THE LOST IN NIGHTMARE

[Jimmy_Jazz]

"Over-the-shoulder camera spoils the fear feeling, you fear more what you can't see, and if you can see everything in a wide range instantly, then nothing would surprise you and there is no fear (except an enemy suddenly coming out from nowhere)."

Different perspectives reveal / block different parts of the environment within any location. For example, you could have a static camera that shows you both sides of a corner, whilst a third person viewpoint you wouldn't be able to see around a corner until you approached it at look around yourself. Player RE4, running away from Chainsaw guy and then turning 180 to discover he's closer than you expected can install fear and panic in the same way you change between static camera angles in the traditional REs and find yourself confronted with a group of zombies.

Everyone has their own preferences, but as a Designer, neither one is really better or worse than the other. The real question is how do you create something that is as good as possible. The relentless chainsaw guy and giant crowds in the early parts of RE4 were fear and panic inducing. The problem is that 4 quickly left them behind for super powerful weapons and small groups of armed enemies behind cover.

[Code_R]

Any camera works when the game is designed around it. Throwing in the fixed perspective to this doesn't work because it's RE5.

[Lanzagranadas]

I'm not saying that it's impossible to bring fear or panic with an OTS camera, but I think it ruins many oportunities and means compared to fixed angle cameras placed smartly. Sure you can be eventually scared by an enemy behind you when you quick turn with an OTS cam, but you can also anticipate a lot of situations and potential scary moments thanks to the wide range view and the camera control, and most enemies won't never hurt you as long as you keep running, you can take advantage of them by keep moving forward and also using stage exploits such as ladders or windows until you reach a safe distance to shoot them.

The old school limitations worked better to me, it was awesome to enter in a room, hearing enemies sounds but not knowing how many they are and were exactly they are, or even if they already noticed you or not. This, combined with auto-aim disabled (only RE or RE2 unfortunatelly) was even better.

[Darkmoon]

The easiest way to make the over the shoulder camera work is to make an enemy that deliberately avoids it. One that can detect your vision and deliberately tries to find cover to hide behind, move around the sides and flank and do everything else in it's power to avoid you. In large, non-linear areas that now be created, this shouldn't be too hard. An enclosed space with multiples routes and corridors, areas for the enemies to hide in and ambush you and a few other factors could make them quite terrifying, especially if combined with the right sound effects (seeing a vent and hearing something breathing on the other side, hearing footfalls above and below you, hearing something moving in a room...) could be pretty effective.

As an added bonus, the monsters attempt to avoid detection would mean less linear positioning and movement - you would likely be able to learn the most likely route a monster could go, but you'd never be sure where or when they're going to show up.

It would work well with creatures like Hunters, or even something like a Ganado which I always felt could be scary if they were played smarter and more dangerous in lower numbers.

I'll have to ask Enrico how doable such an idea is with todays tech.

[Drake]

It's very possible considering the stalkers in dead space 2 did that quite well.

[Darkmoon]

True, although I was thinking of something of and upgrade to them. No hit and run tactics (once they're clearly seen they'll come for the murdering) and no peek a boo games. The idea would be to take a area, such as one of the two sections in RE5 but with multiple organic paths, or even a mansion environment or indoor. They would essentially spawn in half a dozen places, then attempt to get as close as they can without being spotted. The key would be two fold - large areas, as in mansion sized areas and larger, generated at once combined with a two stage AI - the sneak mode where they attempt to close and a more normal mode where they attack once spotted. Some enemies could keep the Stalker style AI the whole time, of course, making them stealth enemies. Others might have an ambush style AI, going into hiding somewhere once they were close enough. And others, like a basic zombie, would simply go for the player once they were close enough/in the same room.

All three AI types should be relatively easy to do, really, and with a large area and multiple routes should create a pretty organic experience. Left 4 Dead had a certain element of this, but there were a lot of scripted events too. The idea in this would be to avoid those as much as possible. It would be a lot more terrifying for me if you never knew exactly where the witch might be, only that it would go into ambush mode once you got close enough - so the closest that contais ammo might have a vicious stalker hiding in it.

It's the best way I can think of to recreate the set camera angle fear of the unknown - and better yet, it'll survive after a couple of completions. Adding in additional stuff like branching stories and locations and you could create a fairly diverse game that plays quite differently each time.

[Carnivol]

I'll have to ask Enrico how doable such an idea is with todays tech.

This is actually how most of the AI operations in Metal Gear Rising behave (everything, incl. character fall direction, targeting, and other stuff) is relative to camera positioning and not character positioning. In Rising it's of course one of the most annoying weaknesses of the game, as it's both incredibly frustrating if the camera hits something and alters its perspective outside of the player's control and because once you see through it, it's way too easy to manipulate enemies to behave in the exact way you want them to behave, by more or less steering them into corners and specific positioning by simple manipulation of the camera.

[Darkmoon]

So, doable but implemented poorly in Rising.

...along with half the rest of the game from what I've played.

So it might be usable with some consideration.

[BrionIrons]

You also have to consider that, despite how meh it was, 6 still sold millions and 4, 5, and even revelations have had seemingly better sales rates than the old resident evils. While a good bit of us wouldn't mind going back to static angles or so, the general gaming populace would abandon resident evil faster than the titanic. In the end, what capcom wants overall is sales, and regressing to the old style would just hurt them.

Not going back will hurt them even more. "Cough Looking For a Buy Out Cough Couch"

[Drake]

Pretty sure Resident evil wouldn't continue to hit millions in sales if they went back to the old tank style. There is a reason it died off.