Action-Adventure Games: Can Stealth Work in the Action-Adventure Genre?

Let’s face it, the genre of games called action-adventure is a pretty broad one. Most games contain both action and adventure, and the mechanics that define the genre are elements that turn up in other genres as well. Boiled down, action-adventure games usually put the player in the role of a single protagonist who must solve puzzles or complete other objectives to progress. By this bare-bones definition, most modern games are also action-adventure games. The broad definition of this genre means a lot of little niches can fit into it.

This can lead to the formation of new genres, many of which see more popular use than the broader “action-adventure games” term. And while stealth games are one of these evolutionary paths, the path the genre has taken means that, despite still falling under the action-adventure games umbrella, several of the game’s core tenets are seemingly at odds with the broader whole.

Thankfully, stealth and action-adventure games can play nice with one another. What might seem like inescapable hurdles are simply challenges for developers to overcome, furthering both the action-adventure games genre and its niches, like stealth games.

Open-World Environments Present a Problem for Stealthy Action-Adventure Games

For many gamers, an open-world environment is a staple for a good action-adventure game. Gamers today often prefer the freedom of movement that open-world environments provide to earlier, more linear games. Open worlds mean large, explorable spaces packed full of enemies, puzzles, and challenges to overcome.

While that’s great for action-adventure games, it poses a challenge for stealth. Wide-open spaces can make hiding from enemies a chore unless, as in a game like Skyrim, you can level your abilities to the point that you can crouch in broad daylight, three feet from an enemy and remain magically undetectable.

This is where social stealth shines. Games like the Assassin’s Creed series give players the ability to blend in with a crowd, making stealth possible even in open-world action-adventure games. In games that have open levels that consist of a series of missions (rather than a true open world), social stealth may take the form of disguises—an important mechanic in the Hitman series and Alekhine’s Gun.

Open worlds are totally possible in stealth action-adventure games, provided stealth isn’t simply a mechanic shoehorned in to attract more players. While Skyrim‘s stealth system is enjoyable, its role in plotlines that aren’t the Thieves Guild or Dark Brotherhood are limited and can feel silly because the game wasn’t designed to be a pure stealth game.

Boss Battles Action-Adventure Games Sometimes Insurmountable for Stealth Fans

Boss battles are a staple of action-adventure games—when progressing through a level, you frequently stumble upon a souped-up version of earlier enemies and must defeat them using the tactics you’ve been practicing. But when you combine action-adventure games with stealth, you may run into a problem—how can you have a powerful enemy when so many stealth games actively make the player feel less powerful to emphasize stealth?

Games like Deus Ex: Human Revolution have struggled with this, as speccing your character into a stealth master was excellent for most of the gameplay, but ineffectual on bosses. Typical boss battles are one-on-one fights, and if your skills are all based on sneaking around and attacking from the shadows, you’ll likely be unable to take on the more powerful bosses. It’s a fatal flaw in hybrid games, as it can be impossible to progress without improved skills in shooting.

Some games take the Metal Gear approach to this problem—in Metal Gear Solid 3, one boss battle involves a sniper stand-off that can literally take hours. It’s a challenge built around stealth rather than a super-powered enemy. These kinds of boss battles bridge the gap between action-adventure games and stealth, making use of the latter’s unique mechanics with the former’s genre staples.

Some games take an alternative to this approach, providing players with a series of increasingly difficult objectives to accomplish, culminating with a final test of skill. In Alekhine’s Gun, some objectives are optional, but the levels typically end with a required challenge that involves navigating several smaller challenges along the way. Slipping unnoticed past one guard is a step, but slipping past several to assassinate your target is significantly harder. The same goes for rounding up disguises, bugging an office, or eliminating single guards to progress—rather than having one super-powered foe, games like Alekhine’s Gun bundle challenges together, giving players smaller problems to solve on the way to accomplishing the main objective. It’s a different form of the typical boss battle of action-adventure games, but the satisfaction of combining all of your skills is no less impactful.

Action-Adventure Hybrids Bridge Genre Gaps

Action-adventure games are a huge genre, and stealth games fit neatly under that umbrella by turning the combat, open-world settings, and boss battles into revolutionary experiences. Without the innovation pioneered by early action-adventure games like Hideo Kojima with the Metal Gear series and Looking Glass Studios’ Thief, we wouldn’t have much of the diversity that populates the genre today.

Successful stealth games play with typical concepts of boss battles and open world settings, turning the tired genre of action-adventure on its head. Sometimes what gamers want and what will work in a game’s genre are at odds, but that means that developers have to get creative—what might feel like limitations actually become opportunities to innovate.

For the latest in action-adventure games, order Alekhine’s Gun, a historical stealth game that blends your favorite action-adventure aspects with stealth, open settings, and objective-based challenges.