The Wrong Left Turn and the Uncanny Valley

[FinnN]

Personally I think complaining about 1:1 is a bit of a red herring. I pretty much agree with Steve in what he says, and I certainly think that the principle problems come when what's shown graphically dramatically from what's happening in the abstracted model which the computer is running.

Some of these I think are essentially bugs, or at least things that need to be 'unabstracted' or rebalanced. In ToW you have the bushes, and it seems in CM:SF you have the 3m high concrete walls. I'm sure in both games this sort of problem, together with elements that can be progressively improved (like pathing), will be patched away in time.

Others though are valid abstractions and I think it's been touched on briefly why these are a problem when they shouldn't be - lack of documentation and ingame assistance (such as tooltips or a tutorial that's more than an afterthought). "...What we can do is educate you as to where those abstractions are and what to expect from them. This took about 12 months to do for CMBO...". Well, if you want a game to appeal to a wider audience (which I'm sure is partially behind the 1:1 and RT) then making the game accessible is going to be critical. Personally I feel that that should have been a much higher priority than it seems to have been. I have many friends that would probably enjoy CM:SF, but who will make a decision on whether to play a game fairly quickly - and CM:SF isn't making much attempt to educate from what I've seen. Some tool-tips, a well illustrated tutorial/walk-through or maybe some annotated gameplay videos included on the DVD version would all be a good start. I'm certainly willing to put time in to get into the game (or will do when I have the time) but I doubt that a more mainstream game player will.

Don't confuse what I'm saying with that it should be dumbed down. I beta tested for a flight sim once, there were a few stages - initially it was hardcore simmers and later on general gamers too. Towards the end of testing one of the gamers put in a bug saying they couldn't bail out whilst in a high speed spinning dive. The reason was that the sim was preventing it due to g-forces. Now to my mind the solution is to put up a message saying 'can't bail out due to g-forces or something'. In fact that feature got cut on the grounds that it would be confusing. And that wasn't an isolated incident. At the time I was fuming thinking 'why invite these idiots in who have no idea what sort of game this is?'. In retrospect the company was right though - if you want a game to be appealing you need to be able to make it understandable to people who don't know the design of the game, or maybe even the detail of the scenario. Where I (still) think they were wrong is in dumbing it down rather than providing more feedback/documentation to the player. I get the impression that BFC used ex CM players and some military types to help beta test the game. I think that's fine, but I equally get the impression that they didn't take into account people who know nothing about CM and/or little about modern warfare. I think that's as much behind the string of bad/mediocre reviews that CM:SF is getting as any problems with the game engine/design itself (I quite like it).

Have fun

Finn

[Bradley Dick]

It all comes down to this:

Do YOU like it ? If so, buy it, play it, love it, make missions for it. If not, move on. This isn't a crazy girlfriend you keep around because the sex is good, it's a war game. It won't freak out if you leave it and neither will its friends (people like me, who love it).

[thewood]

CMBB keeps calling and hanging up. I swear I have seen it sitting outside my house late at night. I amy need a restraining order.

I agree with FinnN wholeheartedly. A little clarification and documentation would go a long way. The 200 page manual could probably been compressed to a 10 page cheatsheet for what it tells me on how this game works.

Bradley, seeing some of the questions you have on the board could have been answered with simple claifications in a help file or manual.

Every time I play, I come back to the boards to see if anyone has an answer to a problem I have.

[Bradley Dick]

Hell, who knows if half the questions I ask on here ARE in the manual. I'm usually on here when I'm at work. Maybe I should send myself the PDF file......

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by dalem:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by kipanderson:

There is no fundamental problem with the scale and scope of CMX2. The problem is that CMSF was sent out the door unfinished… three months early.

I disagree.

-dale </font>

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by JasonC:

...since I can click around on the ones with the best view or de-select, of course I can still see the whole picture. This means the effects of being "un-borg" only appear through what the tac AI fails to do now, that it might have done if borg-ed. Since right now the AI is failing to do much of anything, this is not exactly prominent in the behavior seen...

