New Public Video

[Sneil]

Regarding the running (seeing as you're planning on spending time on this in the future), I think the biggest thing that makes it comes off as odd to people is the front leg extending well past the point it needs to stop and hit the ground. Adjust that and you wont have such a dramatic pendulum swing effect between the two legs.

This video is an awesome reference: Start at 50sec for a slow motion side view. (he looks a little lame with his chest sticking out and shoulders back, I'd leave them in a bit more of a relaxed pose. They wouldnt need to look like professional runners)

Also notice the head and shoulders aren't leaning forwards in any way way whatsoever. This only would ever occur while a person is accelerating, but not while maintaining a constant pace/velocity. The hips and shoulders remain perfectly aligned with each other perpendicular to the ground.

Also take note of the up and down motion of the entire upper body, hips to top of the head. This would be a lot more difficult to achieve I think with your animation/physics system (just guessing) and probably wouldn't draw too much attention if it was not there, but would add a lot to the bouncy hair effect.

Hope this helps a bit for whenever you plan to do some more work on that front.

 

[Rob]

Holy shit, Cryaotic posted a comment on the video praising you guys.

Just seen that Hilbert at Guru3D has put the video on the front page too...

 

[MrActionHouse]

Oh man, oh yes oh man oh yes oh maan oh yes oh maaan oh yes oh man ooooh yes oh man.
Im soon to explode in exsitment!

 

[Madoc]

Regarding the running...

Given how many people got hung up on the running I put my mind to it and had an idea which with some tweaks led to a very noticeable improvement. We however found that a bit of lean was necessary or the character looked like they were jogging too fast rather than running and about to fall backwards. We did make the lean more extreme during accelleration, neat idea.

We're going to release a quick video showing the improvement and also explaining the controls clearly.

 

[Pilluminati]

I'm amazed that people get so hung up on one animation almost disregarding all the incredible stuff they've been shown.

 

[Sneil]

Right on and really good to hear! Thanks for the response and love the fact you're putting the lean in at the start of the run.

And trust me, I've done some animations for a tight nit nwn2 community I'm a part off and know all too well how people get caught up and distracted by these things. Basically and unfortunately, you know when youve made a good and natural animation when you get little to no comments on them. If its good, people just don't take any notice of em. But, if its off in the slightest way, its all people seem to notice as youve been finding out. People take for granted and dont understand the effort it takes to make something look real and natural. Seemed to me some minor adjusting was all that was needed. Can't wait to see what you've done.

Btw congrats on the 50, 000 YouTube views. People are absolutely loving what you guys are doing.

(ugh, typed from my phone. sorry for the horrible grammar. )

 

[Fresh]

Really nice to hear, Madoc. I know it's unfair that so much attention went right for the running animations, but I think most people comment on that because the rest of the game is...perfect! It's nothing else to "complain" about really. You've come a long way since the Kickstarter days and it shows in your videos. Can't wait to see what you've come up with in the video and learn about the game controls - something I've been curious about.

 

[Rob]

I'm amazed that people get so hung up on one animation almost disregarding all the incredible stuff they've been shown.

I don't think people are complaining, just giving constructive criticism! It's great to say "well done, that's brilliant" to give the devs some praise and make them feel good about it, but I can imagine it's more practically useful to identify thinks that aren't up to par with everything else - this is the development & testing phase after all!!! I think the devs know exactly how incredible we think what they've done is.

 

[Fresh]

Some public articles about the video if anyone's interested:
Rock, Paper, Shotgun
PC Gamer
Kotaku

 

[cnileoleman]

Whoa, awesome. Seems like thaumaturgy can be used in very tricky and creative ways. Guard on a walkway? Teleport him off and watch him fall to his death!
On a separate note, terrain detail looks good for a released game, character movement looks good for alpha. Can't wait to see where you go with the animations. And Thaumaturgy. We must have ALL the thaumaturgy. I will be backing this within the week.

 

[Pilluminati]

I don't think people are complaining, just giving constructive criticism! It's great to say "well done, that's brilliant" to give the devs some praise and make them feel good about it, but I can imagine it's more practically useful to identify thinks that aren't up to par with everything else - this is the development & testing phase after all!!! I think the devs know exactly how incredible we think what they've done is.

I meant mostly the public response, youtube comments, etc, not anyone here on the forum. Almost every comment says something about the running animation (not very constructively at all), I mean come on...? Is it really THAT important when you have all this stuff?

 

[Elric von Rabenfels]

I meant mostly the public response, youtube comments, etc, not anyone here on the forum. Almost every comment says something about the running animation (not very constructively at all), I mean come on...? Is it really THAT important when you have all this stuff?

Yes it is.

When something very basic and fundamental, especially if you will see it ALL the time, is unsettling for some reason, it can make your whole game experience go sour.

It's not objective. It's subjective. Very subjective.
But it's how humans work, one very specific thing to dislike about a game can ruin it all for a person, and make that person dislike the game for it, justified or not, no matter how many glorious things are next to that one dislikable thing.

