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Thread Statistics | Show CCP posts - 10 post(s) |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
888
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Posted - 2014.06.08 14:40:00 -
[1] - Quote
In case any of the CCP devs in attendance at GDC this year missed it
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1020583/Animation-Bootcamp-An-Indie-Approach
The sections on movement, especially where the two mesh balls form the foundation of how a character moves over and interacts with the terrain are relevant.
Legion must have a better system for movement over terrain built into the game from the beginning. Not saying that CCP needs to develop their own procedural animation system from scratch.
But movement over terrain and through the environment must be smooth and responsive. And it must be built on a system that will not add excessive work for map and level designers and animators every time something new is added to the game. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
896
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Posted - 2014.06.11 17:31:00 -
[2] - Quote
Your Absolut End wrote:They should keep in mind that diferent suits will be able to move different.
A heavy shouldnt be able to move like a scout through terrain.
Movement in games is definately important, love the whole movement design in titanfall :)
Titanfall is definitely fun to play, and the movement is pretty great as a pilot. Even though it can feel contrived/ slightly floaty. somewhat disconnected to the environment at times.
I think the great thing about the procedural animation system that Wolfire is working on is that it started out with a really simple yet elegant approach. Then the developer put solid foundation in place. Then they (well, really he, since the studio is basically one guy) was able to continue to build on that to do things like wall running, hanging on ledges, roll down hills, equip and fight with different weapons etc. And also account for usually complex animation/ object interaction problems fairly easily. What happens when a character runs straight at a wall full speed? What happens when the character leaps right at a wall when running full speed?
And the animations totally outclass what you see Titanfall. The pilot eject sequences are kind of goofy in comparison. Like Wile E Coyote running off a cliff before he realizes that gravity is about to reassert itself.
The cool thing about implementing some procedural techniques is that it allows you have every character interact with every object and terrain in game without needing to program every instance and animate every sequence from scratch.
Since project legion will still feature human mercenaries, there will be a need to do some mo-cap and some traditional animation in-betweens. For the sake of fidelity/ heightened realism. But if CCP is able to put a decent character movement framework/ foundation in place that would go a long ways toward making development efficient and enable a smaller studio to add bells and whistles over time. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
898
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Posted - 2014.06.14 23:45:00 -
[3] - Quote
Iron Wolf Saber wrote:http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1020583/Animation-Bootcamp-An-Indie-Approach
seems interesting and applicable to our own soldier movements.
Maybe it seems applicable because that is the exact same link that I posted to start this whole thing off in the first post of the thread?
Please pay attention! FFS... |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
898
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Posted - 2014.06.15 04:40:00 -
[4] - Quote
CCP Wolfman wrote:No need to get angry Aigun...
Not angry. Something between bemused and exasperated.
Anyway, procedural animation would also be really beneficial for the first person weapon load, re-load, weapon swap animations, and for hip fire and aiming animations. It would potentially allow smaller teams to create more content rapidly once the system is in place.
The segment of the presentation that demonstrated a revolver was a nice illustration of what can be accomplished with that kind of system in a short time. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
899
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Posted - 2014.06.15 16:46:00 -
[5] - Quote
Bunny hoppingGǪ
Bunny hopping is a non issue. There is no such thing as bunny hopping in Dust 514, and never has been, There also won't be bunny hopping in legion.
For reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunny_hopping
Yes, players can exploit animations to make themselves difficult to hit. In an FPS it is the developers job to take this basic fact of gaming into consideration when designing movement systems.
The real question is, "Should characters be able to jump repeatedly?"
The obvious answer is, "Yes."
Next thing you have to look at, then, is how that repeated jumping should actually work.
Stamina management is a related mechanic, but a separate issue. I think that there should be stamina management in Legion. It allows for deeper and more interesting character building. Also an area that can be used to balance various types of builds. It could be a really interesting aspect of team play if CCP ever introduce anything like buffs/ debuffs. And it would also help to flesh out the Universe of New Eden. If all characters have a stamina bar built in from day 1, you could use that to simulate the effects of differing gravity on different planets.
Going off on a slight tangent here, but in EVE Valkyrie, the team has mentioned that different ship classes will have different advantages and disadvantages on different turfs. In legion, the same thing could be accomplished with stamina management. It is a running joke when talking about science fiction film and tv that every single planet that anyone ever goes to is always almost exactly 9.78 m/s-¦. But all of the different planets, even the temperate planets, all have different mass and size, and therefore gravity. But your drop suit could simulates "normal" gravity at the cost of stamina.
