Mission Makers Hell

[nubbin77 0]

I'm in on the mission mod team!

[.pablo. 0]

Quote[/b] ]Basically, the community (or the official forums community at least) doesn't seem to care about missions. It has nothing to do with "using too many addons" in a mission, because even addon-free missions are ignored. Hence the term "mission maker's hell" seems to fit. The community only seems to care about downloading the latest m4, playing around with it for a while, then throwing it away when the next m4 is released.

the real question is "why?"

in my opinion, there are two major reasons that people spend more time with addons than trying new missions:

the first reason is that most missions out there for ofp are bad. and by bad, i mean the mission maker obviously had no one seriously beta-test the mission before it was released. spelling and grammar errors, no overviews, bad overviews, cur__sp, bad briefings that leave the player confused, no intros, a poorly conceived plot/no plot, error messages, lots of obscure addons, bad scripting, the difficulty being too high or too low, lag, the mission not ending, no outro, etc. etc. lead to no motive. the player has no motive to play the mission because doing so is just aggravating. is this true for all missions? no, of course not. but its true for most of them. a little bit later i will talk about novelty in missions, which is something completely different from amateurish mistakes.

the second reason people mess around with addons intead of playing missions is more theoretical; i.e. i have no proof other than my own testimony. i don't download variations of an addon i already have (new m4s, new t80s, etc), but when i do download an addon, it is because it captures my imagination.

for example:

i downloaded the jetpack addon when it came out, made a quick scenario with me and a couple other jetpacks attacking a convoy, and imagined all the other amazing missions that could be made with the jetpack. the novelty of the jetpack was enough to engage my interest for a while, but i soon grew tired of the relatively similar situations that having the jetpack put me in.

the key idea here is that variety and novelty are the key elements to making a good mission. a mission can be perfectly balanced, include a story, intro, etc, but if the player just got done with another mission that had the exact same set-up, then what's the point?

this is where multiplayer gaming comes in. as it has been said so many times before, human opponents offer the variety and unpredictability which keeps games alive for years after all its players have finished the single player campaign. therefore, if a singleplayer mission is to hold the attention of a multiplayer gamer, it must either: a) attempt to imitate the unpredictability of a human opponent with its ai, or b) offer some kind of gimmick that multiplayer does not have.

examples of attempts to alter the ai include general barron's realistic combat patrol, all sorts of waypoint systems used by players, triggers, scripts, etc.

examples of gimmicks include the chain of command's command system, all sorts of long cutscenes involving custom music, a fancy story, etc.

these are not suggestions, these are things that a mission maker must do if they want their mission to be successful. and these things are on top of the most abundant kinds of problems with missions, which are just simple and aggravating mistakes.

[Drongo69 117]

I really like the idea of mission-making teams. Personally though, I think that putting hours of effort into a mission that most people will play about once is somewhat wasteful. What OFP needs is mission systems or dynamic campaigns. Something with high replayability such as CTI, Unscripted War or (ahem) my Counter-Insurgency (/gratuitous self promotion off).

As I posted in the Coin thread, a core system with plug-in spawn files would solve the addon problem. The core system only uses BIS stuff, the player only downloads and uses the spawn files for the addons he/she wants. If you don't get what I'm talking about, check the thread.

Personally I think one good dynamic campaign is worth dozens of missions. Perhaps such systems should be the goal of misson-teams? For example:

- Counter-Insurgency (template in progress)

- Conventional force-on-force campaign (working on this)

- Guerilla warfare against an occupying army

- dynamic helo-pilot campaign

or for something really crazy (that I attempted)

- zombie apocalypse survival simulator

All of this possible within OFP. The scripting is not even that difficult, just time consuming. But many hands make light work.

[The_Oakster 0]

Quote[/b] ]I think it is the mission makers that can, and have to, solve the problem.

No offense, but ytf do I HAVE to solve anything? I'm enjoying my missions and so are my friends...

I mean that mission makers are the only ones that can sort the problem. Addon makers dont need to because they are only making addons, they are not bothered about the missions that the addon might appear in, they just want to create a perfect tank, chopper etc. The missions that the addon appears in is irrelevant. However a mission is entirely dependent on addons even if it is just the BIS stuff.

Its all very well saying that you and your friends enjoy your missions but I figured the thread was on a community wide scale...

