Thirith on 10/10/2022 at 13:14
I thought that the original Deus Ex did that reasonably well, in ways that felt fair and transparent. If you're not good with a gun, you'll see that your bullet might end up anywhere within the crosshair area. Your skill determines how quickly and how much the crosshair shrinks and how much it wanders. As a result, you either had to take the risk or get closer or use a scope or aim at the torso (higher chance of hitting the target, low chance of a one-hit kill) or use a different approach altogether.
EvaUnit02 on 11/10/2022 at 02:44
Quote Posted by Thirith
I thought that the original
Deus Ex did that reasonably well, in ways that felt fair and transparent. If you're not good with a gun, you'll see that your bullet might end up anywhere within the crosshair area. Your skill determines how quickly and how much the crosshair shrinks and how much it wanders. As a result, you either had to take the risk or get closer or use a scope or aim at the torso (higher chance of hitting the target, low chance of a one-hit kill) or use a different approach altogether.
In Deus Ex's context where you're an elite intelligence agent (or Mass Effect 1's, where you're elite military special forces), the RPG mechanics being applied to the SKILL OF AIMING A GUN made no sense. The sequels making their gameplay more accessible by defenestrating those particular mechanics actually benefited the setting immersion, IMO.
catbarf on 11/10/2022 at 18:50
Quote Posted by nicked
That's no better though, because then you've got the massive disconnect between player action and results when everything's actually using dice rolls in the background. It's fine on pen and paper to have skill partially determined by a dice roll because your imagination fills in the abstraction. If you make a videogame with FPS mechanics, as a player, I expect my own skill at FPS games to be the deciding factor. It always feels rubbish to miss a shot due to a dice roll when your cursor was over the target's head.
I'm personally okay with an RPG using stats/skills to affect things like damage and crit chance, rather than arbitrarily missed shots like Morrowind. Malf's more criticizing the looter-shooter element where you're picking up a new gun every fifteen minutes because your old one is obsolete, which is a gameplay element on top of your actual player attributes affecting how effective those guns are.
Besides, you can also leverage RPG stats in the implementation of common FPS mechanics. Weapon sway, ADS time, hipfire accuracy, recoil, and reload speed can all be tied to player attributes without layering anything 'artificial' over top.
Malf on 12/10/2022 at 15:00
Quote Posted by catbarf
I'm personally okay with an RPG using stats/skills to affect things like damage and crit chance, rather than arbitrarily missed shots like Morrowind. Malf's more criticizing the looter-shooter element where you're picking up a new gun every fifteen minutes because your old one is obsolete, which is a gameplay element on top of your actual player attributes affecting how effective those guns are.
Besides, you can also leverage RPG stats in the implementation of common FPS mechanics. Weapon sway, ADS time, hipfire accuracy, recoil, and reload speed can all be tied to player attributes without layering anything 'artificial' over top.
Pretty much, yeah.
Although going full-on netrunner allows you to bypass almost all gunplay. My past couple of runs, including my current one, I've sequence-broken early on, going off-piste as soon as I've been allowed, and it's made possible by two things which aren't in-line with the looter-shooter gear system.
1: Going almost exclusively netrunner allows you to take out everything in the initial, locked-off north-western part of the map with no issues and no guns. It only builds in power, and by the time you've exhausted all of the missions available to you in that part of the map, you'll be wiping out entire locations using just Breach, Ping and Contagion.
2: It doesn't matter how many levels an enemy is above you, if you can get behind them without being seen, you can take them out (apart from enemies specifically designed not to be taken out this way).
And these really highlight how useless the looter-shooter gear system really is. Takedowns will
always work, while a shot to the head isn't guaranteed to. Netrunning will always work too, even on harder targets like Cyberpsychos.
But I'm not sure the game has AI advanced enough to support combat that relies solely on its mechanics rather than running a treadmill of ever more powerful guns.
And maybe that's really the reason so many games (FPS or otherwise) have adopted these mechanics. Difficulty is easier to regulate through gear than through being able to design and program advanced, yet fair, AI.
And now that I think about it, I think the last FPS-style game that really put effort in to enemy AI that I played and could tell that was the case was probably FEAR. Although, please feel free to remind me of other games with notable AI if this seems hyperbolic (I mean yes, Crysis is widely lauded as having good AI, but to be honest, it didn't wow me as much as FEAR.)
Most encounter design in games these days seems to all be about rock, paper, scissors and pattern recognition.
heywood on 12/10/2022 at 15:22
Quote Posted by EvaUnit02
In Deus Ex's context where you're an elite intelligence agent (or Mass Effect 1's, where you're elite military special forces), the RPG mechanics being applied to the SKILL OF AIMING A GUN made no sense. The sequels making their gameplay more accessible by defenestrating those particular mechanics actually benefited the setting immersion, IMO.
