A couple of questions

[Ankh Morpork]

Ofc mate - but it would be a start

[stoex]

Ankh Morpork,

I have played CMSF and I know about data . The simple fact is that savegames in CMSF (and also the PBEM files) are in a very compressed format, and since CMSF handles a lot more data than CMx1 games (like deformable hi-fidelity terrain and 1 to 1 soldier representation), they also tend to be large. Someone else has stated this. However, unlike what you seem to assume, even streaming this data out into a video may not be feasible, since it can often take the game engine up to or more than a minute to load a 60-second turn from a pbem file. Even on a fast computer. Of course I don't need to tell you that this is a problem . There is probably a way to remove the redundant parts from the pbem files and get them into a format where they can be strung back together into a full battle (before loading them into the engine), but this would have to be done beforehand, not on the fly. Remember that quite a bit of overhead is included in a pbem file compared to what you need to make an AAR, besides the fact the data needs to be translated into graphics & sound. Every second pbem file contains data from two consecutive game turns, for instance.

[Ankh Morpork]

Ankh Morpork,

I have played CMSF and I know about data . The simple fact is that savegames in CMSF (and also the PBEM files) are in a very compressed format, and since CMSF handles a lot more data than CMx1 games (like deformable hi-fidelity terrain and 1 to 1 soldier representation), they also tend to be large. Someone else has stated this. However, unlike what you seem to assume, even streaming this data out into a video may not be feasible, since it can often take the game engine up to or more than a minute to load a 60-second turn from a pbem file. Even on a fast computer. Of course I don't need to tell you that this is a problem . There is probably a way to remove the redundant parts from the pbem files and get them into a format where they can be strung back together into a full battle (before loading them into the engine), but this would have to be done beforehand, not on the fly. Remember that quite a bit of overhead is included in a pbem file compared to what you need to make an AAR, besides the fact the data needs to be translated into graphics & sound. Every second pbem file contains data from two consecutive game turns, for instance.

Your ofcourse correct - BUT when you load a pbem it loads the full scenario - including every units status etc etc. However, You wont be needing to load every part if you already had the main part loaded already. What you do need is to extract the actual action rather than extract the full scenario every minute.

So every pbem include map+units+unit status+actual round. It would actually be enough to include the first things just once rather than reload them every minute. (this is ofcourse an example - I the actual content of the pbem is proberbly not exactly those things I explained - but Im sure its something similar).

Kind of hard to explain - so I hope you understand

Edit: Every unit/object/ground etc will already be in the memory already. You only need to extract the "changes" - which is far from as much as the actual pbem.

Edit2: btw - your talking about extracted to graphics/sound/video. None of these are relevant since thats being handled by the graphic engine and are not included in a pbem.

[gibsonm]

Have you even played WeGo mate? Im starting to doubt it

Good morning 0600 here and the answer is "Yes!" I have, do, and only play WEGO.

The reason why I asked was because I wanted to ensure that what you wanted was not just a level 8 overhead view of each turn but the abilitly to jump from unit to unit and observer from multiple perspectives from each unit.

Because when I asked:

They might want to review the turn by watching the replay at a bird's eye elevation to get an overall feel.

you said:

This is exactly what Im talking about. These things are just like any other WeGo replay only it will be 30 minutes rather than 1 minute.

However, the rest you mentioned is not at all what Im talking about. Im talking about a replay of the game - not at all about changing what happened during the game.

By "the rest you mentioned is not at all what Im talking about"

I presumed you were referring to the rest of my post namely:

Then they may wish to "zoom in" on particular units or terrain and say select a squad and follow it, then rewind and pick a tank on the other side of the map and watch that. Then if say the tank is destroyed part way through the turn, they want to rewind to the start of the turn and pick the tank again but this time change the view aspect so they can detect the firer.

I know of others who wanted to be able to do "what if" type stuff where to use the above example if the tank is destroyed, they want to do a "fly though" of an alternate route so that next time they use that way instead of the one they did use, etc.

[gibsonm]

I have yet to see a PBEM over 5mb.. (Speaking 5000p infantry battle in CMBB)

Still even in the case of 50 megabytes would be handable

I'm afraid CMBB is the wrong frame of reference.

Once you get CMSF installed you might be suprised.

[Ankh Morpork]

No Gibsom - I mean the part about changing things in the combat. Moving the camera around is nothing that will affect the size at all since its being calculated by the game engine while you play the file.

Edit: Oh btw, Good morning to you!

[gibsonm]

Well as ALS Veteran mentioned while I was getting some kip, that sort of reduced feature set might satisfy your requirment but not everyone's and accordingly is probably not the way that BTS / BFC would address the issue.

