Facing

[Jack_Slinger]

I also really don’t want this to become a feature, either the cost of facing is too high and ruins it that way or its so cheap it just makes me press 5+ buttons to move one square for no god reason.

[Binky]

Sadly, I have to say that if full-facing becomes implemented, I’m going to have to say goodbye; Just like I did to UrW.

Although I hate it when people say that, as if the devs are going to say ‘OH GOD COME BACK PLEASE, I BEG YOU!’, I do hate the mechanic in UrW and it does make it an awkward mess to play.

However, I think that UrW’s problem is mainly to do with the control system (turning and then forward) and how it’s implemented rather than looking being a horrible mechanic - I believe it would add a lot of realism and more importantly tension if used correctly.

To reiterate, my suggestion would be to keep track of the direction you’re walking and shift the view that way slightly - possibly a few squares (just like real walking/looking), with the option of fixing your view in one direction (or on an object/point) which would give you the full view (with only one square in the opposite direction perhaps. Fixing your view could have a small cost, as could returning to ‘walking view’. This could do away with the ‘central’ view and mean that for the most part you’re not doing too much shifting of perspective.

This coupled with running/tripping/actions (as Kevin says) would be fantastic on tension and I really doubt the extra one or two keystrokes would really make it a such a chore.

[The_Darkling_Wolf]

We have no plans to implement a system like UnReal World’s. It’d be exactly the same as our current system, except if you have your view shifted in a direction, then you gain some debuffs to doing stuff such as sprinting or fighting in the opposite direction. You can always just centre the view again and have things be normal.

[kevin.granade]

I’m not familiar with UrW’s system, but from what I gather it’s totally different from what I’m proposing. Please don’t judge my proposal based on some other system. In particular, there’s very little impact if you just leave your view centered, whereas it sounds like UrW’s system required you to manage facing constantly, which is something I’m very focused on avoiding.

I think the idea of having facing slide in the direction of movement a square at a time by default (leaving the character in frame of course) is a good one, I’ll take a look at implementing it and see how it goes. Probably apply the same in vehicles where the view slews around with you as you turn. With both of these it’d be a switchable mode, so if you don’t want your view shifting around it won’t happen.

Finally, I’m being very careful with this. I’m prototyping implementation ideas, and thinking really hard about providing a better interface for you without causing additional overhead, and I’m not tying it to game mechanics until I’m totally happy with the interface AND I get feedback that it works well from users. if it breaks the game I’m not going to leave it in because it’s my idea, sometimes you have to kill your darlings in programming too.

[deadmerits]

I found UrW’s facing just fine, but I wasn’t running from zombie hoards on there. That being said I understand its not going to be like that. What I was first reading I was concerned about how constant our attention will have to be focused on which direction your facing, I was originally excited at the driving aspect. But reading more and as its being discussed and elaborated I’m more and more excited. And I would never threaten to quit playing because of the design from here on out (as if you care anyways), I’m following development in the first place because I enjoy what you guys have done so far. Thanks and keep up the good work.

[n9103]

Well, I’m glad some clarification got put out there.
While I may have been a bit overly dramatic, the sentiments behind it were genuine.
From what I was understanding, the current view-shifting was only a stopgap measure until the full facing code was done, not that this was the facing system.
To me, and probably most that have played UrW or other such games that give you a cone of vision, facing implies just that, a limited field of view in a narrow cone. Kevin’s talking about restricting it the further out you focused only reinforced that idea in my mind.
Also, the intent wasn’t to be asked to come back, it was to point out that such a dramatic shift in playstyle could strongly drive away players that otherwise have come to love the game.

shrug What’s done is done, and it looks that no one’s the worse for wear but me with a bit of egg on my face.

[Sonny]

As much as I like UrW, their facing system is horrible. Really. Combined with movement system of turn-somewhere-slowly-or-use-45-or-180-points-turn-then-you-finally-can-move, it’s enough suffering for average masochist, especially when you track and hunt something in woods. Really awkward.

[Miloch]

I like the suggested system, though I still say we need to increase the total sight area.

[coffeespoons]

Personally I see the use of facing as more realistic but significantly less fun if universally applied. Let’s be honest: in a zombie-strewn apocalyptic wasteland with danger around every corner, I’m sure that it goes without saying people would be constantly checking in every direction.

I was pretty unimpressed by the rather fussy nature of unreal world which included facing as an issue.

