The island - living or abandoned?

[CarlGustaffa 4]

How much alive should the island feel like from the vanilla game? Are we mission makers too lazy to implement sense of a living place, is it too cumbersome, or is it only a matter of memory and performance?

There was a completely awesome addon for Arma1 that really added a lot of ambiance to the world, for the most part using sounds, lights, and particles (sorry, the name of the mod evades me atm). I've missed such a mod for both Arma2 and OA, very dearly.

The island comes with some light poles and sounds on the oil pumps, but that's pretty much it. Even missions like ColtanBlues adds trigger based sounds the old fashioned way (manually placed triggers). In downloaded missions this isn't something I notice a lot of. Every place you go, there is utter darkness. Hangars are dark, despite numerous lights in the ceiling. Same with barracks and airport control tower. No chanting at the mosks, no electrical humming, no sounds from running Warfare buildings, silenced factories - it's like the area has been deserted for decades.

I'm capable to adding sounds and lights (lights are bad, but not my fault, some weird engine restrictions I guess) automatically to the whole island, but its a bit tricky especially if you want to remove them, due building destruction or whatever. Now, I do like to be in full control, but as mentioned it requires quite a bit of work and scripting effort.

So what do you think?

[maddogx 13]

Option #1. I'd rather the mission maker is fully in charge.

[CameronMcDonald 146]

I'd like to see as many modules (for lights, ambient civvies, smoke, vehicles, etc) as possible, but if you open up the vanilla island without any action, it should be as dead as a doornail.

[-)rStrangelove 0]

Abandoned with scripts would be a good thing. Nevermind the bugs, you cant escape them anyway, fixed setting or not. :D

I get the same feeling when walking around in ArmA, its all dead quiet. Adding life into a mission is what most ppl dont see as a priority therefore i guess its often lacking believability. It takes additional time for mission maker and thats a bad thing when you finished something after a whole month of work - you want to get it out asap to get feedback. Also, adding life adds fps strains on top of what you already have in your mission.

Nevertheless it's an important atmosphere booster. Whenever i ride along in RedDeadRedemption on my PS3 i cant help but being amazed how beautiful the landscape & life sim is. ArmA could learn a thing or 2 from Rockstar.

[Alex72 1]

If the island is living then it will be hard to make a mission where the island should be "dead". Im not really a pro in the editor but i do know how to add lights and sounds.

If BIS have the time then maybe a set of modules to switch on "life" would be the ultimate solution. Like we have now in ARMA2 with civilian module and animal module. Also a module that switch on sounds for all parts of the island if thats wanted by the mission maker. Or even such a thing could be made by the community possibly.

I think i'd like it to be proper sandbox. That we should be able to turn on/off the ambience of the world so there are more diversity to the mission making.

[andersson 285]

Abandoned, but with modules to make it come to life. Please.

[Tonmeister 14]

#2. There should be modules for populating both land and sea elements

[NeMeSiS 11]

Abandoned, but with modules to make it come to life. Please.

This.

[wolfbite 8]

Like arma 3 ... dead.. Until I put civ module...

[evilnate 0]

Just as it is, let it be in the hands of the mission designers.

[msy 22]

As the campaign will be designed based on sand box, I think there should be some civilian element.

For two similar games: STALKER and FAR CRY 2, the former has some neutral NPCs which can be your friends or enemies, but the later has only enemies and specific friends no civilians or nertral. I like much more STALKER than FAR CRY 2.

Edited June 15, 2011 by msy

[paragraphic l 2]

The Armed Assault mod was ECS right? http://www.ecsteam.online.fr

I dearly miss something like that in ArmAII, if done correct most sounds can be standard and sounds like chanting in mosk/church could be added through module for a populated island.

[5LEvEN 11]

There should be modules for civilian life. The cities should be populated by people and cars via a module, and same with the country areas except with wild animals and livestock added on.

The cities feel dark, as if they have no power. So I guess a module to make the cities have lights like in real life.

Finally a module for sounds, so if you pass a factory you hear work, if you pass a church you will hear some chanting, if you pass a house you might here some chatter from people inside.

[ProfTournesol 956]

There should be modules for civilian life. The cities should be populated by people and cars via a module, and same with the country areas except with wild animals and livestock added on.

The cities feel dark, as if they have no power. So I guess a module to make the cities have lights like in real life.

Well, as it is now in ArmA2 ?

