Stunts: How Could They be Changed?

[Shogi]

It really seems 50/50 to me. I'm really on the fence. Third person would probably be best in terms of awareness and showcasing the movement system (probably the most important part of the game). First person would show off the gun porn better and make actual shooting easier. If we go first person we'd have to do it Mirror's Edge style so you actually feel the motion. There was always a disconnect there is TS imo. Perhaps we can do both? Set the camera in the 3rd person model and then just have a toggle button or something.

We could perhaps experiment with a hybrid 2nd person camera with a sort of lag time so standing still it looks like a straight fps but when you start moving it sorta lags behind a bit so it almost becomes over the shoulder, and maybe during stunts it pulls out a bit farther, but not too much. The crosshair also wouldnt be centered in the screen, it could maybe roam a bit which affects the camera direction.

Obviously I've not spent any time dealing with game camera angles, but allow me to theorize/imagine:

ProTip: show

We sort of "keyframe" certain camera angles- over each shoulder, first person, a couple others by hardcoding their position relative to the player (or perhaps just a bounding box/sphere set around the player's head). Then with some clever scripting/algorithms based on the trajectories of both the crosshair position on the screen and the player's speed/direction of motion we sort of move the actual camera toward or away from these set points. So what you actually see is a very clever blended transition between a first person view and third person view.

In all likelyhood thats overly difficult to setup or utterly disorienting and useless but if it could work anything like i'm imagining it really could be the best of both worlds. 1 issue i do see is that with the crosshair/player roaming on screen, bullet trajectories between the gun and crosshair would be tricky to understand at first (speaking of which are we doing bullet physics?). This could be remedied with a laser sight though that may or may not actually be visible to other players. It doesn't actually have to be a laser, just some way of guesstimating those midpoints.

Additionally it would play into the lightweight pistol user vs heavy because the amount of camera movement and sway would depend on how fast you're moving around, affecting your aim. Experienced players will learn how to compensate though.

I'm just brainstorming, feel free to shit all over that. I might do some mock up images later if you want.

[misanq]

I'm not sure if you're serious, or being sarcastic about the 3rd person only.

Aside from the cover system, no I wasn't. But yeah, ignoring from the choppiness, that video is probably a better example than uncharted or GOW, since those games put their camera well on the right hand side of the character, which probably wouldn't be great for stunting. Also, I think the badness of the third person in TS might have been more down to the engine than anything else.

@Shogi
I think the 2nd person camera idea would probably be a bit distracting as far as the first person to third transition goes, unless the way you imagine it is much different to the way I do.

[Shogi]

It could be a bit yeah, but ideally camera motion would be minimized or made snappier so as to keep it as relatively still in a particular angle as possible.

Also, I vote no on a cover system. We want to encourage people to keep moving. Letting them hide behind things just gives them another reason not to. Plus cover based shooters are really getting done to death right now; let's do the exact opposite.

[LazyDog]

I will not entertain arguments of "keep it like TS because TS was perfect." This is not a vote. You need to either give an statement of why I should do it this way or that way or GTFO.

If that was directed towards me I suggest you watch your tongue mr Vino...

Moving + jump + stunt button: Dive
Moving + crouch + stunt button: Roll
Hold stunt button after dive or roll: Stay in prone (This is opposite from TS I think)
Moving + stunt button: Straight to slide
Only stunt button: Straight to prone
Moving + jump + crouch + stunt button: SUPARJUMP (jk)

I will try to break this down with arguments rather then just reacting with disgust towards this idea.

Reasons for keeping the high, mid, low stunt:
1. It worked. Its simply just worked and everybody know it. If we try to think about this shit too logically we wont get closer to the truth because stunting is an experience that needs to be experienced.
2. Having one button for stunting is genius. Its simple, its fast and it frees up other keys that players can bind to whatever they want.

Reasons for throwing away this new idea:
1. Its more complex, it uses more buttons.
2. I don't understand what we would gain by trowing in more buttons?
3. I see no reason to go straight to prone, its boring. Low dive is more fun and gets the job done.
4. 4 buttons for super jump. Again simply too many buttons.

Its not that I hate your idea because its quite similar to the old mechanics but I see absolutely no upsides either. It seems to me that you are changing things for the sake of change.

