There is so much game here!

[Lightspeed]

So I'm not a Dev, so I don't know what I'm talking about, right got it.

But as someone who's been making missions, campaigns in GR and Arma for over 10 years now, as well as, creating maps in various editors including Cry and some that I can't even remember the name of, plus golf courses for various golf games - I think I have a pretty good understanding of what it takes to put a game together. And that doesn't include the f* tonne of things I don't know about making games, particularly around programming, I hack code at times, I definitely don't code.

But as any Dev would know, it's impossible to learn and develop everything, you need specialists in a huge range of areas to bring it all together.

So when I look at the detail put into this game, I am just blown away by the amount of content.

One thing I know for sure is, people will tend to pick on all the things they don't like or don't fit their play style - much more readily then they will ever stop and take notice of all of the incredible things going on.

Why am I saying this? Not sure really, maybe because I'm a massive supporter of Devs and I think they cop a lot for the things they 'haven't done right' and little praise for all of the effort to make things right. Think of any other industry, you don't like a product, you don't buy it simple. You don't jump on line and launch attacks and the makers, you just go n buy something else. Not for game developers and publishers - prepare to be blasted even if 90-95% of the content is awesome - because ppl will slay you for the 5-10% they don't approve of.

Just a few of the things I notice as a mission maker:

The detail in every compound and village - they didn't have to look that detailed. Every one of those objects was placed by someone - and the towns aren't generic so each one was crafted individually. Maybe just maybe it was done through programming (highly doubtful) but if they were, that's a massive feat in itself.

The conversations and animations between NPCs - not necessary per se, but it adds so much to the experience. That's hundreds of hours of effort and this occurs all over the map.

AI patrol paths - seems so simple but they all have to be worked out. And what I love is, they're not easily predictable, there is some thought going into this.

QRFs - fast and furious - again, lots of effort.

Loading out gear - maybe not as much customization as people want, but really when is it ever going to be enough? Devs have to draw a line in the sand at some point, and really there's enough in here to make lots of unique characters. Not going to debate it with anyone though - it takes time and it looks great.

The terrain, the vegetation, the wildlife, the way it blends seamlessly together - that doesn't just happen - that is a miracle at work. Miracles by humans.

UI, sounds, scripts, cut scenes. models, animations, missions and triggers, and triggers upon triggers upon triggers, drone, marking targets (or not), driving, flying, boating, it goes on and on and on. Anyone tried producing a plausible storyline for a campaign before? Try it some time and then times in by 21 bosses or whatever it is for GR:WL - even that is a challenge. So next time you clear a village, just have a wonder round and take it all in - stop and smell the roses (maybe the flesh). GRWL is beyond epic.

So yeh, random post, but this is my tip of the hat to the Devs - a bunch of f*king legends!

 

 

Edited February 24, 2017 by Lightspeed

[Lightspeed]

And on that note - I bought the game! I haven't pre-ordered a game in prolly 10 years other than Arma.

[Zeealex]

Not shooting anything down here, just giving a more pragmatic viewpoint and picking apart the process, as someone who's dabbled into all of the larger points of game development at some point, even just briefly, I actually think the game's pretty good, now that i've played it a few times already, i'll probably end up picking it up myself. 

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So when I look at the detail put into this game, I am just blown away by the amount of content.

Certainly 4 years worth of content there. however there's the idea of "work smarter not harder" a lot of these things will be modular, done once, copied over, altered slightly, still a lot of work in the grand scheme of things, but nevertheless not everything will be made ground up every time. 

 

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The detail in every compound and village - they didn't have to look that detailed. Every one of those objects was placed by someone - and the towns aren't generic so each one was crafted individually. Maybe just maybe it was done through programming (highly doubtful) but if they were, that's a massive feat in itself.

my guess is a mix of both, see above, having seen many technical aspects of Snowdrop (the division's engine) there will be some parts that are placed by hand, some parts procedural, some parts that are a mix of both, these would still need vetting and checking to ensure the placement isn't invalid. 

