knife fighting will never be properly represented in video games with our current input methods because it is fundamentally incompatible with the tools that we have due to its two-handed nature. some games have pretty good melee combat, most of the interesting ones try to either use physics as their basis (exanima, half-sword) ((though there is a serious lack of serious physics based games in this world, and many of the ones that do exist feel about as floppy as an impotent man)) or just blend it in for collision detection and to smooth out animations (hellish quart) and while exanima gets pretty close to what a general melee fight with various weapons looks like and feels like it still falls very short when the player uses daggers and the like. the main gripes i have with it are that it is impossible for me to quickly chain stab after stab, and that i cannot use my character's free left hand to claw at my opponent's face or grab their forehead, neck, wrist or groin to distract them from my knife hand that would simultaneously plunge the blade into their exposed side repeatedly. i had thought up a way to represent a simplified but accurate version of knife fighting, which would be in 2d and rely on controller input, using a twin-stick control scheme for attacking and gyro controls for the legs. but i don't know a thing about making games and i don't really care to learn to write the code and use the tools.
>>2 VR sucks. the dual eye vision and depth perception are cool but the motion detection leaves a lot to be desired when you're making fast movements like you would during a fight. ask anyone who plays blade and sorcery. plus, locomotion in vr is difficult to get right. a joystick on the controller can be distracting, and other methods like teleportation or hand movement locomotion feel very unnatural. foot controllers might solve this, but more accurate motion detection would still be required, and it's a real mess for the end user with all the batteries and cables and the large space needed to play. currently, vr is only good for porn. >>3 overgrowth is a great game, i've played it a lot. the knife combat is pretty good and it's fairly accurate. you can't block in a knife fight, only dodge and grab after a dodge. knife fights end quickly, all it takes is a few good slashes and you're done for. though the representation isn't fully accurate as the characters lead with the knife hand, a technique that should only be applied to machetes and swords. extending the knife hand leaves you very vulnerable. additionally, the damage model could use some more detail, like critical hit areas for arteries and nerves in the throat, armpits, inner elbows, forearms, inner thighs and groin. hitting such areas would end the fight in a matter of seconds. still, it is a step in the right direction and a mighty fine game.
some games have pretty good melee combat, most of the interesting ones try to either use physics as their basis (exanima, half-sword) ((though there is a serious lack of serious physics based games in this world, and many of the ones that do exist feel about as floppy as an impotent man)) or just blend it in for collision detection and to smooth out animations (hellish quart) and while exanima gets pretty close to what a general melee fight with various weapons looks like and feels like it still falls very short when the player uses daggers and the like. the main gripes i have with it are that it is impossible for me to quickly chain stab after stab, and that i cannot use my character's free left hand to claw at my opponent's face or grab their forehead, neck, wrist or groin to distract them from my knife hand that would simultaneously plunge the blade into their exposed side repeatedly.
i had thought up a way to represent a simplified but accurate version of knife fighting, which would be in 2d and rely on controller input, using a twin-stick control scheme for attacking and gyro controls for the legs. but i don't know a thing about making games and i don't really care to learn to write the code and use the tools.