

Nakatomi Space - djnym
http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/nakatomi-space.html

======
lmkg
This article made me think of video games and how a few of them have made
really innovative uses of space (no, really!).

One of my all-time favorite is a game called X-Com from 1993 (called UFO:
Enemy Unknown in the UK). It's basically a turn-based tactical strategy game.
Perhaps its most defining feature is almost completely-destructible terrain.
The gameplay ends up being very similar to the Israeli invasion described in
the article: using the doorway is almost always the wrong choice. The computer
will have the door covered. If you knock through/down the right wall, they
have to spend the rest of the turn with their guns pointed the wrong direction
(the game has overwatch) and their backs exposed. The most powerful weapon in
the game does just enough damage to knock a man-sized hole in the side of a
UFO; the qualitative change in gameplay is significant. Those corridors are
twisty and treacherous, but entering from the middle instead of the start
turns the advantage around.

The other game I thought of is the Splinter Cell series. Pandora Tomorrow, the
second game, gave the series a very asymmetric multiplayer style of spies vs
mercenaries. In addition to wildly varying, and anti-complementary, abilities,
the two sides were practically playing on different maps. The spies could fit
in air ducts climb over fences. The mercenaries could only navigate around in
the "normal" space of rooms and doors, but effectively owned the places where
they could walk, on account of automatic weapons. The result was effectively
two maps, one wrapped around and between the other. Even before I was exposed
to the idea of scripted spaces, the idea was mind-bending to me. After reading
the article, it's even more impressive: one side in the asymetric conflict has
an architectural advantage, balancing against its comaprative weakness in more
traditional areas. I was never any good at the multiplayer, but it was still
fascinating.

Chaos Theory, the third game in the Splinter Cell series, also had some
impressive work in the single player. It's the first game I've played where
using a non-traditional route like a duct or a drophole actually felt like I
was hacking the level rather than following the route that was laid out for
me. Games have been using air ducts since Half-Life, but whenever they're
available it feels like you're supposed to use them, often because you have no
other choice. I feel like I'm finding _the_ way to advance the level. It's
difficult to describe, but the holes in the environment felt more natural,
like I was following real-world logic rather than game-logic.

I haven't played Mirror's Edge for myself, I would be interested to hear
people's perspective on how original that game's use of space is.

~~~
barrkel
Mirror's Edge is extremely linear - there's usually exactly one right way to
do things, and if you don't do it that way, you die, rinse, repeat, ad
infinitum, ad tedium. I couldn't play it for more than a couple of hours.

Two games I relate to on the theme of navigation of space are the Thief
series, and Far Cry 2.

With Thief, you have a rough map, and your task is to navigate the territory
to get to your goals, avoiding hazards such as loud tile and metal, bright
lights, guards, traps etc. With a selection of arrows for making the ground
silent, extinguishing torches, and rope arrows for climbing, it can be a lot
of fun. Constantine's Mansion (Constantine's Sword mission) is a particularly
architectural delight, with optical illusions and a network of grassy tunnels
joining different floors.

Actually, a defining metaphor of the first two Thief games is architecture as
sexuality; in the first, your enemy is the earthy Pagan Trickster and his co-
conspirator, wood nymph Viktoria, and you pursue him into the bowels of the
earth. In the second, your enemy is a technocratic religious self-described
prophet, and you pursue him in a monstrous skyscraper of metal, working your
way up and up.

Similarly, a substantial and (for me at least) entertaining part of Far Cry 2
relates to the navigation between mission objectives. The roads are patrolled,
and intersections are heavily enough guarded that clearing them risks
depleting ammo, so the best policy is generally to navigate in the gaps
between the roads, choosing crossing points, swimming in rivers, selecting the
right angle of entry approach for mission destinations, etc. Given that every
main mission involves at least three different destinations (one to your buddy
in a safehouse, one to the buddy's preferred mission target, and a third as
the original mission), you need to enjoy this navigation to get the most out
of the game. (Most people didn't; it seems they stuck to the roads and found
the guard checkpoints tedious.)

As to games like Half-Life and its successors in particular, they seem to me
to inhibit exploration and be very linear. Any time there's an interesting
passage hidden away in a corner, I make a note of it and scout out ahead to
see what the mainstream alternative is; but in HL2 and episodes, it usually
turns out that the main branch is a dead end, and you _must_ go back and
investigate that hidden passage. So it kills any chance of you feeling clever,
and makes the unorthodox mundane.

------
brandnewlow
Excellent find. However he mischaracterizes one segment of Die Hard that would
actually strengthen his thesis.

The article argues that the logic of Die Hard rewards those who "infest" the
spaces they inhabit, traversing them creatively rather than via their intended
corridors, elevators, and doorways.

He uses the L.A. SWAT team running across Nakatomi Plaza's rose garden as an
example of this.

I'd counter that the SWAT team's approach was actually conventional. They try
to get in through the front door, and get blown away. Had they tried to tunnel
in from below, for example, in Die Hard's world they would have been more
successful.

Also, his point that the subsequent Die Hard films would have been improved by
holding onto the premise of exploring an architectural space rings true. Die
Hard 2 tried to do this with an airport, but it was a much less interesting
locale. You could debate whether or not Die Hard 3 was taking the same
approach to NYC or not...

If, as he says, Die Hard is more about architecture than characters, I'd argue
that the true spiritual sequel to Die Hard is Steven Seagal's Under Siege,
aka, "Die Hard on a boat." Throughout the (awesome) film, Seagal travels
around a navy ship in all sorts of unconventional ways, letting the viewer
explore the unfamiliar space in a fashion similar to John McClane's adventure
in Die Hard.