 

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The conversations and animations between NPCs - not necessary per se, but it adds so much to the experience. That's hundreds of hours of effort and this occurs all over the map.

agreed, wasn't necessary but if they wanted the living breathing environment they promised it was a must-have and would feel awkward without it, and it would be coded into the AI behavior. Again, done once.

 

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AI patrol paths - seems so simple but they all have to be worked out. And what I love is, they're not easily predictable, there is some thought going into this.

Again, this is likely a "done once, copied over" format, if the paths are randomized it may be done as part of the AI behaviour or as part of the overall game script, which will mean that it's coded in one time and then the AI will pick its own path using various queries and procedures along the way. 

not saying it's not a lot of work, it is, just that it's probably not like arma mission making where the mission maker has to put down each individual path point. It's probably entirely randomized. I could be wrong, but I would've thought the better option would've been to do it procedurally and randomized. 

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QRFs - fast and furious - again, lots of effort.

lots of effort, but also with the AI already in place, it would be simple, as not a lot of work would need to be done as far as I see and would do it. spawn the QRF, set them to use a specific behaviour, launch them at the player/mission location, notice i said simple, not easy

 

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Loading out gear - maybe not as much customization as people want, but really when is it ever going to be enough? Devs have to draw a line in the sand at some point, and really there's enough in here to make lots of unique characters.

from my own experience character customization is a pain in the ass to do. And Wildlands has done it well despite some annoying bugs/issues, like eye colour being way off, taking too long to load, and the preview/accept function needs some tweaking. 

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The terrain, the vegetation, the wildlife, the way it blends seamlessly together - that doesn't just happen - that is a miracle at work. Miracles by humans.

if it's anything like the engines I've used this is probably dictated by a properties map in which a unique colour will correspond to a different vegetatation property, so blue will be underwater vegetation, red might be sands, green might be forests, so on and so forth; the more properties you have the more vegetation variation there will be and this will be done procedurally, with level designers and gang then going in and placing more objects down and checking its playable, but again, this could well be handled by a properties map. 

This properties map may have come out of an external program, such as worldmachine, L3DT, etc etc. someone still had to make it, so yes, it's pretty freaking awesome. Miracle's a little too far IMHO, it's amazing, don't get me wrong, but it's not exactly innovative or groundbreaking (no pun intended)

The vegetation itself has been created with the assistance of photogrammetry and perhaps LIDAR, not all of it will have been, a good chunk of it would have been done using more traditional methods (for example I have a feeling the 'rock guy' rocky mentioned most likely used Zbrush and co to achieve his final results) but I know for a fact Ubi has used assets bought from Quixel Megascans to speed up the process, I recognize some of the things in there from using it myself, it's pretty cool. 
 

 

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UI, sounds, scripts, cut scenes. models, animations, missions and triggers, and triggers upon triggers upon triggers, drone, marking targets (or not), driving, flying, boating, it goes on and on and on

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Anyone tried producing a plausible storyline for a campaign before?

There are dedicated writers for the storyline, and advisors on board with them too, probably went through a good few drafts though, rome wasn't built in a day. 

Models, again, done with the assistance of photogrammetry, also clothing simulation, and Zbrush, as a modeller (who admittedly is still a fledgling compared to these guys) the process, to me, is simple, but remember, I said simple, not easy. photogrammatrized models need cleaning up, clothing simulation is time consuming and not perfect, and Zbrush is just a pain in the ass in general, but there will be people on the team who love it. The simulation and the programming of external programs had to be done by someone and they deserve as much thanks, but in the end you might be thanking bill gates or some ######, so there's a line that needs to be drawn somewhere. 

