PlaneShift
Gameplay => Newbie Help (Start Here) => Topic started by: thedevilsjester on July 26, 2006, 02:33:06 am
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Let me start off by saying that I have played (and still play) many online RPGs from muds to full blown MMORPGs, and while Planeshift (so far) looks really good (and I applaud the efforts of the developers :thumbup:), the one thing it seriously lacks is decent movement.
The game feels more like a Resident Evil style game with its slow and tedious movement. Most 3d rpgs use a very similar (to each other) style of movement, and there is a good reason for this, because it works. Because it takes the tedium out of controling your character, allowing you to focus on the actual game content. Just load up EQ1/2 or FFXI, or many others to get an example of a good movement system, where you can jump in and just play, not take hours just trying to figureout how to move your character without falling off ledges or running into walls. :thumbdown:
After trying the movement for awhile, I had a bright idea! Maybe there are mouse movement controls like these other RPGs! Maybe that will take the pain out of movement, alas what I found out is that mouse movement is just as bad as the keyboard movement. "Pathfinding"mouse movement on a game that has deadly cliffs and bridges to navigate often, is a BAD IDEA :@#\, and thats if it works right, since it doesnt (mainly camera issues), its even worse! And to top it off, if you have a normal mouse (2-3 button), you cant have MOUSE movement on a mouse button, otherwise the other interaction buttons go arwy!
I am not without suggestions however. Again looking at other mmorpgs, mouse movement should be very similar to keyboard movent you in the direction the camera is facing (hold the button, sprite runs in that direction) Camera movement should be done via another mouse button (yes, you can have both camera movement AND context menus on the same button if done properly).
An auto run feature which, again, runs in the direction of the camera (you then use the keys or the mouse to change the camera direction, thus changing your movement direction)
And finally have the option to have the movement keys relative to the camera.
(And of course, fix that mouse look!)
Just a disclaimer, this isnt a rant so much as a "I really want to play this game, but the horrible movement prevents me from enjoying it" post...take from it what you will.
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umm. it took you hours to figure out how to move without falling off of stuff? it took me only 15 min and that was back in mb when things were more interesting.
and ...
/me points to the dev app form.
it is there waiting for you.
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yes I was wondering the same thing. Does the movement system actually trouble you THAT much? I have absolutely no problem with it. My only concern on cliffs and mountains is the lag. Sometimes im walking walking walking laaaaag and i find myself at the bottom and about to go to the DR.
Perhaps it is just the lag that is troubling you?
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I, for one, *do* find the mouse part of movement troublesome. Just being able to up the sensitivity more than is currently possible would help and awful lot... Dealing with it though..
/me shrugs
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Hey, don't call us similar to Resident Evil! That's just mean. PS is certainly quite playable, whereas RE is not.
What's wrong with it, exactly? (oh, and btw, you if you really wanted a messed up system, take a look at the code for the old one... ew) The default is standard WADS, and you just... move. It really can't be any simpler. If you want things differently, just go into the options and change it. Someone suggested adding more camera controls, and I'll probably do so for the next release.
Oh, and moving relative to the camera is a horrible idea. That's prone to many problems, and it's much easier to just keep things consistient and under the control of the player. Anything other than press forward to go forward is a mess.
WRT mouse buttons, there's a bug in CS where it's not picking up mouse+modifier combos right. You should be able to set mouserun to something like ctrl+leftclick or something, but that's dead. If they don't fix it at some point, I may end up hacking around it.
Oh, and if you really want to, you can set click to forward (or the secondary forward) to use it to move. We don't have a full mouse movement system (where moving the mosue turns the player), but someone might be coaxed to write one at some point. Though, I personally find things like this are just novelties. WADS has been more than adequate, and most people either use it intuitively or can learn it rather quickly. It's been the standard for quite a while for a reason.
Other than that, you just have a lot of vague pointing to other games without any real specifics. Please don't post rants unless you have solutions to go with them.
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/me chuckles
Oh the things people love to point out. When I play in planeshift I have set movment on my keyboard to the following keys ....
Upper arrow - Foward
Down arrow - backward
left and right arrow - Left and right movement
right shift - run
Right Ctrl - sneak
t - auto run
Mouse - I use to look around
Mouse scroll button - To zoom in and out
m - For different camera angles
right click - For clicking on NPC's and players
I am sure I forgot a bunch of keys but you get the idea. Never once have I had a problem with the movement with the system I have created for myself. Nor have I died from lag or auto running off of a cliff. I also use the camera angles (my m - for different camera angles) for appropriate situations. Normally I stay on third person view. Unless I want to spin myself into feeling sick, then I use first person view. Over all the controls for movement is better than most games and I haven't had to many problems with the set up. Especially since this game is far from being fully developed. This mouse look (Which I have never used) sounds like pure suicide if you are traveling in parts of the game that have a high volume of terrain. Maybe you could try other ways to control your character?
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I think the movement right now is pretty decent, and not really a priority issue for the devs. However, I do think collision detection (sort-of related to movement in this case- yes, this post should be in the wish list, and I'm sure it has been) should be implemented on characters as soon as possible as it would add a very realistic, very interesting aspect to the game. For example, an evil guild/character could actually do something evil and block off a road or passage, and good guilds/characters would have a purpose, called upon to vanquish the evil characters. Or... npc rogues/monsters (like the one on the bridge in the mine of the Laanx Dungeon) would actually be functional guarding passage: to be able to access the lucrative resources beyond, one would have to be strong enough to kill the roadblock.
My thoughts,
Xirius
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Check this Players as Physical Barriers (http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=18798.0) thread from the Wishlist :} "As soon as possible" is just not an option at this stage.
