.

[Dryke]

 

 

I know it's not, I was pointing the fact people would somehow find absurd to see a remaining trace of a freshly seen zed, when they don't have any problem with locating items, sheetropes, player made stuff, state of doors & windows before it actually reaches their FOV. That's pretty ambiguous.

 

 

I think the thing that people should keep in mind when considering this 'discrepancy' is that we are talking about two entirely different levels of significance. 

 

The zombies are an immediate threat and their significance is immense, so coming up with some way to accurately model LOS issues is important.  So far they have chosen to model absolute LOS and it is up to the player's human brain to provide the memory regarding where they saw a zombie, how fast it was moving, etc.; personally I find this to be very realistic.  While it is true that your in-game stress level impacts LOS, it is your personal stress that affects your ability to remember things...so if you are bugged out fighting some zombie and you forget the zombie sneaking up behind you...or misjudge the distance or speed...well, that's how it goes.

 

Buildings?  Trees?  Roads?  These are generally speaking no threat at all.  They don't move.  They are essentially insignificant.  So while it is true that it is not 'realistic' for the game to remember the map for you, it also has a negligible impact on gameplay.  After all, you could easily justify it by assuming that your character picked up a map of the town, or perhaps drew one on a piece of paper as he/she went along.

[Lexy]

on a sidenote .... the spin-a-roodle thingy is over now ... the latest build increased your time to turn around 

and imho the new turning-speed is actually set pretty good 

 

i have to agree to what Dryke said. 

 

 

 

 So far they have chosen to model absolute LOS and it is up to the player's human brain to provide the memory regarding where they saw a zombie, how fast it was moving, etc.; personally I find this to be very realistic.  While it is true that your in-game stress level impacts LOS, it is your personal stress that affects your ability to remember things...so if you are bugged out fighting some zombie and you forget the zombie sneaking up behind you...or misjudge the distance or speed...well, that's how it goes.

[deprav]

 

 

 

I know it's not, I was pointing the fact people would somehow find absurd to see a remaining trace of a freshly seen zed, when they don't have any problem with locating items, sheetropes, player made stuff, state of doors & windows before it actually reaches their FOV. That's pretty ambiguous.

 

 

I think the thing that people should keep in mind when considering this 'discrepancy' is that we are talking about two entirely different levels of significance. 

 

The zombies are an immediate threat and their significance is immense, so coming up with some way to accurately model LOS issues is important.  So far they have chosen to model absolute LOS and it is up to the player's human brain to provide the memory regarding where they saw a zombie, how fast it was moving, etc.; personally I find this to be very realistic.  While it is true that your in-game stress level impacts LOS, it is your personal stress that affects your ability to remember things...so if you are bugged out fighting some zombie and you forget the zombie sneaking up behind you...or misjudge the distance or speed...well, that's how it goes.

 

Buildings?  Trees?  Roads?  These are generally speaking no threat at all.  They don't move.  They are essentially insignificant.  So while it is true that it is not 'realistic' for the game to remember the map for you, it also has a negligible impact on gameplay.  After all, you could easily justify it by assuming that your character picked up a map of the town, or perhaps drew one on a piece of paper as he/she went along.

 

 

 

Ye I hear your point, tho in MP map showing you stuff you didn't even see first can have an impact on the game.

Lets say a player's walking passed a house, north of it. He wasn't planning to give it any attention but, as he pass behind it the map "shows" him a barricaded window he wouldn't have seen otherwise, he changes his mind and starts sniffing around to see an entry point or people to loot etc... Even the game showing you dead bodies have an impact on someone's decisions.

Anyway, I'm losing myself xD

Point is, the last version did change some stuff about the rotating speed and the time it takes for Z to appear in your LOS (I feels quicker)... I'm good with it.

Tho my point wasn't to simulate memory, it was to replace "the visual void" happening when you turn your back. It feels like when you see a horde it's the end of the world, maximu stress & despair, but you turn your eyes away there's no sign of it, only a blank map you could have a nice pic-nic on. The "slower fading" of the last known position would have been a way to visually tell the player "no matter where you're looking, you're facked man!"

So yeah, the point was to replace "the void" without actually changing the gameplay, you'd still have to check around you to know where they actually are.

 

My real grips with the LOS are the short distance and the "disappearing Z" when they're hugging your face.

[Viceroy]

I find it difficult sometimes to ascertain where exactly I can and cannot see. I wish we had a setting to make fog of war black again where you can't see after x amount of seconds.

[Burianu]

I say your character should be looking towards where ever your mouse is pointing, regardless of whether you're holding ctrl (to simulate head swivel), within the confines of ~270 degrees.  I don't like having to hold ctrl to see to the side of me.

[EnigmaGrey]

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

[Obijankenobi]

Well I don't agree at all.

