How will the "border" be generated?

[dmitri 0]

Having a coastline makes the world you're playing in feel complete. If there was a lowres terrain extending into infinity, I'd always be thinking "oh that's the part where the map ends, here we do not go". Ocean into infinity feels natural. Less of a "gamey" contrivance.

I'm up for anything new or different though, surprise us BIS.

[berghoff 11]

I were wondering, how will the border be defined ?

In ArmA & OFP we got infinite ocean.

Chernarus is supposed to be inland, so if anyone got an idea ?

Insider info: we have some ideas, most likely we will end up with some extrapolation + random generation, but it is not decided yet.

We first need to implement features which affect gameplay or influence artwork creation, this is an isolated task which can be done very late in the development cycle.

I do wonder.. so when you drive a car or are on foot can you just walk outside map forever .. or will there be some system that makes you turn around after a while? Or maybe get eaten by hungry wolves at night.. or perish from thirst heh..

[Ezekiel 0]

That'd definitely a coast in the pic, so hows *that* gonna be handled? Infinite beachy shoreline? Could do it as sheer cliff I spose. Also yeah, I'm not sure how the current edge of map stuff works but presumably you can just keep flying or swimming or sailing out into the horizon?

Regards how far you can go - I'd suggest, as in many similar games, putting a 'warning' border around the map - so its terrain that you can enter as usual on foot or in a plane, but it's marked as the 'edge' on the map and gives you an on-screen warning that you're straying from the battlefield. If you go further outside of this border (which would have to be reasonably large to take account of fast moving planes) then you could get an insta-death. Not unrealistic since you'd be officially AWOL, and probably deep in enemy territory so liable to be shot down with MANPADs. Otherwise you've got the problem of people flying a million miles out and then ejecting, and getting stuck in a bunch of endless low detail terrain on foot. You want the stuff to be visible to those with 10,000km viewdistances, but not actually... 'usable'.

[Lou Montana 101]

player setdamage 1.

And don't bother me anymore.

[Yoshama 0]

make it a continent, like Australia. lots and lots and lots of land so when you fly a fast plane it takes at least 5 minutes to cross it. the land lovers get their LAND! and the sea goers get their beaches with infinite watter.

that wouldn't be laggy at all, but it would be cool

[Deadfast 43]

What about a peninsula?

One side with infinitely generated forest, the other with infinite sea.

Compromise FTW:D

[NoRailgunner 0]

Don't forget the last warning sign (maybe with russian sign/text)

[kuIoodporny 45]

Google Earth

[Guest]

Insider info: we have some ideas, most likely we will end up with some extrapolation + random generation, but it is not decided yet.

We first need to implement features which affect gameplay or influence artwork creation, this is an isolated task which can be done very late in the development cycle.

Today, september/17/2008: Suma at this stage of developement, what about these borders?

Are you decided?

Thank you.

[funnyguy1 0]

Something must prevent players from wandering too far from the main map, right? I think sharks with lasers in the sea and hungry Sasquatches in the forests will do the trick.

[aus_twisted 0]

Something must prevent players from wandering too far from the main map, right? I think sharks with lasers in the sea and hungry Sasquatches in the forests will do the trick.

Not really, you can travel out to sea in OFP and ArmA to unlimited space, though I remember the OFP campaign missions had triggers that warned you if you went to far from the objective and actually killed you if you went to far away.

[icebreakr 3159]

Suma: check out how Novalogic made the "border" in their hit Joint Ops years ago. But I guess that is a whole different technology involved, so just check out the effect.

[EricM 0]

I'd hate to have "killing triggers" like in BF2 or Crysis, or invisible "force fields"...

It's so frustrating. Especially if you have somewhat fast planes like the F35 or Su27, you need to be able to go beyond the border to turn and go back... without getting magically killed.

I think that a repeating tile with automatic tree clutter based on a sat mask would do the trick... maybe with more fog than usual to cover for the lower density of objects and details...

