ARMA 2's player movement "feel"

[maddogx 13]

I like the VBS2 vehicle GUI system, where you get a little "map" of the vehicle for you to use.

I would prefer a system more like the one they've implemented in TKOH, where you press Alt to see action icons on the vehicle. Something like this in Arma (perhaps minus having to press a key to see the icons) would make interaction with vehicles a lot more immersive - no need to scroll through a menu or click on a GUI.

As for player movement, I'm fine with the selection of speeds we have now and don't really feel the need for fluid speed changes. My biggest gripe with the movement in Arma2 are the bugs ("stance dance", auto-stand-up) and the general clunkuness due to its rigidity and non-interruptability of some longer anims. Fix those and we'd have a winner, I'd say.

[dmarkwick 261]

Scrolling is not as precise as pressing a key. You sprint with one key, with scrolling you need to find that sweet spot. And imagine how clunky it will be in MP. Right now when squad leader orders to sprint you just hold W and immediately move at the same speed as everyone else. I don't see what's wrong with the current speed system. It's fast and responsive.

Well I should disagree (of course ;)) I don't see a reason why all entities need be tied to the same exact movement speeds, vehicles can have different speeds and MP seems to handle slight differences in speeds OK. It would give you some amount of ingame control about how fast you move vs how much stuff you have, a lightly encumbered scout could make more use of sprinting & fast running with little impact on stamina while a heavily encumbered machinegunner might need to consider a slower speed, and a sniper might have need for a far slower movement than is normal.

I'm not saying its a game breaker or even a requirement, I'm just saying I think it could work well. I'm sure the current 4-speed mechanism will suffice, I just don't see how the same 4 speeds all the time can be seen as more realistic or desirable.

Having that in ArmA is a much better solution since it's fast too - as selecting sweet spots with a mouse is faster than scrolling through the menu.

Indeed, in fact I think the scrolling menu system in general is getting a little faded by now, I'm sure there are examples of reasons why it should remain, but I'm guessing there's more reasons to lose it than to keep it.

As I understand with VBS2 2.0 BIS tries to unify VBS and ArmA engines (seeing how they show the footage of ArmA in promotions and VBS2 2.0 release date being the same as ArmA3's) so maybe we will get sweetspot interface instead of scroll-action menu at least for vehicles

I don't think it's a unification drive, after all VBS2 is derived directly from ArmA engine so it's more like a feature list owned by different company thing. If features automatically migrated from VBS2 to ArmA there would be little point in developing for VBS2 for BIA :)

[metalcraze 290]

Except devs already move features from VBS2 to ArmA - with a delay of course. I imagine this will allow them to do it more easily.

Well you know how it works. First military gets all the toys and years later ArmA starts to get them. Maybe this is just for comfort since RV2 and RV3 have notable differences in how they work. But RV4 and RV4 won't when the time comes (i. e. military will get new features and previous new features are now old enough to go to unfortunate civilians)

[Opticalsnare 12]

Funny this was brought up, cause recently ive actually been ripping the animations to bits finding out this and that. It seems most of the handling,feeling,movement,aiming etc etc is related to the animation system, and theres alot of animations and animations connected to other anims etc and i can see why theres this problem with clunkyness. Ive manage to fix some of the weapon aimming as in where it feels sloppy or laggy whatever you wanna call it is pretty much gone it now feels like a FPS where you can aim in quick reaction on targets. Transistions from standing to kneeling, lying has had its speed increased and feels much more fluid than before. Still il keep you guys posted with how i get on.

OS

[HyperU2 11]

Sounds good. There is nothing worse than that awkward pause after standing up and before running. Especially under fire.

[max power 21]

I think if you press forward and then get up, the character will get up into a running animation.

[Opticalsnare 12]

Man those so many animations its insane. If i need to mod the speed of the animations and that some are faster than others it means changing about 2000 lines. But changing some of the common ones might be more sensible.

[twisted 127]

Funny this was brought up, cause recently ive actually been ripping the animations to bits finding out this and that. It seems most of the handling,feeling,movement,aiming etc etc is related to the animation system, and theres alot of animations and animations connected to other anims etc and i can see why theres this problem with clunkyness. Ive manage to fix some of the weapon aimming as in where it feels sloppy or laggy whatever you wanna call it is pretty much gone it now feels like a FPS where you can aim in quick reaction on targets. Transistions from standing to kneeling, lying has had its speed increased and feels much more fluid than before. Still il keep you guys posted with how i get on.

