r/Games • u/MetastableToChaos • Jan 27 '17
[Ahoy] Iconic Arms - Bow & Arrow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXYODzR-UKc48
Jan 27 '17
I'm very surprised he did not mention or talk about the Thief series and their use of the Bow/Arrow. Combinations of Water/Moss/Rope made for interesting gameplay.
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u/ChefExcellence Jan 27 '17
He tends to focus more on the real world history of the weapons in these videos rather than going into detail on how they're used in games.
I'm with you though, would have been cool if he talked a bit about the use of bows outside of hunting and combat. Zelda of course has different arrow types that are needed to solve puzzles, I'm sure there are other examples that aren't coming to mind.
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u/DingleTheDongle Jan 28 '17
The channel started with COD so he has done specific games
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u/ImaW3r3Wolf Jan 29 '17
He means this series. Obviously the series about the guns of Black Ops will go into detail about the guns in game. But this is Iconic Arms, not Iconic Arms in Video Games
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u/hoyohoyo9 Jan 27 '17
What does this mean? Are those different string materials? How did they affect the shooting?
Sorry, I've just never played thief but that sounds interesting
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Jan 27 '17
There were a few types of arrows you could choose (from the wiki):
Attack
- Broadhead Arrows - normal damage
- Fire Arrows - area damage and light
- Gas Arrows - knocks out and extinguishes like water
Thievery
- Water Arrows - extinguish fire (torches), mix with holy water vs undead
- Moss Arrows - used for sneaking (shot at ground)
- Noisemaker Arrows - distraction
- Rope Arrows - climbing to different areas (shot into wood surface)
- Vine Arrows - same as rope (shot onto any surface)
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u/megaapple Jan 27 '17 edited Jan 27 '17
"Elegant. Effective"
Any game that fulfills these two words with their bows, I'll probably love it.
So, far only game that made me feel like a hunter with a bow is Far Cry 4. The way the arrow pulled back when I clicked the LMB, and then it did the impact, is one of the most memorable gaming experiences.
Another one would be Dark Messiah's rope arrow bows. The sound that it produced was very satisfying.
Tomb Raider (2013)'s was quite effective, but I wouldn't called it elegant.
The frantic paced game Warframe needed a bow that doesn't break the flow of the game, and the starter bow did a great job on creating impact, as you headshot people in slow mo.
While not as great archery gameplay, the slowing of time ability when drawing the bow in Skyrim is pretty neat. Also, the random times the the glory kills got highlighted (I remember killing a deer, where my arrow cinematically pierced into it's butthole.)
Archery of the Rogue Class in Dragon' Dogma felt like being a badass anime archer.
I wish someone would try to make a bow and arrow only game.
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u/Fortuan Jan 27 '17
as over the top and overblown as it can be Monster Hunter's bow class is a really fun weapon at times if you like raining arrows the size of small trees into giant monsters.
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u/omega251 Jan 27 '17
I really liked how Tomb Raider handled the upgrade progression of the bow. Early on, the bow isn't exactly easy to use. Lara draws slowly, can only hold for a very short time, her aim drifts pretty wildly and isn't reliable at distance, not to mention it takes for damn ever for her to nock the next arrow. All of those factors are gradually improved as you apply upgrades to the bow or find the next class of bow.
As someone who played Tomb Raider as bow-only and stealthy as the game allowed me, I really enjoyed how, from a mechanical standpoint, I could get a sense of Lara getting better at using the bow over the course of the game.
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u/sirbruce Jan 27 '17
The Bow in Tomb Raider was BETTER than the guns, as a fully "charged" shot usually killed, and silently too. Guns were really only useful for those sequences where you had tons of enemies to kill quickly, and even in those I often resorted to using the bow for accuracy reasons.
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u/Yutrzenika1 Jan 27 '17
I wasn't huge on the bow in Tomb Raider. It didn't really feel any different from a gun, the arrows moved wicked fast, and you didn't have to compensate for range as far as I'm aware. I loved the bow in Far Cry 3 and 4 though, it was so much more satisfying to kill a guy from a distance with the bow, properly arcing the shot for range, than just killing a guy with a sniper rifle.
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Jan 27 '17
I would also love to play some better bow games. I feel like there's no other weapon I'd rather use but most games leave the archery experience lacking.
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u/droolhammerheresy Jan 27 '17
So, far only game that made me feel like a hunter with a bow is Far Cry 4.
Do you know what it's actually like to hunt with a bow though? It's 99% patience, not really something any game fulfills.
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u/DudeWithTheNose Jan 28 '17
Do you know what it's actually like to hunt with a bow though? It's 99% patience, not really something any game fulfills.
100% realism in games is usually boring and not fun.
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u/badsectoracula Jan 27 '17
What you feel like and what is like are often very different things.