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Summary: Full CD == bad. Being able to block your path sounds cool, but it's prone to problems and exploitation. The correct solution is some form of partial CD, where models aren't allowed inside eachother and only nudge eachother out of the way.
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Summary: Full CD == bad. Being able to block your path sounds cool, but it's prone to problems and exploitation. The correct solution is some form of partial CD, where models aren't allowed inside eachother and only nudge eachother out of the way.
I can already imagine mad dwarfs ...Imagine a kran tackling a dwarf - he'd push him around pretty easily, I imagine. ...I also imagine the dwarves wouldn't stand for it very long :P
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I didnt rant, and I did post viable solutions. If you read my whole post, you will see them all.
The movement system is exactally like RE style games (Which is the worst possible movement type imagineable), and the mouse/camera doesnt even come close to working in any predictable manner. And the button assigning is just...it needs work. The idea to assign a movement combination to a keyboard key and a mouse button is just...not to insult the person who suggested it....stupid. Why should we use TWO input devices for a simple action?
The movement as is is slow and tedious, "Move forward, rotate a little, move forward, rotate a little more, etc..." you pretty much have to come to a dead stop to turn any slightly sharp angle without falling off of the narrow walkways.
I explored PS awhile ago (about the time combat was being added) and really liked the feel and design of the game (although lots of missing models was a bummer ;p), but I stopped playing it the same day because of some nasty graphical error (ghosts of every object on the screen).
Now, a good deal of time later, I try again, and the errors are gone, the models are still missing, and everything seems to be gearing up to be a good system, except movement. I have played _MANY_ MMORPGs, and have never had a problem with movement, yet I cant stand the movement system in this engine, its less of an annoyance if I have the camera always stay behind the sprite (less stopping to turn), but it could still use alot of work.
Some of you mentioned hating absolute movement (sprite relative to the camera), and thats ok that you dont like it, but it takes a few simple modifcations to allow for BOTH methods. And the one claiming that anything other than forward goes forward is a mess, hasnt played many mmorpgs, I just got off of FFXI and EQ2, both of which use a "Forward moves you in the direction of the camera" method (just like the vast majority of mmorpgs) and they play just fine. I have coded such systems myself without any of these imagined problems you mention.
In most MMORPGs, when I move my player, I have it set on auto run, and simply hold a mouse button and move the mouse, which moves the camera, which changes the direction my sprite is running. Simple, effective, and would be a godsend to this engine. I do like the idea of the "walk to" mouse movement idea, but it seems to be a bit flawed (I would have to play more to get an exact reason on this).
The biggest issue for me and movement is more of a mouse/camera issue, since I dont usally use the keyboard for anything other than chat.
In its defence, even with the subpar movement, the rest of the game/engine surpasses all free/opensource mmorpgs and many commercial ones, as far as I can tell so far. It has great visuals, the area designs look really nice, the interfaces are nice also (except for the main buttons up top...and a big bulky font, but I can live with those), detailed gameplay features, and it runs great.
On a side note/question, is there anyway to get it to go to a proper 16:9/16:10 screen ratio? (1680x1050), I can set that resolution, but it just stretches it from a 4:3
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I'm sorry, calling it like RE is just insulting. (and no, I'm not being sarcastic... that's just mean; RE is the only game I ever rented and returned right away because the controls were simply unplayable) I think the problem is you're expecting fancy mouse stuff, and you just don't like the standard keyboard system which everyone has used for quite a while. The "Move forward, rotate a little, move forward, rotate a little more, etc..." thing makes no sense to me, as that's not the case. Anyone used to WADS can run circles around with no prior learning. (many gamers out there instinctively put their hands on a keyboard with their fingers on shift, A, W, and D, rather than the home row :P ) Myself and everyone else I've heard from considers it quite fine. We just don't have the fancy mouse stuff yet. Feel free to write it for us.
Why in the world would setting a keyboard modifier + mouse button combo be stupid? (not that it works at the moment for all of the controls; CS bug) Though, I guess it makes sense if you don't actually use your keyboard much, which seems to be the case.
Now, if you were using first-person with our stock WADS, yeah, that might be weird. Most people who do that turn on mouselook and move with WADS (probably swapping turns for strafes) and use the mouse to turn. Personally, I don't know how anyone could really play PS without one of the third-person views on. You don't get a good enough view of the area otherwise.
WRT ratio, the camera should work fine-ish at other ratios. It's just the GUI that goes wonky. We just don't have anything to detect and position correctly for them.
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I completely agree with you about RE, its a game I hate, and the only reason being the movement. And not to be insultive but I dont honestly see a difference between the RE and PS movement (default settings), they are pretty close, and it would be very simple to add the camera based movement as I suggested (as an optional movement method), with that, and a better camera movement (and the ability to have a mouse button assigned to move the camera AND interact with objects, simple, if the mouse is not over an object when clicked, it acts as a camera control, if it is over an object, it does the standard object interaction, cant be but a few lines of code to achive), I would have no real complaints.
As for WASD, not only do I not use my keyboard for gaming (its for typing) but the positioning of WASD on a natural style keyboard does not make for good movement of any sort. they are not aligned like standard arrow keys, they are at an angle and staggered for best ergonomics, so the best (and easiest by far) method of movement comes from using the mouse, yet its fatally flawed.
As for detecting the ratio, its really pretty simple, you can detect the screen resolution and simply do the math to see what ratio the width is compared to the height. I understand it would be difficult to draw copies of all the 2d artwork (loading screens etc...) for all possible ratios, but a centered, (possibly bordered), 2d image is much better than seeing fat faces and such.
