RPG : 1st person or 3rd?

#1 I always preferred 3rd person, I find I get disorientated by the narrow FoV and become lost in 1st person, particularly in indoor environments. It's a matter of taste I guess..

#2 Think of it as framing a picture... what do you want your players to see? Where is your best artwork?

What is your focal point? Your main character? The environment? The monsters?

Can you pull off first-person with spinning kicks and backflips and avoid the onset of motion sickness? You should play-test that before deciding to go first person. :P

#3 I prefer 3rd person RPG's over 1st person also, though I have enjoyed both. To me, a first person game feels more like it's ME that's playing through the world (which some people like), which isn't quite the point of "role playing".

#4 I think your role playing regardless of the viewpoint but the advantage of 3rd person is that you "see" your outter trappings which you can't in 1st person (barr walking around with a mirror). Dressing up is a big part of role playing and 3rd person gives you a sense of that.

I've played first person but it takes a bit of time to "get into character" and you end up relying heavily on other characters to get you there (for me anyway).

Since the option is there for both 1st and 3rd person, perhaps leave it for playtesting to decide(?).

#5 Tony's comments on framing should be your visual impetus for the choice.

Personally, I have always preferred top-down third-person over first (though the visual spectacle of first or over-the-shoulder third is much grander). One of the main reasons is the melee combat in most first-person RPG's feels horribly stilted. It is like your arms or weapons are either too long or too short. DMoM&M did it more right than most, but there were times when I was annoyed by the weapons I was using because it seemed like I was right on target (or was hitting through walls, mwahahaha). Kind of like hitting through trees in Oblivion (especially since the AI usually doesn't attack unless you are in the LoS). Makes getting experience pretty easy at points, not that I enjoyed the game much.

One thing that I have always hated about first-person RPG's is being attacked from behind. Because it usually takes two good hits to get turned around, you end up getting smacked down quickly when ambushed. But rather than making the ambush feel intense, it has always felt cheap. Like being in a narrow hallway with a team of snipers in CS:S. Oh. Hit from behind. Turn. Whack. Ack! Attack! Attack! Phew... Damn need to find herbs... Turn... Attack from behind! Hack! Turn! Hack! Attack!

At least King's Field has pretty linear hallways with few back-attacks. Daggerfall and Oblivion, otoh had them in spades in the overworld. Which made me not feel so bad about cheating the AI and collision engine to kill things.

#6 In any FP I think there should be 2 keys available: One is use to glance behind you and it just swings the camera around for as long as you hold it. It's especially useful when running away and checking what's chasing you. ;-) The other actually turns you around almost instantly, so when you get ambushed you can get right into the fight. These are things we can do in real life, they should be available in games, and they're not hard to implement.

#7 I've always been a big fan of third person for RPGs - since many RPGs have grandiose settings and interesting character designs. By having a locked camera perspective, you can compose great scenes for the characters to move through, and you'll know that the player will be able to appreciate all your great art - something that is easy to pass by in a follow-cam or first person type scenario.

Similarly, being able to see your characters makes them them that much more memorable and iconic of your game. If you are going to be putting any time into making cool looking characters, it seems kind of silly to never have them visible.

#8 I like exploration and minor combat in first-person, I prefer large fights and in third-person though. This is why I like Gothic, you can alter the cameras distance from the player from being first-person to basically a sky cam depending on the situation. I agree with Shiraz with the camera controls though.

#9 Regardless of any other real or perceived faults that it had, Fable did a good job of doing both - It was 3rd person normally (melee, exploration, etc), but you would switch to 1st person view when you were shooting the bow for precise aiming. You could also hold down a button and "look around" in first person view.

#10 I must say that I absolutely hate the "hold to look" solution on PC's, though. The Thing irritated me greatly in that regard because I wanted accurate aiming and the things I was aiming at were fast...and I could not move while aiming in first-person. For some reason it works well on consoles, but it does not sit well in my mind on PC's. I'm not sure why. I had no problem with it on the XBox, but the PC pissed me off.

