MikeyD Posted January 28, 2005 Share Posted January 28, 2005 I was just reading a game review (for Grand Teft Auto, actually) and they were talking about the mood-setting 'scripted scenes' in the game. We've all seen them. Animated actors or voice-overs against montage scenes setting up the upcoming section. Would this film-like technique be applicable to the upcoming CMX2 games? I still recall that funky battle sequence at the start of CMBO (with the old default art!). I can imagine we could use a pretty substantial intro to any speculative WWIII games or a space game (CM: Space Lobsters!) Imagine the intro to "Fulda Gap '71." Start with a montage sequence of German countryside. The camera flies over the border crossing to see massing armor behind th next hill. Cut to dire newspaper headlines, quick cuts of politicians (UN?) arguing, then the newspaper headline "WAR DECLARED!"All the while a voice-over is setting up the premise. A crisis has erupted following an incident at the Finnish border. Events are set in motion, etc. BFC farms out the computer animation to others while they remain focused on game mechanics. A scripted opening would be a way for BFC to visually 'keep up witn the Jonses' with the current crop of games, and if done in a consistent distinctive manner across titles it could be a way of 'branding' the CM line. I believe they've already got a few 'movies for downloading from 'Dangerous Waters'. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sergei Posted January 28, 2005 Share Posted January 28, 2005 Maybe you should stop worrying about CMX2 and just drink beer. That's what I am doing, anyway. It would be fun to watch, but then it'd require some scripting language or tools to do, and probably not a core function. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted January 28, 2005 Share Posted January 28, 2005 Kiss homemade scenarios goodbye. Every try to make cut scenes for OP Flashpoint? Doable, but the "instructions" tell you to "fiddle with the numbers in the camera controls"... Maybe we need an entire thread devoted to "Stuff that CMX2 Isn't" and we can all devote pearls of wisdom to it. I regret I won't be the first one to suggest health packs. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flamingknives Posted January 28, 2005 Share Posted January 28, 2005 Remeber the guys who did that 'Combat Vision' stuff? If the new engine is one-tenth as good as the BFC crew claim, creating short movies shouldn't be too hard. I rather liked the intro movie to CMBO. Something like that would be good. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Znarf Posted January 30, 2005 Share Posted January 30, 2005 I find cut scenes rather annoying and usually skip them. It's difficult enough to make scenarios, I don't want to deal with cut scense. Just my $0.02. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kip Watson Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I don't seek this feature, but I would like to see more elaborate briefings, that could include formatted text and graphics (eg. recon pics and maps). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarkus Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Originally posted by Kip Watson: I don't seek this feature, but I would like to see more elaborate briefings, that could include formatted text and graphics (eg. recon pics and maps). I second that. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junk2drive Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 A simple way for Windows users to do this is create the briefing in MS Word, paste the text to a map and picture in MS Paint, then save it as a jpeg. If BFC specified the briefing to be xxx size and xxx kbs per page it would be doable. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Originally posted by flamingknives: Remeber the guys who did that 'Combat Vision' stuff? If the new engine is one-tenth as good as the BFC crew claim, creating short movies shouldn't be too hard. I rather liked the intro movie to CMBO. Something like that would be good. The intro movie to MUZZLE VELOCITY was good too - talk about disappointing to find out that the graphics in-game were nowhere near as good as the movies! I did like the intro movie to CMBO, though, come to think of it - though it looked a bit silly, the music was well done, and it showed off the camera shake nicely. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Originally posted by junk2drive: A simple way for Windows users to do this is create the briefing in MS Word, paste the text to a map and picture in MS Paint, then save it as a jpeg. If BFC specified the briefing to be xxx size and xxx kbs per page it would be doable. Yeah, but the text would turn for crap in .jpg format. HTML format would be the way to go. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junk2drive Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 " text would turn for crap in .jpg format." I've not tried that with a small font. HTML would be the same as creating a webpage and there are simple freeware programs. You are saying that could be loaded into the game (CMx2) the same as a .txt file? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Originally posted by junk2drive: " text would turn for crap in .jpg format." I've not tried that with a small font. HTML would be the same as creating a webpage and there are simple freeware programs. You are saying that could be loaded into the game (CMx2) the same as a .txt file? I don't know, I don't have a copy of CMX2 yet - do you? There are other games that allow you to do this - Op Flashpoint comes to mind - IIRC you can use HTML to create scenario briefing screens. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain Pies Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Actually it would be possible for BFC to do cut scenes if they implement the whole battle movie playback that many people have requested. It could be done with a slightly modified version of that functionality. