Flashlights
SmoodCroozn
Join Date: 2003-11-04 Member: 22310Members
Join Date: 2003-11-04 Member: 22310Members
<div class="IPBDescription">Shouldn't Both Be Fixed?</div> Sorry for posting a lot this week. I just feel we should fix and make the features right now better than introducing a whole crapload more of stuff... So anyway:
Marine flashlight is ridiculous. Basically it's telling the aliens "Hey I'm the bright one, kill me first!". When you turn it on, it magically illuminates all around you, shouldn't this be fixed? Is there a way to make the area directly in front of that marine brighter, not the marine itself?
Alien flashlight is not as bad, but it's pretty useless as well. Sure it can help around in those dark hives where you have to find the movement chambers, but other than that, it's pretty useless as well. I think it is going to be fixed in beta 5, and I hope it provides more uses.
Well, that's all my rantings, hope you have a bad day.
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Marine flashlight is ridiculous. Basically it's telling the aliens "Hey I'm the bright one, kill me first!". When you turn it on, it magically illuminates all around you, shouldn't this be fixed? Is there a way to make the area directly in front of that marine brighter, not the marine itself?
Alien flashlight is not as bad, but it's pretty useless as well. Sure it can help around in those dark hives where you have to find the movement chambers, but other than that, it's pretty useless as well. I think it is going to be fixed in beta 5, and I hope it provides more uses.
Well, that's all my rantings, hope you have a bad day.
<!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Comments
You have to remember that making things 'more realistic' in a physics sense (ie. the flashlight casts the light forward instead of acting as a point light) you raise the requirements to play the game.
Personally I'd rather see the removal of the flashlight and being replaced with a decent NV system. On top of that, have an upgrade (decently expensive one) that detects heat signatures as well while in NV mode (thus effectively countering cloaking). I'd also vote for a better alien 'flashlight mode'... no suggestions on how that might be accomplished though.
Obviously there would have to be caveats applied as it seems like a really powerful tech upg... such as making the NV system overly bright in places that are brighter than say... VERY dim. Then adjust the lighting in some of the areas to accomodate this ie. long hallways with little to no...
Anyways, I'm ranting now. Suffice to say, Flashlight = suxorz | Nightvision = roxorz.
practical.....?
No
It would take them too long to fix it, delaying beta 5 untill april 3045
Do me a favor and don't develop any games.
Do me a favor and don't develop any games. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
AvP 2 pulled of thermal vision quite nicely with the Pred's Humanoid vision filter. and the aliens in there had the ferrimone vision that gave away the position of even cloaked preds... i don't see why having a vision mode that was an effective counter to cloaking is such a game killing idea that you're so opposed to it being put in a game.
But then maybe you're just one of those that doesn't like the idea... at which i'm slightly offended that you have the aire to think your opinion should be what determines what aspects could constitute a good game for the rest of the gaming community let alone the NS community.
Now I don't mean to start a flame war or anything, but your comment hardly constitutes any kind of meaningful discussion and should have simply been left unsaid. If you do have some actual basis for your disdain I as well as the rest of us would be more than glad to hear your explanation.
That aside, Ripur, thanks for pointing out the debunk for thermal detection. Even so, I'm sure we could be imaginative enough to define some way to detect cloaks aside from the sensor pings. Mind you, its not necessary or anything, just something i think would offer more options to the playing field... diversity of gameplay if you will. Regardless of any kind of visual upgrade, I still stand that a NV mode needs to be developed and the flashlight tossed altogether.
Giving each individual marine the ability to do this as well, regardless of the cost, would make cloaking 100% worthless forever. Flayra has already declared a loathing for anything that does this... remember why all suggestions for things that remove parasite are rejected? Because in starcraft, the fact that medics can heal parasited marines makes the parasite worthless, and thus never used.
We want MORE strategic diversity in NS, not less. Completely killing an upgrade is not moving in the right direction.
Sniper Rifles,
Atomic Handgrenades,
Heat Seaking Missle + Rocket Launcher (Counter against SC as well)
and the obs should be able to fire a giant laser to destroy all hives.