PS: I love you Vino... I hurt you because I love you.

[misanq]

It could be a bit yeah, but ideally camera motion would be minimized or made snappier so as to keep it as relatively still in a particular angle as possible.

Also, I vote no on a cover system. We want to encourage people to keep moving. Letting them hide behind things just gives them another reason not to. Plus cover based shooters are really getting done to death right now; let's do the exact opposite.

It'd probably be better with pictures.
Also, the cover system thing was a joke, really. If you think about it, a cover system would probably be a straight up liability in a action game, since people would invariably just rocket over your chest high wall and shoot you in the back of the head mid-dive while you were still frantically trying to detach yourself from the cover. That or spawn behind you.

It worked. Its simply just worked and everybody know it.

The high low system wasn't really all that great since you had to look away from your target to do most of the stunts. I think it might have been more of a case of it working because people just accepted that that was how it was.

[LazyDog]

The high low system wasn't really all that great since you had to look away from your target to do most of the stunts. I think it might have been more of a case of it working because people just accepted that that was how it was.

I'm not sure if looking away from your target to do stunts is a bad thing. Why is it bad?
To me it felt very natural to look up in order to stunt up (high). I'm having a hard time believing that people just accepted the stunt mechanics due to lack of alternatives, because every other gotdamn thing in TS was under heated debate at least once back in the days. Almost every aspect of the game has been flamed (the rifles, the mac10, the akimbos, the fu, the exploits, the wall climb, the matrix move, the lobby map, the kevlar, the slowmo, the kf-power up, the superjump etc etc) ... but what I can remember people liked the stunt mechanics.

[Shogi]

Look, no one's saying TS had a bad system. It worked. I agree that looking away from your target wasn't great, so the system had some flaws. Regardless, just because it worked is no reason not to try something different. Innovation requires experimentation.

I'll try and mock up some photos today to illustrate the system.

[Vino]

LazyDog, I was talking to Venge. If I don't specifically quote or address someone you can assume I'm replying to the person who posted immediately before me.

1. Its more complex, it uses more buttons.

I don't really see it that way. I see it as using one button contextually.

If you want to look at it that way then TS's stunting system was more complex because it involved using the mouse and it had a couple different keys for each stunt. There were your double tab space stunts, your double tap crouch stunts, your stunt button stunts, and the infamous use-your-mind-to-activate stunts. The system I've proposed has only one button that activates stunts.

Also superjump was a joke, thus the (jk) new game will not have superjump.

Upsides:
* Conceptually simpler. I know you don't think so, but I do. When you press the stunt button a stunt happens. Which stunt depends on what you're doing at the time.
* Easier to instruct new users. "Press right mouse button to stunt!" or similar.
* It's able to do a "straight to slide" move which is something I think TS lacked. It's the same kind of deal as sliding into first base in baseball.

If you don't like straight to prone, it's not a vital part of the system. It's take-out-able. It'll depend on how cool the animation is.

[Vino]

Concerning third person only, here are my thoughts:

Pros:
* Can see the stunting better
* Easier to develop (no V models)

Cons:
* Less immersion
* Good cameras are tough to design

[bryt]

* Good cameras are tough to design

i just want to emphasize that one. i feel like making third person actually work well would undermine the whole project. but if you must, i vote for a Vanquish type camera mechanics, minus the cover system.

[Vino]

i feel like making third person actually work well would undermine the whole project.

What?

Third person working well will undermine the project? Am I understanding that correctly?

[bryt]

MAKING it work well, as in the process of getting it right.

[Wish]

Third person working well will make the project better.

But the winning strategy is to include both. Give options (a rare and desirable option in today's market), don't alienate players unnecessarily.

[Antagonist]

I like fps games :$

[Vino]

i feel like making third person actually work well would undermine the whole project.

un·der·mine /ˌəndərˈmīn/ Verb
1. Erode the base or foundation of (a rock formation).
2. Dig or excavate beneath (a building or fortification) so as to make it collapse.

Making third person work will would erode the foundation of the game? I really don't understand what you're trying to say. Maybe you mean something more like underscore, meaning to give emphasis? Sorry to be obsessed with grammar semantics but your thoughts on the topic are important to me.