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I must admit I never liked PS movement much either. Strafing particularly frustrated me, due do its slow speed. I think movement mainly felt cumbersome because the sensitivity of the mouse, when used for controlling direction and looking around, was too low to be used. I remember trying to adjust sensitivity settings myself, but I don't recall ever having any success. I remember also certain keypresses (strafing+moving) would cancel eachother out and stop you dead in your tracks, which was frustrating. But maybe that has been fixed since. :)
Apart from mouse sensitivity, other keys can be reassigned in the Options menu, so that shouldn't pose a problem. If WSAD does not suit you, simply change it to something that works for your keyboard layout.
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I like the strafing in PS ...it could be a bit faster though.
As for movement ...I like it. I never liked that (e.g.) FF-type of movement though where you couldn't go everywhere - I mean if I see a path, why shouldn't I be able to take it? Why must I just use the paths that are predefined. If I see a clif, I'm just careful not to jump off it if I don't want to. And as far as the click-on-floor-wait-for-char-to-move-there type is simple to use, I think that the first-person WASD/arrows/whatever_your_setting gives you a closer/tighter interaction with your character's movement. And autorun is just practical ;)
As for the natural keyboard: It's not the fault of any dev that WASD feels odd on it ...just as it's not if you use AZERTY or a Dvorak layout :P
As far as I understood you about that camera-bound movement - it's already in in a indirect way. In "third person follow" and "first person" (maybe in some others too) when you move your camera (e.g. moving your mouse while holding the middle button).
p.s. I didn't know "natural" keyboards are good for any gaming ...hell, I don't even like to type on them o_O
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and besides you can mod your game pad to bind the keys for walking (and actions) while mouse movement isnt has good for it :P
altho game pad isnt the best for planeshift due to the chating around, but i used this system before in other games
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and besides you can mod your game pad to bind the keys for walking (and actions) while mouse movement isnt has good for it :P
altho game pad isnt the best for planeshift due to the chating around, but i used this system before in other games
There is also "mouse to Joystick" programs. If you have a flight sim type joystick, you can have all functions other than chat on 1 device. I havent been able to get it just right yet though.
I do find the controls a little difficult, espescialy in the DR. I see people fly by me going up the spirale ledges, when i try that i find myself falling :o
I dont know if it is my keyboard but, I can rearly target my guy to go straight. I am always going in a zig zag pattern. the turn rotation never stops where i want it to, it is either too much or too little. ::|
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yes i know but mouse movement isnt very good for gamepads or joystick anyway, im not counting flightsimulators tho since theyr are a completly diferent playing style that you find in rpg/action games
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Yeah, strafing sucks, but that has nothing to do with the movement system. The anim is just so slow, that the speed had to be lowered to match it. We don't have any speed-anim syncing. (we'll have to overhaul that thing sometime)
If you're on an azerty or dvorak, you can just change the keys to match WADS, but with whatever keys are there. ;)
You can move forward, left, strafe, and jump at once if you want now. When I rewrote the controls and movement stuffs, I fixed many bugs, but it's basically the same scheme as before. It just actually works now. (only things I really added were the sneak mode and ability to show the strafe anim, not that many races have the anims) For people who have used both this and the old system, I usually hear that it's easier to use and more fluid, and you don't get stuck in crap as easily...
I think we can sum up this thread as follows:
* We use WADS for movement, primarily, and for those who use keyboard movement it's quite decent.
* For those people who don't use their keyboard much, our mouse-based stuff isn't very good. It works, but you have to cusomize the controls first, and it's missing many fancier features.
Personally, I find it very odd that someone would avoid using their keyboard this much. It could be just that I've been using computers longer; half the people here can barely type. :/ I still object to using RE as a comparison. I find that personally offensive, and in RE you can't really turn while moving, while you can just fine here. (1st person mode is a different story, but that's really in there for people who use the mouse to turn with)
About camera-bound movement: There are camera modes where the camera is bount to the movement. What he wants is where you can move the camera wherever, and pressing keys moves in that direction regardless of where the character is currently facing. With a manual camera this is possible to be useful, however it becomes cumbersome. With any vagely automatic camera, it's a good way to totally negate the ability to play a game. Ex: Run forward, camera switchs modes to oposite direction, you run in that direction, hits the same boundary, flips again, repeat quickly, and now you're having a seizure.
Side topics:
I love the so-called "natural" keyboard layout. I have it on my desktop (though I use my laptop most of the time). It does take a while to learn, but once you do it's quite nice and easier to type with. Defintiely a matter of opinion, though.
It's obviously easy to detect the screen ratio, but we just don't and don't have anything to deal with it. It'd have to not stretch the widgets incorrectly, and position them in relative locations. The simplest thing to do, I guess, is just make them not stretch and place them in the same spots. (so there's be nothing on the right side, for example) Then it would just require that the user moves stuff where they want it, and it would save it thereafter. (there's already stuff that would force it back on screen, if the resolution was lowered)
Edited to add:
About the mouse sensitivity: Yes, others have complained that the settings in the options can't go high enough. I should probably just bump up the maximums there.
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I dont strafe in games where I can fall off of a ledge and die or agro enemies I have no hope of surviving. I only see strafing as a usefull movement tool in FPS games where most of the time falls dont equal death, and enemies dont stand arround in randomly placed groups in the middle of the world, and one man with a gun CAN take on the world. In a MMORPG, where moving too close to a group of enemies that you cant kill yet will result in instant death, and cliffs that do the same, strafing isnt that usefull of a tool for movement.