The way Deus Ex handled shooting skills makes sense to people who have real shooting experience. The only immersion breaking mistake was not starting you out as Trained on Pistol and Rifle skills, as any rookie UNATCO agent would be. But even that is defensible as a player choice.
catbarf on 13/10/2022 at 15:06
Quote Posted by Malf
And now that I think about it, I think the last FPS-style game that really put effort in to enemy AI that I played and could tell that was the case was probably FEAR. Although, please feel free to remind me of other games with notable AI if this seems hyperbolic (I mean yes, Crysis is widely lauded as having good AI, but to be honest, it didn't wow me as much as FEAR.)
Yeah, FEAR set a high mark that I don't think I've seen reached since. But in fairness to Cyberpunk, Crysis, and other (relatively) open-world games, FEAR's AI involves a lot of smoke and mirrors, and relies heavily on intelligent map design and deliberately tight environs. It's been a while since I studied it, but IIRC AI actors can trigger each other to play voice lines (eg an actor that has just started to move will trigger a nearby actor to verbally give it the order to move), and they move a lot more than typical shooter AI, which gives the impression that they're deliberately flanking the player even though it's essentially just the unplanned result of moving to the next piece of cover. When you do fight in more open spaces in FEAR, I find the illusion starts to break down a bit, even though there is a lot of sophistication to how the AI coordinates as a team and learns from what isn't working.
Also, I'm not sure it's a given that players actually
want smarter AI. AI that's smart enough that you can't easily 'game' it is unpredictable, and unpredictability makes it a difficult challenge to 'solve'. Some genres are better for that than others; strategy benefits from smart, human-like AI, but a Thief game with guards that behaved like real people rather than predictable automatons could be frustrating. Predictable AI that facilitate pattern-recognition and rock-paper-scissors gameplay as you put it keeps that Skinner box going for the lowest common denominator of players. Cyberpunk's AI is pretty damn dumb, but there doesn't seem to be much market demand for AI beyond the level of, say, Halo, where the enemies respond to the player but don't coordinate or learn. Probably doesn't help that AI is much harder to market than graphics or gunplay.
But yeah I would also love to hear if there are any games in the last two decades I've missed that capture that same sort of magic. It almost seems to me like developers that want players to feel challenged in that way just end up making PVP games.
heywood on 13/10/2022 at 15:57
Monolith set the bar high early. Even the NOLF games have AI that holds up reasonably well by today's standards.
I won't speak for others, but the combat AI in most of today's single player games is probably good enough for me. It's the interactions with neutral and friendly NPCs that tend to make or break immersion. Cyberpunk's AI is disappointing in this regard, but it's not unusual for an open world game. That's kind of why I've gotten away from playing them.
Malf on 17/10/2022 at 11:04
Another interesting thing with my current playthrough:
When I initially played the game, I was running Windows and an RTX2080 Super.
I'm still running that same card, but on Linux, and Linux/Wine doesn't currently support DX12 raytracing.
So I'm playing sans RT and to be honest?
I don't miss it.
Framerates are constantly high and smooth, and without having an RT image to compare it to concurrently, the game still looks great. In fact, it's making me question how much difference RT really made to the game in the first place.
Is it possible that RT is the new stereoscopic 3D and just a gimmick?
I strongly suspect so.
When cards come down to sensible levels again, I'll certainly be paying less attention to RT performance when I look at replacing mine.
And as I've discovered RT is far less important to me, I suspect that means this card will last me at least an extra year or more than it would if RT were still important to me.
Thirith on 17/10/2022 at 12:42
I don't think that RT is a must-have, but neither do I think it's a gimmick. I don't think we're there yet, but I expect that some degree of RT will be the standard by 2025. I have to admit that virtual spaces where light acts as it does in the real world appeal to me, much like having objects react physically as they would in the real world did back when Max Payne 2 came out. Being able to stand in front of a reflective surface and seeing people and cars reflected in it even though they're not on the screen lends the same kind of tangibility to me as boxes that go flying when I run through them. And I've definitely become much more aware of the shortcomings of screen-space reflections.
EvaUnit02 on 6/9/2023 at 11:00
Would love to play Phantom Liberty, but I'll be playing Starfield. Bad time to release CRPG content.
Inline Image:
https://files.catbox.moe/yo7y7v.jpgQuote:
As revealed on Cyberpunk 2077's social media accounts, the free content included in Update 2.0 will deliver a number of quality-of-life improvements: a new police system, vehicle combat, car chases, and a number of changes to loot, items, and crafting will be added, as well as redesigned skill trees and perks, improvements to the UI and UX, better AI combat, a new capacity system, and revamped cyberware — plus new radio stations to listen to when creating chaos in Night City!
As for Phantom Liberty, players who purchase the upcoming expansion will see their level cap increased to 60 and will have the opportunity to experience a fresh storyline with new characters, quests, gigs, boss fights, and more in the brand-new Dogtown district. Over 100 new items will be available, and dynamic events like vehicle missions and airdrops will give you a chance to put the new vehicle missile launchers to good use.
(
https://www.trueachievements.com/n54915/cyberpunk-2077-free-premium-content-phantom-liberty)