Monday Night Combat
Individual Game Mechanics
- Looking
- Walking
- Shooting
- Running (certain classes)
- Diving (certain classes)
- Melee
- Special Attacks (different per character)
- Jumping (doesn’t cancel other movement or actions)
- Setting up/upgrading turrets
- Buying bots/items
Real Time Control
The response time for the inputs for these mechanics feels instantaneous as it is below 100ms. Also the game definitely plays at least 20 frames per second (on the Xbox). There is real time control for most of these actions with the exception of a few. Some of the special attacks make you go through their animation before you’re allowed to do anything else (such as a power slam). Also, when buying bots or setting up/upgrading turrets, you aren’t allowed to do any other action until you are finished dealing with the bot/turret. Some of these actions are also affected by the character you happen to be playing. For instance, when playing a heavy character, you walk slower and take longer to begin and end a jump. However when you play a light character, you move much quicker and have very quick, light jumps. Although a few of the actions don’t have real-time control, as a whole the game definitely feels responsive and has a continuous feedback loop, meaning it has real-time control.
Spatial Simulation
Monday Night Combat (MNC) takes place in a variety of different maps that are voted for before each game session. The player can interact with the environment in several different ways, from bumping into walls, bots, or other players, to being launched forward or upward after running onto a lift. In addition to interacting with the environment, players also interact with other people’s attacks. For instance, if a player is too close to a large bot as it smashes the ground, the player is flung away from the impact. Similar effects happen for various projectiles in the game, such as sniper bullets and grenade launchers. It is also very possible to fall off the edge in certain maps if you jump over (or are knocked over) a railing. In addition to all this, some of the classes in the game also feature jet packs or abilities that cause the avatar to charge in a certain direction to improve mobility across sections of the maps. These extra abilities add to the sense of spatial simulation as all parts of the map are playable and respond as you’d expect.
Polish
Monday Night Combat is a very polished game. There are various “advertisements” that are flashing on billboards in the game, holograms showing you locations of different items, muzzle flashes, explosions, and much more. In addition to these visual polish effects, it has sounds for everything, from typical gun fire, explosions, and footsteps, to a very satisfying “ding” sound whenever you get a headshot with a sniper rifle. This game’s polish effects are one of the major reasons the game is so enjoyable to play for so long.
With its combination of real-time control, extensive spatial simulation and plenty of polish to spare, Monday Night Combat definitely has game feel.
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