Although someone mentioned that RE doesnt have the ability to really walk and turn at the same time, for the most part PS doesnt either. Sure you can walk and turn in general directions, but (for example), in the area you are in when you die, after you go up the bridge, when you need to take a 90 degree turn to the left and up the cliff side (and then SLOWLY walk arround the path leading up), you have to pretty much come to a dead stop to turn in the right direction or risk falling off of the ledge. Where as in say EQ2 I can run at full speed past and up very similar structures without any worry about falling. Now I am sure that someone with lots of experiance with the PS style of control might be able to make that turn at full speed also, that is not the point, new users to the engine are not going to instantly be familar with a system that takes a good deal of time and practice just to prevent yourself from falling off a cliff, when they can load any other mmorpg and feel right at home with the standardized control schemes.
As for screen ratio, non 3d images should _NEVER_ be based purely on a percentage of the screen, thats just pure laziness on the devs part. Seriously, I design plenty of OpenGL and (formerly) Direct3d based applications, and not once have I ever written a program that couldnt go to any possible ratio without stretching the 2d portions.
Its as simple as
float SinglePixelX = (1.0f / width);
float SinglePixelY = (1.0f / height);
....
glVertex2f(SinglePixelX*X_Placement, SinglePixelY*Y_Placement);
....
etc.....
Although the above is just an incomplete example, I am sure developers who can manage such a complicated game system can understand simple mathmatics.
In their defence, maybe none of the devs ever tested on a non 4:3 screen, but since the majority of laptops, and most of the newer PCs are being equiped with a non standard ratio, its not something they should ignore.
Personally, I find it very odd that someone would avoid using their keyboard this much. It could be just that I've been using computers longer; half the people here can barely type.
On the contrary, I use my keyboard often, I write code for atleast 4 hours a day (much more on weekends) for many, many years. Plus numerous other projects (stories, poems, website designs, posting on forums, etc...) that after so much keyboard interaction its quite nice to just sit back with a wireless mouse and sip coffee while relaxing in a game.
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You're beeing a little overly harsh here. We're not lazy, we've just never needed these things. Very few people have widescreens, and it's just never something that's come up. The stuff is scaled to match the resolution, and it just needs extra logic to notice ratios. It's just not done yet.
We all make this in our spare time. We have around a dozen programmers, and only a few at any one time are doing anything, and even then it's usually on the weekend.
With the controls, you're really the first person to think this is as bad as you say it is. Everyone else just uses it and it works. Most people can use WADS without much of an issue. And with the finer control things, that's one of the reasons the sneak mode was added.
My main issue with your posts is the vagueness of it. You're just saying stuff is bad and you can't use it, but without any real suggestions on how to fix the things you're complaining about. Yes, we don't have the mouse stuff, but unless you feel like writing it we just don't for now.
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"Sure you can walk and turn in general directions, but (for example), in the area you are in when you die, after you go up the bridge, when you need to take a 90 degree turn to the left and up the cliff side (and then SLOWLY walk arround the path leading up), you have to pretty much come to a dead stop to turn in the right direction or risk falling off of the ledge."
I'd like to see you run as fast as you can in RL and make a 90 degree turn without having to slow down. ::) I see the movement the way it is now quite nice, save for the slow turning with the mouse, but again, thats already been discussed.
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"Sure you can walk and turn in general directions, but (for example), in the area you are in when you die, after you go up the bridge, when you need to take a 90 degree turn to the left and up the cliff side (and then SLOWLY walk arround the path leading up), you have to pretty much come to a dead stop to turn in the right direction or risk falling off of the ledge."
I'd like to see you run as fast as you can in RL and make a 90 degree turn without having to slow down. ::) I see the movement the way it is now quite nice, save for the slow turning with the mouse, but again, thats already been discussed.
First, we play games to ESCAPE real life. I would like to see you cast magic, or do many of the other things that you can do in MMORPGs including PS in real life, but you know its not gonna happen.
My main issue with your posts is the vagueness of it. You're just saying stuff is bad and you can't use it, but without any real suggestions on how to fix the things you're complaining about. Yes, we don't have the mouse stuff, but unless you feel like writing it we just don't for now.
I keep getting that "You complain but dont offer solutions" argument here, which must mean you dont actually read my post all the way through because I have made MANY suggestions for improvement.
Not many people have widescreens? Are you joking? I havent physically seen a laptop in years that didnt have a non 4:3 ratio (they are not always 'wide' but they are rarely 4:3), and atleast 30% of the people I know with desktop PCs have widescreens, and I know alot of people. Hell, widescreens are so popular now that even my place of work (most definitly not a computer orientated company), just upgraded ALL of their PCs with widescreens.
Yes, I understand all to well that there are alot of things to do, and not everything is a priority, and many coders are contributors that do it during their spare time, I work on projects the same way. You missunderstand my post, I dont demand that they be fixed or changed right now, I didnt say anything of the sort, I simply gave my view on the subject, hoping that the developers would take this into account and work on it when they can get to it. If everyone just ignored the problem (any problem), instead of voicing their opinion, you would end up with a pile of junk rather than a useable engine. Isnt that what community projects are about?
In the few months I have played my most recent MMORPG (EQ2) I have seen many drastic game changes (all of them, in my opinion, a really good step in the right direction). How would any of these changes have come about if the players hadnt spoken up? Well I am speaking up, the movement system is lacking and could use a good workover.
With the controls, you're really the first person to think this is as bad as you say it is.