No pls, think before posting. Heat detecting NV is completely stupid and nonsense. It would be better to include a "Scan here commander" request for marines.
<3 <3 !!! <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/biggrin-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
WRONG!
Go play the spcialist-there flashlights are COMPLETELY fixed.
The devs really do need to fix it though...
Alien flashlights need to brighten marines or have some other use... other than brightening your chambers and seeing webs. They should not work like normal marine flashlights. Marine flashlights right now are a joke because though the path is brighter you have the risk of exposing yourself more to an enemy. This should not be a risky thing, why would the TSA bother to equip things that risks your life?
I would prefer this:
- make both beneficial a lot at few times, not as beneficial most of the time
- make both limited such as flashlights die out, alien flashlight consumes alien energy
Go play the spcialist-there flashlights are COMPLETELY fixed. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I didn't say impossible
And if you aren't a coder you wouldn't know if it was partly hardcoded(I don't, but that's how one of the svencoop coders explained it some time long ago).
Preach it brudda!!!
WRONG!
Go play the spcialist-there flashlights are COMPLETELY fixed.
The devs really do need to fix it though... <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I was just about to say this.
And for those that say Alien Flashlight is worthless: You obviously don't play on FF servers, and if you do, I doubt that you don't have trouble TKing.
Of course, the problem is really the implimentation. A flashlight isn't the equlivalent of a car headlamp, it should be creating a beam of light projecting forward, not a pool of light around the whole player. Now, solutions like Doom 3 does are clearly unfeasable, the HL engine is quite limited with lighting options. Perhaps a cone-shaped model attached to the player model, projecting forward, would be better than the current glow. The model could have the render fx applied to it like alien chambers do when they're viewed with the alien flashlight on(overlay?). That would make it glow, and also be semitransparent, like the beam from a light. That way it would only be visible from in front of the marine. Even so, I can't see it being a high priority fix.
Go play the spcialist-there flashlights are COMPLETELY fixed.
The devs really do need to fix it though...
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It IS partly hard coded. You get a few dynamic light effects applyable to players and that's it. The only sensible thing you can do is somehow tell the engine to use the first person flashlight effect instead and have the player send a custom message with the direction they are pointing their flashlight. You would have to send one extra vector(3 floats = 12 bytes) or a pitch and yaw(2 angles, 2 floats = 8 bytes. If less precision used, 2 shorts = 4 bytes) instead of just sending that the player has a flashlight on( packed as a single flag bit?).
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->And for those that say Alien Flashlight is worthless: You obviously don't play on FF servers, and if you do, I doubt that you don't have trouble TKing.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You mean we don't play on AvA servers? Why would it be good on FF servers?
I think that rather than use the default flashlight the devs would just get the engine to create a dynamic light at a certain point and tell it where to point
The TSA marines have those funky visors, which I can only assume must be a status display/aiming recticle display/head and eye protection device. Adding "low light viewing conditions" to that list isn't hard, and it's what the devs should do if they want to replace the marine "flashlight."
The one and only situation where the alien flashlight serves any purpose at all is when everything in the hive room is cloaked, and you can't find the movement chamber to teleport to the other hive. That's it.
If they want to fix the alien flashlight, they will have to get inventive. I'm hoping they find a creative solution. I know what mine would be, but the truth is, nobody cares what anyone else thinks would be a creative solution except when it's the dev team, so I'm not going to take the time to even write it up.
One thing I will miss if they decide to actually do something useful with the flashlight command is my flashy script. Strobe lights are fun.</span>
that would make sense!
but please no heat-seaking modules that find cloaked targets <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
yes, the pandora tommorow multiplayer flashlight would own, but theres no player, and dynamic shadows in NS...
<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->And for those that say Alien Flashlight is worthless: You obviously don't play on FF servers, and if you do, I doubt that you don't have trouble TKing.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You mean we don't play on AvA servers? Why would it be good on FF servers? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
On FF servers it helps because sometimes you can't see too well where your fellow aliens are, and just bite randomly. I rarely play without it ON- its that useful(my server is FF all the time, nmw).