Regarding HUDs, there is a cool HL2 mod in development (nearing public release of some sort, it seems) called Insurgency. It looks a lot like a conventional FPS such as BF2, but they are really rethinking a lot of conventions. For example, they do have an aim to completely kill the HUD and it sounds like it's working fine.
A worthy experiment, in my opinion. As long as the fact that "you have been shot", or "you have been shot twice and it really hurts" is properly conveyed by hints that blend with the rest of the game world, it becomes not only manageable, but more immersive.
I don't see why people disliked COD2's health system. Realism-wise, it is of course absurd. However, there are four things that it does better than conventional health systems:
-With a conventional health system, you'll be finding med packs sitting about in all the quiet places anyway. These things are not realistic in the slightest, and beyond that they are boring. Healing oneself becomes a mindless reflex that feels out of place from the rest of the game. (That's because, in a game aiming to be realistic, an instant healing object is out of place).
-Otherwise, you will find yourself quicksaving around every corner. Prey tried to do away with this by simply having you resurrected whenever you die (and it did not work very well, considering how it made the final boss completely uninteresting).
A health system like that of COD2, where you can restore full health in a tough situation without quickloading, does away with it in a very tidy and completely transparent manner. If you do something stupid, you can still escape (which is exciting, if the AI is good); after doing that, you can hide and try again all in the same instance of gameplay. No load screens, no function keys, no "I'd better save!". It's clean!
-With the 'healing everywhere' style of health system, there is more focus on strategy / wits, and less focus on hoarding weapons and ammunition. No player can just pop out of a hole in the ground and start blasting everything; it becomes obvious rather quickly that this is a stupid thing to do, and instead you will focus on the importance of cover to not die. People not only actually pay more attention to cover, but they stay closer to it. Running through an open field is a scary task where your character's safety is challenged by the fact that he has no cover, rather than the fact that "he only has 37 health!"
-Lastly, health systems like that of COD2 actually encourage more realistic health meters. Your character can't take much before he's killed, and this is made acceptable by the fact that there is no health bar to say "WTF, that took 99 health?!".
Bullets and especially explosions in COD2 are more powerful than in most games, because the player's health isn't 10 times that of Superman in order to make it playable.
It really depends on the game, but with anything tactical I feel that COD2's way is great. Even if it isn't the best way possible, it is at least fresh; exploration is good, because this health bar thing is getting old.
For everything else, where an HUD is really necessary, I'd say HL2's HUD is one of the best; just stick the info at the bottom of the screen in a minimalist way and don't surround it with useless pictures.
On the other hand, Battlefield 2's is one of the most cluttery HUDs, filled with all matter of unimportant information and with a chat window that doesn't work because it is spammed by death messages.
A worthy experiment, in my opinion. As long as the fact that "you have been shot", or "you have been shot twice and it really hurts" is properly conveyed by hints that blend with the rest of the game world, it becomes not only manageable, but more immersive.
I don't see why people disliked COD2's health system. Realism-wise, it is of course absurd. However, there are four things that it does better than conventional health systems:
-With a conventional health system, you'll be finding med packs sitting about in all the quiet places anyway. These things are not realistic in the slightest, and beyond that they are boring. Healing oneself becomes a mindless reflex that feels out of place from the rest of the game. (That's because, in a game aiming to be realistic, an instant healing object is out of place).
-Otherwise, you will find yourself quicksaving around every corner. Prey tried to do away with this by simply having you resurrected whenever you die (and it did not work very well, considering how it made the final boss completely uninteresting).
A health system like that of COD2, where you can restore full health in a tough situation without quickloading, does away with it in a very tidy and completely transparent manner. If you do something stupid, you can still escape (which is exciting, if the AI is good); after doing that, you can hide and try again all in the same instance of gameplay. No load screens, no function keys, no "I'd better save!". It's clean!
-With the 'healing everywhere' style of health system, there is more focus on strategy / wits, and less focus on hoarding weapons and ammunition. No player can just pop out of a hole in the ground and start blasting everything; it becomes obvious rather quickly that this is a stupid thing to do, and instead you will focus on the importance of cover to not die. People not only actually pay more attention to cover, but they stay closer to it. Running through an open field is a scary task where your character's safety is challenged by the fact that he has no cover, rather than the fact that "he only has 37 health!"
-Lastly, health systems like that of COD2 actually encourage more realistic health meters. Your character can't take much before he's killed, and this is made acceptable by the fact that there is no health bar to say "WTF, that took 99 health?!".
Bullets and especially explosions in COD2 are more powerful than in most games, because the player's health isn't 10 times that of Superman in order to make it playable.
It really depends on the game, but with anything tactical I feel that COD2's way is great. Even if it isn't the best way possible, it is at least fresh; exploration is good, because this health bar thing is getting old.
For everything else, where an HUD is really necessary, I'd say HL2's HUD is one of the best; just stick the info at the bottom of the screen in a minimalist way and don't surround it with useless pictures.
On the other hand, Battlefield 2's is one of the most cluttery HUDs, filled with all matter of unimportant information and with a chat window that doesn't work because it is spammed by death messages.