OS

man that'd be something with lots of interest

[no use for a name 0]

Funny this was brought up, cause recently ive actually been ripping the animations to bits finding out this and that. It seems most of the handling,feeling,movement,aiming etc etc is related to the animation system, and theres alot of animations and animations connected to other anims etc and i can see why theres this problem with clunkyness. Ive manage to fix some of the weapon aimming as in where it feels sloppy or laggy whatever you wanna call it is pretty much gone it now feels like a FPS where you can aim in quick reaction on targets. Transistions from standing to kneeling, lying has had its speed increased and feels much more fluid than before. Still il keep you guys posted with how i get on.

OS

Thanks for the info OS. Sounds VERY promising!! I always had a feeling that one of the bigger contributors to Arma's "clunkyness" was in the scripted animations. Although much improved over OFP and Arma, they still don't have the "fluidity" of most other FPS's. It always seemed like it was more unresponsive and "laggy", and I guess this is why.

Good luck on the project! Will definitely be looking for it :D

[BobcatBob 10]

Funny this was brought up, cause recently ive actually been ripping the animations to bits finding out this and that. It seems most of the handling,feeling,movement,aiming etc etc is related to the animation system, and theres alot of animations and animations connected to other anims etc and i can see why theres this problem with clunkyness. Ive manage to fix some of the weapon aimming as in where it feels sloppy or laggy whatever you wanna call it is pretty much gone it now feels like a FPS where you can aim in quick reaction on targets. Transistions from standing to kneeling, lying has had its speed increased and feels much more fluid than before. Still il keep you guys posted with how i get on.

OS

dude, if when you complete all you can do on this project (maybe let others know what they can do to contribute too) you make your work compatible with Smookie's animations pack, I will love you forever.

[rallyolle 10]

This is what i think

you move like a fridge in arma, CQC is a pain, clearing out buildings etc. I want it to be alot smoother, cod4 cs etc normal fps games give a more realistic feeling when moving indoors especially sorry, wish it was like that. Grab something like my paintball gun or w/e move around inside and its alot more like cs than arma.

Also hope arma 3 features full deactivation of mouse acceleration and smoothing inside the game options.

[maddogx 13]

This is what i think

you move like a fridge in arma, CQC is a pain, clearing out buildings etc. I want it to be alot smoother, cod4 cs etc normal fps games give a more realistic feeling when moving indoors especially sorry, wish it was like that. Grab something like my paintball gun or w/e move around inside and its alot more like cs than arma.

Movement in COD/CS style games does indeed feel more organic than in Arma, but I wouldn't want to switch to that kind of movement completely. Essentially, movement in Arma2/3 needs improving, but not to the point where it is turned into another "twitch shooter".

Also hope arma 3 features full deactivation of mouse acceleration and smoothing inside the game options.

I'm not aware of any mouse acceleration in Arma2, and there is a slider for smoothing in the controls options. Set that all the way to the left and you're good, although it does stutter for some reason. That could definitely be fixed. :)

[Task 1]

Yeah, I would like to also like to see some fine tweaking done to the movement. I would like there to be an even slowermovement mode available in addition to the one already in game, like almost creepyslow, like 1 step every 1.5 seconds or something.

I feel like the current slow/careful mode is actually a balance between movement and stealth, a slower movement mode would be useful when a high degree of stealth is required, but movement speed is not n issue; like for snipers, or covert breach and entry.

Another wish I have is for there to be "Stack Up" and "Breach and Clear" type scripts, with animations to match ( See Rainbow Six Vegas ) to help with the sometimes wonky AI and building clearing.

[Dawks 10]

Couldn't find another place to post this.

I just tested and proved that mouse "acceleration" (which is a stupid term ... proper ballistics speed up and also slow down) is backwards.

Moving fast, a full wrist flex got me around 90 degrees ... barely ... if I moved a whole lot. The same movement slow? A full 360 more than twice.

Precisely backwards. Want to twhirl in response to footsteps? good luck. Want to aim precisely? have fun.

I had better ballistics in 1992.

[maddogx 13]

Couldn't find another place to post this.

I just tested and proved that mouse "acceleration" (which is a stupid term ... proper ballistics speed up and also slow down) is backwards.

Moving fast, a full wrist flex got me around 90 degrees ... barely ... if I moved a whole lot. The same movement slow? A full 360 more than twice.

Precisely backwards. Want to twhirl in response to footsteps? good luck. Want to aim precisely? have fun.

I had better ballistics in 1992.

This is not "backwards mouse acceleration", it's just due to the fact that turn speed in Arma2 is limited. No matter how fast you move your mouse, your avatar will never turn faster than the maximum turn speed. As a result, moving the mouse really fast will give the impression of inverse acceleration, as you described.

I wrote a more detailed explanation of this effect a few years ago. :D

[BobcatBob 10]

This makes me think more and more that the new animation system will solve like %75 of all CBQ baddness, I hope that BI are able to perservere with that thoug, as it sounds like it's getting INSANELY difficult to do :(

[galzohar 31]

Couldn't find another place to post this.

