10 for the Producers: Episode 06 (2015.05.04)

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:00

   [Music] hi everybody and welcome back to another episode of 10 for the producers I flying solo today I've just returned from Denver Colorado while Chris is now out in uh eing London so we're here for another episode of 10 for the brers but this time we're going to focus on the first person shooter cuz I know while I've been out there I've seen the community post a lot of people have a lot of questions so we're going to answer nothing but FPS questions today and again thank you very much to all of our subscribers that make a program like this possible make it possible for me to sit here and and answer your questions so uh let's Dive Right In without further Ado our first question comes to us from FAL Coran FAL Coran asks will you be able to have the choice to play

2. 00:00:47

   solo against NPCs like an arena Commander or is the FPS multiplayer only the answer on that is on first release the FPS is going to be multiplayer only there will be two game modes on two different Maps team elimination which is 8v8 and SATA ball which is 16 V16 these are the targets at least um there are very much plans because something uh that is a critical part of Squadron 42 is that we have ai working for FPS combat obviously so as we work towards that goal for squadron 42 we will be releasing game modes for the FPS much like vuel swarm which are uh FPS versus AI that you can engage in both solo and cooperatively so the idea is there to implement that but it will not be in the first release that's something

3. 00:01:34

   we're building towards right now so next question comes from Jeff that was surprisingly simple name Jeff asks will we be able to land and make the transition from dog fighting to FPS in a single match before the persistent Universe releases or rather are there going to be any Maps where both flying and running are about as important the answer is yes before the persistent universe releases we will be having maps that include both groundbased uh first-person shooter combat as well as ships and traversing from one to the other to accomplish the goals of that map one of the things we've talked about historically in the road map is that we're going to be doing this initial FPS release to kind of get the mechanics and nail down and kind of work a little bit in a bubble so that we test it all out we get it working and then from there we're going to be

4. 00:02:21

   releasing multi Cru ships sometime after the social module once we have multic creu ships and FPS combat working we're going to move to bring the two together and what we've always called like Arena Commander version 3.0 which is capture the Idris so we had the idea of having a giant Idris is one of the main objectives of the map and two teams of Fighters that would be able to well Fighters and multi cruise ships that would be able to fight over it take control of it and pilot it so that is what we're building towards and all of that will be before uh you know the full version of the persistent Universe has been released so the answer is yes all right so our next question comes to us from commodore I'm really interested in learning how much players will be able to interact with your immediate environment as any such elements as both depth and skill to the module will we

5. 00:03:09

   see the use of controlled explosions from grenades or even fire extinguishers to help Propel players and NPCs in various directions or perhaps even launch objects at an oncoming enemy so yeah the answer is yes we we actually have a lot of interaction with the environment it's one of the things that's very cool about the FPS cuz you know again like so much of what we do what we're doing in this one module applies to the universe at L it's like a an R&D and test bed for what we're going to be doing in the rest of the persistent universe so for example on gold Horizons which is one of the maps it's kind of a know James Cameron alien-esque feeling space station you walk into the cafeteria for example and if you throw an EMP grenade in there it detonates and you can see as the pulse wave goes out all the lights along will shatter all the screens will go and you'll end up darkening the entire room so you can sneak in there if you want to

6. 00:03:57

   um so there's a lot of interesting ways that you can interact with the environment you can turn on and off gravity on the gravity generators you can open and close doors ammo boxes uh you can gez I'm trying to think what else there's vating mantling you can slide into cover so there's a lot of different ways that you as a player both uh from a game-changing perspective but also just animation and kind of immersion in the world movement uh really interact with the environment um and that's only going to get more so I mean you talk about fire extinguishers to help Propel the player and interestingly one of our weapons that's a bit unique is we have a force propulsion grenade which is essentially just a a concussive blast wave that's meant to propel players and it imparts a physics push on all the players and with the new articulated entity ragd doll system depending on where it hits and how much force it has at that distance

7. 00:04:45

   from the grenade it'll impart a different level of push back and so while it may seem like kind of a lame grenade when you're like okay I could throw a frag grenade or I could throw a force propulsion grenade when you're in zero g it becomes super effective which is really fun to see so there's that kind of dynamicism dynamicism I think I might have made up a word there but it's that kind of dynamic behavior that makes the the module so interesting and so much fun and and seeing how that would play out in the persistent universe is really fun too all right so on to the next question comes to us from allergic to bullets will we have the option to change out equipment and armors on the release of the module if so what can we expect to see so there another good question uh one of the game modes we've talked about is team elimin on the gold Horizon's map we were just discussing um we have the

