Games with skills/abilities that interact well with environments/spells/abilities

[GWestphal]

Why can't I cast entangle or oil slick and then hit it with a flame strike or fire ball to create a conflagration. Why can't I summon a rain storm and electrocute a group of people. Where is the interactivity!!

 

[Borealis7]

you can in DA:O and in older games. there some spells that work in combinations.

 

[Craig234]

Ya, I remember at least one game that was designed to do that, but can't remember which. I think it specifically included the 'oil then fire' example.

 

[Soundmanred]

Bioshock

 

[darkewaffle]

Magicka sort of worked that way. While it sounds interesting, I think it would difficult to balance such things to find a middle ground between 'useless gimmick' and 'overpowered combo'.

 

[Jeffg010]

It is interesting idea but the more buttons you make people push the more your going to turn off people from wanting to play. If I had to cast 3 different spells to get the right amount of damage then all that does is slow down the game. Look at these type of game everyone ends up with builds that maxes out DPS as fast as you can. If people had the choice to cast 1 spell that did the same amount as 3 spells which do you think they would choose?

Also throw in PvP and you need bust damage to stop healing and killing people as quick as possible.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

Bioshock did this, you could use the environment to your advantage, there was often pools of water, pools of oil, gas canisters and other physics objects laying around the room, you could combine that with Inferno/telekinesis/Electrobolt to get some powerful combos. For example you can ignite a chair, pick it up and hurl it at an enemy, doing damage and setting them on fire, if they're near water they will run to it to put themselves out, once they're standing in it you could hit it with an electrobolt and fry them. The sequel improved on this with various traps, you could combine with plasmid effects to get swirling tornados of fire and things like that.

Another quite good game for this was Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, specifically the mage class. You had ice/fire spells which you could combine with elements in the environment to make traps and deal damage in some very clever ways, set a barrel on fire and kick it down a flight of stairs as enemies charge up at you, or freeze the floor near a fire, line up an enemy, kick them into the ice patch watch them slide over straight into the fire.

Dragon Age: Origin allowed the mages to combine a few of the spells as well.

 

[TheVrolok]

As mentioned BioShock and DA:O are the two recent titles that come to mind.

 

[Rhezuss]

Dragon Age: Origins have that sort of spell interaction/combinaison like Grease + Fire or some bigger stuff like Tempest + Firestorm + Blizzard (can't recall the exact names of the spells...) which would produce some big ass effects!

 

[Red Storm]

Magicka's entire premise is doing exactly that, throwing together spell combinations until you or your enemies (or both of you) die.

 

[acheron]

Nethack.

 

[cytoSiN]

Nethack.

QFT