I just tested and proved that mouse "acceleration" (which is a stupid term ... proper ballistics speed up and also slow down) is backwards.

Moving fast, a full wrist flex got me around 90 degrees ... barely ... if I moved a whole lot. The same movement slow? A full 360 more than twice.

Precisely backwards. Want to twhirl in response to footsteps? good luck. Want to aim precisely? have fun.

I had better ballistics in 1992.

As said, the limited turning speed is a defining element in Arma and should never ever be removed! Infinite turning speeds in other games is one of the things that make them truly bad.

Just don't try to push your soldier to turn faster than he is actually able to and you won't feel like he's failing to do what you want, OK? ;)

[Dawks 10]

This is not "backwards mouse acceleration", it's just due to the fact that turn speed in Arma2 is limited. No matter how fast you move your mouse, your avatar will never turn faster than the maximum turn speed.

Okie dokie; not exactly a feature, but not a bug either.

As a result, moving the mouse really fast will give the impression of inverse acceleration, as you described.

Yes, it would do that.

cheers

@Galzohar - I certainly wasn't looking for anything like infinite turning speed, but ballistics is nice. We could have fast = "maximum turn speed" and slow = precision.

As though the speed of the mouse movement was setting the sensitivity on the fly.

Edited February 4, 2012 by Tremblay

[Opticalsnare 12]

Yeh would like to see the movement improved alot. Not to the case of it being a FPS style but movement should be precise and act as you want it to, the best way i can describe the movement atm is the soldier feels like hes clumsy and dreamlike where your slow and inmobile stuck in slime. Your a soldier for heavens sake if you need to go prone you really are gonna get down as fast as possible even to the point of causing injury to yourself while doing so because your life depends on your actions yourself not being dictated by a system which determines its actions for you.

But as stated the movement is directly linked to the animation system when i ripped the animations open and changed them i did make them alot more fluid and comfortable making the soldier faster reaction and less like a clumsy robot. But it was so much work involved that it was just too much for myself to do on my own. Im hoping that BIS has the time and effort to make the changes themselfs. Gunplay should also be improved upon as i found weapons feel too sluggish obv some might say that weight is a factor but i have fired weapons and used tacticly in my past days and didnt find them sluggish, but more they were a part of my body like i was wielding a tool that i could use not a sledgehammer.

Still have to wait and see i quess. But consider this alot of my friends who i tried to get them into ArmA2 were put off because of the clunky/clumsy feeling of the game and im sure if this was resolved and made to cater more to the people who feel this way including myself will help the game be more popular to them.

[metalcraze 290]

but i have fired weapons and used tacticly in my past days and didnt find them sluggish, but more they were a part of my body like i was wielding a tool that i could use not a sledgehammer.

So tell me how you could hit anything anywhere exactly the same moment you did a turn?

Weapon inertia is one of two things that stops ArmA from turning into a completely unrealistic reflex-based fragfest. The other being the lack of floating camera.

[Opticalsnare 12]

I didnt mention turning but whatever i was referring to the aiming of the actual weapon. And when your aimming in real-life you can move your arms whilst aimming not turning your upper body but you need to aim further you can move your upperbody and not moving your legs and when you need to turn further again you then move your legs to maintain a steady posture. This is generally how ArmA2 is setup and is correct, but needs further looking into as it feels a bit rough and could be more fluid and comfortable to handle.

Your unrealistic reflex-based feeling is because other FPS does not split the movements up but combines them all in one single movement so moving your weapon about moves your whole body. Now getting to the point of weapon weight as ingame you cannot totally feel the weight of the weapon because its a game and your holding a mouse not a weapon the game simulates the weight of the weapon by adding in the sluggish feeling laggy feeling fine whatever, but i feel it could either again be looked into more so its more comfortable to aim or adjusted.

Because when i was aimming in real-life i never really experienced myself overshooting the target or aimming not enough i simply aimmed my weapon at the target required fired and hit the target, but again as in real-life you can feel the weight of the weapon so you can handle it more efficiently. Its the same as in racing sim games if your using a steering wheel and pedals with clutch controls, you can feel the clutch in real-life but ingame you cant feel shit so its mostly just some simulated effects. Thats why theres force feedback on the steering wheels not cause they provide some extra vibrations but whilst driving you can feel what the car is doing how the weight is being transfered when the wheels loose grip etc. But in the ArmA2 case theres nothing but a mouse to use so it makes it alot harder to actually feel the weight of what your using realistic yes but without anything to connect that simulated weight to its somewhat useless and can get frustrating.