I think you're onto something with this statement.

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

...As I've said many times over, CMBO sold the most, CMBB sold significantly less, CMAK sold even less than CMBB. You guys can have rose colored glasses about how great our past games are, but we can not. ...

Steve

How much effect though was the subject matter / setting? Does your customer base routinely purchase games set in the WWII Mediterranean Theater in greater, less, or the same quantity as European Theatre? ETO over East Front?

My understanding of the WWII Wargame niche is the best sellers are in the order you release the CMX1 series; ETO, East Front, Med. So the diminishing return had been expected and not a series of notable events.

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by monkeezgob:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Pinetree:

Ssnake of Esim games(Steel Beasts) has made an interesting point in this thread. He believes that..

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />..many areas of the engine clearly are rooted in WW2 - maps are generally too small, there are no metrics for collateral damage etc.

(An excellent semi-review by him in that thread BTW)

This is my feeling too. CMSF,IMHO, does feel a bit like a WW2 game with a modern twist. As much fun as it is, I think there should be some sort of penalty for flattening half the neighbourhood... </font>

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by dalem:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by moneymaxx:

To wrap this up I'd like to ask why would one want to stick with abstractions if there was perfect 1:1 representation.

Because unless you're the fire team or squad leader, you're commanding units, not individuals.

The only way it's gonna work is if you show me individuals but let me not "care" about them, and the only way I'm not going to "care" about them is if their actions and reactions are "reasonable" in the context of the game's output.

-dale </font>

[Sitting Duck]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

...Some things we can't fix, like people expecting they can put down 1 or 2 Waypoints 100m away in a complex environment and have the unit read the player's mind to ensure that the unit goes along the EXACT path that the player had in his mind...

Wouldn't it be possible to show the exact "predicted" path on the screen? The prediction would help spot some of potential pathing glitches.

Reliability of the predicted path would vary based on unseen obstacles or other unpredicted events (like coming under fire).

Movable waypoints would also help fine tune the path if needed.

[dalem]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

And it would give dalem something to do in the crapper.

Sing it, brother. Lately I've been re-reading all my ASL scenarios.

-dale

[The_Capt]

Michael,

Very nice opening, you should write a book on the history of wargaming...start with chess and boxing.

Can't believe you forgot Computer Ambush by SSI, was the first time I think a WEGO system was used albeit not as refined as CM.

When looking at game design you have to start well ahead of the discussions of "how and why" and look squarely at "who".

I am speaking of the business case for the game. I doubt Steve will come out and give us access but you can damn well be sure there was a business case that drove the design decisions to move toward more realistic modelling of tactical warfare. The move to less abstraction (1:1, RT, etc) as compared to CMx1 is driven by a marketing reasons.

Now many will follow the false-logic that "it is a game" and thus the game-customer is the target...therefore the customer is always right...I am a game-customer..so my 50 bucks earns me the right to "be right"..enter the opinions of the masses blah blah blah.

BFC is a business that has stayed in business for over a decade, not by the skin of their teeth but actually exanding into an indie-wargame publishing house. So I would argue they know what they are doing wrt the business end of wargaming.

What I see in CMSF is the start of a new vision for CM, taking it away from the hardcore grog boardgamers who finally bought a computer and towards something else.

The "something else" is the question of the hour. Bugs and AI issues are all noise that time and effort will fix. What is the market for this game is central to any discussion of how it has undergone design changes.

I have theories but I would rather hear from others first...

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by The_Capt:

Michael,

Very nice opening, you should write a book on the history of wargaming...start with chess and boxing.

Good points in the rest of your post. Wanted to zoom in on this. I'm already at work on a book on the history of tactical board wargaming covering 20th Century subjects, from inception to 2000. If nothing else, it lets me write off my collection as a business expense.

As to your rest - yes, clearly if the desires of CMX1 players were the only driving force behind the development model, things might be different right now. That's all fair enough. There is still lots of flex room and many things can happen in the upcoming months and titles.