 

[Empire²]

I have to agree with Elric here. Especially when a game has as much depth as Sui Generis, it's a shame to have a basic mechanic that doesn't work as well as it should, when there's a lot of more intricate things going right.

Planetside 2 used to have an issue where the physics would get really messy, and characters would move like they were made of rubber bands, with over-exaggerated running animations and such.

Not a good video, but all I could find:

Edit: Also, how about the camera in the PC port of Dark Souls? That was darn awful, and prevented me from playing more than 5 minutes.

 

[Rob]

Very true. It doesn't take much to ruin everything.

For example, I couldn't play Ego Draconis - after 5mins I gave up and never looked at it again, all because the lack of anti-aliasing was making my eyes bleed.

 

[ZaratanCho]

Well youtube comments is the minority of people. They can't even see the dodges and stabs and alot of other things shown in the video. Though it is good the running is improved and there will be a video with explanation so average people will understand things better hopefully.

The overall response, not only the vocal, seems to be very good. From just one video the pledges are increasing alot in a short amount of time, and i think they will keep going up. It is a bit exciting to see how far things will go in the future.

I don't think the running in the video was so bad that it ruins the game(far from it), but again i am glad it is being improved.

 

[fluffydino2000]

I skimmed through this thread and noticed people were commenting on the teleporting. I don't know if this has been said so I'll say it anyway. The teleporting is likely to be well balanced and not at all overpowered. Ignoring the obvious ability to just change the cost and charge time of the spell, it will likely become much less powerful anyway.

Firstly, teleporting anywhere is risky because you can't see the entire area in which you are teleporting to. Furthermore, anyone who sees you teleport will probably either attack you or run and tell the guards that there is a demon. People don't like things they don't understand. Also, little things can be added to dissuade you from teleporting somewhere as a short-cut. For example, an enemy or two can be placed overlooking obvious routes. Or, birds could be perched where you want to teleport, which would fly away and make noise, alerting nearby enemies.

All this only really leaves is the ability to teleport around the wilderness without any risk at all, which in itself is pretty harmless.

And then there's the other obvious point, that was probably a very powerful character who had specialised in thaumaturgy and so would be weaker at other things (probably also has displacement as innate form).

Now, to my views on the video. Oh dear lord, was that cool.

With just a snippet of one characters exploration you can see just how dynamic this game is gonna be. Very. The ability to just decide to go into a guarded area, for no reason other than curiosity, and then have all the options of stealth, combat and disguise, it's like an open-world, completely objective-less Deus Ex (a very good thing). And this is without dialogue in the game, or any civilians. When this game gets to the point where you hunt for information and start to formulate plans and schemes, I may well just die of disbelief.

I liked the music (although sometimes it didn't seem to suit what was happening), and the environments. Especially the wilderness - the way the terrain maid hills and pathways was excellent, and I'm very glad to see things like caves hiding in plain sight. The interior environments were also great, I think the lack of life in the settlements made them seem slightly worse in comparison, but the architecture and design of both were great. The weather effects were awesome.

Onto the combat, not quite as spectacular as some of the other fights but still hugely impressive compared to every other game I've ever played. The item descriptions were excellent. I was slightly disappointed that the book wasn't read, but it's nice to see that they'll be in the game and worth collecting. The way the sword was held in the characters hands was a great improvement. The particle effects were awesome, for the displacing.

It'd be cool if you could equip stuff to specific hands. Also, as good as the transitions are, it's always better to have none at all. Although I understand if this isn't feasible.

Now I have just one query. Have you ever stress tested the engine for a number of characters on screen at once? Also, are characters off screen affected by physics or are there actions just simulated until they are on screen?

 

[AW8]

In a little hurry so I'll be brief!

It looked absolutely great!

The music was wonderful, especially in the end.

I loved how you could decorate the player home(?) so seamless!

I loved the teleportation spell!!! I love when magic is more than simple fireballs, and it's a great for stealth too! I was surprised and amazed when you teleported the guard over the wall. It looks so fun!

And when you equipped the guard's armor at the end, I was like "come on, let there be a disguise system! Come on! Come on!" and when you walked past the oblivious guards I literally said "YES!!!"

Looks great so far!

 

[nox]

Bit late to the party, but that was BLOODY BRILLIANT!

That spell! I hope all the thaumaturgy will have the same kind of feel, not over the top but still awesome. (loved it when she dropped the guard from the wall.)

And as the rest have said; music, fighting, locations, architecture, everything is fantastic!

 

[Cooper Holt]

I think all that needs to be tweaked, in my opinion, is the amount of power it takes to teleport, the speed of regenerating power, the running animation, and the hand placement for polearms.

 

[LavaCreep]

What would be cool is if there were islands and you could get in a rowing boat that had pretty good buoyancy physics. Better yet, a pirate ship! That would be awesome, but seems like that would be in a different direction that this game is going for. Maybe your next game could be pirate based!