Poll: Do you want "characters" as racers in Grip?

[harrisonosirrah]

They way I see it, if the drivers are not directly tied to their vehicle, no one will care about the drivers at all. Maybe some of you would prefer that, I don't really know how I feel about it.

I think that having teams and drivers and back-story adds to the world, it makes it believable. It is also harder to make something (vehicle, driver) seem special when everything is customizable. In RC1 Yuri was special, because he was better and looked different from everybody. If you can make any vehicle or driver into someone at Yuri's level, that will mean the only rewarding unlocks will be the vehicle mods.

If every player is just some random racer in a helmet, I doubt I'll care too much how I or anyone else looks. That's just me though.

[Chris_CE]

Ha, I can tell you now... there will be no character generation. That's a guarantee.

Again, I was just thinking characters for opposing racers (not yourself) would be cool in that it would make things more personal.

It's kind of like in a movie if the villains had no identity, you wouldn't really care as much.

But the cars in Grip will all have a distinct look and personality.

[Moo]

Now that I think of it, maybe in the career you could challenge the opposing racers in a 1v1 race in order to unlock the parts they use. That would give them a bigger purpose in the game.

[potterman28wxcv]

Now that I think of it, maybe in the career you could challenge the opposing racers in a 1v1 race in order to unlock the parts they use. That would give them a bigger purpose in the game.

I like the idea of having to defeat someone to gain his parts. Thus, I like the idea of having characters.

(imagine if you had to defeat the Rollcage Stage 2 Genesis to gain it ? Sure it would be hard, but damn rewarding when you finally succeed !)

[Unreal.2K7]

I voted for no characters. Afterall, it's time and resources toward a thing we never see. In RC1 they are only present as placeholder avatars to help to distinguish which car that player took with a brief glance. If you're removing the character-car binding, then characters become just the voices you hear during the taunting.
So, speaking about taunting: we NEED the horns on the cars for mocking opponents!

[LustVanGoth]

I would like my avatar but only customization simple but always but i will not be mad if they will be like in RC 1

[Tazeram]

it's time and resources toward a thing we never see.

Yeah, i agree that it's not worth the time and effort IMO.

we NEED the horns on the cars for mocking opponents!

But this... this is something we DO need! Oh yes! Got to have them classic Horns!

[Whiplash]

Having characters for AI players is good. But having to be sticked to them as a player isn't. It would be nice if players could chose some avatars (prepared or custom) when playing against each other.
The problem about characters are multiplayer races. It's really bad to have races where multiple same characters are picked, which is the case with RC1. The GRIP should base multiplayer races on cars, not on characters. We should be able to chose many same cars (with different color) and with our own player names and avatars. That's the best solution in my opinion.

[Starlight 456]

I would like Rollcage 1 style, where they have a face and a car, but nothing beyond that, and you choose from that list of characters.

[Lunatik]

For me, I really like the idea of having characters as proposed. So that they're shown on the HUD, taunt, etc.
For me, that has always added an extra element to the game, like creating rivalries!
As for the actual player, I don't mind as much... I personally am fine with having avatars to chose from but if there is no choice, it's usually fine too.

[Chris_CE]

Rivalries is the key thing. I was talking to Broscar about this today.

If you're doing career mode and you blow up, let's say, "Frank" 5 times in one race, he'll hold a grudge against you and next race will be gunning for you. And when he blasts you with a missile, you better believe you're going to hear him over the radio telling you off.

That's how I perceive this as working.

Think of how cool the nemesis system from Shadow of Mordor was (if you guys played it - you should by the way)

[Xaotros]

Rivalries is the key thing. I was talking to Broscar about this today.

If you're doing career mode and you blow up, let's say, "Frank" 5 times in one race, he'll hold a grudge against you and next race will be gunning for you. And when he blasts you from behind, you better believe you're going to hear him over the radio telling you off.

That's how I perceive this as working.

Think of how cool the nemesis system from Shadow of Mordor was (if you guys played it - you should by the way)

I wasn't thinking like that, but SoM system sounds like something i would like to see in GRIP.

[SoFabulous]

Here's my 2 cents. I loved Rollcage Stage 2 growing up, and throughout the game I it was fun seeing what sorts of things the AIs would try, and I would frequently be struggling against one or two AIs who were good and/or had good cars. But because every race was different, and that meant different cars, the cars that gave me the most trouble would be different each time. So instead of saying "YOLO420 is going to win unless..." I would think "that red Genesis is going to win unless..." and I think the continuity of characters would be great for identification and getting emotionally attached.

