Probably a stupid question, but I'm creating an rpg and I thought it wouldn't be too difficult to have an intro animation of in-game play on the title screen, much like the early ultima series or exile trilogy. I am either going to do this or just use title screen art. Just wondering if their are any benifts to intro animations. I don't really see any, just wondering what you guys thought.

Well, any good animation / attract sequence shouldn't just be flashy and show off how nice your game looks, but it can also display (subtly or not) some idea of *how to play*.

Show some characters doing whatever their special moves are, doing something "smart" to avoid danger or score a critical hit... any little bit of information that the player might not otherwise get right away.

There's no point to the giant 3d movies that come as intro sequences with some games these days... you watch it once to see the shininess and then delete it to speed your load time. :) But even the simplest Q-Bert jump-jump-jump before the game starts can help the player visualise how the game is supposed to work.

Ah I see... Never really thought of it as a means of a tutorial. However, I don't believe this would work well with the style of game that I am designing. So I guess I'll just stick with the graphic art.

Well, intro animations are used to pull the player into the game and get them in the mood. They are also used to give the game context, so the player has some idea of the situation they are in when play begins.

I assume this is an indie game so a static title screen, maybe jazzed up with some simple animation (i.e. flickering tourch or candle, or the simple effect of having the title text appearing to float over some rippliing water, etc. ... depends on the "feel or mood" your going for.) would be fine.

David

Mickey Crocker,

An alternative is to draw comic style pages to tell an intro story or cenematic. I plan to go with that for my game to enhance the little story telling there is in the game :).

John

From a business point of view...
I think the case where an intro screen can really help you is if you use it as an upsell screen. What I mean is that you can show higher levels and parts of the game that a trial user couldn't, or wouldn't likely see. They see all this cool stuff at the beginning every time they run the game. Its really all about creating excitement and interest in the whole game every time the player starts it up.

You can also put some text on the screen to remind the user how cool and deep the game is and that they should be sure to upgrade to the full version.

Of course, don't forget to have a buy button on the cinematic or on the screen they get right after they finish viewing it.

Reflexive's Ricochet does a brilliant job of this.

Just my 2 cents,
Denis