Inside Star Citizen: Alpha 4.0 - Conflict Resolution

Transcript — every row opens the video at that moment

1. 00:00:00

   what's the word I'm thinking of murderous it's not M it's like it's it's not like you don't want to say immersive but it's it's visal is probably a bit too much of a a big word it's I'm think engaging I supp tell us what you really think of the back iose engaging is the word right like you're going to get a much more like engaging he doesn't think you know the word visceral people well it's a lot of syllables for a bloke from cry we have a two syllable cat or on from [Music] as the Pyar system is Lawless this means

2. 00:00:52

   that combat can break out anywhere social spaces can turn into combat spaces in the blink of an N the main experience with trying to build is something that feels a bit more like wild and not the typical thing that you've seen in Stanton so the themes are a bit more chaotic than you'd expect so for example if you're shopping and then someone decides to take a firefight with you cuz they think your armor is cool and they want it you can jump over that kiosk sit behind that cover and return fire so you're basically turning this shopping mall which you at previously into a combat zone these spaces were built modularly with various different overlays that had to stitch together but also make sure that it accounted for a fair combat fight and easy navigation for both vehicles and any other the light elements that you want to be able

3. 00:01:39

   to bring to these places as for the trade posts because of their ever shifting inventory of things they could sell could buy things being on display this changes the layout of the Trade Post itself taking everyday objects in the Trading Post like uh weapon terminals something that you would purchase would then as soon as a fight is initiated becomes cover you would be using these things to help yourself to not get shot by the enemy essentially so you could be ducking behind cover behind a ship component that you want to purchase for your ship later but first you got to take care of this rival gang attacking you then afterwards you can decide hey I need to grab a multi-tool for this other Salvage Mission I need to go to so after the firefight is finished he goes to the counter pick up your multitool with a salvage component pay for it Chip's done and off your head out

4. 00:02:30

   taking what we've learned and the setups from Squadron 42 to pyro for example NPCs having specific archetypes and having more specific classes using things like defend areas and keeping NPCs in specific areas pyro we're taking that to the next level where we're having more specific areas used for defenses and things like that and making areas stay in NPCs we're also using something called schedule areas which basically enforces NPCs to stay within a certain vicinity in combat for 4.0 with server meshing we expect higher server frame rates so the idea is you'll get a much more engaging AI experience let's talk about some of those classes we have what we call our techi which typically features light armor and SMGs and they have more aggressive traits so they're focused on getting close to you and flushing you

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   out similar with our CQC class which typically has shotguns and obviously they have the much higher aggression version we've seen us talk about traits citizen on and this is putting that work in the persistent universe and allowing us to create more Dynamic situations we're doing other things as well for example we're making NPCs hold up in runes for shotguns and things like that so when you have to eliminate a specific Target and you're going into a room those guys are specifically holding up there and you're kind of having a tug of warar of them in close quartered environments versus them just kind of walking around the area with our Juggernaut enemy you'll have seen that that's incredibly highly healthed lmg enemy which ignores all shooting restrictions can focus on pushing the player and shooting them out and

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   basically being that slow moving Target that walks towards you similar including things like copons into battle one of the factions has pet copons and copons fight alongside them and that is fantastic because it gives you a different silhouette when you're fighting these factions you know you have to shoot a lot lower you have to be a lot more conscious cuz they're a lot quicker than a human being and just these nice little new additions to combat we're integrating more things in terms of having people who are more aggressive having different factions having different accuracy profiles and making the factions in pyro feeling a bit more versatile and different to when you fight each other these encounters are a lot more crafted and bespoke Pyro is a system of conflict and in there there's many factions vying

7. 00:04:56

   Over Control when you arrive at pyro one of the first thing you want to do is enlist one the two primary factions the head hunters have more tiered structured armor which you can acquire the more higher tiered the armor is the more tanky and resistant those enemies are as a head hunter you might be hovering around the sunset Mesa trying to think of how you're going to get close by you would land your ship under the cover of Darkness you're taking your ground vehicle to The Outpost you're then getting out trying to sneak past the Outer Perimeter and eventually navigating your way down to either the gas tanks or to the main Landing pit itself and finding the exact critical point that would break the entire operation at the scrapyard citizens of prosperity have