[sneakysix 0]

Well since my last post Ive now joined a team with their own server and Ive spun off a couple of missions for them already. Using the servers addons only that will only update as whem a certain type of addon comes out. This seems to have brought back to life the thrill of making missions that others can enjoy.

Looking back at the posts I really appreciate everyones feedback on this topic, next to none spam and many great arguments on both sides. Thx all

[xezon 0]

But if I'm just a addon-player, then I don't care about any of that; because all I want to do is plop addons down in the editor, play around with them for a couple hours, then go spam the forums.

Same view here Barron... your aspects are good.

[The-Architect 0]

Yeah a lot of the stuff Barron said made sense.

[Johan_D 0]

I think its even simpler.. the human is a very visual animal, a screenshot of a tank is much more explaining, appealing and tells often the whole story in one screenshot.

The mission maker however, doesnt have it, he relies of a as short as possible story to get people downloading it, a lot of addon hasle and some general shots.

Thats why for example screenshots always win from the story or mission. Visual beasts are we.

I think we need a new website who does only missions, and tries to set a high standard. Even newbies can have a great view on simple things one never thought of before.

Johan

[andersson 285]

I think there is need for a mission-depot or mission-"scrapyard" where you can upload your beta-mission with a short explanation so others can download it and play it as it is or finnish it off. Right now there is no idea to submit a good but "unfinnished" mission.

I have a few missions that are fun to play but have no intro, outro or borders around the picture (a picture that isnt there..). Its only a briefing. Thats all my friends and I need. Yes, an intro can really make a mission so much better but its so timeconsuming to make one. And in MP an intro turns out to be annoying when you have to see it everytime you restart the mission.

So I would like to be able to download good playable missions that other like but cant release as a finnished mission. But they do not need to be top notch as long as they are fun to play.

About addons and missions. I prefer that people only used BIS units. Thats because I make my own mods with all of the beautiful addons that are released! So I can play steal the car with better looking and with realistic value ofp in woodland, desert or winter.

[Winters 1]

I think we need a new website who does only missions, and tries to set a high standard. Even newbies can have a great view on simple things one never thought of before.

Johan

We already have one, its called the OFP Pub

Winters OFP Pub

EDIT: The Pub is always adding new content (although lately i have been extremely busy with a new mission to do much updating) and is available to host missions for people who do not have a place for them to call home

[Drongo69 117]

How about an "Adopt a mission" thread? People could post their "couldn't be bothered finishing the last 10%" missions and anyone could download and finish it. Some kind of minimum standard would be required to make sure the people didn't just post junk.

As for making missions with only BIS stuff, I tried to do that for a while, but it gets kind of boring. Making missions can be a long and repetitive process, so I like to use cool units when doing so.

[Johan_D 0]

@winters.. funny.. i was thinking of the same idea.. gonna checkout.

About BIS stuff, I dont think thats a go, some people are Nam buffs, some (like me) WW2, so we need addons. But NO 10 versions of a Tiger, a few is enough. Why dont addon makers make usefull things, like a staffcar, landscape things, like decent haystacks, and so on.

[Winters 1]

And civilian stuff, there are not enough civilian addons, not by a long shot.

EDIT: I would kill for a Bond aston martin with MG headlights.

[QBA69 1]

I think there is need for a mission-depot or mission-"scrapyard" where you can upload your beta-mission with a short explanation so others can download it and play it as it is or finnish it off. Right now there is no idea to submit a good but "unfinnished" mission.

Winters mentioned his site but forgot that we have also Editing Center where you can upload your missions for beta testing.

Quote[/b] ]About addons and missions. I prefer that people only used BIS units. Thats because I make my own mods with all of the beautiful addons that are released! So I can play steal the car with better looking and with realistic value ofp in woodland, desert or winter.

Regarding this so called "with or without addons" problem - imo actually there is no problem at all. It's only up to you I mean mission maker to use some addons or stick to the BIS stuff. But I'm pretty sure that sooner or later most of mission makers just have to use some addons because of one simple reason - there are too few units and equipment in "out of box" OFP. And I also agree with other posters that there is no use to include too many addons into missions since we have mods like Y2K3 or FFUR.