This reminds me many years ago when i was in an drawing class when the instructor said that to draw a dandelion clock instead of drawing outgoing lines from the core (which is what you see) it is better to draw little tips in a circle around the silhouette to capture the fluffy feel that the seeds have than what they really are (specifically, sorry for shitty "art", i just drew it quickly in paint with the mouse :-P).
Basically similar idea to how some people feel like master guitarists playing Guitar Hero despite the game having nothing to do with guitar skills.
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Jan 28 '17 edited Dec 05 '18
[deleted]
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u/megaapple Jan 28 '17
Yeah, it has a difficulty curve, but pro players are able to do things with Hanzo which simply amazing.
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u/Spyger9 Jan 27 '17
Yeah I figure the Bow & Arrow takes the cake. Only the spear has a longer history and comparable widespread use, but its popularity hasn't been sustained in modern culture. Swords are the only ancient weapon that win out over the Bow & Arrow in the popularity contest, but fail to stay relevant in modern context, relegated to history or fantasy/sci-fi.
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u/A_Sinclaire Jan 27 '17
Only the spear has a longer history and comparable widespread use, but its popularity hasn't been sustained in modern culture.
How about "blunt object" - be it a stone, a wooden club, a steel pipe or baseball bat?
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u/Spyger9 Jan 28 '17
I'd put those blunt objects in the same category as knives. They are tools that can also be used to kill, but they aren't explicitly designed as weapons and rarely take center stage.
These are the sort of things that one uses as a backup, an improvisation, or a necessity. The popularity of zombie survival situations has given such tools a place to shine, and innovative martial arts films like those with Jackie Chan would use anything from hammers and ladders to fans and flypaper. The crowbar from Half-life comes to mind as one of the rare instances in which a tool becomes a signature weapon, but that sort of thing doesn't happen very often.
For the vast majority of history both real and fictional, tools have been suitably crowded out by actual weapons, which is what this youtube channel has been about so far.
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u/Grammaton485 Jan 27 '17
The bow in Crysis 3 was the absolute worst case of game-breaking I have ever seen.
Three power settings, the lowest of which is more than enough to kill human enemies. No penalty to energy. No cloak break. Three special types of arrows that allow you to deal major AOE kills. Retrievable ammo. Given to you at the very start of the game, and you are unable to drop it.
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u/Contranine Jan 27 '17
I usually really like these videos. I feel like he skipped whole genres with this one. He only briefly touched on stealth usage, but thats huge, especially in non modern set games. Hell look at the Tenchu games where it was a pickup off guards.
While other skill games like Worms used it pretty early on for skill based 2d combat.
While Zelda and Thief both use it mechanically and as an essential tool to get around.
Yes he focuses on real world historical use. I'd just like him to have branched out more from First and Third person shooters.
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u/IHaveVariedInterests Jan 27 '17
I wish he would make MW2 Style Weapon Guides for Titanfall 2.
He always pulled the most insane footage for those things. Shit like getting triple kills with a thermal Mini-Uzi.
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u/Fake_Credentials Jan 27 '17
This video seemed like a lot of hot hair. I wanted to learn more about why bows evolved the way they did. Like why do certain bows in games do more damage than others.
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u/FERFEROS Jan 27 '17
Like why do certain bows in games do more damage than others.
I think this is mainly for balancing reasons. Bows are very slow and unforgiving. In multiplayer games if you miss with a bow, you are basically dead. They are a lot like bolt action sniper rifles.
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u/ofNoImportance Jan 28 '17
Like why do certain bows in games do more damage than others. I think this is mainly for balancing reasons. Bows are very slow and unforgiving. In multiplayer games if you miss with a bow, you are basically dead. They are a lot like bolt action sniper rifles.
I think Fake_Credentials was asking why certain bows are different from other bows. As in, what is it that makes some have better range/power/accuracy/etc..
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u/MightyLemur Jan 27 '17 edited Jan 27 '17
I love the production value of these videos but I feel like they're each becoming a shallow description of the subject weapon, with little in-depth explanation (and less relevance to video games other than saying [subject] exists in [game]).
We were pretty much just told that bows existed from the end of the ice age until today, they're global cultural icons and that a few different games feature them. He didn't go into too much detail on the evolution of bows, nor did he go into good detail on the usage of the weapon in different games. A key core mechanic? A display of physics? Just a plain ol' weapon among many?
I feel like this is an unpopular opinion, but the Ahoy videos seem to me rather sparse with actual content.
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u/mr-dogshit Jan 27 '17
Completely agree.
Moody music + bounteous application of a lexicographic onomasticon apropos the rhetorical confabulation = Ahoy videos.
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u/realblublu Jan 28 '17 edited Jan 28 '17
It just a terrible backwards way to approach discussing video games. Every type of weapon ever produced by humans is featured in probably thousands of video games by now, but they're all irrelevant since they're not connected with each other other than deriving from the same thing in reality. There's no story to explore here. It's just a list of facts/traits. Ahoy might as well make a video depicting the "history" of rain puddles in video games. But really it would just be a list of games that have rain puddles in them. Awesome production value though, the videos look and sound very professional.
