Reverendo Posted November 8, 1999 Share Posted November 8, 1999 Before flaming me to death, let's write an introduction to this thread, FAQ style: Q- Is this a thread about Lack O' Feedback? A- No Q- About knocked out tanks then? A- Nope Q- Dead bodies! It has to be about that! A- Guess again Q- Then what the hell is this about? A- All of those topics, actually! Now, my reasons: I have been writing on many message boards for a long time, and I do ken some people get a bit too nervous. Peaceful and respectful discussions are hard to drive sometimes. But the thing is that previous threads about the above mentioned topics have been closed, and I'm yet to be heard. I'm not asking for special attention. I just want another chance for us respectful people who want to have a chat with BTS about some suggestions of ours. I'm posting my arguments on another message (Please, don't close this thread yet!) ------------------ Regards Reverendo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverendo Posted November 8, 1999 Author Share Posted November 8, 1999 Ok then... flame me brother for I've done wrong, but... Many people have complained about 'Lack of feedback'. Steve's reasoning about the 'Spreadsheet' thing is quite easy to understand, and I do think having a 'unit overview' window would be a crime. This is not hardcore wargaming. This is natural. And that's why I love it. The 'dead bodies' thing was quite a mess, since half of the forum wanted them and half of the forum didn't. The bad thing is that none of them gave any reasons, and if they did, the other side didn't listen. Some even wrote ironic threads about it. It was wrong, and I ken we are all sorry. As far as I ken, dead bodies would mean a mess with framerate and a disrespectful behaviour, disregarding wargamers and combattants' feelings. That's what I read in the threads anyway. The thing is that having 'blood spots' or depicting animated violence would be terrible. If somebody did that, I would regard it as blasphemy and I would call the Inquisitors Hotline. A wargame should NEVER become a dismemberfest, not in any way. But let's not get too extreme. Remember when we were young and we played with toy soldiers? We represented battles and, whenever we wanted to simulate a casualty, we just made a toy soldier lay over the floor. It is quite an innocent thing to do, I don't think it hurts anyone's feelings. Just a prone soldier, nothing else. Some will say 'What about frame rate?' At the beggining of every CM game, the computer renders EVERY single soldier we have, and doesn't seem to have any 'horse power' problem. Drawing those soldiers prone would be exactly the same (with this exception: the computer can actually forget about them, they're not going to move anymore). Others will say 'Why to depict casualties anyway?' There are many possible reasons, and 'Feedback' is just one of them. Just think about your troops' morale. It SHOULD lower if they entered a house (p.e) full of friendly dead soldiers. That's what happened in Close Combat 2 (almost the only good, realistic thing you could find). It would also make you remember which zones are covered by heavy fire, where did your assault go wrong, which part of your waypoints is more exposed to gunfire, etc. And if we talk about enemy dead soldiers, it could tell you if there ACTUALLY was something firing at you in that wood before you ordered mortar fire... Lots of things could be done. It wouldn't be hard to add a hotkey to hide dead soldiers either (there's one for hiding vehicles, why not soldiers?) Now, I would like to hear any arguments against that in a way as peaceful and tranquile as possible. I don't want a 'Go to hell', I don't want a 'You don't have feelings', I don't want a 'We won't add them cause we don't want to'... :¬) You guys at BTS are perhaps the best game producers ever. And quite friendly people for what I have read. Please trust us users, at least one more time. Sincerely ------------------ Regards Reverendo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionn Posted November 8, 1999 Share Posted November 8, 1999 Reverendo I gave reasons as regards the dead bodies as did Steve.. many people gave reasons, some technical, some moral and SOME related to delaying the game release Your statement that "at the beginning CM renders EVERY SINGLE soldier" is simply wrong. It renders somewhere between one in 3 and 1 in 4 soldiers.. So right there we have a tripling or quadrupling of soldier polygons if we have a 1 on 1 representation of dead. That would NOT be a pretty picture for gamers IMO. FWIW I know people playing CM on Pentium I 100s with NO 3D card and 16 MB Ram (that's the lowest I've heard of it running on but there may be lower).. If we put in dead bodies then quite simply we'd probably lose ALL gamers running anything less than a P200 with 3D card. I'd hate to lose them. As for seeing dead bodies I have zero problem with seeing them in any emotional sense. I've seen rooms filled with up to 60 dead bodies at a time (some whole, some with arms and legs or heads missing), seen a swimming pool full of corpses and seen and done some rather sickening things as regards body parts and thus couldn't care less on ethical or moral grounds etc BUT I simply accept that for technical reasons and for BTS own "vision" reasons they shouldn't go in. In the same way that BTS is looking at a MUCH larger picture when considering other game features it is doing so when considering dead bodies SO I think it is beholden to the gamer to accept that just, perhaps, BTS knows what they're doing and one should "Trust them one more time." Now, I'm open to discussion on this as always BUT if you want dead bodies in then you must ensure that you can get them in in such a way that you won't: a) hurt the framerates. won't cause FAR more important features to be left out ( there is only a finite amount of time.. If dead bodies takes 6 hours then that is 6 hours less to tweak the AI, improve graphics, add in that last Sherman model etc... BTS is NOT seeing dead bodies in isolation but I think many of you are.. Putting dead bodies in DEMANDS leaving something else out.) c) get CM banned by Germany which, if I understand correctly, makes it illegal for blood to be shown on-screen in a wargame. Panzer Elite and other such games don't have blood marks when you kill infantry (Panzer Elite is made in Germany BTW) for just that reason. ------------------ ___________ Fionn Kelly Manager of Historical Research, The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverendo Posted November 8, 1999 Author Share Posted November 8, 1999 Thanks for your reply Fionn... We're always glad to hear from you. First, I have to say I made a small mistake, since the way I used the word 'Soldier' may have caused some misunderstanding. I ken the computer only renders three soldiers per squad. Guess that leaves us with 1 soldier rendered per 4 soldiers represented. What I wanted was exactly the same, that is, 1 dead body per 4 actual casualties. This won't hurt framerate, and It will be more pleasant to see than a dead soldier for each actual casualty (not from an emotive point of view, but the ground would be carpeted with dead bodies and you wouldn't be able to see anything). About production time, the graphic for a prone soldier is already done, we all have seen it, so I do not think it would be too hard to set it as a casualty marker. I'm not a programmer, but the thing would be something like 'Whenever a soldier -that is, 4 actual soldiers- is ordered to disappear due to casualties, just draw a prone soldier and don't move it for the rest of the battle'. To improve the graphical aspect, an animation could be done, but it is not required. And finally, about Germany, remember I'm asking about 'prone soldiers', not blood. The way Close Combat was produced, it accepted the sight of blood, but blood in CM would be absolutely tasteless (don't ask me why, I just can't imagine it). So, is there anything against that? If there is, please tell me... :¬) Again thanks for your reply. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted November 8, 1999 Share Posted November 8, 1999 Reverendo, we have had several threads just like this one. Nothing new. Sorry, but I REALLY do not feel like answering all the same questions (especially the technical ones) again and again and again. Why bother, because someone is only going to ask us again in another week or two. Sorry, but I am closing this up. As I said, if someone comes up with a novel reason why we must have bodies, we are NOT putting them in. And even if one were presented, it WILL NOT GO INTO the first release, so the point is moot. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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