 

Just imagine this was an FPS. 

 

When there is ONE guy following you you could determine his position by the sounds, that is admittingly harder in this game - Still, this is something your brain can do.. Turn around and see where the zombie is heading and extrapolate it's movement. No big deal.

But when theres a horde of a few, or even a few hundreds, you could not locate anything. You would hear their moaning and that they are close, but you wouldn't know what happens behind you. 

Now I agree that they could increase the tiles you can look behind youself, to imitate the effect that sound has, but I don't even know what you're asking.

Games are limited. How would you include the factors you mentioned in a first person shooter?

 

The line of sight thing is great, and the only thing that really keeps tension, as the zombies get down easily and the only thing that gets you in trouble is being careless.

 

Now image in real life that you were followed by 5 guys that want to kill you and you have them in your sight, would you notice the 6th guy trying to get you from behind? Most likely not, since you are focused on the 5 guys.

 

 

However, I do know there are issues with the line of sight. Sometimes things just disappear out of plain sight, especially large hordes, and even though there are supposedly 15 light updates per second it certainly isn't the case that it just takes 2 frames to see what happens around a corner or up the stairs.

These are the real issues here.

 

Otherwise using the brain is absolutely the only thing needed, even in the new build were turn speed is limited. I still got followed by 30 zombies and took them out one by one while still observing the environment.

If the obvious visibility issues (seeing this behind a wall that obstructs the view and dissapearing and light updates) are fixed this should not be of any issue

[deprav]

Well, seems like most people think I was suggesting some kind of rear view mechanics or something along those lines. That wasn't the case, but nevermind...

 

maybe those who played back in the days of the first demo would remember "ghost/transluscent zombies" and their use on your character's insanity. This discussion is pointless anyway, been writting books of argumentation for the most insignificant point of the list.

I noticed the short range of the FOV has been given some lenght on the last versions tho, there goes another point.
 

 

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

Yep ! I'm pretty sure it's down the line and it will be done eventually, it doesn't feel like a priority right now ^^

[Varnhagen]

Hi Folks,

first time here so please be gentle and refrain from hurting my frail soul

 

I do get what the OP wanted to point out. His/Her problem isn't so much with the LOS but, as was explicitly stated, with the avatar's deficient spatial awareness.

 

As of now, with increasing exhaustion and decreasing angle of your FOV your "blind-side" (out of hearing circle and FOV) gets ridiculously large. Spatial awareness doesn't work in game as most human beings function in their environments, because of the way sound is abstracted. And here I concur with deprav. A chasing zombie (horde) has to be visualized even while the PC has turned his/her back and is running for its'(?) life. That could be done by a simple red dot per zed or a big red dot indicating a general area of "commotion". Why doesn't deprav see the horde soliciting his/her/its balcony? Is the PC staring into the sunset and joined by the horde in a commemorative silence? Have Zeds ceased to moan, scuffle, topple and visited a ninja school of applied sneaky-dom?

How do real humans cope with outside influences? I myself as a dedicated pedestrian am able to "sense" a single incoming car a couple dozen yards away. I hear, I look, I perceive, I react. I don't hear, I still look (cause my mommy taught me to). On a heavily frequented road with dozens of cars all blur together and hearing them doesn't mean perceiving them individually.

Same with zeds (I suppose). A single Zed out for a stroll, should be audible, hence visualized. (I mean ambient noises should be rather faint in the post-apocalypse. And zeds don't levitate to their destination to my knowledge.) Lots of incoming zeds and whatever happens behind the PC's back is less likely to be perceived distinctly. The current situation is that without the "keen hearing" perk, which I would re-designate as "Not deaf", the PC "hears" Zeds when they are rubbing their sprites against the PC's. Thus it is basically a tactile instead of an auditory perception.

What to do? The game is able to track the visibility of zeds. Why not define an overwhelmed senses state depending on the number of bogeys in which peripherical vision and listening is short-circuited and the information is unreliable?

Oh and by the way, I like the panic ghost idea very much. I just chased a bunch of zeds out of my safehouse because the horde tried to take a shortcut at night. Wouldn't it be cool chasing ghosts at night and attracting real zombies with the noises? Hilarity ensues... 
Nighty Night

 

Postscriptum: One last point concerning change of perception while being exhausted: The FOV doesn't shrink, but the DOF is reduced (thus one becomes clumsy) and the horizon is lowered (the head hangs, useless staring matches with the floor) and reaction times increase (staring off into the universe, might as well go to bed). In a nutshell, zombification. So ingame it should do the same. Zeds have to be nearer to be seen. Slow Zeds should be later seen than fast zeds. Zeds standing still could be ignored, until they are very (veeeeeeeeeeeery) close. But reducing the FOV to a literal LoS is .... not so good....