~~~
ErrantX
> Die Hard 2 tried to do this with an airport, but it was a much less
> interesting locale

Im not sure it is less interesting; I think mostly they used it poorly.
Airports are a fascinating place and at times (i.e. when he used the storm
drains to get out to the runway) I think there were examples of "Nakatomi
Space".

The main problem was that an Airport is a very large and very open space -
they didn't use that well.

------
angelbob
Quick summary: _What I find so interesting about Die Hard—in addition to
unironically enjoying the film—is that it cinematically depicts what it means
to bend space to your own particular navigational needs. This mutational
exploration of architecture even supplies the building's narrative premise:
the terrorists are there for no other reason than to drill through and rob the
Nakatomi Corporation's electromagnetically sealed vault._

The article is all about how "Die Hard" and an Israeli invasion of Palestinian
territory in 2002 are both about using space in unexpected ways, and moving
through everything _except_ doors, streets and hallways.

------
10ren
Fascinating. I never thought of Die Hard like that, but he's right. The hero
doesn't just improvise ingeniously - a standard hero trope - but specifically
in terms of architecture. He isn't _given_ clever gadgets like James Bond, but
conjures them from the mundane. It's definitely hacking.

An architecture is a theory of space; he has other theories.

------
philwelch
"What I find so interesting about Die Hard—in addition to unironically
enjoying the film—is that it cinematically depicts what it means to bend space
to your own particular navigational needs. This mutational exploration of
architecture even supplies the building's narrative premise: the terrorists
are there for no other reason than to drill through and rob the Nakatomi
Corporation's electromagnetically sealed vault.

Die Hard asks naive but powerful questions: If you have to get from A to
B—that is, from the 31st floor to the lobby, or from the 26th floor to the
roof—why not blast, carve, shoot, lockpick, and climb your way there,
hitchhiking rides atop elevator cars and meandering through the labyrinthine,
previously unexposed back-corridors of the built environment?"

So, basically, just like a hacker. Like Mel using the values of opcodes as
numeric constants, spacing instructions just right on the drum to slow down
the computer's execution rather than using time delay loops, and exploiting a
register overflow instead of a loop test. Not constraining one's self to the
artificial rules the system is built to enforce, but dropping back to the
fundamental physical rules the system was built upon in the first place.

~~~
gwern
Exactly! The MIT hackers in particular were famous also for their exploration
of the physical plant; see
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roof_and_tunnel_hacking>

------
wallflower
In the Pixar film "Ratatouille", there is an amazing visual sequence where
Remy the cutely digitally-rendered rat runs through the hidden spaces between
houses/walls/interior.

------
zandorg
For a more general look at this topic:
<http://johnaugust.com/archives/2006/air-vents-are-for-air>

------
Qz
Would anyone really characterize the villains in Die Hard as 'terrorists'?
What exactly is _terrorizing_ about drilling into a vault in a secure building
in order to steal money? How are they not just _robbers_?

~~~
brandnewlow
They pass themselves off as terrorists to the public to hide the robbery
plans, for a lot of people, that's probably what stuck.

~~~
devinj
Also, it conveniently avoids spoilers.

~~~
donw
The movie was released in 1988. It's hard to spoil something that has already
been consumed, processed, excreted, and reused to make a garden.

~~~
devinj
Consumed and processed by you, perhaps. The film was released (somewhat
shortly) before I was even born. I watched Die Hard for the first time last
year. Before then, the only thing I knew about it was that it had Bruce Willis
in it. I don't think I'm particularly special, I just don't watch that many
old movies.

The point is, spoiling it adds nothing to the conversation: "I watched the
movie and _you_ got this plot element that, while important to the film, is
completely unimportant to your point ... wrong!". On the other hand, not
spoiling it lets anyone a bit too young to have seen it the first time around
not have their experience of the film permanently altered for the worse. There
is no contest. Don't spoil things, even if it's old as hell. It really,
honestly ruins things for some people who are a bit behind the times and care
about this sort of thing.