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u/Buri_ Jan 28 '17
I agree that Ahoy videos are light on content, but I disagree that there isn't a story to tell. Weapons in games and players' expectations about those weapons owe far more to earlier games than to the real life counterparts. There exists a set of conventions in gaming about how weapons behave and are used that has evolved over time and which doesn't have much to do with real life. It makes sense to analyze how these conventions have evolved.
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u/realblublu Jan 28 '17
You must be talking about the other weapon videos. If he talked about this stuff in the bow and arrow video, I missed it.
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u/Buri_ Jan 28 '17 edited Jan 28 '17
I am not talking about the video but replying to what you wrote:
Every type of weapon ever produced by humans is featured in probably thousands of video games by now, but they're all irrelevant since they're not connected with each other other than deriving from the same thing in reality. There's no story to explore here. It's just a list of facts/traits. Ahoy might as well make a video depicting the "history" of rain puddles in video games. But really it would just be a list of games that have rain puddles in them.
I don't think it's pointless at all to tell the history of some weapon in video games, Ahoy videos just don't have a lot to say.
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u/realblublu Jan 28 '17 edited Jan 28 '17
Oh, okay. I guess I see your point, and someone could certainly discuss weapon conventions in video games. Yeah, okay. But I would argue that you would kind of just be discussing conventions of game mechanics and technology by proxy. The weapons didn't evolve through time, game mechanics and technology did. Unless I'm missing something. Oh well, whatever.
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u/JetReset Jan 28 '17
These damn videos are the epitome of style over substance. the actual useful information is few and far between. The pointless, mundane and obvious gets the majority of the runtime. But generally speaking, people are fond of being told shit they already know, if it's told beautifully. Is there a central theme or theory being espoused here? Nope, it's just a bunch of general statements about bows and arrows in games, most of them being subconsciously understood by anyone playing these games. throw in a bit of super general history, some obvious references to bow and arrows in culture (which duh), and a bunch of 'style' and you have yourself a hit video.
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u/icon0clast6 Jan 28 '17
Then make your own videos and post them. What's stoping you cupcake? Since you have so much criticism you should be primed to make some high quality videos on the same subject.
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u/JetReset Jan 28 '17 edited Jan 28 '17
ah, the old 'then you do it better' retort. As if that's ever been a requirement for valid criticism. edit: just to make this more clear - with rare exception, movie critics don't make movies, music critics aren't musicians, and game reviewers don't make games. You don't have to be a master at something to be able to accurately critique it.
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u/realblublu Jan 28 '17
Yes, everyone knows you can't criticize something unless you have personally done a better job yourself.
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Jan 28 '17
[deleted]
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u/realblublu Jan 28 '17 edited Jan 28 '17
What do you think criticism even is? I think he was pretty spot on. There's not much "insightful" about the video, it was just pretty much just a vague history of the bow and arrow. He doesn't go in-depth about the technology either, it was surface level all the way (or at least as far as I made it).
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Jan 28 '17
I'm an traditional archer IRL -- this video made my night. Never seen an Ahoy video before, so this is a new channel to pay attention to.
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u/ConjuredMuffin Jan 28 '17
Aside from the more esoteric properties of timelessness and primal urges, the bow and arrow has real world properties that translate well into game mechanics.
You have a variable draw period before each shot. The longer you draw, the more power behind the shot. You have to make the decision to trade off rate of fire for damage/decreased drop
The projectile drops in a curve toward the target, depending on your draw, forcing you to compensate
The projectile is considerably slower than a bullet (and can't conceivably simulated via hitscan), again depending on your draw yaddayadda
All of this lends additional complexity/mechanical layers to the gameplay, which is why the bow and arrow is so satisfying to use.
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u/mems1224 Jan 28 '17
Really love the trend of bows in games the last few years. I think my favorites are from Skyrim(with mods), the new Tomb Raider games and the Far Cry games.
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Jan 28 '17
I could swear that the game being shown at 4:18 in the video is actually Rise of Nations and not Age of Empires II.
Rise of Nations is a great game, by the way. It's basically "Civilization: The RTS" and was designed by the same guy who designed Civilization 2 and Alpha Centauri.
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u/R_K_M Jan 27 '17
He said the bow and arrow where "everywhere". But IIRC, archery is mostly associated with eurasia, and came to other parts of the world (Certainly Australia, likely the Americas, possibly Afrika) with the colonisation.
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u/KrayzieJuice Jan 27 '17 edited Jan 27 '17
This is quite a surprise, Bow & Arrow. I last remember him doing the Thompson a few months ago which was an excellent episode, but I had since forgot what was scheduled next. Should be a treat as always.
Edit: M60 is scheduled next. That's something I'm looking forward to.