Further reinforced by Steve's (who is supposed to be having a break) comments:

Exactly If something is requested a lot, seems to be a no-brainer, and yet isn't in the game... chances are it isn't as easy for us to do as appears to the end user.

Full game replay is desirable. Always has been, always will be. We'll get around to it eventually.

Steve

Cheers.

[stoex]

I agree, Ankh Morpork (great name btw ), neither you or nor I know how a pbem file is encoded. But I do know that while CMSF (and CMBN) now are playable in RT, and the engine is built around RT, that does not mean the engine or the save files are programmed/encoded or even capable of streaming battle data out of the files on the HDD. That's all I meant. The game engine itself and the data being handled by it on the fly while playing can put a heavy taxing on even high-powered rigs (as anyone can tell you when they experience frame rate drops on large scenarios), so 'simply' subtracting the in-game calculations and 'replacing' it with on-the-fly decoding of data from stored files may not be entirely easy to do. At the very least new 'replay' file formats would probably have to be devised (which may be even bigger than current savegames to allow streaming, who knows?) and the engine would have to be extended to be able to do this. Also remember that a lot of stuff that gets calculated in-game according to the game mechanics can immediately be thrown out again after it happens (like all the random effects), but would have to be stored in the replay file to make it happen the same way in the replay.

But as Steve said, it's on the list, and it's certainly technically feasible, so we will probably get it eventually. I hope we do .

[Other Means]

I think you might be confusing the rather cool flexibility of the orders available and the ease of the interface used to implement them.

Objectively CMSF's menus result in so many hundreds of unneccesary mouseclicks and keypresses that I can't believe anyone could claim to be a fan. Sure you can get used to anything but really they are absolute rubbish and unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any improvement in sight.

For example to get a single unit to move to a position and face the way I want, I make the following mouse commands:

Click to select the unit

Click to select the M tab

Click to select the Move order

Click click on the desired move location

Right click to unselect the move order

Click to select the C tab

Click to select the Face order

Click on the waypoint

Click the desire facing direction

Right click to unselect the waypoint

Right Click again to unselect the unit.

In a more mainstream game designed by someone who does not wish RSI on their customers you could do the exact same thing with the mouse like this:

Click to select the unit

Right click to place a move order

Waypoint stays highlighted and you scroll mousewheel to modify the move order to the one you want if not the default

Drag mouse from the waypoint to give facing direction

Click on the ground to deselect the unit.

Things are simpler if you change the default keys to mine. See the sticky on the CMSF board.

[Ankh Morpork]

But as Steve said, it's on the list, and it's certainly technically feasible, so we will probably get it eventually. I hope we do .

Exactly this thread turned into something it shouldnt have done in the first place, but it was nice discussing it still

There are tons of other things I'd like to see in the game - but it's proberbly better to see the first release and then start bombarding with suggestions since they proberbly got quite alot to do atm as it is anyway!

I just hope it doesnt turn out to be as big letdown to me as Shockforce was (or Theatre Of War...then again, it's only distributed by battlefront and the ones making CM is not at all involved...atleast I think thats the case )

Ive been playing CMBB pretty much frequently since the release - quite odd though that I keep upgrading my pc to quality hardware...and still I keep falling back to games like Combat mission (and other oldies that dont really need my hardware).

Tbh I would have been happy enough to pay full price for an upgraded game engine to CMBB without any hesitation. I just hope CM:BFN manage to get me just as excited as CMBB did! (I guess one thing that I dont like with SF is the fact that most vehicles are classified which means we cannot get as awsome details as we do in ww2 games...and modern battlefield arent really my cup of tea!).

[Battlefront.com]

I guess I have to repeat myself again...

If a full, continuous replay at the end of the game were easily done it would have been done long ago. Both for CMx1 and for CMx2. Since it has not been done, despite the obvious (and I do mean obvious) desirability of such a feature, it should be pretty clear to all that it is not an easy feature to add. Technically possible? Yes, but not easy and therefore it has to sit and wait its turn with lots of other "it would be really nice if" type features. In the end it doesn't matter if end users, or even I, understand why it's so difficult because it's not relevant. If Charles says it's not easy to do, then it isn't easy to do.

Hoolaman,

While I'll certainly not argue with anybody about the efficiency and current UI needs improvement, it is a bit disingenuous to take the absolute worst case in CM:SF and compare it to a fantasy system that wouldn't work very well as described. In CM:SF right now, using hotkeys and the space bar triggered Menu, people can get things done just about as efficiently as what your best case example would be with the flaws in it corrected. UI rarely works as well in reality as people envision it on paper. Hence the flaws in the current CM UI

Steve