>>32766>But its not complicated though.It's
more complicated is the point. Video games are a business, so things are going to be biased toward the easiest (cheapest) option.
>The absolutely simplest version is just having enemy attempt to run away and despawn when their health get below certain threshold.No, that's more complicated because you have to code for the fleeing behavior as well as checking to despawn them after they are out of sight etc. It's way simpler to just have them de-activate and drop as a ragdoll.
>Or rudimentary morale system, like if their ally got killed near them, they have % chance to leg it.This is already a lot more complex. You need to have some kind of routine that runs every so often to check for whatever you set as the condition to run. You need to program in the behavior and the checker, and you need to record dialogue so the player knows they are running in fear and it's not the navigation bugging out. It's way easier to record the voice actor doing a few death screams and just program
if health <= 0 {self.die()}
and make a die() function that plays a death sound, switches off the normal programming and turns them into a ragdoll.
>And especially when we talk about AAA titles with development budget in millions, the issue isnt in it being too complicated or time-consuming to program, but industry being too stale to innovate basics of gaming in such a way.That's part of it but also a big part is that it's a business and they will cut corners if possible. Even the biggest budget games with the most attention to detail still end up cutting a shitload of corners for this exact reason. Red Dead Redemption 2 is currently treated as the high water mark for all of that kind of thing, but it's still got lots of scrapped content and features that are obviously unfinished, because Rockstar decided to work on GTA Online, which was a lot more profit for a lot less effort.
>Out of the top of my head, Gothic games lets you beat NPCs without killing them, in Kingdom Come: Deliverance you can leave wounded enemies live, and in Warband soldiers flee when battle goes south for them.And there's free mods for Skyrim that gives you like a dozen options besides outright killing people. The problem is not that it's not doable or something. The problem is that doing it requires work, and people have to be paid to do that work, and businesses don't want to pay more than the bare minimum.