One thing that I think would be important, however, is that (just like players) each AI character is not limited to a specific car. To take the Mario Kart games as an example, in Mario Kart 64 each character had their car and that was it. Bowser always bumps Toad aside. But in the later MK games, such as Mario Kart Wii, characters could choose their car. Instead of 'Bowser always pushes Toad,' it became 'Bowser pushes Toad unless Bowser is in a bike and Toad is in a kart.' Allowing characters to choose different vehicles increased the diversity of interactions they could have with other characters, which I think made the game a lot more interesting.

One way you could do this, is that each AI character is predisposed to a specific selection of cars and/or in-game strategies. Maybe David only plays Vostok cars, or Bob plays random tier 1 cars yet mysteriously remains competitive, or Eric likes to mirror the car you're using. Maybe Fred goes for all of the shortcuts he can, regardless of the fact that his car may not be able to make each one. I think this sort of system would be great. Maybe during single player, the game restricts you to a subset of the AI characters until you beat ____ level or go to _____ region, so that you're forming ideas and opinions of the specific AI characters as you go through the game.

TL;DR I'm in favor of having characters who are not tied to a single car, particularly if they have semblances of personalities.

[Xiphan]

I voted yes, but my line of thinking is if we could create our own characters / avatars instead of there being prefabricated characters shipped with the game. The only thing more fun than blowing up a rival's car, is blowing up the car your friend is driving!

Of course if you just wanna jump in a quick race then by all means have some prefab chars to choose from, but it would be great if there was some sort of character creator for the career mode (I'm assuming there'll be an option like that for the single player?) which you could then use in multiplayer as well.

[landvaarder]

Maybe make char creation a stretch goal (? (last one maybe))

[Ria]

Do I want characters in Grip? YES!

But I think my perspective is a little different from most here: When I mean characters, I mean that specific characters have specific behaviors.

This was one of the first major differences I noticed between Rollcage 1 and 2: The second game had completely interchangeable opponents, whereas Leon, Lenny, Lothar, Yuri, Jet, Ria and Tony contribute considerably to the first game.

When I play, I can easily tell them apart from far away, which will let me plan how to drive when catching up with them: Lenny and Leon are pretty much maniacs, the will aggressively attack no matter the cost. Tony is a little more defensive. Lothar and Jet play nice most of the time, whereas Yuri just speeds on, oblivious to our struggles.

It's entirely possible this design is out-dated, or attractive only to hard-core gamers, but I personally believe it could be successfully implemented in Grip.

[yellowquiet]

I kinda liked the soullessness of RC2. But it seems like people are going to want characters so I say only the AI have characters with certain driving styles that fit their machine with a little background of the character. I also like the idea of having challenge races against the characters to unlock more parts. But don't name the cars after the characters like in RC1.

[Tiakh]

I kinda liked the soullessness of RC2. But it seems like people are going to want characters so I say only the AI have characters with certain driving styles that fit their machine with a little background of the character. I also like the idea of having challenge races against the characters to unlock more parts. But don't name the cars after the characters like in RC1.

+1
same here

[Muskylounger]

This ties into what I was saying with detailed cockpits. Having a driver inside you could see would be excellent and having that character model react in some way to getting hit with weapons/crashing/getting passed would be great.

However the characters should be fairly generic, just different race suits and stuff, not like "the bulky tank commander looking guy" who drives the biggest car and wears a tank top, that would be lame haha.

Also no need to have opponents faces or names hovering above the cars either, its unnecessary and immersion breaking.

[Chris_CE]

TL;DR I'm in favor of having characters who are not tied to a single car, particularly if they have semblances of personalities.

But the car is an extension of their personality. You can't take a biker with a long beard and dump him into a Miata. That's blasphemy

I think having the cars get different upgrades alleviates the issues from Mario Kart with Bowser and Toad, as you explained.
But I feel like what's the point of having characters if they have no distinct car?

When I play, I can easily tell them apart from far away, which will let me plan how to drive when catching up with them: Lenny and Leon are pretty much maniacs, the will aggressively attack no matter the cost. Tony is a little more defensive. Lothar and Jet play nice most of the time, whereas Yuri just speeds on, oblivious to our struggles.

This is pretty close to how I envision it. All characters have distinct personalities with distinct cars and ways of driving.
Adds another level of immersion rather than racing faceless robot cars.

But don't name the cars after the characters like in RC1.

Yeah the cars won't be called Bob and Frank, ha

This ties into what I was saying with detailed cockpits. Having a driver inside you could see would be excellent and having that character model react in some way to getting hit with weapons/crashing/getting passed would be great.

However the characters should be fairly generic, just different race suits and stuff, not like "the bulky tank commander looking guy" who drives the biggest car and wears a tank top, that would be lame haha.

This may not sound all that difficult to implement, but believe me, it is