The most/only acceptable versions IMHO would be to along the lines of:

-a narrow blindspot cone behind the player, perhaps with a new zombie type (burrowing? silent? enhanced tracking?) that could exploit this and generate some more tension - or one that was triggered by particular conditions such as intoxication, or

-if it were tied into the implementation of running: I think that a reduced cone of vision might help to counter balance the advantages of additional speed and the possibility of a fast zombie catching up with you in this blindspot might add some tension to an otherwise risk-free escape.

Personally speaking, gameplay-wise a much larger visible screen area is surely a much higher priority (although the reality is that bringing tiles support up to date would undoubtedly bring the most new players in). The current window is unnecessarily restrictive - spending ime hitting “x” and manually panning is a nuisance so a larger screen would reduce the inconvenience and speed of play rather than add any inherent player advantage. It might also be an opportunity of rebalancing sight +ve and -ve traits and the otherwise no-brainer use of binoculars.

I do appreciate the hard work of those actively involved in the project / and regret I have no coding skills to help. I do appreciate that suggestions such as a larger screen area and/ or tiles are non-trivial tasks!

[kevin.granade]

Personally I see the use of facing as more realistic but significantly less fun if universally applied. Let’s be honest: in a zombie-strewn apocalyptic wasteland with danger around every corner, I’m sure that it goes without saying people would be constantly checking in every direction.

If it were just for the sake of having facing, I wouldn’t be messing with it, but I think this actually helps by allowing you to chose what area of the map to concentrate on. Also as I’ve said several times, the default is you can see in all directions like you can now by default, you aren’t going to have a blind spot at all times that you have to manage, just when you are focusing on something.

I was pretty unimpressed by the rather fussy nature of unreal world which included facing as an issue.

FWIU the system is completely different.

[quote=“coffeespoons, post:29, topic:194”]The most/only acceptable versions IMHO would be to along the lines of:

-a narrow blindspot cone behind the player, perhaps with a new zombie type (burrowing? silent? enhanced tracking?) that could exploit this and generate some more tension - or one that was triggered by particular conditions such as intoxication, or[/quote]

This is a possibility, but when you’re walking around you aren’t going to have a blindspot by default.

-if it were tied into the implementation of running: I think that a reduced cone of vision might help to counter balance the advantages of additional speed and the possibility of a fast zombie catching up with you in this blindspot might add some tension to an otherwise risk-free escape.

This is a definite possibility, running may force you to focus in a particular direction.

Personally speaking, gameplay-wise a much larger visible screen area is surely a much higher priority (although the reality is that bringing tiles support up to date would undoubtedly bring the most new players in). The current window is unnecessarily restrictive - spending ime hitting “x” and manually panning is a nuisance so a larger screen would reduce the inconvenience and speed of play rather than add any inherent player advantage. It might also be an opportunity of rebalancing sight +ve and -ve traits and the otherwise no-brainer use of binoculars.

A larger viewing area is a possibility but the entire area the player can see is 121x121 squares, so we will not be displaying the entire area at once, it’s just too large. Also facing as I’m implementing it is a mitigating factor for the small view size, not something that makes it worse

[Rutilant]

I’m kinda new so I don’t know what weight my thoughts carry here, but I figured I’d pitch in my two cents.

Why can’t we have customizable window and tile sizes? It’d be an incredible improvement just to be able to have the X and Y sizes
uniform so vehicles don’t look bizarre and the skewed proportion doesn’t make you walk into zombies that were closer than you thought.

I’d really like to see some improvements on that end before more restrictions to how much you can see - being limited to only half of what
we currently have now in terms of visible, usable screen space almost sounds preposterous.

[n9103]

Edit FONTDATA in the game dir.

[Rutilant]

Thanks! That is actually pretty helpful.

Still, it’s hardly ideal - it stretches out the info pane as well, and doesn’t change the size of the font, just the black border around it.

My main concern is that right now we have (around) a 25x25 area immediately visible to the character, and if facing gives us a generous 180 degree field of view (probably more for compound eyes mutation, just a thought), that becomes a 12x25 area of usable, visible play area, beyond sound cues.

Since game balance is controlled by the character’s field of view, not the player’s field of view, I think it would be nice to have a section in the in-game options menu that lets you set your viewport size however you like? Let the player decide what is a good playing size?

[n9103]

Facing is just a shift of the viewport, as it stands now. The only restriction is that the more you look in one direction, the less you can see in the other.