Back to so called bunny hopping. Repeated jumping. Dust 514 solved the problems that crop up with repeated jumping by capping them with a depleting stamina bar. A simple, basic solution. A game like Titan Fall allows players to move so quickly and fluidly and traverse the maps so effortlessly that repeated jumping is never an issue. There is no such thing as stamina management in that game. Legion should come up with it's own, up do date and future proof movement system.
A system based on the idea that in general characters can traverse every square inch of the terrain and installations. And that each type of dropsuit will do so in its own unique way.
And then make some basic rules for each of the different types of suits. Apologies in advance for going full armchair game design in 3GǪ 2GǪ 1...
Put together a basic set of movements over terrain. Flat ground, undulating ground, steep slope, low obstacles, rocks or cliffs. Walk, jog, fast run, vault, clamber, climb.
Scout suit can: walk, jog, fast run, vault, clamber, fast clamber, climb, fast climb, and has the ability to climb walls.
Assault suit can: walk, jog, fast run, clamber, climb, but cannot climb walls,
and so on.
What about jumping, and repeat jumping?
Scout suit cannot repeat jump! What? A scout suit is designed for fast and continuous running at very low cost to stamina. The scout suit jump does not cost much stamina, but is a high arc, 4 meter jump and can only be made from a full fast run. The landing has some frames of compression, where the , and going from landing to full run takes a lot longer than going from walk to full run. Scout suit can combo their jump with wall climbingGǪ Can they wall run? Will legion go full parkour? who knows.
A heavy suit cannot jump, at all. A heavy can get over curbs and railings and vault without movement or stamina penalties. But no jumping. Suit just isn't designed to move like that. Also no fast run. Sorry, heavies.
And the assault suit can bunnyhop. If you want to call it that. But repeatedly spamming the jump button while moving in the same direction will get you a series of slow, predictable jumps kind of like a kid playing hopscotch. The assault can make fast, low arc leaps or by rapidly changing directions, but each leap in a different direction costs stamina.
That is a huge amount of work. Does CCP Shanghai have the resources to put together something that involved using more traditional techniques and their current engine? Probably not. WIll any of those proposals actually work and make interesting, balanced gameplay, or would they just be broken and as prone to abuse asGǪ Bunnyhopping? Who knows. But project legion will be a much better game in the long run if CCP get over some of these legacy FPS issues that keep cropping up and design movement specifically for legion. So, even though every drop suit should be able to traverse all of the terrain in a map, the game will be that much richer and engaging if they all do it in their own specific way. And repeat jumping is just one kind of movement. It isn't a bad thing in and of itself, but why not design the jumps to be a unique part of legion's FPS gameplay? Rather than using a generic template for all suits and then get bogged down in trying to figure out how many jumps are too many.
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Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
901
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Posted - 2014.06.16 13:03:00 -
[6] - Quote
Sole Fenychs wrote:
Also, stupid-looking? Seriously? There are many stupid looking things in Dust and jumping around is not one of them.
In fact, it looks awesome to see someone scale heights and distances with long jumps. And jumping into cover is completely valid, though it should have its own animation to make it look more dynamic.
Goat Simulator, the Mountain Goat expansion pack...
I find scaling heights, especially when you run out of stamina and can just spam the jump button to hop up a hill to be awkward at best. From first person or even watching someone else attempt Dust 514's version of mountaineering.
But I really like the idea of jumps that are specific to interactions with different elements of the environment. What would be really great for legion to do is build a movement system that would allow CCP to add those features over time. At least spend some time planning ahead so that they don't need to spend huge amounts of time and effort and risk causing game breaking bugs every time they want to change or add to how the characters interact with walls, or hills, or vehicles. For both third person and first person animations. It would be especially cool if first and third person animations were linked so all you had to do was change or add to the movement once and it would just work.
Not sure if more contemporary game engines account for that. Not sure if it makes sense to try to build something like that into their current Frankenstein engine. But the time to do it is now. Not in 3 years time when the existing character movement model will feel even more dated, clumsy, unwieldy and artificial than it does today.
Since they have to rebuild some very basic character movement/ environment interactions anyway, why not make that work as part of a system that can be built upon in the future? Instead of scrambling to create a more short term solution to one problem, that just becomes the source of other problems down the line. |
Aighun
Zumari Force Projection
Caldari State
906
|
Posted - 2014.06.22 18:51:00 -
[7] - Quote
Ender Storm wrote:Jumping. Remove it. You dont need it to trasverse obstacles, just to imitate the eastern bunny.
But then why not just make legion a vehicle game? A western mech game?
Why make a game with human combatants? We are hominoids. Jumping around is what we do. As much as any leporidae. |
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