which should make for a game more like Jagged Alliance 2 (played straight, with pretty graphics and a faster pace) than Fallout Tactics .

　　Scarier in first-person than a Skaarj A more whimsical idea would be to do a Starcraft first-person shooter. The Terran marine, Zerg hydralisk, and Protoss zealot could face off on the plains of Aiur or infiltrate the belly of a Protoss carrier for some head-to-head action. I want to be the Protoss. Then again, so would anyone, considering how unbalanced those three units are. Comparing Starcraft with Aliens Versus Predator, it would seem that vastly different combat models is easier to translate in a strategy game, where the large number of units can serve to counterbalance the strengths of individuals. But I would really like to see a full-scale, 3D Protoss zealot in an action game, so either Blizzard will have to figure out the balance or I'll need to learn some mod-making skills.

　　Crossovers are only really compelling when there's a setting or a character that's so interesting in itself that it could survive the shock of being transplanted. It's not really surprising, though, that the real success of a PC game always comes down to the gameplay, not a cameo by a well-established character.

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