8. 00:05:45

   much higher and deadly accuracy they also have more civil Weaponry versus criminal Weaponry as well so you'll see things more like bearings and so on so forth versus other more Lawless factions which typically have things like C arms if you're aligned with a citizens for Prosperity you might be given a mission to go to rustville and actually head down into the canyons and try to steal some of their scrap from their derel ships in the base of the Canyons because of par one's unique terrain where rustville is located you will need to get into your ground vehicle again navigate through all the twisting canyons and Ravines and use your multitool to steal as much scrap as possible to end up sabotaging the Unlimited Supply of scrap that the head hunters at rustville have got so regardless if you side with head

9. 00:06:33

   hunters or citizens of prosperity you'll both be able to fight the zenner threat these hate everybody they are operating out of pyro 2 3 and Pyro 6 the zena threat is more what you'd think of as a PMC in terms of how you fight them and how they behave they're a lot more cautious they're a lot more careful you know they won't try rush out of cover they play a lot more defensively we can use our trait system to inform how how they make combat decisions so where you'd expect someone like the head hunters to be a bit more you know run at you push you out the zena threat characters will be a lot more cautious and stationary and prefer to stay in cover and take long shots and they'll have a much higher accuracy profile but they'll shoot for much shorter durations so they can serve that ammo a lot more a place we're going to fight Zeno

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    threat is at the last ditch settlement on pyro 2 last ditch is another large law settlement we have a town close by it and then different mining operations between the the village and the mining Tower and it's kind of a call back to the history of the system where there was once these Mega corporations in pyro that would do these large scale mining operations it's a vital part in the the Pyro ecosystem for these Outlaw gangs to control so we can also see here that there is fortifications but they're they're mainly around the Village from which these gangs operate but interestingly it's almost built on three levels there's like a main habitation area on top of this Bluff and then just down from that is

11. 00:08:11

    the refinery area and then right at the base of the super large Mega mining structure is a small sort of extraction area in an old kind of Quarry should make for some very interesting fights especially as you move between those sort of three sublocations within the larger location I hope that the player will get a sense of of trying to stop xenot threat with our evil Deeds shadowfall is another zenra Outpost it's quite a large zenra Outpost that lives in the shadow of this mountain on pyro 3 and kind of just sits on the shore of this Lake this location hits different it's uh a location just like the outlaw locations but we can feel that things have been turned up further it is not

12. 00:09:00

    only is it chaos but it is now a structured chaos there's fire and there's these spiked barricades that make up the place around it within the homestad location we have a lot of elevated positions that the player will look and we'll see that there is a lot of like scaffolding buildup and it feels like a fortified position so in 323 we added sniper MPCs to the distribution centers in 4.0 we're going further on that and adding specific watch nests and things like that to keep these snipers in so you'll have to be careful and keep an eye on for these Outpost and these high elevation where snipers could essentially hit you from how a validating combat is ensuring that the players can have a lot more stealthy approach have a lot more overview of what their targets are doing and where they're going so you could use elevation to plan things out such things as a

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    comm's tower such things as Cliff edges you can basically survey over the tray post or The Outpost itself you can look at Key things does it have automated weapon systems there does it have primary second and tertiary pathing to allow the player in it's all about defensive structures about obstructing the player in order to get to its objective with a lot of anti-air turrets littered around the location you are going to need to use your aerial support to take out these defensive measures so that you can even get people close to the location eventually you can pull in your ground Vehicles drop off an Elite Squad you can stealth through the scrapyard you can stealth via the nearby lake come through the derel Outpost section finally clearing out Xeno threat once and for all well until they come back

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    from another Outpost it's definitely a place that will just feel very hostile to the player and you feel like this is a location that has a purpose within the universe and that it's important for these Outlaw gangs to protect what they have going right here in 4.0 you can expect a lot more crafted engaging combat experiences with new archetypes enemies using new weapons fighting animals alongside humans and all sorts of absolute crazy that you expect from pyro eradicate he all right BOS well what more can I add we always knew there'd be a lot of combat in pyro

15. 00:11:25

    but with the addition of more AI archetypes from Squadron and the anticipated performance of improvements generated by server meshing we're hoping to deliver an experience that's more dangerous engaging and heck I'm not from Coventry so I can say it visceral for our players for inside Star Citizen I'm Jared hucke thanks for letting us share the people and process of game development with you and we'll see you all here next week for a look at characters and creatures in 4.0