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FreedomArena Community Feedback

Discussion in 'Made With Unity' started by VeganApps, Jan 8, 2007.

  1. VeganApps

    VeganApps

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2006
    Posts:
    263
    Hi Community,

    Maybe some of you noticed the 3DU Contest at idevgames.com and the entry "FreedomArena" by the DynamicGill Team.

    For those who didn't:
    http://freedomarena.dynamichead.net/

    There you find the link to download the 3DU entry and some sketch-like description.
    Please also read the "Dev Plan". There you can see the basic direction we wanna go.

    First of all I want to pronounce that this is not a final game at all yet.
    It's more a pretty early alpha version or prototype.

    -However, we now badly would like to get some freedback from you here.

    Known bugs/errors and the (internal build) status:
    -Music on/off key doesn't work proper the first time -Fixed (last minute bug)
    -The performance (fps) slows down after some playing. -Unknown (probably because nothing is deleted out of the memory yet/Particle emitters are possible reason #1)
    -The turret doesn't automatically aim sometimes -Fixed (caused by the collision boxes of the vehicle/makes the turret blind)
    -The flag is unreachable after loosing the flag while jumping. -Fixed (final flag will be a rigidbody and fall back to the ground)
    -Music is low quality -Fixed (because of the 30 MB filesize limit)
    -Some shaders look not proper on older hardware -Not yet fixed (probably using the wrong shaders)
    -Terrain shadows and some cutting-edges are displayed wrong -Probably fixed
    -Water reflects wrong -Unknown
    -No visible vehicle suspension for the wheels -Not yet fixed. The final version will use enhanced car physics for offroad vehicles.

    Terrain:
    250,000 triangles cut into 128 pieces (~2k triangles per piece).
    Only the visibility is enabled/disabled to get a stable framerate.
    The collision mesh is always active... of all pieces (for the AI).
    To each terrain piece one grass generator script was added.

    The AI:
    Currently I use a very simple solution.
    The AI always drives straight into the direction of interested (flag or gate).
    The final version will use a combination of the current system + highmap + collision raycasts.
    Highmap: To drive around big mountains and aim e.g. ski-jumps.
    Collision raycasts: To drive around e.g. trees.

    Known critique and my comments:
    -Gameplay is not yet very good and nothing special. -Only like 20% of the gameplay features are in yet.
    -Automatic aiming of the turret. Somehow more exciting aiming would be better. -Only the standart gatling-turret will behave so simple. Rocket launcher etc will have an aiming system. However... other suggestions are welcome.
    -The arrow is not visable. -I did this to keep the arrow in the background... that it is only visible if you really want to see it. Had no problems at all to see it. We'll make it more visable though.
    -Have shadows under the vehicle ? -no. Final will have shadows.
    -Too slow on my machine. -As well as on mine... ;) Will be fixed.

    We plan to release the game or at least a pretty final beta mid 2007...
    And I am sure we'll keep you updated here from time to time. :)

    We are also interested in suggestions for unique and interesting terrain themes, stunt objects etc, etc...
    All (technical) suggestions, comments, feedback and features requests are highly welcome. [/url]
     
  2. Mr-Logan

    Mr-Logan

    Joined:
    Apr 13, 2006
    Posts:
    455
    one thing i really miss is a minimap with position of flag and enemies on it,
    but about turret control, it would be cool if you shifted top and bottem viewport, so that the top shows what the turret see's (though in 3rd person view and with crosshair) and the bottem shows what the driver see's in 1st person view.. and you control the crosshair using.

    if you need inspiration for controls, check out goliath: http://www.goliathgame.com/
     
  3. AaronC

    AaronC

    Joined:
    Mar 6, 2006
    Posts:
    3,552
    The music is flaming awesome! Who wrote it?
    Perhaps have camera options inc a wide angle behind car so you can see heaps of the scene?
    AC
     
  4. antenna-tree

    antenna-tree

    Joined:
    Oct 30, 2005
    Posts:
    5,324
    For me there are some definite performance issues with this game so far. It runs like a slideshow on my 1.25 GHZ PBG4 at the lowest settings possible.

