Solution to fix the camera problem

[Roshawn Terrell]

My mistake, I must have misread or read over a few of your messages.

True I've never used a VR headset, I shouldn't have commented on that.

I still hold, however, that a 3rd-person view won't give you the necessary awareness that will probably be required in this game (also, there's no ceiling in the dungeons, but that's likely not a massive problem). I think that, combat aside, everything that applies to 1st person view applies in a similar if not same degree to 3rd person view. Like what I said back there about the video where some displacement(?) thaumaturgy was being shown off -- the teleporting from roof to roof and such.

This is just one example, and I admit I can't think of any more irrefutable ones right now, but I think that the full implementation of thamaturgy will present some more.

As for personal preference of viewpoints, you've swayed me a bit. I thought you were talking about 1st person view, which I'm not usually a massive fan of either way, but between third person and isometric I don't have much of an innate preference. Depends on the game. I still think I'd prefer the iso point of view for exanima, but I guess a large part of that would be because I'm used to it now. But as I said, a 3rd person view might just make some important points of the game undoable (<- that's the weirdest looking word, isn't it?).

Though I'd love at least some kind of option to go 3rd person or free-orbit camera outdoors maybe, just so I can LOOK AT THE BEAUTIFUL SKY!

This idea is more so directed at Sui Generis which is still in development, and is also open world and not a dungeon crawler such as this game.

 

[Roshawn Terrell]

I have gotten used to the isometric view for the game but a 1st person perspective would make this game more immersive. Currently, I don't think there is much of a problem with the camera movement or perspective as is. There are other problem areas of the game that are more important to focus on and easier to fix (such as more movement improvements and combat controls with the keyboard that could be fixed) than throwing away the existing perspective and controls.

Mod support isn't even confirmed yet. VR + different mapped controls could be added with the correct tools. I've seen a playthrough of dark souls 3 with a mod that added artificial VR to the game, so I'd imagine it wouldn't be much harder than with dark souls 3.

My focus is on 3rd person, not first person, first person has a whole other host of problems that i simply don't know much of any solutions for. Even with a VR headset there are still some significant issues that can't really be solved.

I would say the main issue with first person, is the fact that with a game like this that's entirely physics based. Where your weapon is, is extremely important when trying to determine your next attack, or even movement. The problem with first person, is that in many instances, you cannot see your weapon. This is not a problem in real life because we have hand eye coordination, and know where our arm and even entire body is at in 3d space, without even having to look at it.

The problem here is the fact that unlike in real life, you can't feel your body in the game. So to have any awareness of its subtle movements and changes in momentum, you have to be able to see it.

All VR would do is force you to be constantly looking at where your weapon is, rather than at your enemy.
The only real solution i can think of is to place a sort of small 3D model of your body in the corner of the screen that mirrors all of your body movement. Essentially giving you a small 3rd person window below your screen. But that seems like a lot simply for a new perspective, especially seeing how including first person doesn't really add any mechanical benefit that 3rd person can't provide. Though if you could figure out a way to make first person for VR and make it look and work well. Then i think that would absolutely be worth any and all effort put in to make that happen. Regardless if there are any further mechanical advantages or not. The immersion from VR is simply unmatched.

Also as i said before "A mechanic like this would absolutely trump any weapon manipulation Exanima has at this point. Not only that, but due to the fact that Exanima is physics based rather than animation based, you could now have FULL control of your weapon, and actually fling and twirl and entirely control your weapon with REAL physics. Imagine being able to effectively draw a figure eight with your weapon, that's the level of fidelity and control this could provide."

I however definitely agree with you on the fact that this game definitely does need more movement improvements.

 

[Roryn]

This idea is more so directed at Sui Generis which is still in development, and is also open world and not a dungeon crawler such as this game.

But they'll both be featuring the same technology and have the same style, controls, and just about everything else I imagine.

 

[Roshawn Terrell]

True, the main point was to bring to light the fact that there is still a lot of time before Sui generis actually comes out. Also the fact that their are still major improvements to the combat system that are planned up until that point.

In other words it makes a lot more sense to implement such an extreme idea into something that is still far from being complete. Rather than into something that's already been released.

 

[Magus]

I like this thread, good arguments, some people way too hotheaded though, it's just a suggestion.

Now don't get too frustrated Roshawn, you just were born in the wrong year. We can only get so much immersion with our current tech. Companies have to worry about dev time and user base if they want to survive, keeping it simple on the hardware side helps alot (maybe in the future, when everyone has VR sets and other nice gadgets). Your ideas of changing the base concept of the UI might be nice for another game they make in the future, I think now is not the right time. To be honest, I would try a dual mouse setup, my left hand coordination sucks but it sounds fun actually.

As of now the focus has to be on good gameplay, if you feel your moves can be controlled perfectly, immersion is there. My favorite racing games are Rock'n'Roll Racing (isometric) and Death Rally (top down), both have the movement relative to the car. So Exanima felt intuitive and precise, even with digital buttons of kb I still feel like it is my fault when my weapon hits the floor, while trying a leg hit. So once you get used to it, it works extremely well, I only feel the need for high precision when swinging for greater impact, and that's covered by the mouse movement. I like the camera angle, it helps positioning the mouse so left/right movement goes exactly in the direction I want.

I disagree with the "far from being complete", I think the combat system is solid, even the performance is good for all it is doing at once (performance issues are mostly caused by the lightning system from my tests). It needs alot of tweaks on balancing but one could argue that's a never ending work.

We always have to think of player base, to be fair to BM. By the end of the day, it's more important that creative companies don't go bankrupt by trying too much at once. BM is already going hard on a good physics based combat system, trying to make a revolution on the hardware interface would be too much. Anything that requires new hardware at this point wouldn't help development or user base.

 

[Roshawn Terrell]

I see your points, thank you for your response.

I just see in this game, the potential to make some of my deepest dreams a reality.

I almost imagine the perfect game with a skill ceiling on par with that of Chinese Go. Near perfectly if not perfectly recreating a real life sword fight through simulating the real physical interactions that occur within a sword fight.

A skill ceiling so high that players no longer play through cold hard calculation, but through intuition, just like Chinese Go. A skill ceiling so high that making an AI that can beat a human player, would actually be considered a technological feat. Just like it was a technological feat when Google's AlphaGo beat one of the worlds top Chinese Go players.

Imagine entire tournaments with grand prizes dedicated to this game?

 

[Magus]

I like the way you think, and BM might be able to pull it off someday. Personally I'm impressed with the whole ragdoll/physics combat system, and can't imagine what they could come out with once they have their engine polished.