8. 00:05:33

   concept of there being two teams uh the Marines and the Outlaws AKA Pirates AKA Naro Wells uh they have a selection of armor to choose from each so there's a light medium and heavy armor for each team which looks completely different and is themed in stats to their distinct Behavior we also have a variety of weapons sub machine gun assault rifle laser assault rifle Electric shotgun sniper rifle frag grenades EMP grenades Force propulsion grenades area denial systems uh jeez anyways lots of things uh I can't remember all the top of my head uh oh and the burst Cannon which is my personal favorite uh cuz I shot a QA guy in the face with that and when all the little bursty Parts exploded he crashed it was like the ultimate kill um

9. 00:06:22

   so yes there is a lot of different options and that's all just for the vzer release um so the VZ release will include all these different weapons and armor types what we're going to do for the V1 release is we're going to be including things like the attachment system so I actually get to use my props so you know things like this you'd be able to put a scope on there if you're choosing will have a variety of different Scopes you can put your forgrip or forward assist grip on there if you want um different kinds of barrels silencers all that and that's all planned to be in the attachment system for V1 so thank you for that question so our next question comes to us from Steve Hunter could you briefly describe how fatigue will work in the FPS especially with respect to the different armor loadouts so the concept of fatigue much like in other games is kind of a stamina the health of your character right so depending on the size

10. 00:07:10

    of your Loadout out and the size of your armor it encumbers you so if you are in your light armor with a limited load out as you run along you will end up being able to Sprint and have Sprint further have better stamina that also means that when you come to a stop and you go into the aim down sights you'll be less out of breath so you'll have less Bob and you'll be a little bit more stable as you move up to medium and heavy as you might imagine as you become more encumbered it's easier for you to become out of breath you can see it on your visor as it steams up and you'll see it too as you come to a rest it'll take you longer to settle if you're more out of breath so that's the way the I would say the the broad Strokes of the way that the stamina system works and how it's affected by your load out as well as the armor that you choose um and there's lots of little Nuance things that happen

11. 00:07:58

    in there how you react to recoil how your gun moves um that you will get to see and appreciate once you play the module our next question comes to us from Crow with the recently announced intent to switch to a physics based damage of projectile system will player clothing SL armor be modeled based on the materials that make them up so that actual location of the projectile hit on the body zones matters in determining protection penetration Etc will a well-placed shot at a joint where two armor plates come together cause the player more damage will armor repairs be as common as ship damage repairs same overall approach in system or will we just be discarding our clothing and armor if it becomes too damaged so it's a a very good question uh very detailed question and I have a kind of somewhat detailed answer for you

12. 00:08:46

    so bear with me yes as we move to the physics based damage of projectiles we will be doing that for energy weapons as well as ballistic weapons there's a variety of factors that will affector into how much uh kinetic energy is actually applied at the impact point we also have the concept on the ships which we will apply to the characters that it will check on the physics proxy that it hits duck down and see what material is applied to the thing that is the the proxy is for so say for example on this gun if we had a physics proxy to keep you from hitting on this rail so your character would impact it that is then tied to what is the material of this which is like this yellow plastic that yellow plastic in the material effects table would have its own set of stats that would say I absorb this much kinetic energy before I allow things to pass through uh it takes this amount to

13. 00:09:34

    penetrate me all of these different factors that would then further allow the bullet to pass or Not Pass based off of the energy of the weapon and the uh the ability of the surface to deflect that energy if it passes through it would then hit whatever is next in line or in the case of a character likely your skin and then apply damage as it would to your skin so yes that is something that's really cool that falls out of the system is that we do all these material lookups and then can determine where exactly you've hit or at least what material you've hit and then allow the bullet to pass through and adjust all the physical properties of the bullet which then in turn adjust the damage so it's something that comes out of the system for free and it's also something that is super dynamic because as we allow you to change your ammo types so you could have a weapon that

14. 00:10:21

    you change the barrel on and then you change the ammo for it you'll actually feel it behave differently if you get a different kind of armor made of a different material you'll feel it behave differently and because the materials are set on a per item basis it will allow you to do things like shooting to a weak point so all of that coming out of one system is really cool but that's one of the things that Chris is uh really good about is thinking about these things in a systemic nature um which is what lends itself to a lot of the emergent gameplay that we have in Arena Commander so we want to bring that to the FPS as well all right next question is Plastics Plastics asks what factors were considered when designing the FPS arenas specifically in relation to the intendent style and pace of the game for example games like Call Call of Duty or Counter Strike often force people into specific bottlenecks and experienced

15. 00:11:09

    players learn to anticipate the most likely attack strategy or will the design of starmarine encourage more free form and unexpected strategies for both sides um so it's it's a combination of both actually I think choke points and and focus for areas is important in map design this is something I really wish I was back at in Denver so we could talk to Rodney about cuz Rodney is our lead designer and he's very uh he's very conscious of map design one of the things that's very important to him and important to us is that we we don't design maps that can be used for a multitude of game modes so like in the most recent Call of Duty you might see oh it's the same map but you can play all 10 game modes on it and there's some very light changes to it but we're really big on the idea of Designing the entire flow of the map to support one specific game mode because there's a lot of little Nuance things that you can