Edited February 7, 2012 by Opticalsnare

[DeclaredEvol 10]

OpticalSnare is correct in every way, I'd like to share my personal opinion. My experience from 1998-2012 is that most games feel fluent and you can move fast. I think Battlefield 3 in all opinion has the most realistic combat experience of all games, but still is too unorganized to say its better than ArmA 2. I'd like to explain why I've found ArmA 2 difficult to play... One, falling off stairs and objects is weird. Two, movement sometimes feels jurky or choppy. Three, your weapon moves around ALOT while moving. Four, the animations themselves are a part of my concern. There needs to be a lot more available to the player, because under combat you're going to need 100% control.

::My Wishlist::

-Smooth, fluent movement...

-Almost no arm swaying while standing or sitting... only while moving... the players patience decides his accuracy.

-When moving and shooting, most military men... prefer turning their bodies to move forward instead of side stepping. Side stepping has always been a difficult thing while aiming, but turning your legs sideways and keeping your torso towards the target insures the best form of aim.

-Realistic Grenade throwing and Weapon swapping.

-Interface for different combat stances, at long distance its more natural not to spread your feet a yard or so while firing. On the contrary, its useful in CQB for when you need to be able to fire rapidly. ((I advise maybe three different modes of stance for each Standing, Crouching and Proning. Sort of like Red for more leg spread, stability in stance. Yellow for mediocre stance, stability... and maybe Blue for casual stance))

-Realistic body armor, most armors of today can take impact damage from even an 556 round or AK round. Depending on the velocity and strength, Armor usually almost never lets a bullet penetrate. Anything cannon sized or strengthened would be 100% exceptional.

-Customizable helmet and body attachments, like mountable flashlights... ir strobes. Very useful for getting advantages in the gameplay...

-3D Optics on every scope there is, would help SOOOO much... especially on performance. The DM M4 Pack was so true to its word, its much more natural. Of course some scopes have rubber padding and allow closer contact... but its definitely the best feel. Especially since you can still move the arms a little!

-Cover systems, and stacking up definitely helps the animation and gameplay!

Edited April 13, 2012 by DeclaredEvol

[Ckrauslo 12]

in first person? No issue here, i like the movement when walking, with the gun up.

Noway you can hold a gun steady while you walk. And its worse with a scope!

its the best "sim" part of the first person view...

My friend i'm a Brazilian PELOPES or Special Operations Platoon soldier in the army, and i guarantee you, that i can walk and maintain my aim at the target very easily

that stance that we see the guy walking in game, with the elbows tucked in, was created to allow you to do this, so if you can't walk and shoot you must have some problems with you're hands...In CQB you can walk and shoot precisely, and as you try to view longer distances, more sway you'll see, i can manage my stance and my gun to be able to walk slowly and hit someone at 75 meters, it's part of the TAT here in Brazil, (TAT means,Shoting Aptitude Test) and modern military are trained to engage targets while walking, this way he can move cover to cover, try seeing Special Operations Trainings, they show this part, and even the regular soldier, have to be able to do those things, of course walking you wont be able to do some things like a sniper shoot ...but in some Tactical Shooting instruction Fields, they teach you to while walking double tap to the chest and one to the head, in targets even 25 meters away...most of the guys here saying it's impossible probably never done these kind of stuff, and if did i don't know how you never trained this

A guy doing CQB walking Drill

one more edit with one more video

another video

Edited November 16, 2013 by Ckrauslo

[Harzach 2505]

My friend i'm a Brazilian PELOPES or Special Operations Platoon soldier in the army, and i guarantee you, that i can walk and maintain my aim at the target very easily...

Indeed. It isn't rocket science. Maintaining a steady upper body/head position while moving is necessary for plenty of situations. If a first-year marching band member can do it, so can a trained warfighter.

[Ckrauslo 12]

Indeed. It isn't rocket science. Maintaining a steady upper body/head position while moving is necessary for plenty of situations. If a first-year marching band member can do it, so can a trained warfighter.

Precisely what i mean, I'm a 3º SGT in the 61º BIS "Batalhão de infantaria de Selva" or Battalion of Jungle Infantry, i'm the Team Leader of the 3º Squad of SUOPES under the Command of PELOPES, I lead a team of 5 mans, i'm the 6 one, i'm a Sniper( Caçador ''Hunter''), and will try to go to the Commandos Try out by the end of next year, Here in Brazil the Pelopes is similar to the Rangers, The commandos to the Green Berets and the 1 Battalion of Special forces is similar to the Delta Force, we are not as well trained as these forces, but if we can walk and some times fast walk and still hit targets accurately,i have no doubts that the US soldiers that are so better trained as they claim, wont be able to shoot precisely while CQB walking

PS: in case someone say that special units should be secret, here in Brazil the only unit that maintain identity as secret: are the Commandos, The 1ºBFESP the Navy GRUMEC, The Marines Corp COMANF, and the Air Force PARASAr,

Edited November 17, 2013 by Ckrauslo