[SPC.Spets 21]

Yeah! completely abandoned for mission makers, and modules to add animals, npc, etc if we want/need

[katipo66 94]

Finally a module for sounds, so if you pass a factory you hear work, if you pass a church you will hear some chanting, if you pass a house you might here some chatter from people inside.

I find sound mods like that to be less immersive as I know there is no one around, it's like the ambient war sound mods, even though I hear it, I know there is no action happening from where the sound is coming from.

[mrcash2009 0]

I'd like to see as many modules (for lights, ambient civvies, smoke, vehicles, etc) as possible, but if you open up the vanilla island without any action, it should be as dead as a doornail.

As the above quote states for me. I could have typed "This." ... but I hate that so much it gives me white knuckles.

[NeMeSiS 11]

As the above quote states for me. I could have typed "This." ... but I hate that so much it gives me white knuckles.

Well... Sorry, but i am going to keep doing it in future. :p

[Armoredfury193 10]

The ambient civilian and civilian vehicles module should be more easily manipulated...for instance, easily setting a maximum and minimum capacity for AI civilians spawned on the island.

Edit: I know this can be done in ArmA2 atm, but not quite as simply as an adjustable bar or simple field where you could type in the values.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Here is the problem: Arma2 had scripted solution to create lights that went on and off on building windows (and smoke stacks, but these are easy). But the technique used can't be used in OA/A3 as all/most houses are enterable, it's not a simple texture to add glow to (especially in OA, where there are few windows at all :p).

Having thought about it for a day, I think the most feasible way to bring the island to (electrical) life is how the electrical grid addon worked for Arma1 - branches/substations control bigger areas. Access to individual house would generate too much net traffic in multiplayer to be useful (JIP problems guaranteed), while a number of substations would be very manageable.

The problem about #lightpoint driven setups on a per mission basis, is that it simply doesn't work very well. Extreme limitations on #lightpoint usage and how they snap on at certain distances (appears to be floating point rounding bugs). They also wrongly ignore polygon face side. Light up a house from the inside, and it will light up also the outside walls.

I would much rather have double texture sets for building interiors, illuminated and dark, depending on the status of the closest grid substation. The grid simulation addon in A2 was brilliant, but the effects were limited. With vanilla support for it, BIS would have to add what is needed to make it better.

So, to clarify. I'm for the most part interested in the electrical grid coming to life and being shown properly, since the visuals are impossible to do with any kind of believability using scripts and #lightpoint objects. Not actual AI (they could be hiding in the attic for all I care :)) or car system - we already have systems for these. Electrical grid simulation wouldn't add much overhead to a server, but could require more texture memory on the clients.

[twisted 127]

Abandoned, but with modules to make it come to life. Please.

and if those modules could be a bit more intuitive and easy to implement than before - just look at how many how do i do 'x' with this module posts there are for arma2.

[NeMeSiS 11]

and if those modules could be a bit more intuitive and easy to implement than before - just look at how many how do i do 'x' with this module posts there are for arma2.

Personally i find the documentation about them pretty extensive, though the biki itself could be a bit more intuitive.

[Uberduderofdoomer 10]

Interesting question. Hmm. I would say empty but with modules like ambient civs and cars to liven it up, but it really depends. I kind of wish they integrated stuff like electricty grids (cut lights in enemy occupied city at night ftw) or maybe traffic lights on city streets ect. but these kinds of things would be harder to do by having it depend on modules as opposed to integrated game logic. Or I'm just talking out of my ass. Either case, you could go for a million things and the option to go either way by modules would make for many varied scenarios.

BTW i thought the town construction set and ambient civs modules were easy as hell to use, even if you have to look them up to be sure. Maybe in game vids in the editor demonstrating module functions? Although I really wish you could use a certain seed for town construction set so you could re-use the same town... (can you actually do that?)

Edited June 16, 2011 by Uberduderofdoomer

[moricky 210]

Although I really wish you could use a certain seed for town construction set so you could re-use the same town... (can you actually do that?)

http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Town_Generator

Variable random does that ;)

Even if you won't set it, town placed on some location will be always generated with same seed until position is changed.

[-=Borz=- 10]

it would be great having civilians who go to bed at night and get up around 7 am to go to work, etc.

Thus, at night you would have only a few occasional people in the streets or driving.

There might be a way to switch on and off civilians/traffic etc just by doing one single click.

(now someone will answer informing me that there are modules with names of ladies, etc...

I am aware of this, i have read forums for hours and hours, but could never make modules work)

Edited June 19, 2011 by -=Borz=-