[dalem]

Originally posted by Dirtweasle:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by dalem:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by moneymaxx:

To wrap this up I'd like to ask why would one want to stick with abstractions if there was perfect 1:1 representation.

Because unless you're the fire team or squad leader, you're commanding units, not individuals.

The only way it's gonna work is if you show me individuals but let me not "care" about them, and the only way I'm not going to "care" about them is if their actions and reactions are "reasonable" in the context of the game's output.

-dale </font>

[dalem]

Originally posted by The_Capt:

Can't believe you forgot Computer Ambush by SSI, was the first time I think a WEGO system was used albeit not as refined as CM.

The V for Victory/World at War series were WEGO as well. Dunno if they were first. But man they were good. Thanks Eric!

-dale

[Rik81]

Clap, clap, clap. I really enjoyed reading Michaels OP above. Well reasoned and well presented. Thank you.

[Guest Guest]

deleted per user request

[thewood]

I definitely third that. It would quiet the board down at least a little and seperate the real bugs from designs.

[rlg85]

I for one appreciate Steve's last post, nice to see (as expected ) that they are hard at work addressing the issues we've had with the game

(Did I mention the shoots through walls one is killing me? /sarcasm)

Anyway, speaking for myself at least, I don't expect to see the 1:1 be "perfect" and abstractions are expected, at least at this point in time.

I think the main thing we're hoping for is for cover from terrain to be a little more apparent (seems like something that could abstracted to some extent without detracting from the overall 1:1) And for our little dudes to better use said terrain for self preservation.

If these major parts can be addressed, and we have soldiers that can respond enough to the enemy and terrain so that the currently high kill rates are brought down quite a bit, then i'll definately be pefectly content to wait on the little fancy 1:1 details that have been mentioned in this thread.

It looks like you guys are moving in that direction and before we know it those of us who have problems with the game will have fewer and fewer things to worry about.

Now about those QBs..*insert sarcastic smirk here*

[Battlefront.com]

GreenAsJade

Right now (1.01 demo) I have a unit reproducable tripping of for _miles_ from my line for absolutely no apparent reason.

In such situations then it is likely due to bugs, which is a loose term to include things that are coded to work one way and don't as well as things that crop up that weren't coded for in a special way. The more complex the terrain, the more difficult it is to get all these things right all the time. It's the curse of having a complex game environment and not having someone dedicated to programming this one specific aspect of the game.

FinnN,

Personally I feel that that should have been a much higher priority than it seems to have been.

Problem is that we can't put in more educational features, tutorials, etc. until the game is basically done. It's really a difficult thing to do during development because diverting attention from making the game to documenting it is often impractical. As stated above, it is one of the double edged sword dilemmas we face as developers; we have to create an environment that is extremely complex and therefore requires a lot of explaining, yet the time needed to make that complex environment is so much greater than the time we have that explaining things becomes detrimental to game development itself. We had this same problem with CMBO, but not CMBB and CMAK. Why? Because we had nearly 3 years to explain how CMBO worked (Beta Demo -> final patched version) before CMBB was released. By then we had a very educated group of customers helping out and a pool of text (like the stuff I've written in this thread) to cut and paste into the CMBB manual.

Sitting Duck,

Wouldn't it be possible to show the exact "predicted" path on the screen? The prediction would help spot some of potential pathing glitches.

This *might* be technically possible. I've asked Charles about it in the past and there are some issues with it, but I think given some breathing space he probably could implement something like this.

The_Capt,

Can't believe you forgot Computer Ambush by SSI, was the first time I think a WEGO system was used albeit not as refined as CM.

Ironically I never could get it working due to crashing all the time Did SSI's tactical space game (argh... it's killing me I can't remember what it is called!!) predate Computer Ambush? That was basically a WeGo construction set of a paper and dice game. Spent hundreds of hours on that one and was one of the first games I ever had that I had a hack for (made you able to command more than 4 ships per side if you had 32k of RAM ).

rlg85,

It looks like you guys are moving in that direction and before we know it those of us who have problems with the game will have fewer and fewer things to worry about.