16. 00:11:57

    change and adjust that maybe work for one game mode but don't work for another so for example if I think about uh gold Horizons for example the two starting areas are opposing one another so that's pretty standard okay sure um there's about one two three three and then immediately four alternate routes that you can take to engage one another so it keeps too much of the bottleneck from happening and too much of the focus from happening when you get into those next rooms there's a lot of verticality to them so you can go up down left right and Al makes it cool for Zerg again because there's a zerg generator in there so there are a lot of options in a lot of Open Spaces but also narrow corridors so what's fun is that if you for example kit yourself out with a light Marine with a light load out but you're super quick you can actually run

17. 00:12:47

    down go around get into the main call it the main Warehouse area uh on the bottom floor and usually get up before people who are in the heavier armor have gotten out from the base so there's a lot of different depending on who you are and how you K yourself out and how you like to play and how if you want to be stealthy if you want to be tanky uh there's different roots that are kind of more conducive to that style and you can do whatever you want it just is uh it's interesting the way the dyamics play it's it's really a lot of fun to play to I honestly I can't wait to release it for you guys so you guys can check it out and you don't have to ask these questions you can just play it for yourself um our next question comes from agrom magnet agrom magnet asks three questions s actually but I'm going to answer them rapid fire they're all pretty good will there be any Variety in the character models yet or during the

18. 00:13:35

    first release are we going to be the stereotypical white guy uh no you will be the stereotypical British guy because it will include a face scan of a British guy so there you go that's answer number one number two is version 1.2 where we will see all the improved animations make its way into the hanger module yes upon the release of the FPS which internally we call 1.2 that is when you make their way into the hanger module number number three performance-wise how demanding is star Marine is it easier or harder to run than Arena Commander well right now harder to run because that's not done yet um but hopefully it'll be about commensurate but there definitely is a lot more you're pushing a lot more polyes you're pushing a lot more particle effects and you're a lot more uh Geo density on Star marinees so it will be slightly more uh more demanding on your graphics card I

19. 00:14:23

    think all right next question comes from Siberian K says I'll try to make it short pointy what is your strategy for handling the inevitable player population explosion with the release of the FPS Alpha will your Dynamic Cloud infrastructure and team be ready for this I'll make my answer short as well which is we really hope so because we're one of the things we're doing is rebuilding the matchmaking system the global instance manager and moving to this entirely Cloud solution that we've talked about in the past that will be premiering with the FPS so it will either go gloriously or it won't go well and we'll be on the PTU for a little while um but we'll see I mean that's kind of the magic of this right that's the art of this is that as soon as we finish this new development because I

20. 00:15:11

    think we all agree that we want to improve our multiplayer stability in our matchmaking uh we'll put it out there and we'll test it with you guys and we'll see how well it works and if it works great great if it doesn't we'll improve it and we'll get it working so that's that uh okay our last question comes to us from amoto do you plan on releasing weapons developed by either the Shon vuel or bonu or maybe some kind of a hybrid technology like we've seen in the freelancer so the answer to that question is yes absolutely um in the future so for the first release it's all human uee weapons as we move forward we'll begin introducing new weapons manufacturers we want the manufacturers of the weapons to be as distinctive as the ships both in their designs and their function and so as we develop out

21. 00:16:00

    these manufacturers and we give them a wider kit of weapons we'll give a little more background on them some lore on them and we'll start incorporating things like like you have with the moushi industrial starflight concern where they have elements of Shion technology or elements of bonu technology so it's just a matter of working out the lore working out the designs both from A Creative Design standpoint and also a gameplay design standpoint um but once we get there yeah it's absolutely something we'd love to do I mean it's one of the fun things about MK ships is that they have those influences uh as we'll see in the Reliant coming up anyways that's all for today thank you very very much to all of you who make this possible both the subscribers who make it possible for me to interface with you guys in this way um and answer these questions but also to the whole

22. 00:16:47

    Community who makes it possible for all of us to sit here and work on this game it is a true uh blessing for all of us to be able to work on this and we all really enjoy it a great deal and we look forward to making this game that we all want to play together and we can't wait till we're able to release the FPS module for everybody so that we can all play it and get everybody's feedback so thank you again cheers and uh I'll see you next time hey guys thanks for watching um temp for the chairman uh if you guys would like to uh see more episodes go here if you guys would like to subscribe to our YouTube channel and always keep up to date with all our video content go here and uh if you guys would like to watch episodes of R the verse go here

23. 00:17:36

    please and I will see you in the verse