Might this be simply because of the harsh response you seem to give (case in point) if someone disagrees with the way something works? Hmm? Just a little? Might the people who dislike it just give up on it and not even bother to sign up and post on the forum? (I know a few of these personally, they like the engine, dont like the movement, but feel its pointless to sign up to a forum and complain, ) Knowing its usually a pointless waste of bandwidth because more often then not, devotees and the developers tend to act in the same manner that some of you in this post have? Now this forum hasnt been nearly as bad with their response as I have seen in other communities, but it certainly isnt welcoming input and ideas.
BTW I just showed the game to my brother-in-law about two hours ago, I didnt tell him anything bad about it, didnt mention movement AT ALL, I told him only good about the engine, showed him all the interesting details in character creation, and the nice visuals the game offers, and went through lists of skills and such that will be available in the game, and told him that he should check it out, and the first thing he noticed watching me play was how it controled. He didnt like it at all. I told him, however, that as a beta, a work in progress, that the developers would fix things like that when they get the chance. I hope I am not wrong.
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I told him, however, that as a beta, a work in progress, that the developers would fix things like that when they get the chance. I hope I am not wrong.
Alpha. Yes, it is a work in progress. The developers do this as a hobbie, and spend their free time on it when they can. You can find all the answers you seek at the planeshift main wedsite if you are unsure of things.
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You started off by saying the movement system is horrible, talked about other games, and pointing out that you want some mouse movement stuff. What I'm saying, is that our controls are just standard keyboard based, which you simply don't know how to use that well, and we just don't have the mouse stuff you're talking about.
And no, not that many people have widescreens. You may be a bit biased if your company has that kind of cash. Only reason I have a computer that can even run PS is because I won it in a contest... With respect to most people, meaning the average person and not the one with money to burn, widescreens are quite uncommon.
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You started off by saying the movement system is horrible, talked about other games, and pointing out that you want some mouse movement stuff. What I'm saying, is that our controls are just standard keyboard based, which you simply don't know how to use that well, and we just don't have the mouse stuff you're talking about.
And no, not that many people have widescreens. You may be a bit biased if your company has that kind of cash. Only reason I have a computer that can even run PS is because I won it in a contest... With respect to most people, meaning the average person and not the one with money to burn, widescreens are quite uncommon.
I think you are underestimating the average computer. The company I work for barely makes a profit, but replaced their old outdated montiors with new ones. The people that live arround me are very low level wages (not much higher than minimum wage), and are not computer literate in the lowest sense (southern missouri rednecks), yet many of them have widescreens, and practically all of the newer laptops come with widescreens. Most 3d games I have purchased in the past 5+ years have support for widescreen ratios, its not difficult, its not new, hell early Black & White macs and pcs (15 years ago) had tall "document size" monitors that were not 4:3. Lack of support for such features is simply lack of foresight and something _VERY_EASY_ to fix. Simply, as I said, replace your static percentage variables in your vector calculations, with dynamic ones based on the screen ratio, the simple math 1/screensize can give you this value, its not rocket science. I know much more about how many people have non standard ratios because I had to scour the net far and wide when I originally bought mine, to figureout how to get my OS to use the proper ratio, because like PS, the developers didnt seem to have many of the non standard arround to test on. This has since been fixed in the OS (for the most part), but PS still suffers from it. Although I am sure with time it will be fixed, its really basic math.
Instead of using a width of 32, for instance, use a width of ((1/width)*32), I usually hold 1/width and 1/height in a variable thats set at the same time the screen resolution is set so that I dont have to add that (albiet minor) performance hit everytime a new vector is calculated, I can simply go PixelWidth*32, and when the resolution is changed, I simply recalculate the PixelWidth variable and everything automagically fixes itself.
As for a PC that can run PS, hell $250 at tigerdirect or tech4less, etc... can get you a PC that can play it twice over (tigerdirect just had a refurbished AMD 64bit 4800+ DualCore system for $480 and thats extremely top of the line, that could run PS four times over without breaking a sweat), just because you live with (or lived with) outdated technology doesnt mean the whole world follows suite. And something you KEEP overlooking is laptops, a good 90% or more of the laptops in the past few years all come with nonstandard ratios, they are not all wide, but they are not 4:3 either (and many many of them are quite capable of playing PS without a hitch)
As for your movement being standard, thats just it, ITS NOT STANDARD. Thats the point. Sure you may use standard key assignments, but that doesnt make the movement system standard by any means. I have played many MMORPGs, all of which, for the most part, follow the standard, PS does not.
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I have better things to do IRL (study for 5 exams!!) then post here, so I'll make it short:
I own a widescreen laptop. Also I work at Cyberpipe (http://www.cyberpipe.org) - a place that's amongst others a free cybercafe and offering free workshops presentations etc. about FOSS. What I see there are a lot of diverse laptop owners and I'd say a very good third has a widescreen. Also I'm surrounded there with a lot of desktops (and servers) and well ...none of those there has a widescreen. So, if I'd to count all the computers (not counting servers and projectors), I'd have to say there's around 15-20% those which are widescreen.
I'll say it again as I have numerous times before - I like PlaneShift because it's not like other MMORPGs. I positevly despise the movement in FinalFantasy and when playing Neverwinter Nights I probably use keyboard movement more often then the point'n'click one.
I like strafing for two reasons:
- it offers me more flexibility in my role-playing (like shuffling towards somebody that's close to you or away)
- it offers me more flexibility in movement - sliding along cliffs, walls, etc; moving diagonally
Mouselook is something that needs to be amended sometime, but since PlaneShift is still alpha, I'm sure a lot of things have higher priority then that. But seing you know your way around programming - why don't you post a bug or even a patch to the bugreport system? The source's open and you seem to know how it should be done - I'm no coder, but from what I see it'd be easier to post a patch for you then waste days arguing about it in this thread. And not only would you keep your own nerves calmer, you'd also make other widescreen owners happier. ;)
p.s. are we officially already alpha? I know MB was pre-alpha..