    I'm not sure what's slowing it down... maybe physics? The one thing that pops out to me though is that you're breaking your terrain into so many pieces. A 250,000 poly terrain maybe shouldn't be broken up quite so much (you say 128 pieces at roughly 2k a piece). Maybe since you keep the collisions on for each piece regardless of whether the mesh is being rendered or not is slowing things down? I'd experiment with breaking it up into less pieces if it's possible.
     
  5. nickavv

    nickavv

    Joined:
    Aug 2, 2006
    Posts:
    1,801
    Runs very bad on my 700 Mhz G4. But it looked okay. :?
     
  6. Mr-Logan

    Mr-Logan

    Joined:
    Apr 13, 2006
    Posts:
    455
    oh, btw ran smoothly on my duelcore 3ghz with geforce 7800 gt 2gb ram :roll:
     
  7. drJones

    drJones

    Joined:
    Oct 19, 2005
    Posts:
    1,351
    the game has got a great look going ( runs good on my intel iMac on all but the highest settings), but one thing that is sorely missing IMO is manual weapon control.

    however you want to do it, i think at the very least the option should be there.
    you could have WASD move the vehicle the mouse move a firing crosshair around the view. or have it where you can snap into weapon view let autopilot take over to wipe out any baddies that come up behind you (that would be awesome IMO).

    it would be nice to see a homing rocket upgrade that kinda works like a jet hud, get your enemy within a certain range in front of you it locks on.

    you could have some auto fire powerups that attach to the rear of the vehicle or something, but not being able to fire the main weapon is just letting a script have all the fun ; )

    one other suggestion, the hills are great but you should have some nice semi flat areas with the ability to really pick up alot of speed.

    very well done so far.
     
  8. Cav

    Cav

    Joined:
    Aug 2, 2006
    Posts:
    93
    runs like a slideshow on my 1.67 powerbook G4 too...even on the low settings. Couldnt manage enough 'gameplay' to get a good opinion on how it plays...

    looks like it could be cool tho, any chance of a slicker version?
     
  9. VeganApps

    VeganApps

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2006
    Posts:
    263
    Thx for the feedback! :D

    shalow:
    -minimap: We will add that.
    -turret&aiming: We will most likely change the aiming. I guess the 360° aiming will be replaced with a only-forward-aiming and the turret-view will be replaced with a minimap. The turret-view causes too much problems and irritations. Like this the aiming will be a lil bit more challenging and interesting.
    Other weapons, you can unlock while the game, like a rocket launcher will even have a aiming system like known from air-air-missles in starship or jet games.
    We were also thinking about aiming like in the Battlefield gaming series... but the game will be too fast and the terrain too hilly to aim without any computer-aided system. Tests showed that.
    The normal view will be 3rd person... but it will also be possible to switch to first-person-view.
    However... the first person view will be more something for advanced gamers.

    Thx for the inspiration link. I didn't know about this game at all. The idea for FreedomArena was mostly instired by 1nsane from Codemasters. It has brilliant physics for the year 2001 imo.
    Another inspiration was Interstate '82. A Battlefield Modification. Also a great game. I loved to drive the Delorean. *dreams*

    Targos:
    The music was made by Tommy. Visit http://www.duendenova.com. A friend since years. :)
    I guess he will join us here when OTEE releases Unity for the Windows platform. :wink:
    Not sure what you mean with your second question - sorry.

    aNTeNNa trEE:
    Physics are not the reason for the slowing-down imo.
    We tried only one piece. And beside that it needed 30+ minutes (collision-mesh) to import it into Unity it also run very unstable. When the car was located at one end of the terrain looking to the other end the framerate dramatically broke in. Even with a small camera view distance.
    Broken into pieces I wrote a script to manage the visibility for each piece and the framerate got pretty stable.
    Since I added the particle emitters and the walls the framerate breaks in after some time.
    I guess I just have to delete the emitters when out of view and attach them when close enough to view them.
    A other thought was that the grass script caused this behavior... -but not at all. The grass script even works brilliant if it is attached to more than one terrain or 128... -All tests to optimize it somehow only slowed it down.

    drJones:
    Players would flame us. Internal tests showed that you nearly hit nothing but the ground with a manual weapon control. And also: How you want to balance this proper ? -I think the Player and the AI should have the same chance and use the same scripts...
    However... We'll think about that and try to do it as good as possible to provide beginners and also advanced gamers a nice game.

