Thelvyn on 19/3/2007 at 00:28
Perhaps it has been too long since the last teaser. People are desperate to find more information on The Darkmod's progress it would seem. Of course some people will never be happy no matter how much you give them.
Aja on 19/3/2007 at 04:38
Does the Darkmod have protocols for noise masking/overlapping? One problem I've always had with the Thief series is how a guard can pick out Garrett's footsteps in a crowded street, or in a mansion with several other patrolling guards. Unless a guard is hearing constant footsteps behind him, he should assume it's one of his colleagues. Similarly, when the environment is noisy, for instance, if a boiler is running, nothing short of an explosion should alert a guard to Garrett's presence. High noise areas should provide some degree of safety - if the player can't even hear himself, how could a guard be able to?
Ishtvan on 19/3/2007 at 05:13
Quote Posted by Aja
Does the Darkmod have protocols for noise masking/overlapping? One problem I've always had with the Thief series is how a guard can pick out Garrett's footsteps in a crowded street, or in a mansion with several other patrolling guards.
We're hoping to do that, and have some preliminary designs. The hard part is making it work while still maintaining good performance. You have to propagate all those other sounds if you want them to interact in a believable way, and that's more performance intensive than just propagating the player's sounds. There's a lot more higher priority stuff that still has to be done though, so it may or may not make it into the first release.
nomad of the pacific on 19/3/2007 at 09:51
Release! :eek:
Why is it that when I hear a member of the Dark Mod team use the word "release" my heart skips a beat even when the context doesn't imply a time frame? :joke:
ascottk on 19/3/2007 at 16:56
Release . . . release . . . release . . . . . . release :joke:
nomad of the pacific on 19/3/2007 at 20:50
Gasp! Cardiac Arrest! :eww: Builder....
Macsen on 19/3/2007 at 21:32
Quote Posted by Thelvyn
Perhaps it has been too long since the last teaser. People are desperate to find more information on The Darkmod's progress it would seem.
Today they re-coded the polygram chute emittors on the spacial map specular sheen-modules. (Unfortunately not all Dark Mod news is that exciting.)
Printer's Devil on 20/3/2007 at 01:27
What about "tagging" areas with suggestions for AI, Ishtvan? For instance:
{AI enters Street.}
Tag: Its a busy, noisy street. Don't worry unless you see something suspicious.
{AI enters Mansion.}
Tag: Other guards and servants are around. Regular, calm footsteps are friendly. Running is cause for alarm. Beware faint noises or weapon impact sounds!
{AI enters Crypt}
Tag: This place should be empty. All small noises are cause for suspicion. Loud sounds are serious trouble.
And so on. That way, the AI are still only listening for Garrett (or enemy AI), but are "told" how they should react to his noises, depending on the situation. Anyway, just a thought. Keep up the good work.
demagogue on 20/3/2007 at 03:22
I recall this idea also surfacing for whether a guard (which can throw things at an unreachable player), is going to be throwing inside stuff (like bottles) vs outside stuff (like rocks).
But I would think this kind of area tagging could be handled by creative scripting if an author wanted that kind of nuance (which he could then share with other builders), especially since this kind of tagging is practically always going to be pretty customized anyway, to deal with whatever exceptional sitaution of that FM -- is it really "inside" or "outside"? Does a house always lead to being protective (what if a guard is in somebody else's house). Is a crypt always similarly spooky; a mansion always similarly high-end; a street always similarly busy. Speaking of streets, do you have to distinguish sparse high end residential neighborhoods from busy high end civic areas, from sparse poor back allyways, now from busy poor end docks (now 4 possibilities). The same neighborhoods night vs day (now 16); big city vs village (32); business day vs holiday (64), etc, etc.
There's just too much room for variation it seems to me. And trying to cover each situation with a tag may lead to boxes within boxes to cover each kind of exception, and then still be lacking. It's not like EAX where the tags really cover all the possibilities.
So it seems to me that a general utility for area tagging which would have to be so customized for each FM anyway maybe isn't worth the trouble. if builders have to go to all the extra work anyway, just let them script everything they want to whatever degree of specificity they want. But that's just my intuition.
Ishtvan on 23/3/2007 at 00:02
D3 has a "location" system in place already where you can place entitites at portals to divide up your map into a number of distinct areas.
We do have a system in place for defining "location properties", some of which will effect the AI, but exactly which ones we'll have and how they will effect AI is not really firmed up yet. At the very least we'll have levels of security for detecting out of place objects. A mansion guard isn't going to care if a rock is moved on the lawn outside, but they might notice if you go into the master bedroom and knock over all the chairs and leave all the desk drawers open.
We also plan on some concept of "territory", so that guards won't immediately attack you if you're outside of the private area they're guarding. Bafford's had this in T1, if you recall the guards didn't bother you outside.
As for not responding to walking footsteps inside private areas, that might make things a little too easy. It might make sense logically that if the place is bustling with dinner guests, the AI shouldn't notice walking footsteps, but if you handicap the AI too much they just become not challenging. Yes it's unrealistic for the AI to not investigate the walking footsteps of a servant, but to investigate yours, but I think that's just a convention to make the game more challenging.
Ideally we would leave it up to the FM author. We could add another variable for all sounds "suspicion", in addition to volume, and then define a suspicion cutoff on a per-location basis. That's asking a lot for FM authors adding new sounds though.. it's already pretty hard to get the player volume and the AI volume right. :)
IMO it's better to just factor the suspicion in to the volume. Not strictly realistic, because there may be some very suspicious sounds that are still very soft and shouldn't travel very far, but it works so far.