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Posting a patch would be a useless waste of time if the coders dont consider the thing broke. If I posted a patch to 'fix' something they think works fine already, or a patch that added or changed something that they dont want messed with, such as movement and screen ratio, then that would be a huge waste of my time. And as you said, you dont know much about coding, its not as simple as 'patching whats broken', I would have to spend hours trying to set up a proper development enviroment (all the proper versions of the proper libs and utilites that they compile with, the same compiler they use, etc...), attempt to get PS client and server compiled (which as their own news posts say "The sources package was giving some issues"), and then try and figureout their coding style, their rules, their formats, and then attempt to fix something that they havent really agreed is broken. I could always, of course, write up a untested patch, but there are always tiny things that you didnt account for that need tweeking and such. If I didnt have so many other projects at the moment (one of which, oddly enough, is a mmorpg), I would be glad to help, assuming of course, that I agreed with the licence (havent read it really).
As far as PS not being like other MMORPGs, from the looks of it, besides movement, its almost identical to EQ2 (a comment which my brother-in-law made the other day), which isnt bad by any means.
As far as your post about widescreens, its all area dependent, just like HD TV's, statistics say %23 of homes in the USA have HD TV's, and they are a hot seller, yet I have never seen a house with one in it, they just dont sell arround here, where as with widescreens, you goto Best Buy, Circuit City, or Wal-Mart and thats almost all they offer anymore in this area. If you goto pretty much any online PC store (I use tigerdirect.com) and look at all of their laptops, ATLEAST 75% have non 4:3, they are NOT all widescreen, but they most are not 4:3, thats the point, it doesnt have to be a widescreen to have a non 4:3 ratio.
And the game is still listed as prealpha on sourceforge, I use the term beta (somewhat inaccurately) to apply to all pre release state projects.
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I would have to spend hours trying to set up a proper development enviroment (all the proper versions of the proper libs and utilites that they compile with, the same compiler they use, etc...), attempt to get PS client and server compiled (which as their own news posts say "The sources package was giving some issues"),
hehe ...that I don't code much, doesn't mean I haven't compiled PS before - I know how much trouble it is. You can find out which nightly or daily CVS/SVN tarballs you need and all that, though. If I remember correctly it's listed now somewhere which taballs of the deps and PS work together. It's still a pity the (non-CVS/SVN) source releases of all this packages are too scarce.
and then try and figureout their coding style, their rules, their formats, and then attempt to fix something that they havent really agreed is broken. I could always, of course, write up a untested patch, but there are always tiny things that you didnt account for that need tweeking and such. If I didnt have so many other projects at the moment (one of which, oddly enough, is a mmorpg)
I don't know ...from what I can tell, they seem to agree that it's not perfect. But just assume it good 'nuff for now. And "now" is pretty much pre-alpha where a lot of features need to be added.
p.s. care sharing the name of the game? ;)
I would be glad to help, assuming of course, that I agreed with the licence (havent read it really).
The code is under GPL. Art and data are under PlaneShift license (which is an interesting piece of license, if you ask me as a lawyer ;) )
As far as your post about widescreens, its all area dependent, just like HD TV's, statistics say %23 of homes in the USA have HD TV's, and they are a hot seller, yet I have never seen a house with one in it, they just dont sell arround here, where as with widescreens, you goto Best Buy, Circuit City, or Wal-Mart and thats almost all they offer anymore in this area. If you goto pretty much any online PC store (I use tigerdirect.com) and look at all of their laptops, ATLEAST 75% have non 4:3, they are NOT all widescreen, but they most are not 4:3, thats the point, it doesnt have to be a widescreen to have a non 4:3 ratio.
Hmmm ...you've got a point there, I guess.
It's also true though that if the ration is close to 4:3 the bug is probably less annoying then on a wider screen.
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Fully agree with Santiago. The turning and sidewalk are still too slow, but as it has been said, the animations can't adapt to the movement speed yet, so we'll have to wait a bit for that.
AFAIK the guys from CS are working on better pathfinding stuff, so it won't take that long to have a working click-on-the-floor-and-walk-there system.
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p.s. care sharing the name of the game?
The game has yet to be named (doesnt even have original artwork, using graphics from a previous project), and is still in early development stages, it wont ever be released to be played (although I will eventually need people to check it out just so I can see its working), hell the only 'sever' is my own PC that has max 30k/s upstream, its just a "see if I can do it" project, I have many such projects.
I don't know ...from what I can tell, they seem to agree that it's not perfect. But just assume it good 'nuff for now. And "now" is pretty much pre-alpha where a lot of features need to be added.
I wasnt asking for perfection or even to have it fixed asap, I was voicing my opinion that its not great, sure it might be good enough for now, but seeing the intial fanboy response that I got from my post, some of the more vocal in the community dont seem to agree that its flawed.
Yes I agree, the bug may be less annoying on non widescreens that dont have 4:3 ratio, but that was far from the point. The point is, non 4:3 ratio computer monitors have existed for well over 15 years, why then, seeing that you need a modern PC to run PS, do they not support modern monitors out of the box? What am I looking for? Do I want them to fix it right now? Yes. Do I need them to? No, I would just like an official "Yes, its on the todo list and we will get to it when we have the chance". Thats all. Thats all I really want from any of this, I dont expect them to instantly jump on my every complaint, but a few simple "Yes we are going to add/change that" or a "no wont change that <valid reason>" from an official source, thats all.
