Suggestions for PS from Double Agent

[VaNilla]

The forum is pretty dead so I thought I'd bump this topic up, it never got discussed as much as I'd have liked. Looking back on this topic now I accept it would be wrong to remove CT's sound reticule, but there's so many good ideas in Double Agent that shouldn't go to waste.

[DreadStunLock]

No shit sherlock, mind mentioning which ones or we meant to read  your mind?

[Cronky]

No shit sherlock, mind mentioning which ones or we meant to read  your mind?

While I wouldn't have worded it like that, he has a point point Stone. 2 pages isn't a lot to look over, but  a summarized version of what you though was some good ideas seems like a good way to start back up a discussion. Especially if some of your opinions of some features have changed in the time since you first made this topic.

Also I didn't play much of DA multiplayer, so I'm not too familiar with what changed.

@Dread - calm down!

[Farley4Fan]

You might find what you're looking for in the original post, Dread/Cronky.   ;)

'Scape moves cuz they're cool.  Favorite one was the overhead backwards ledge grab.  Sliding would be great as well.  I don't think the diving out of windows one is necessary even though it was obviously the one that would win in a manly, hairy, old timey, fisticuffs match against the other escape moves.

I think we can all agree on the all-direction pipe grabbing mechanic.  I think we should come up with a better name for that because it always brings to mind menage a trois involving a plumber or something.

Drones?  Ehh... I don't think they would fit.  I feel like drones were OK in DA because of the size of the maps and numerous places that a frag just could not get to.

Presence Detector?  Boo.  I say stick with the good ole sound reticle.  Surround sound will obviously be allowed, but when crouching there should be no noise made whatsoever.  I think most of us would love to avoid the problems that EAX caused.

Infinite ammunition...  why?  Convservation of ammo only leads to more interesting gameplay.  In fact, I think mercs should get less ammo, and places to restock would become more useful for balancing maps.

I've always liked remote hacking at least as an alternative objective type.  It may have been just a way to simplify and combine the disc objective with the terminal, but you gotta admit that the race back the spy spawn could be pretty exciting.  It was almost like the last orphanage objective but it happened every single match.

And I think I speak for all of us when I demand that we bring back baldness.

[DreadStunLock]

You might find what you're looking for in the original post, Dread/Cronky.   ;)

'Scape moves cuz they're cool.  Favorite one was the overhead backwards ledge grab.  Sliding would be great as well.  I don't think the diving out of windows one is necessary even though it was obviously the one that would win in a manly, hairy, old timey, fisticuffs match against the other escape moves.

I think we can all agree on the all-direction pipe grabbing mechanic.  I think we should come up with a better name for that because it always brings to mind menage a trois involving a plumber or something.

Drones?  Ehh... I don't think they would fit.  I feel like drones were OK in DA because of the size of the maps and numerous places that a frag just could not get to.

Presence Detector?  Boo.  I say stick with the good ole sound reticle.  Surround sound will obviously be allowed, but when crouching there should be no noise made whatsoever.  I think most of us would love to avoid the problems that EAX caused.

Infinite ammunition...  why?  Convservation of ammo only leads to more interesting gameplay.  In fact, I think mercs should get less ammo, and places to restock would become more useful for balancing maps.

I've always liked remote hacking at least as an alternative objective type.  It may have been just a way to simplify and combine the disc objective with the terminal, but you gotta admit that the race back the spy spawn could be pretty exciting.  It was almost like the last orphanage objective but it happened every single match.

And I think I speak for all of us when I demand that we bring back baldness.

I actually like the ammo idea, would even love to experience 4 mags of 60 spare at the start, and 30 in your clip, after that on the depot you would have a choice to either wait till your bar fully replenishes and you get all your mags in, or you can do a quick one, and you just get 2 mags, 1 already in, and 1 spare.

[Pusianka]

there is a nice part in this topic where you talk about stick to the wall thingy which was in most cases useless at least in CT. I THINK!(bravo!) that we could use stick to the wall thingy to walk through thin paths. It was annoying in CT that your collision wasn't changing when you were sticking to the wall, which should have been changing then.

[VaNilla]

You might find what you're looking for in the original post, Dread/Cronky.   ;)

Bingo. The thing I most want to see the most from DA is the dynamic of its pacing. In CT each maps plays at the same sort of pace, it'd be nice to see some map design which really promote fast paced play and some that promote going slowly, things like the animations are just obvious :P

[Asshole]

1. This is a CT remake.
2. DA sucks, that is why nobody plays it anymore

A presence detector is stupid because then you cant sneak behind mercs, all you can do is stay away from them all the time.

Agent is right, PD + no elbow + no shocker gun = super gay (DA).

no PD(good) + no elbow(bad) + shocker(good) = gay too
no PD(good) + elbow(good) + no shocker(bad)= gay
PD(bad) + elbow(good) + shocker(good) = gay

no PD(good) + elbow(good) + Shocker(good) = Great (CT) (The reason why your dumb-ass is registered in this fucking forum in the first place)

All components are important. If you fuck one thing up you screw the whole experience. (just read your own comments on how DA sucked due to accumulation of small fuck ups).

Now stop trying to fuck this game up for once. Its fucked up enough already just because of the fact that it has been like 6 years since it was announced. I think the priority here is for a courtesy beta to be released... Some  respect for the damn fan base please...

[VaNilla]

Why would you register a new account to avoid embarassing yourself? There's some great features in DA regardless of how well it played as its own game.

[knooger]

@Asshole

CT is PT remake - that makes CT so baaaad?