#11 Why not do both like Oblivion does?

#12 Yes, Oblivion seems to manage it well and gives you both 1st and 3rd person views. Their spell casting/item use system is absolute garbage in my opinion though.

#13 The Oblivion system was totally useless in third person. It was only a camera move - it was impossible to do anything other than run around and look at yourself in third person. However, that's all I'd really want. The animations were pretty crummy too - but if you do go with 1st person, definitely have the option like Oblivion (even if it isn't very functional)

#14 IMO i think if anyone does it the best, it's world of warcraft. Oblivion's 3rd person was pointless, just like Tom said, it was only for visual aesthetics. I personally have a hard time playing in 1st person because I feel like I get really lost. But in WoW I can manage pretty well

#15 My vote is for 3rd person. 1st person usually looks blocky and sparse to me. Of course, if you have a stellar 3D artist...

#16 The question you really have to ask is do you want the player to see the adventure or be in the adventure? If you go with 1st person, you of course get a more immersive feel but have to address problems of getting lost, no peripheral vision, etc. However, FPs allow for things like scaring the player and usually give the player direct control (you have to click the mouse and the sword swings as oppoded to you select a move and watch the character do a maneuver). TPs gives you the aesthestics and view but is more of a "movie mode". You can see people sneaking up behind you without turning your head. But you can cast a spell and watch elaborate hand gestures that you wouldn't see in FPs. So, how do you want to tell your story?

There can be an interesting, but more difficult to implement, medium. The game plays in FP but switches to TP when needed as defined by game mechanics. Example you are fighting someone in FP and a wizard casts a "tangling vines" spells at you. As soon as a vine grabs your arm or leg or whatever the game detects your partial or total imobility and pulls the camera back so you can grasp the full predicament of your character. You jump off a ledge and it pulls back so you can see yourself flying as you try to reach for another ledge. FPs usually only do this when you die but, really, why stop there?

Of course, you have to make sure your controls are either versatile enough to work in both modes or give the user options to deal with the challenges. i.e. a message comes up "Hit the right mouse button quickly to escape the vines grasp." This solution requires serious planning for smooth gameplay but I'm just throwing it out there.

#17 Both choices are good.

I personally don't like the third-person "behind the character" view very much (which annoys me to no end in Dungeons & Dragons Online). It seems I spend as much time fighting the camera as I do fighting the monsters in tight quarters.

I'd also suggest sticking with one view, rather than switching between the two. It's easier for you, the developer, and it's usually easier for the player. It's hard switching from one type of control to the other.

Good luck!

#18 Yeah, I know what you mean Jay.

I also don't feel as immersed in the combat in 3rd person. When my avatar is getting whaled on from all sides by beasties, I don't feel that much actual worry. In first person, when your camera is shaking and going red, I feel more actual stress, more like its me taking the hits. Which is good ;) In fact, to keep track of multiple enemies in 3rd person I tend to zoom out a bit and go to an overhead view. It helps, tactically, but pulls me out of the feeling of "being in the thick of things" even more.


In Dark Messiah theres a part where you fight the Orc shaman in a one-on-one duel while the other orcs watch, I feel that fight was done really really well.

#19 @ Tony : Yeah, thats an excellent point. Personally, I love grand, massive architecture in games, one of the reasons I like 1st person view is to see it properly.

I guess it will depend on my character art versus my environment art. If I make some cool looking armor sets and wicked combat animations, it would be kind of pointless not to show them off.

Cool architecture might be easier than combat animations though, I don't exactly have a motion-capture studio like Ubisoft did for Prince of Persia.


Mincerto mentioned Gothic, and I admit, even though its 3rd person, you still get a good view at the interesting architecture, playing it is actually what got me considering 3rd person as a possibility, its a good example of how it can be done without losing your sense of vertical scale.