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Most things in PS work after the principle "if you want something to be done, do it yourself".
PS in the way it is now has been developed over the last 5 years and will be developed for the next 50 (and longer?) years.. so why don't you just keep your idea in mind and jump in to realise it when you have time to do so?
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AFAIK the guys from CS are working on better pathfinding stuff, so it won't take that long to have a working click-on-the-floor-and-walk-there system.
If it comes to that I vote against it!
IMHO the click-on-the-floor-and-walk-there system is hurting the direct interaction/involvement between the player and the character. I think it's only a little better then point-and-click-on-map-and-go-fetch-a-cup-of-coffee-while-the-PC-gets-there system from that point of view (and that map one makes me puke!)
But back on topic - I wouldn't exactly agree with Kerol. But I think you would have more luck posting a bug report or maybe try the dev IRC channel then posting on the forums. Not many devs read the forums regulary (and even less play, AFAIK).
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That's alright, I remember a year or two ago when you could climb over a wall in Hydlaa and get stuck in an ocean of white goo and you'd need to make a new character to keep playing. Quite a nuiscance.
The only thing I could think of would be to implement a joystick feature, but I really don't mind the movement. It's finny watching people try to role play being drunk and walking around. XD
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If it comes to that I vote against it!
Was already implemented. Broke somehow and noone got to fix it.
I wouldn't exactly agree with Kerol.
Well.. err.. in general or on a specific point? >o)
But I think you would have more luck posting a bug report or maybe try the dev IRC channel then posting on the forums.
The wishlist is a list of wishes for implementation :)
So, this is exactly the place where to put such stuff.
If you want something to be implemented
- write a patch, hope a dev builds it in
- poke every dev you see on IRC, forums, bugtracker, email and PM till they poke you back, in the eye
- make a donation (http://www.planeshift.it/donations.htm) and write the specific field of interest as reason for donation.
- post here and hope that a dev sees it and remembers the post when it comes to the point of implementation (and DaveG already has already seen it, so no need to call for more attention ;) )
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Was already implemented. Broke somehow and noone got to fix it.
Good riddance. Though it seems to have eluded me ...unless it was in AB o_O.
Well.. err.. in general or on a specific point? >o)
Oh, about the "it only gets done if you do it yourself" point ;)
The wishlist is a list of wishes for implementation :)
So, this is exactly the place where to put such stuff.
Actually it IS a bug and not a new feature - so it fits best in the bug report system :P
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Its not a bug if its the way it was intended to be. I.E. is it a bug of windows that you have to restart for practically everything? No, its just in its design, so submitting a bug report to microsoft complaining that you have to restart when installing video drivers, or a new program, etc... would be fruitless because they dont consider that a bug.
As far as I know, the devs dont consider the walking to be bugged, is this what they want it to be? Posting a bug report for something thats not so much of a bug, as a badly implemented feature, is not what bug systems are for.
For the ratio issue, yeah, that would be a bug report, but that was just a side note in the original post, wasnt the main topic of discussion, I can run the game in a 4:3 ratio window without ratio issues so for now its just a minor annoyance, it was just the reasoning behind why its not being supported yet that I was arguing with.
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well..
I am quite amazed that point'n'clik with mouse is not implemented here, and even considered unimportant.
i was playing lineage2 for quite a moment, where it is, it works well, it makes game much easier to play,
and you can focus on other things, you dont have to strain your toes with pressing arrows all the time.
you point, character starts to walk to that point, and if there is a pit beetwen you and target you fall in.
any interface keys are assigned to alt+ key while f1 ..f10 corresponded to a quickbar shortcut icons.
let me desrcibe lineage2 interface with an example. while i dont like game very much because its mainly pvp/pk, and for other reasons(like pre designed character builds), i think its interface and movement system is just the best :)
[[YES i know that PS is opensource project with budget 0 and lineage2 is a commercial mmorpg, but thats really not excuse ;) ]]
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/1949/shot00048ala7.jpg
you can see a screen here, instantly noticing an iterface - its very well made, icons are small, you can arrange their position on the screen as you like them, also there are no fancy ornaments (like that tree motive in inventory window in PS) that make it very clear and easy to use. in PS we have big brown buttons and fancy windows, that isnt very good idea for me.
ok.
in the right is mentioned quickbar, in left bottom part of the screen you can see a chat box.
since all commands are assigned to either F1 -F10 keys, or performed with alt/ctrl + key, whatewer common key you press will make its letter apear in chat box, like pressing wsad and enter will make your character to say wsad :) so keyboard is used mainly for chating.
thats the problem, apart from weird movement in PS, there is also issue with typing an answers and switching between BIG chat box and world - you can accidentaly click chat box and be unable to stop autorun in time.
play l2 for a moment you will understand why this system is effective while very simple at the same time.
you could try implement that system into PS! this would really make it great and would attract more players (every single person I know that played in PS complains about player movement, so...)