Nobody plays it anymore because ubisoft dumbed down that game so much, mercs haven't got mines etc. spies cannot, eblow and doesn't have tazer.
SCDA has few good improvements over CT eg. escape moves. I enjoyed playing it with some friends but you have keep in your head that's not CT anymore.
Less ammo for merc is good idea, movement should be "fluid" like in SCDA.
We shouldn't care about EAX advantage since it's that standard is killed by OpenAL, Devs shouldn't even waste their time with implementing it into the game.

2. DA sucks, that is why nobody plays it anymore

Now stop trying to fuck this game up for once. Its fucked up enough already just because of the fact that it has been like 6 years since it was announced. I think the priority here is for a courtesy beta to be released... Some  respect for the damn fan base please...

Nobody plays CT anymore, nobody at all.

Don't say about respect since you are creating smurf accounts all over the forums to QQ about SCDA.

@Dreadstunlock
Somebody doesn't feel sarcasm.

[DreadStunLock]

@Knooger, people still play CT, yesterday there was 40 people online.

[SheikTheGeek]

Well Im glad someone is willing to bring up some of the good things about DA instead of just saying "DA sucks."

A lot of what was said in the OP I agree with.

[Vega]

A few points real quick.

1.  For all the little steps forward DA made by improving spy traversal and netcode, it took huge leaps backward with the PD and overall play-style of the game.  This is generally speaking why "DA sucks" because minor patches won't fix a broken game.  At its heart it was a different game that had cut the skill level in half and leaving experienced PT/CT players angry and unsatisfied.  It's like taking chess and replacing it with checkers: both games have merit but the former requires vastly more strategy, skill, and knowledge than the latter.

2.  Spekkio echos my thoughts on the presence of in-game sound. 

3.  The sound detector is a solid idea and is a far better alternative than to a generic presence detector that completely kills the whole idea of stealth.  That being said, sure, it doesn't need to be replica of CT but I felt it worked very well overall.  EAX needs to be dealt with that's for sure.

4.  I say no to unlimited ammo with the merc's gun.  Mercs already had ammo boxes located on the map and they essentially gave the merc unlimited ammo.  The inclusion of limited ammo capacity for a merc makes it more skillful.  If that's not the objective of the game then go for the unlimited ammo scenario.

5.  Sniping could be changed, I agree it's a bit odd but no less deadly. 

[VaNilla]

I think a large part of the learning curve and confusion comes from the fact that the way sound behaves in CT is ill defined. A large part of that comes from the shitty sound engine -- some surfaces can be heard across the map while others can't, and the same surface is heard differently in different maps. Another part of that, though, is that the actions which set off the reticle are never defined in the game manual, and not all the actions are intuitive (taking out the gun with the laser on vs. laser off, for example). That is mostly why I decided to write the noob guide back in the beta days. And yet another problem is that it's an all-or-nothing system -- you either crawl along at a snail's pace and don't set off the reticle, or move quickly and you do. There is no medium, and when the clock is on the merc's side, going that slow all the time so that the merc's can't hear your footsteps in a vent can be a huge detriment.

After looking back at this thread and changing my opinion about the presence detector, this post pretty much sums up my thoughts about CT's sound engine (although not about alarm snares. I still think a modified version of the decoy from DA would be more balanced). The sound detector shouldn't go crazy as soon as a spy moves at anything but a snail's pace. I would actually love to see the sound meter from the Chaos Theory's single player campaign. Imagine if it functioned just like it did in the original game.

As the player moves through the map, the threshold of the sound metre would dynamically change in real time depending on the ambient sound within the area, and/or the range of the sound detector. Anything from gunshots to weather effects and even missle strikes would dynamically change the threshold of the sound metre; this would be represented with a line on the sound meter. Like this.



Spies and Mercenaries would both have the same sound metre on their HUD except for one major difference. While the Spies would use the meter to stay silent, the mercs use the meter to monitor the sound produced by Spies. The sound meter would be used to find reckless spies, while the sound reticule displays where the sound is coming from with arrows (just like CT's multiplayer).

Imagine playing Warehouse from Pandora Tommorow during a winter storm. The rain is splashing against the ground, and the atmosphere is cold and grey, set around 4pm. You can both see and hear the rain in full view outside the warehouse at the spies spawn. This sets the sound metre wild, easily placing the threshold half way up the sound meter. Inside the warehouse the air feels different. The natural light is just as dull as it was outside, but darker under cover of the Warehouse's aging roof. The light parses through tiny white windows on the left side of the Warehouse, and is offset by bright harsh lights throughout the Warehouse. The shadows stick out like sore thumbs, providing ample opportunity for stealthy players to sneak by undetected. The lights inside the first sector flicker into motion as the first player enters the room, be it Spies or Mercenaries. Not only is this very creepy, but also gives either team a quick opportunity to get into position through the cover of darkness. At random intervals lightning strikes; the light flashes through the windows, lighting up the whole sector for a split second. The main lights shut down as the lightning strikes, but quickly flicker back to life 3 seconds later. Imagine sneaking in front of a Mercenary and lining up the perfect takedown, only to be spotted as the Mercenary you've just scared shitless shoots you down! However, despite momentarily losing the cover of shadows, one big advantage for the spies is that these lightning strikes are very loud indeed. The sound threshold flys off the charts, allowing spies the chance to quickly run straight through the map without being heard by the Mercenaries, if only for 1 second as the lightning rumbles away. This is the type of gameplay that could be possible only with the inclusion of a sound meter! I hope this helped you understand my vision for the game.

I think the sound meter would greatly improve the game, as well as significantly balancing the overpowered sound reticule from Chaos Theory. It would also greatly diversify the gameplay, as you wouldn't necessarily have to crawl around the map to remain undetected. Thoughts?

[frvge]

Interesting idea! I like it myself. I'm not sure how we'd do that technically,besides extending UDK with even more custom PS volumes to set some settings. But the idea is nice.