Finally speaking as a novice mission maker I think that making missions ain't easy mainly because BIS didn't give us any helpful tools - except for the editor of course ;) But one thing is sure for me - the hole process of making our own missions is very interesting and absorbing even though it's also time-consuming and sometimes irritating a lot. Personally I feel as I was a movie director, producer, director of photography and author of screenplay and music - all in one ;) It's really a great fun!

[x582gr51 0]

Well, yeah, there is too many addons released because of textures changes or some guns sights or some config chg if the model itself isn't a new one why making an addons.

The tools problem can be solved if the scripters get together and create a sort of software studio or something like that.

Then all new scripts are not only a textfile but a plug-in for an external mission, config, description, init and even script editor.

The idea is not to rely on a few ppl to be more productive but ensure that you can get as much ppl as you can and from it the probability of quality release also get boosted.

Just thinK as if there wasn't a guy named Bill Gate who was acting like a salvager taking things there, there and there then with is knowledge simplified things so that a 6 years old kid can operate a computer, would u be playing OFP today?

Probably not so why not learn from this and give us all the chance to evolve.

Yes, OFP give a chance to be one man game studio as you can be 3d artist, producer, director, technician, the decoration funny guy and many more. But this can be a weakness too as more things you have to do then more of the quality of each thing degrade and in the end you wasted your time producing something that have only one or two good aspects and in the overall is considered as bad.

Two solutions are there to solve this degrading issue:

First, is that the members of the OFP community create groups somehow with the same structure than BAS wich was somehow looking and effective as a game studio.

Second, is that each sector or departement of these "game studio" get in communication and meet for brainstorming about there speciality and sharing informations. Then one day of the week each studio have their own online seminar teaching to those that have less knowledge but good wills. These seminars of course recorded audio/video and with the missions templates all then available on the studio ftp.

*EDIT*

Why not make of this OFP phenomenom a game outside of the game. By this i refer to a game released a few years ago it was about being a new guy trying to make is way to hollywood and having no one else than the GREAT Steven Spieldberg as a mentor. Also took it from my experience while a few years ago playing Rogue Spears, i go annoyed of playing the game so i started to be a manager and i was behind many clan structuring them and organizing events while teaching tactics to players and training teachers. So let my explain my vision out of this: Experienced members and those annoyed playing ofp and MOD studios can stop playing or rushing the creation of stuffs for a while and found an acadamy through what the ppl can really get the infos needed and learn to be a productive member of the ofp community. Each achievement or "diploma" give you acces to more useful things Like newcomers get informed how to use the mission editor then when they succesful at it, they get access to an ftp folder wich contain templates and examples missions. Then supplied of new stuffs and well informed then they have to show successful skills that will give them acces to another folder with tools that help them processing faster. Once they mastered enough skill to do great stuffs then they get acces to an ftp folder where they can upload mission and then try them live and direct on the dedicated server. If they come up with revoilutionary stuffs then they earn an admin or say power user account. This can add fun to the learning process an get ppl involved as when u get promoted then u also get assigned to a duty that u must do the achieve the next level.

*END*

But all of these solutions are currently in process and are part of the natural pattern. It's just that there is not much ppl that get involved to it and many still act as individuals while others miss opportunities because of childish reactions and behaviors. This waste time in the overall process and maybe discourage others. I cannot stop emphasing on that point wich is get involved, accept others that want to be invloved and help those that want to involve.

But as only one human being with a lot of will, i may learn after sometime all of what is required to create addons, making islands and missions. But as only one while we can be "one thousand". So if things are slow then stop complaining, stop your discrimination at all levels and childish reactions give yourself a swift kick in the ass then open yourself to others and share with them, then group deploy operate regroup get strong experiences and continue in the same process some great things may be achieved way faster and way better over a limited time.

[Winters 1]

Winters mentioned his site but forgot that we have also <a href="www.ofpec.com" target="_blank">Editing Center</a> where you can upload your missions for beta testing.

Thanks, OFPEC is good for missions to get beta tested my site is more of a site for a finished mission that just needs a home.

[x582gr51 0]

Quote[/b] ]Thanks, OFPEC is good for missions to get beta tested my site is more of a site for a finished mission that just needs a home.

I don't call that good advertising since if OFPEC host missions files for beta testing then they will surely do the same for the release version.

[Winters 1]

My site was made for me to host the missions that i have made, as a courtesy i am willing to host missions that others have made.

I dont give a damn about advertising, this is not a contest between OFPEC and the Pub.