pong

[misterX]

hi,

i'm wondering about what people would prefer. therefore, i'm encouraging each one of you to take a min and answer quickly this poll! You will decide for some aspects of a pong game.  

1. Moving the paddle
A) moving the paddle "slowly" with the left/right keyboard keys
B) let the paddle follow the (hidden) cursor instantly
C) the mouse pos indicates the direction the paddle will "slowly" follow
D) Something else?

2. Missing the ball
A) The ball explode in small parts
B) The ball disapear and reappear
C) Nothing (?!) (except some noise)
D) Some random lines making a "broken glass" effect
E) Something else?

3. The points
A) The first getting X points wins
B) A sort of rope that both players pull, it measures the points difference, a player wins once it has X more points than the other.
C) Something else?

that's it!
please take part of this poll!  
thanks in advance

[Herkules]

Aren't the pong rules enforced by international law??  

[princec]

B, E - blow up the bat, A

Cas

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[cfmdobbie]

1B, definitely.  A just makes me think I'm being hindered by the system and ruins the fun, while C just feels horribly "laggy".

2A or similar.  You need something drastic enough to reinforce with the user that they probably shouldn't let that happen again, but mundane enough not to be too over the top.  Turning both paddle and ball into a shower of particles and playing a little "pop" noise would do nicely.

3A is good, although B has some draw as well.  I can see both being a good choice, so I'll abstain from that one.

[erikd]

1B
2D would be nice, especially when the pieces of glass fall off screen . However, it would probably get old and irritating very soon so on the long run B or C would do. Or maybe on of a wide array of effects, chosen at random?
3A

The link below answers all your questions about pong and more:  
http://www.classicgaming.com/museum/pongfaq.shtml

[misterX]

thanks for input continue...

it seems 1.B (direct mouse-paddle dependancy) has the majority.

for questions 2 & 3, i would need some more input  

[DrBizzar0]

1. Definitly B
2. I think cfmdobbies idea about "Turning both paddle and ball into a shower of particles" sounds nice.
3. A tug-of-war concept could be cool, so B.

[Markus_Persson]

1) A: But surely you mean up and down keys?
2) E: Blow up paddle. That's what Arkanoid did.
3) A: With B, the only way to win is to totally dominate the other player.. and that's just not fun for either player.


My reason for answering 1A is that I think instamoving the paddle is "cheating", and the mouselag solution is just waay too frustrating.

[misterX]

i think too 1.B would be a bit too "easy". I mean, for a given ball speed and paddle width, it's relatively easy to place the paddle in front of the ball with the mouse. So, except the ball speed is extremely high, you're not going to lose. On the other hand, fast paced action is even funnier!
The problem is more of a multiplayer nature, i believe human reflexes can often be faster than network speed, causing problems!

[Markus_Persson]

Oh, you're going to make a networked pong.

Good luck, you're going to need it. Pong is unusually poorly suited for network play. =)

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[davidaprice]

If you're doing a networked Pong, check out the book Networked Virtual Environments - it actually uses networked Pong as an example in the section on how to work around network latency (as far as I recall, I don't have it with me right now).

[misterX]

thanks, really, but don't bother about this part, let it up to me.
This topic is only here to get opinions input about the 3 questions. That's all.

[blahblahblahh]

My reason for answering 1A is that I think instamoving the paddle is "cheating", and the mouselag solution is just waay too frustrating.

IMHO this is part of why game design is so hard. Question 1 is almost enitrely useless for the designer - because everyone who reads it will re-interpret "slowly" differently.

Having played lots of Pong, I'd go for the drifting paddle, on the  assumption that you will start it slow, find it sucks as a game, speed it up a bit, and eventually get it to follow the mouse at a speed that works nicely.

If you want to test people's choices for *analogue* controls like this, you now need to prototype. Just write an applet in 15-minutes that lets you move a paddle left and right with different control mechanisms (hit a, b, c to change) and different speeds (hit 1,2,3,4,5 to change - for option b the speed can be ignored!)

You may find that people change their mind when exposed to different speeds (including me - I wouldn't rule out that I might find option c irritating at *every* speed, although I'd be a little surprised).