[dentist guba 0]

they have said there will be large lakes in the game.

[Pinocul75 0]

How about do it what some other games do... Massive area, then at the edge its kinda harder to pass (mountains, whatever) then once you go past it, you end up on the other side of the map... not realistic but it works rather well, very smooth and can sometimes actualy add to gameplay ect.

Same Pac Man

lol

[aus_twisted 0]

I'd hate to have "killing triggers" like in BF2 or Crysis, or invisible "force fields"...

It's so frustrating. Especially if you have somewhat fast planes like the F35 or Su27, you need to be able to go beyond the border to turn and go back... without getting magically killed.

I think that a repeating tile with automatic tree clutter based on a sat mask would do the trick... maybe with more fog than usual to cover for the lower density of objects and details...

OFP had it for a lot of it's ground based missions (you had to go a long way from the mission objective which I did sometimes trying destroy everything on the map), they can easily be removed though. It's really only designed for newer players and areas that would have a lot of enemy that are not really there, OFP back then with the campaign was completely new for everyone.

[kavoven 4]

Those killing triggers are a good idea, I use them all the time.

Some AK sounds in the background and whoops, setdamage 1

You don't want mission designers to place units all over the map, just to make it realistic, don't you? Those triggers are the best way of giving you a realistic feeling.

[opteryx 1562]

But do you want such kill triggers embedded in the game? It would be a REAL turn off to see something like that hardcoded and not left up to mission designers...

[Alex72 1]

Im with Opteryx here. Not very realistic when your out scouting and a text come up on the screen telling you "Your going too far - turn back!" and then some ambience AK's blasting and your dead...

ArmA2 is looking bloody brilliant so far, please dont smudge it with some BF2 stuff. Maybe there arent any other way, i dont know, but i would prefer that you just cant go any further, or make the terrain un-penetrable in different levels.

[King Haggis 0]

Just make it an island again, who cares if it's surrounded by water which isn't there in real life. It may be based on a real area but I wouldn't mind if it would be surrounded by water that isn't there in the real world. At least it looks better than a forcefield.

[lockjaw-65- 0]

No!

I understand Chernarus isnt supposed to have a coast but we need the sea, compared to OPF the sea really improved alot in Arma (boats, swiming, tides, etc), why throw it away now.

The game should have land, sea and air, and ofcourse.. fish .

Just a thought, im sure i saw an aircraft carrier in some footage a while back. If no water where would it be?

[opteryx 1562]

This is what it's going to look like, so obviously the north and west borders of the map isn't going to have a coast.

[Alex72 1]

Our new map looks small when looking at the airfield. IF that airfield is in scale with the map. And if it is, then its definatelly a heli place rather than jet.

BTW: Noticed the high hills north and west now. I guess thats the answer to how they stop us from going further. Steep hills from SW to NE. Might be? And if thats the case, the map becomes even smaller.

Pure speculations though.

EDIT: heh, yeah the new map is twice the size of sahrani. So its definatelly not small. Think we might be stopped by the mountains like i previously said though. Maybe...

[sk3pt 0]

IMHO it would be better if they removed the north/west mountains, and replaced them with a coast line, to complete an island.

Don't know, but it seems strange to have an endless randomly generated straight coastline (?).

Anyway, ocean is a must !

[jakerod 254]

72 @ Sep. 27 2008,09:57)]Our new map looks small when looking at the airfield. IF that airfield is in scale with the map. And if it is, then its definatelly a heli place rather than jet.

BTW: Noticed the high hills north and west now. I guess thats the answer to how they stop us from going further. Steep hills from SW to NE. Might be? And if thats the case, the map becomes even smaller.

Pure speculations though.

EDIT: heh, yeah the new map is twice the size of sahrani. So its definatelly not small. Think we might be stopped by the mountains like i previously said though. Maybe...

It doesn't look twice the size of Sahrani to me. It looks maybe twice the size of Southern Sahrani.