Animations will have likely been done through mocaps and cleaned up, hence why they can look sometimes off and uncanny, my favourite one is still the fat woman running down a hill though

marking targets, hmm, I don't honestly think it would be THAT difficult, still requires functions to have been written at some point in the very early development of the engine but it wouldn't have been that hard to do I wouldn't think if the functions were already there. 

vehicle mechanics are a pain in the ass, i'll say that and leave it at that. 

you know perhaps more about missions than I do, I've only dabbled in it a couple of times so I'll reserve judgement. 
 

Wildlands is a good game, not disputing that, now that I've played it more, but as I said, i'm just giving a more pragmatic viewpoint and picking apart and hopefully (fingers crossed) giving you (meaning peeps here, not just you) more insight as to the processes they (probably) used. It's kind of a habit i have and I refuse to stop it, I learn from tearing it apart, I think all of what everyone did was fantastic, and I strongly dispute the claim made by some that it wasn't 4 years of work, I think from building everything up to the final touches it probably was.

 

[Rocky]

When I was shown early builds over the past 2 years, at times I caught myself self wondering how come they spent 4 years on this game? It just didn't look like 4 years of work for HUNDREDS of developers. What I realise now is that they were showing us specific aspects of the game to get our impressions.

However, more recently the builds have totally fleshed out with all the crazy detail stuff Lightspeed alluded to - and it has turned Wildlands into an amazing experience. The level of detail and to quote Lighty, stuff that they simply "did not have to put that there", is staggering, and totally looks like 4 years of work. 

I see new stuff everytime I play that even though it's a small detail, makes the whole experience more enjoyable.

Anyway, I can't really say it better than Lighty.

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The terrain, the vegetation, the wildlife, the way it blends seamlessly together - that doesn't just happen - that is a miracle at work. Miracles by humans.

ps, I spoke to the "rock" guy in Paris. Yeh they have a guy who made it his business to make sure every rock was special, and he took it serious!

[Zeealex]

I think you misinterpreted; I said I disagreed with those who said it wasn't 4 years of work, even I with my pragmatic "could do better" hat on could clearly see that.

As I said, if people give me things they're amazed with i'll pick those things apart and tell them how it was most likely done whether or not that brings a downer to it is subjective, some people will say "photogrammtery? WOW that's amazing tech!" others will say "it was that?! eugh!". Even with the clear dedication of the dev team, they'll work smarter not harder, but the attention to detail is phenomenal, it's clearly well researched and well thought out. 

 

[Rocky]

I hadn't read your post yet Zee lol.

[Zeealex]

gosh darn rocky! giving me an emotional rollercoaster like that!

 

Edited February 24, 2017 by Zeealex

[Rocky]

LOL sorry :op

[NightCrawler]

Yeah I'm not gonna read Z's post either it's a wall of text. Kinda reminds me of 101459's long winded speeches of BS.

 

All I know is, I like the damn game Ubi, great job and kudos from NC!!

Finally I get a game I think I'm gonna love as much as I did back in the day. It's been so long!!

[Zeealex]

2 minutes ago, NightCrawler said:

Yeah I'm not gonna read Z's post either it's a wall of text. Kinda reminds me of 101459's long winded speeches of BS.

thanks... I appreciate that... *rolls eyes*

[NightCrawler]

Your mother had a way about her, to get to the point simply and elegantly and sometimes downright mean . You are simply young and it shows in your writing.

You're very intelligent but you tend to ramble about things, we the readers, especially the old ones, don't care about.

My apology if I said something out of line.

[Zeealex]

There's me thinking people would appreciate a more informed viewpoint with information on how it was done... clearly not...

whatever I'm out of here

Edited February 24, 2017 by Zeealex

[NightCrawler]

LMAO 

[Lightspeed]

It was very insightful Zee, kinda comes off as a compliment sandwich - the Devs did a great job, they only had to do it once and a lot of it's not hard to do, or done by an engine or some other tool - but yeh they did good.  

 

 

 

[Rocky]

A bit harsh NC! LEt's keep the comment about the game not about the posters 

Right Im off to find that fat women running down the hill. Or at least a fat woman to make run down a hill!