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeyD Posted January 31, 2005 Author Share Posted January 31, 2005 I admit some (most) game sequences out there drone on MUCH too long. But anyone who watches commercial TV knows you can cram a lot of info into 30 seconds if you want. I suspect the CMBB and CMAK epics left out opening sequence because of CD space constraints. Since I don't know what the scale, scope, or packaging (multi-CD?) of CMx2 is going to be I don't know if they'll have room - again - to include any mood-setting opening sequences on the disk. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junk2drive Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 IMHO from my other experiences, after the first time it becomes an annoyance. Then, sooner or later, the OS doesn't support the type of playback ... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hellfish Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Originally posted by Michael Dorosh: Kiss homemade scenarios goodbye. Every try to make cut scenes for OP Flashpoint? Doable, but the "instructions" tell you to "fiddle with the numbers in the camera controls"... Maybe we need an entire thread devoted to "Stuff that CMX2 Isn't" and we can all devote pearls of wisdom to it. I regret I won't be the first one to suggest health packs. Go to www.ofpec.com and lookup "camera.sqs". 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sergei Posted February 1, 2005 Share Posted February 1, 2005 Originally posted by Captain Pies: Actually it would be possible for BFC to do cut scenes if they implement the whole battle movie playback that many people have requested. It could be done with a slightly modified version of that functionality. I doubt, directed cutscenes and freely watchable playback are quite different (how many minutes should one cut scene last, anyway?). To do cut scenes, you'd anyway need a scripting language to control the camera. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted February 1, 2005 Share Posted February 1, 2005 Originally posted by fytinghellfish: </font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Michael Dorosh: Kiss homemade scenarios goodbye. Every try to make cut scenes for OP Flashpoint? Doable, but the "instructions" tell you to "fiddle with the numbers in the camera controls"... Maybe we need an entire thread devoted to "Stuff that CMX2 Isn't" and we can all devote pearls of wisdom to it. I regret I won't be the first one to suggest health packs. Go to www.ofpec.com and lookup "camera.sqs". </font> 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sergei Posted February 1, 2005 Share Posted February 1, 2005 Originally posted by Michael Dorosh: Yeah, but the text would turn for crap in .jpg format. HTML format would be the way to go. Would this not depend on the level of JPEG compression? (Haven't tried, anyway.) It'll be interesting to see what sorts of briefings we'll be able to create. Picture embedding would be nice - even though I'm afraid some people would go overboard with this, inflating scenario sizes to megabytes... but it'd be nice to be able to show an operational or a strategic map, the possible tactical map and some photograph maybe. And the Finnish war flag, the moustache of Stalin, colour photography of the kinds of trees that grow in the region, the designer's cat, a cartoon making fun of the Dutch, a girl pic, designer's own logo, his PayPal link... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GSX Posted February 1, 2005 Share Posted February 1, 2005 You know all I want from the next line is upgraded graphics quality and the representation of individuals something akin to the Warhammer 40K game my son plays. That will do me nicely thanks.... [ February 01, 2005, 01:21 PM: Message edited by: GSX ] 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted February 1, 2005 Share Posted February 1, 2005 Originally posted by Sergei: Picture embedding would be nice - even though I'm afraid some people would go overboard with this, inflating scenario sizes to megabytes... With the kind or rig you're going to need to run CMX2, I hope it will come with a 100 Gig hard drive to boot. And detachable drives. And frickin' laser beams attached to your head. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeyD Posted February 2, 2005 Author Share Posted February 2, 2005 I recall there was a lobbying effort by someone awhile ago to have the scenario orders constructed in HTML so that maps and graphics could be embedded. It sounds nice for the CD scenarios but would scare away a lot of 3rd party scenario makers. And BFC would probably have to hire a graphic design person to come in and format & design all the (50ish?) orders pages into a consistent look. More money out of BFC's pocket. My thoughts on scripted scenes were much less ambitious than a new scene per scenario. An informative intro to the game for when you first start it up. If the game's at all subdivided into sections (whe have no idea what XMx2 is going to be like) then each section would have a short informative movie intro. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
junk2drive Posted February 2, 2005 Share Posted February 2, 2005 Mikey, scenario orders, you mean briefings? What I was talking about is the same as the 3 .txt briefings we use now only as a html page instead of text. You type some text, import a jpeg map and save a html. Like Juju's small arms lists, McMMM instructions. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeyD Posted February 2, 2005 Author Share Posted February 2, 2005 "Mikey, scenario orders, you mean briefings?" Yeh, its a sign of advancing age when I can't recall the proper names of... of... things. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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