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I'm a game developer with a special interest in horses and riding. I wrote a lengthy guide on what could be done better when adding horses to games.
Link information
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- Title
- Adding Horses to your Game: Tips, Resources, Do's and Don'ts - The Mane Quest
- Published
- Aug 29 2021
I run a website called The Mane Quest, which is focused entirely on games with horses in them. Someone else shared my "horse nerd's review of elden ring" here a while back (link: https://tildes.net/~games/1h82/the_horse_nerds_review_of_elden_ring_how_torrent_satisfies_gameplay_needs_but_fails_at_horse) and people seemed to really enjoy it, so I figured I'd post another article, this time more of a guide for devs rather than a deep dive into any specific game
I have zero interest in horse riding but an astounding amount of interest in video game developers nailing niche topics like this. Thank you so much for your work on the site!
Amazing resource and will definitely keep it in mind, especially since the principals can be taken further than just horses. It's interesting considerations for world building or even just writing animal companions because I'm guilty of just considering them as a sort of homogeneous accessory or prop.
Really thinking about it now, I am very attached to my horses in the Zelda games and was thrilled that they carried them over from BotW to TotK. Even the derpy first one. The way they could just refuse an input drove me nuts and I think that's where the magic is. You're building a relationship over the entire game. I know Red Dead 2 showed off all the breeds and anatomy of their horses, but they all blended into the background because it was all so frictionless.
Look forward to reading more of your stuff.
Hey you came back and made a post! Thanks for sticking around đź’ś love your content
One of my favorite implementations of horse riding was Shadow of the Colossus. I'd be hard-pressed to elaborate on exactly why, but in that game it felt to me less like controlling the horse directly than usual and more like controlling the guy who was riding the horse.
With a personality you anthropomorphize the horse into a companion. Shadow of the Colossus did that really well by having the main character show affection to the horse, have the horse respond to things and the environment, include the horse into the story, and have the horse be integral to the game mechanics. Lastly, because I wanted to emphasize this over the other points, you are all alone with your horse.
It feels like you are the only two real living creatures in a hostile land, and since your character is mute, the only expression of love and empathy was physical affection to the horse, physical affection he couldn't give or receive from the woman. Which just drives the point home that each other was all you had.
Simple in theory, but oh so tricky to pull off.
I don’t know if I’ve ever actually cared that much about game horses since they do generally just feel like “meaty motorcycles” as you say.
Even in a game like RDR2, which is very detailed with its horse behaviors and even makes some mild effort to give them some personality (though more at a breed level than individual) I never found myself caring about any particular horse. I think part of the problem is that a core part of the loop around getting a horse in a lot of games involved breaking them, but the process of breaking them mostly seems to be making them go from not following your commands to following your commands. While that’s technically right, it ends up feeling like you’re turning something into a meaty motorcycle because once it becomes perfectly responsive to your controller any sense that it is its own entity goes away.
The sole exception was Epona from Ocarina of Time. I don’t know if it was just that I put a ton of hours into that game at an impressionable age or what, but something about the way that game introduces the horse to you and has you interact with it really does make you love her. It was to the point where, when I played Breath of the Wild and stumbled on the ruins of a ranch that was clearly laid out to remind the player of Lon Lon Ranch it actually made me a little nostalgic and emotional. I haven’t really thought about what Nintendo did to make her so compelling of a character. I suspect it has less to do with the game mechanics than the story and art design around her, but it’s worth studying.
At our household we were big fans of your other article -- looking forward to sharing this one as well. this is the best kind of content, even/especially for folks who normally don't pay a lot of attention to horses alive or in game -- it's as chance to take a guided deep dive into someone else's world with humour and clarity. Thank you
I just wanted to echo what others have said about this being a fun niche deep dive into something I otherwise wouldn't be interested in and also add that I love the choice of Baskerville(?) as the sites font. It's the same that I use on my Kindle so reading this felt like reading a book and I love it!
Those front legs are just a human character model, for sure. Looking at the last 2 pictures/gifs in the article, the one on the left with the horse standing in water. Their front left hoof is angled outward a bit just like human feet would be, it looks like. And it 100% explains all of the movement issues. Issues that are not issues if you imagine it being a human just horsing around.
Very interesting. I've never made a game with horses, or thought about it, but this piqued my interest :). Then there's always the reality of unfinished projects, but I'm thinking about it for the first time.