First person mode

[shubla]

As you are doing the rendering rewrite, you could add a fun little feature that would twist the camere into first person and implement moving of the player by arrow keys.

[sMartins]

I asked to loftar about this some time ago .. he answered that this require LOD (level of detail) that is a huge task ...

[Potjeh]

Who cares if it looks a little shitty? We all loved Dungeon Keeper's possession spell.

[loftar]

Changing the camera isn't just a rendering tweak, but affects many aspects of the game model. There are a couple of immediate issues:

• Since the game is meant for an overhead style, the amount of data sent to the client for an even slightly meaningful first-person perspective is far too small.
• The graphics are very much optimized for a rather zoomed-out view, so they don't have enough data to look good in such a very close-up perspective that a first-person perspective would entail.
• Unless extremely wide sweeping changes were made, it would be a half-assed measure either way. A first-person perspective would be kind of pointless if you couldn't climb a mountain and look out over a very large portion of the world

Of course, many of these points are true for :cam bad as well, which is the reason I can't discourage it enough.

All that being said, though, it would be very nice with more sweeping perspectives, and I'd like Haven to have them sooner or later. It's just a very long-term goal, given the above.

Also, the problem with arrow-key movement is mainly latency. Since the game model is meant to go via the server for any action, the delay imposed on such movement would be too large to feel nice. Salem had the same problem with its WASD movement, which is the main reason I haven't brought that back in Haven. Changing that currently isn't even a long-term goal, since server validation is the necessary basis for disabling movement cheats of all kinds.

[sMartins]

All that being said, though, it would be very nice with more sweeping perspectives, and I'd like Haven to have them sooner or later. It's just a very long-term goal, given the above.

Cool, just trying with bad camera to use a close 3th person view and walking a bit in the forest is great for the immersion it gives ... That will be an awesome day!

P.S. Also tbh the wasd thing on Salem worked well to me, never noticed any particular problem with that .... maybe cause I'm in Europe though.

[ven]

Unless extremely wide sweeping changes were made, it would be a half-assed measure either way. A first-person perspective would be kind of pointless if you couldn't climb a mountain and look out over a very large portion of the world

1: half-assed isn't bad when lots of people like the result.
2: it would not be pointless.

Of course playing the game in first person would be nice, but merely experiencing the game in it would already be great. Like potjeh said, a "possession" button would be enough. Picture, for example, sailing in 1st person as a passenger on a knarr or cruising the world in the backseat of a wagon. Indoor parties and other events (like sports and music contests) where people usually stay in one place and interact via chat would also be more interesting with that feature. If implementing such a thing is relatively simple for you, please consider doing it for the sake of greater larp.

So many of the aesthetic thread's pictures are actually product of cam bad:

[shubla]

Who cares about view distance anyway. Lets just say that.. it is very foggy in the hearthlands.. all the time!

[loftar]

1: half-assed isn't bad when lots of people like the result.

I don't like doing something when I don't like the result, especially if you consider inclusion into the default client to be a "mark of official approval". Gazing into the black void is a mind-jarring experience and already ruins, for example, a lot of YouTube vidyas of Haven for me.

So many of the aesthetic thread's pictures are actually product of cam bad:

It is of course worth noting that half of those picture have been manually modded to include distant scenery and beautiful skies, and the rest of them at least has a very specifically chosen perspective, which the game wouldn't be able to uphold consistently.

Lets just say that.. it is very foggy in the hearthlands.. all the time!

That would be easier to buy if it weren't already obvious from the rest of the graphics that the weather in the Hearthlands is mostly sunny and clear.

[MagicManICT]

P.S. Also tbh the wasd thing on Salem worked well to me, never noticed any particular problem with that .... maybe cause I'm in Europe though.

What's your typical reaction time? Unless you're a pro gamer or someone specialized on fast visual reactions, the average visual reaction time is around 250ms, and unless the game has a network model that requires significantly faster, you, as the player, probably aren't going to notice it. The server and developers, on the other hand, could have serious issues, especially when it comes to hacks and exploits.

[loftar]

P.S. Also tbh the wasd thing on Salem worked well to me, never noticed any particular problem with that .... maybe cause I'm in Europe though.

I was bothered by it on my local dev machine.