That is the plan! The first few days were filled with technical complaints. We came up with a bunch of work arounds and most of the problems went away. One very nasty one was worked around for v1.02 and we intend v1.03 to fix the last few that remain. So what started out as a big uproar is largely gone 2+ weeks from release. We expect the same thing to happen with bugs, tweaks, and additional features over the coming weeks. We've already started that process, such as allowing Elite to issue Commands during pause, adding hotkeys, etc. This is a very complex simulation and it will take us some time to get all the kinks worked out of it. The only way to really do that is to have it in the public's hands. There is only so much that a manageable amount of testers can do on their own compared to thousands of people pounding away on thing with a fresh perspective.

Steve

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Dirtweasle:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

...As I've said many times over, CMBO sold the most, CMBB sold significantly less, CMAK sold even less than CMBB. You guys can have rose colored glasses about how great our past games are, but we can not. ...

Steve

How much effect though was the subject matter / setting? Does your customer base routinely purchase games set in the WWII Mediterranean Theater in greater, less, or the same quantity as European Theatre? ETO over East Front?

My understanding of the WWII Wargame niche is the best sellers are in the order you release the CMX1 series; ETO, East Front, Med. So the diminishing return had been expected and not a series of notable events. </font>

[The_Capt]

Hey Steve,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Strategic_Simulations%2C_Inc._games#1979

Try that link, they list all of the games produced. A lot of classics, Mech Bde, Kamfgruppe, Gettysburg. I don't see USAAF though. 1985 was the highwatermark in my opinion.

I had an Apple IIc back then and Computer ambush ran flawlessly, in bold green. My favorite was Frenchy with the piano wire.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Originally posted by Andreas:

I'd like BFC to license the CM engine to someone to produce early war, but hey, I'm sad.

CM engine is exceptional because its design combined some game features in a previously unseen way. the engine itself is not THAT complex that there would be a real need to license it. by today's development tool standards CMx1 engine features are relatively trivial to implement. much of what had to be hand coded back then, are now already built-in in various development packages.

the biggest reason why there has been no CM clones is the fact that CMx1 is so good and people used to think that BattleFront was constantly improving the engine. you don't invest serious money to get 3D models etc if the end result is something that already exists and is going to exist as a much better version half a year later. and it takes balls to be as lame as one needs to be to make a clone of a popular game with dedicated fan base, especially if you yourself really dig the game.

now that it seems likely, or at least quite possible, that CMx1 very well may never come back, not to mention develop to the direction many fans would have preferred, the situation has changed a bit. most likely it hasn't changed enough (CMx1 still works great) for the community (or someone with either extra time or extra money) to start making a (perhaps free) extendable clone, but the possibility just might be there. after all, there are tons of ways to improve the original in ways that matter to the fans.

time will tell how the community feels. seeing how much time is put into stuff like mods and meta campaigns, it doesn't seem impossible to me that some skilled hardcore fans would work together to remake and improve CMx1.

[Battlefront.com]

The_Capt,

Cosmic Balance... THANKS!! And yes, it did predate Computer Ambush. I was using an Atari 800 and it never ran. I think I even got an update disk from them and that didn't run either.

About the CMx1 code... we have no plans to license it because that means support it, and we don't have time for that. We don't want to make it public domain either. The code, therefore, is not going to see any further development either by us or anybody else.

Someone else might try to take CMx1 and clone it, for lack of a better term. However, it's been tried fairly recently and by all accounts I read, it failed. It took 5 years to get the game engine written (CMAK basically didn't have design changes), so I doubt there will be someone else that will be willing to put in that much time into such a small and uncertain game market.

Setve

[dalem]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

About the CMx1 code... we have no plans to license it because that means support it, and we don't have time for that. We don't want to make it public domain either. The code, therefore, is not going to see any further development either by us or anybody else.

Boooooooooo!

Logical, but Dale-Sad-Making.

-dale