Edited March 25, 2014 by Varnhagen

[Rathlord]

Hearing is shown in game by hearing. Simple as that. You can hear zombies coming up behind you, just like you can in real life. Still no need for gimmicky, gamey, immersion breaking mechanics to simulate something already accurately represented in-game.

[EnigmaGrey]

But I can just look at them coming after me for a 10th of second and then imagine their pursuit, all while they scream and moan after me.

[lemmy101]

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

 

I agree, but this is a significant technical issue than a design choice. Would require every object on the map to have a flag for whether it has been seen in whatever state is has been seen, and store the state it was when it was last seen only. That in itself is way too much, but even more so considering it could be a set of 32 or so people it needs to store that data for.

To sum up this thread: The LOS system is built into the fabric of the game, and is as integral to PZs identity as is 'this is how you died', so to not like it is to not like what PZ is all about, the hardcore difficulty leanings (which we fail on with the zombie combat atm and this is considered an issue) and it's not going to change.

 

What's been proposed would either result in your being aware of zombies movement that you should have no business of being aware of, which would destroy the whole point of the LOS system, or otherwise lead to ghost statue zombies all over the place as you look away and 'remember' their last position and this would be confusing and weird, as well as ugly. I see some people get confused at disappearing zombies, I can only imagine how confused they would get at ghost statue zombies all over the place that jump position whenever you turn to reface them. 

 

LOS will generally remain the way it is, polish and tweaks aside, no exceptions. There are few points we're so rigid on.

 

If you want to simulate memory, then remember the zombies position yourself. We don't have an ingame system for 'remembering' where you put loot, or which houses you've looted, how many nails you have back at your safehouse. We leave it to the player to remember stuff themselves for the sake of immersion and to add to the player's responsibilities and challenges for survival and managing their game instead of giving them hand holding systems to simulate stuff they should be doing themselves. I don't see why we should have to add a system to simulate memory in the case of LOS. As Rath said the world remaining when you turn is not a simulation of memory, it is merely because having black behind you at all time makes the game look really dark and boring. If it were up to me purely on gameplay terms, I would totally do this. Maybe we can as an option in sandbox.

 

And if you're incapable of accurately remembering the position of 20 zombies behind you when you turn away while you're sat comfortably at a PC safe and sound and with a birds eye isometric viewpoint, then it's probably worth considering how you would fair in a high pressure stressful situation while panicking and your eyes and head darting around 360 degrees.

[deprav]

For my part, I wasn't suggesting something to simulate memory. Except if you add an "Alzheimer" trait that would start making sense.

But the way you used "ghosts" for the character's insanity in old versions was very interesting and oppresive imo ! Tho I guess it can be done only with sounds in the future if you don't want dem ghosts back. :3

 

I remember locking myself up in a house and seeing transluscent zombies banging at windows, banging at the door, moaning and moaning... And when I thought they'd never leave and I'd die, I stormed out of the house with my baseball bat, ready to fight death... to finally realize all those Z were the fruits of my char's red moodles. Epic moment.
 

 

If it were up to me purely on gameplay terms, I would totally do this. Maybe we can as an option in sandbox.

 

That might be pretty sweet !

[Kurruk]

To sum up this thread: The LOS system is built into the fabric of the game, and is as integral to PZs identity as is 'this is how you died', so to not like it is to not like what PZ is all about, the hardcore difficulty leanings (which we fail on with the zombie combat atm and this is considered an issue) and it's not going to change.

Amen - now group hug and move on to testing 25c

[cookies1]

 

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

 

Long informative text

I don't have much knowledge about game creation, so what I'll suggest now might sound really dumb. Forgive me if that is the case ^^

 

Since the zombies can be hidden by fog of war, can't you just hide barricades and player constructions in the same way? I mean, you wouldn't have to fix flags for every possible state of the item and store it for every player if you only made such things go invisible when it's not looked at. I realise it would look wierd for an entire building or object to disappear when you aren't looking at it, but isn't that the exact same case with zombies? Before the apocalypse it wasn't there, so your characters memories (or map or whatever) of before the apocalypse doesn't have that information about something being there, just like zombies, etc. This way you wouldn't have any knowledge about things you shouldn't know about, and you wouldn't need a complex system for it either since it utilises the same method of disappearing as zombies.

[EnigmaGrey]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ctwvlyp99tr2477/IsoGameCharacter%20-%20Persistantly%20Visible%20Zombies.zip

Slight mod allowing you to persistently see zombies, even when you can't actually see them. This does require you to have seen them first before it kicks in.

All it does is ignore the alphaStep variable for anything inheriting IsoGameCharacter.

It's necessary to have Build 25 (IWBMS, from this Thursday).