    Jet HUD will be added.

    I made the level"design" (the terrain-mesh only)... -Jeff will do it for the final. And I am sure there will be also some semi flat areas... though not very much.

    Cav:
    Next alpha will be slicker and run more stable.
    The grafics will be pretty A... so I guess some computers will saddly just be too slow for this game... but we'll try what we can to speed it up. Definitely. :)
     
  10. AaronC

    AaronC

    Joined:
    Mar 6, 2006
    Posts:
    3,552
    _Timo
    I was suggesting a "toggle Camera" Function So you can be way back from the car-still smooth following, with camera angle wide to see a wide scope? If you have looked at my entry you'll see a camera options gui which applies when driving as well as 3rd/1st person.
    AC
     
  11. drJones

    drJones

    Joined:
    Oct 19, 2005
    Posts:
    1,351
    i can definitly understand with your hilly terrain how it would be difficult to have full manual control (now that i think about it i was rarely SEEING the other bots with how steep close together the hills are - so point taken ; )

    i guess in the context of your game, if your levels are all going to have that sort of geometry and if your camera is to stay that close, IMO there should be at least some sort of partial manual control with the weapons, if not full mouse control. how to do this where there is some satisfying interaction that's not too frustrating i don't know. but if you leave too much of it to a script for me at least that would be frustrating as well.
     
  12. Mr-Logan

    Mr-Logan

    Joined:
    Apr 13, 2006
    Posts:
    455
    Inspiration just dawned on me...
    or maybe its just becouse its long past midnight...

    How about a manual automatic hybrid aiming system,

    The will be the primary weapon and everything els will be secondary weapons that you dont have as much control over.

    You move the mouse around to control the crosshair that at all times stays more or less at the middle of the screen, when the crosshair is close to an enemy vehicle the aiming computer activates and helps the player aim at some point slightly infront of the enemy car, the player still has to press shoot though, and is still capable of controlling the crosshair but as soon as he stops moving the mouse or only moves it slightly the aiming computer aims the crosshair at the closest enemy vehicle (if there are any close to the crosshair at that point).
     
  13. VeganApps

    VeganApps

    Joined:
    Jun 30, 2006
    Posts:
    263
    Thanks for the feedback again.
    I love all your ideas and suggestions. :D

    Targos:
    Good point. Now I got it what you meant. This feature is a must. :)

    drJones:
    Yeah. True. We will test this a bit and in some weeks we'll hopefully come up with the next alpha-demo.
    I guess the player will have to just aim with the car-direction and the turret or weapon only hits/locks automatically if the angle is smaller than ~5° difference.

    shalow:
    That's a neat idea... really.
    Maybe the automatic aiming is limited to like +/-5°. If the player doesn't want to aim this is how it works.
    If the player wants to use the mouse and aim manually he/she can rotate the turret (additionally to the standart +/-5° automatic) for another +/-10°.
    Like this advanced player could aim targets up to 15° difference to the car direction.
    Yay!

    aNTeNNa trEE:
    Thanks for the physics hint. We indeed did a mistake with the terrain handling and the physics/rendering. The physics or the rendering seem to have slowed down the terrain when we had the 250k triangle mesh in only one piece. Since we cut the mesh into pieces this bad behavior is gone... even without the optimization-script. D'oh. -Good that we talked about it. :)
    However... tests are still running.

    EDIT: first post -> homepage URL updated
    Project frozen...