I dont know if I make myself clear enough, its late in the night, so i will make it short and sweet:
player movement and interface system is not something that can wait till better times.
it is one of most important things in the game.
you can have skills and models not implemented, but not the interface and player movement.
easy and intuitive interface is what makes difference between good and not-so-good games, it really does matter for many people, of course you can get used to PS system, you can get used to anything really, but thats not the point.
regards,
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I do agree that the interface in PS is flawed, the menu icons all pretty much look the same and you shouldnt have to mouse over an icon to see what its for (I also liked it alot more when they were on the side of the screen not the top, that just overly clutters the screen), however I dont agree that its a priority, a good game, with good design can make up for a 'temporary' interface (assuming it is temporary)
I dont like the alt+key hotbar systems, I like it more straight forward than that, like Everquest2 or GuildWars, etc.., just press the number (not adding alt) to access the skill/function. Adding an extra button in there just complicates things and causes issues because ctrl and alt are right next to the lame windows key which tends to either crash the game (i.e. FFXI), or stall it for a minute while it goes into a windowed mode (i.e. Everquest2, GuildWars)
As for the basic interface design, Lineage2 is pretty much following the standard that I see in pretty much every mmorpg. Its a standard because its clean, its informative, and it just works.
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That's alright, I remember a year or two ago when you could climb over a wall in Hydlaa and get stuck in an ocean of white goo and you'd need to make a new character to keep playing. Quite a nuiscance.
I feel sorry for you if you thought that was the only way out. all you needed to do was type "/spawn" :D
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As for the basic interface design, Lineage2 is pretty much following the standard that I see in pretty much every mmorpg. Its a standard because its clean, its informative, and it just works.
precisely.
and there is a java emulator for lineage2, which is supposed to be opensource :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L2J
perhaps devs could take a look and see if there is something useful in these files ;)
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I doubt the java L2 server source would help in any fashion because user interface, movement, screen ratio, and pretty much everything else is client side, not server side. The server mainly contains databases and is a relay (and validator) for each clients data.
As far as I can tell there are no real large issues with the PS server, its mainly the client features/bugs that are my concern.
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well..
I am quite amazed that point'n'clik with mouse is not implemented here, and even considered unimportant.
But it was implimented! I know because I fixed it a few months ago. I'm suprised people say it's broke now, so I wll have to look into that. I blame people who don't like mice.
I would like to see many more options people havbe mentioned- smaller icons, movable menus, even changable menus could all be done.
If you think of anything specific, feel free to post in the wishlist :)
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One thing I actually love in this game is the possibility of moving the character with the arrow keys instead of the mouse. Truth is it took me about 30 seconds to make the normal movement of the character... Simple as that.
I have a health problem that prevents me from playing in your face games or similars such as Quake and stuff like that, because the mouse movement makes me dizzy and I feel awful.
Good old days when DOOM came out and I spent hours inside my room playing.
For more than 5 years I had to keep on games with top perspective. I am very very happy with the system of movement in this game! :)
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It only took me 10 minutes tops to find the controls the first time, so i'm not complaining.
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One thing I actually love in this game is the possibility of moving the character with the arrow keys instead of the mouse. Truth is it took me about 30 seconds to make the normal movement of the character... Simple as that.
I have a health problem that prevents me from playing in your face games or similars such as Quake and stuff like that, because the mouse movement makes me dizzy and I feel awful.
Good old days when DOOM came out and I spent hours inside my room playing.
For more than 5 years I had to keep on games with top perspective. I am very very happy with the system of movement in this game! :)
Me too, but having different movement options would help. Keyboard mode, mouse mode, first-person keyboard, and first-person mouse.
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Me too, but having different movement options would help. Keyboard mode, mouse mode, first-person keyboard, and first-person mouse.
Erm.. there are.
Take a look at the options ingame. You can switch the keys to move, hit 'm' by default to change the camera mode, mouse look is there.. you can even type in chat while autorun.
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Well I thought to move with your mouse, you held two keys and clicked somewhere. I forget. ><
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It only took me 10 minutes tops to find the controls the first time, so i'm not complaining.
Its not about how long it takes to find the controls, took me mere seconds, its about the way those controls work. I play EQ2 daily and everytime I come back to it from a test play in PS, the movement is a breath of fresh air.
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Something good came out of it, all right ^_^
I see your point and i am sure the developers take this in consideration even at this early stage, feedback is essential, though seriously, the movement question is less important theb, for example, crafting and skins at this stage
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Ummm... the controls are REALLY customizable in here the keys can be anything you want. You can also back up the XML file to save control sets for different characters, although you have to do this manually. As far as I am concerned using the keyboard is the ONLY way to control this game, and it is the most natural. Try using different Shift and Control conditions with fingers that naturally reach for certain keys when you play. One can get quite quick with it.
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Its not about how long it takes to find the controls, took me mere seconds, its about the way those controls work. I play EQ2 daily and everytime I come back to it from a test play in PS, the movement is a breath of fresh air.
I agree, EQ II (and every other new MMOG) set the right standard for movement.
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no other game I've played has customizability (is that even a word) as planeshift does, and every game I've played i've run around and seen wonderful things to climb, yet none of them let me jump!
(even though I can't get onto rooftops right now (fix that damn you!)) planeshift excels to me, because I can do whatever I like.
the only reason my character trains to get stronger, run further and jump higher to climb more things!
it's fun :3
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Yeah, my vote goes for increase mouse sensitivity...
and fixing the bug that if you middle click, or if you accidentally scroll, you stop moving...
That is all.
Strafing doesn't need more speed, unless you can use it to dodge ranged attacks manually!
What is this sneak mode?
Can anyone sit down? I can't, in game that is...
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I don't know if it has been mentioned, I sort of got glassy-eyed in the middle of the second page, but if you are using auto-run you can navigate using the left-right arrow keys. You can auto-walk by starting auto run and pressing the left shift key. I mostly stay in first-person mode but sometimes like to zoom out in one of the other modes while in the wilderness. One problem I have in the other modes is having the camera inside the geometry, stairs look like shutters and whatnot.
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Me too i find first person view to be the best and if you have troubles on stairs just adjust your view.