[Rathlord]

 

 

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

 

Long informative text

I don't have much knowledge about game creation, so what I'll suggest now might sound really dumb. Forgive me if that is the case ^^

 

Since the zombies can be hidden by fog of war, can't you just hide barricades and player constructions in the same way? I mean, you wouldn't have to fix flags for every possible state of the item and store it for every player if you only made such things go invisible when it's not looked at. I realise it would look wierd for an entire building or object to disappear when you aren't looking at it, but isn't that the exact same case with zombies? Before the apocalypse it wasn't there, so your characters memories (or map or whatever) of before the apocalypse doesn't have that information about something being there, just like zombies, etc. This way you wouldn't have any knowledge about things you shouldn't know about, and you wouldn't need a complex system for it either since it utilises the same method of disappearing as zombies.

 

 

No, this is infeasible for the reasons Lemmy just worked out. Specifically:

 

This:

 I mean, you wouldn't have to fix flags for every possible state of the item

 

Directly contradicts this:

 

if you only made such things go invisible when it's not looked at

 

The game HAS to know which things to make invisible and which not. And as Lemmy already said, we're not going to make entire pieces of scenery (like houses) invisible because it makes the game ugly and unappealing. If you don't understand the mechanics he's talking about, you might just have to take his word for it. It is, unfortunately, probably not possible without grinding the game down to a halt.

[cookies1]

 

 

 

This brings up a good point . . . character-made additions to the map and items dropped shouldn't be visible in the fog of war until first seen -- sends missed messages.

 

Long informative text

I don't have much knowledge about game creation, so what I'll suggest now might sound really dumb. Forgive me if that is the case ^^

 

Since the zombies can be hidden by fog of war, can't you just hide barricades and player constructions in the same way? I mean, you wouldn't have to fix flags for every possible state of the item and store it for every player if you only made such things go invisible when it's not looked at. I realise it would look wierd for an entire building or object to disappear when you aren't looking at it, but isn't that the exact same case with zombies? Before the apocalypse it wasn't there, so your characters memories (or map or whatever) of before the apocalypse doesn't have that information about something being there, just like zombies, etc. This way you wouldn't have any knowledge about things you shouldn't know about, and you wouldn't need a complex system for it either since it utilises the same method of disappearing as zombies.

 

 

No, this is infeasible for the reasons Lemmy just worked out. Specifically:

 

This:

 

 

 I mean, you wouldn't have to fix flags for every possible state of the item

 

Directly contradicts this:

 

 

 

if you only made such things go invisible when it's not looked at

 

The game HAS to know which things to make invisible and which not. And as Lemmy already said, we're not going to make entire pieces of scenery (like houses) invisible because it makes the game ugly and unappealing. If you don't understand the mechanics he's talking about, you might just have to take his word for it. It is, unfortunately, probably not possible without grinding the game down to a halt.

 

Oh, perhaps I misunderstood what Lemmy said. I thought the flags you'd have to store for every player were used for remembering whatever state the construction was when you last saw it now that's it's hidden in fog of war. You know, so after you've seen the object once the current state of the object for the particular player who saw it in that state would have it visible inside his the fog of war, while another player who has seen it in another state would see that in his own fog of war (and a player who hasn't seen it wouldn't see it at all in his fog of war). This, of course, when stored differently for ever player would sum up to a lot of flags.

 

With my suggestion you'd only have to have a flag for all player-constructions determining wether the player is currently looking at the object or not. If he is, make it visible, if he isn't then make it invisible in the same way it does to unwatched zombies. I thought this already had to be a working system of some sort due to the game being able to judge each player individually when it determines wether a player is currently seeing a particular zombie or not.

 

About the invisible scenery, the only invisible scenery would be player-constructions. Yes, it'd be wierd knowing that there is a safe-house behind you even though you can't see it due to it being in fog of war, but I think that'd still be better than knowing it was there before you even laid your eyes upon it. Perhaps it could also be used to the owners advantage as he can build it in a complex way (like a maze for example) making you get lost or confused since you don't know how it all looks from outside, and you'd have to remember it yourself.

 

With that said, I'm trusting TIS completely and I trust Lemmy about what he says. My suggestion was a (perhaps impossible) workaround I thought wasn't adressed in his post. I thought he was talking about storing the state of an object inside the fog of war after you've seen it once, for every player, not just making it invisible. I could however still be wrong either way. It was just a suggestion by a guy who has no knowledge about the mechanics (or game creation for that matter) at all ^^

[Rathlord]

Ah yes, Enigma and I actually kicked around what you're talking about a bit earlier. Due to the way some objects are handled, it would still be a pretty monumental amount of work.

 

From a design standpoint, also, I see a bit of a problem with having inconsistencies between player-made and natural structures. For the sake of immersion I'd really prefer if both were handled identically, because anything else and it will always be drawing attention to itself.