Talk:Descent (video game)

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Good articleDescent (video game) has been listed as one of the Video games good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
September 17, 2019Good article nomineeListed
November 1, 2019Featured article candidateNot promoted
Current status: Good article

List of designers is wrong[edit]

Eric "Wingman" Peterson is not a designer for the game Descent (1995). He is a designer on Descent Underground (started in 2014). He had nothing to do with Descent, Parallax, or Interplay at the time of Descent's creation. He should not be listed on this page except in reference to Descent Underground.

References: http://www.mobygames.com/game/descent (And the game credits itself) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.209.201.242 (talk) 15:22, 3 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, MobyGames is not a reliable source, since it uses user-generated content. However, the burden of proof is on inclusion, not exclusion, and I see no supporting references for Peterson's involvement, so I'll go ahead and remove him from the infobox.--Martin IIIa (talk) 13:32, 14 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Source[edit]

GA Review[edit]

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Descent (1995 video game)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: David Fuchs (talk · contribs) 19:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

{{doing}} Should have comments up by the end of this week. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 19:36, 3 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Overall the article is in pretty great shape. Some points:

  • General:
    • Descent is a spacecraft-based first-person shooter and shoot 'em up[1] video game Why is this a) cited in the lead, and b) not mentioned in the body text? The lead shouldn't contain novel information—on this note, you really need to recast the gameplay section to feature the basic gameplay introduction.
    • In June 1995, the Descent shareware version fell to No. 6 of the 10 top-selling budget PC games and the full game to No. 9 of the 20 top-selling full price PC games[48] before dropping off the chart next month.—bit weird construction here, because we're talking about the game falling off the bestseller lists without mentioning it was ever on them. Are there sources for earlier?
  • Prose:
    • For two levels, the reactor core is replaced with a boss. In these levels, the objective is to destroy the boss in order to trigger the meltdown and escape before the mine self-destructs. These sentences are kind of redundant; the first sentence suggests that the gameplay objective just swaps the reactor core with the boss.
    • Each level is based in a "claustrophobic"[6][7][8] mine or military installation[6] located in various locations in the Solar System in an outward pattern from Earth. The levels are first set on the Moon, and then move inward through the solar system via Venus to Mercury. The player then proceeds further from the Sun, with a level on Mars before progressing towards Pluto's moon Charon. This is also a bit confusing. "Outward pattern from earth" suggests a linear approach, rather than going closer to the sun and then jumping to the edge of the solar system. Why not just say levels are set on Venus, Mercury, Mars, and Pluto's moon Charon?
    • The story begins with a briefing between an anonymous executive of the Post Terran Mining Corporation (PTMC) and the player's character. He is their best "Material Defender",—not clear the "he" in the second sentence is the player character or the executive.
  • References:
    • References look to meet reliable sources guidelines; I did a quick spot-check of statements attributed to current refs 1, 18, 26, 42, 54, 62, and 81, and didn't spot issues.
  • Media:
    • File:Descent.png needs a better fair use rational per NFCC than "to illustrate the game". --Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 22:19, 8 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]
      • @David Fuchs: I fixed all of the listed issues. I also made other edits, particularly removing unnecessary internal links to prevent overlinking. I do believe that the article is good enough to pass GA, as well as be nominated for FA. I put a lot of effort into editing this article and researching the subject. I even emailed the Parallax Software team at https://www.playoverload.com to request avatars of the co-creators of the game released under a CC-BY-SA-compatible license (unfortunately, I am still waiting for their answer, but at least I tried). Maybe take another look at the Sales and a look at the PC Zone review under Pre-release, but I think they are thoroughly researched and well-written. Gamingforfun365 22:00, 11 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have done another pass of the article and did not see remaining issues for GA status, so I will be passing. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 15:29, 17 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Acorn Archimedes port[edit]

The sources provided for the Archimedes port (a couple of articles from Acorn User) never actually mention the Archimedes, and I can't find any other verification of a port for this system; frankly it's hard to imagine the game running even on a high-end, late-model Archimedes. There was a RISC OS version of the game that R-Comp Interactive apparently still sells through their website, but while the Archimedes ran on RISC OS, the minimum CPU required by the Descent port (a StrongARM, or an ARM710 "in a pinch") was never available in the Archimedes range. I've accordingly changed all references to the Archimedes to RISC OS and removed the article from the "Acorn Archimedes games" category. I've done the same for the sequel as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.155.241.98 (talk) 23:04, 25 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Needs a mention of robot AI[edit]

One of Descent's most significant features outside of the Six Degrees of Freedom movement and fully-3D environments was the enemy AI. While each robot had a simple set of behaviors, they were capable of basic learning and complex pathfinding. This learning included a basic idea of when their shots were ineffective (e.g. moving to get a better angle), identifying dangerous obstacles (particularly when observing another robot being destroyed), and the ability to dodge player shots. These sorts of AI improvements, while simple, were a primary selling point of the game and the series - the enemies differed in this respect from enemies in most other games of the era, which generally stuck to their pre-programmed behaviors and only showed variety in pre-scripted situations.

I don't currently have a good source for this, but I had spoken to the developers about them (one time praising them when I saw a set of robots figure out that proximity bombs were dangerous and find a way around them to attack me from a different direction). I got a chance to talk to them about it again more recently when playing Overload with them. I'll keep my eye out for sources that discuss this topic, but I'd also like a recommendation on where and how to include this in the Gameplay section once we achieve WP:V for it. Thanks. — KieferSkunk (talk) — 22:04, 28 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

linux/descent[edit]

.... 0mtwb9gd5wx (talk) 14:45, 24 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]
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