[Blame]

I have around 18 hours in the Open Beta, what I can say is that the Open Beta itself is pretty short, it took me less than 6 hours to finish whatever there was to do, I'm sitting at level 16 right now and feel like I don't have to play it again.

Open Beta's gunsmith also is really lacking, kinda makes you feel sad, I was expecting to get my M4A1 and tune that bad boy up...also I really hate the fact that silencers reduce the damage A LOT, like 50%...we all know in real life they actually make the gun better..

[pz3]

I dont have any clue how GR:WL was developed or what engine etc... 

Dabbling through other graphics, and games... 

 

Most games are a true work of art these days. User interfaces alone have their own teams. 

Sound guys, animators, technical artists, programmers, designers, marketers, legal consultants, so on so forth. 

 

Big business big structure and as I like to qoute one misc dev. 

 

"Through out the whole process your never fully sure what you will end up with" 

Lead designers often feel detached from the actual end product as do all the animators and other developers. 

It all comes together in a rush and that pre production planning is arguably the most important. 

 

Wildlands is on my to buy list. 

Edited February 24, 2017 by pz3

[Blame]

Picked up an enemy gun by accident, now my gun is gone, can't manually take cover..what is this, Rocky I thought you were supposed to help these guys make this game good.

[Lightspeed]

Are you trolling or just a ######?

[Rocky]

1 hour ago, Blame said:

Picked up an enemy gun by accident, now my gun is gone, can't manually take cover..what is this, Rocky I thought you were supposed to help these guys make this game good.

LOL, I did my best Blame.

The cover system is fluid, you don't have to do anything other than walk up to the cover it the character will do it automatically. This is better than a manual cover system as you do not have to press any keys to attach or unattach from cover.

The gun things sounds like a bug, you should report that at ghostrecon.com/beta :o)

[Blame]

2 hours ago, Rocky said:

LOL, I did my best Blame.

The cover system is fluid, you don't have to do anything other than walk up to the cover it the character will do it automatically. This is better than a manual cover system as you do not have to press any keys to attach or unattach from cover.

The gun things sounds like a bug, you should report that at ghostrecon.com/beta :o)

The cover system is fluid yes, but very often it doesn't work at all, you end up staring at the wall instead of end up peeking over it when you engage.

I don't see a problem in having to double tap spacebar to climb or jump and tap it once for cover, like in GR Phantoms.

[Blame]

2 hours ago, Lightspeed said:

Are you trolling or just a ######?

what do you mean? People keep calling me a troll in RaceDepartment, yet all they do is insult and troll me.

Or are cold hard facts too much for a fan...........boy?

Edited February 25, 2017 by Blame

[Zeealex]

Jesus, who knew a game could cause so much infighting...

I like the cover system, and being able to just move in and out without the 'stickiness' getting in the way, it's nice  admittedly the staring at the wall thing is a SLIGHT annoyance, but all you have to do is go out of sights, press W a couple of times then try again. 

The enemy weapon thing sounds like a bug tho, either that or you died or something enemy guns don't stay with you if you die. 

 

[Blame]

1 hour ago, Zeealex said:

Jesus, who knew a game could cause so much infighting...

I like the cover system, and being able to just move in and out without the 'stickiness' getting in the way, it's nice  admittedly the staring at the wall thing is a SLIGHT annoyance, but all you have to do is go out of sights, press W a couple of times then try again. 

The enemy weapon thing sounds like a bug tho, either that or you died or something enemy guns don't stay with you if you die. 

 

I didn't come here to fight, I pointed out a few things I disagree with and what would be better.

Stealth game is kinda weak in the Open Beta, I hope that changes a lot later on, I kind of miss lurking in the shadows with cloak.

[thales100]

Game looks cool and lots of fun to me, as long as I forget about comparing it to GR. 

I will buy it.