Oktokolo
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Posts posted by Oktokolo
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Is this even fixable in software?
If the FoV is not matching the distance of the player from the screen, the projection mismatch is perceived as distortion. Changing distance from or size of the monitor would fix it as would changing the rendered FoV to the real FoV that the screen occupies from the players position in physical space.
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I have the Stylish addon installed and do add the apropriate CSS to my personal anti-nagdialog file. So i will never see this one again.
But the joke here is, that such nag dialogs are not even GDPR compatible. If they need to ask (because the data collection is not a technical necessity or required by law), they also need to provide the option of using the service without collecting the data. The prohibition of consent bundling is the revolutionary new part of the GDPR (besides the possibility of heavy fines). It is the first "data protection" law featuring this rather new concept. So no, GDPR is not at fault here.
My anti-nag CSS file:*[id*=cookie], *[class*=cookie], .pea_cook_wrapper { display: none !important; } html[id*=cookie], html[class*=cookie], body[id*=cookie], body[class*=cookie] { display: block !important; } .site-message--banner, .cc_container--open, .unsupported-browser, #update-browser-banner { display: none !important; } #js-gdpr-consent-banner, #privacy-consent { display: none !important; }You see, that it is rather small. That is because i also use the uMatrix addon to block JavaScript and 3rd-party stuff by default (wich also removes almost all advertisings and makes the web super fast).
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So they write stuff like "THE BLIGHT OF UNDESIRED SOFTWARE AND PROMPTS IS ALL AROUND US", but on the same page show me a half-screen high overlay asking me to accept unneeded cookies...
Credibility level: Politician
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For casual players, it's absolutely fatal when mission makers make the missions even harder, because a handful of elite players think it's easy peasy.
The higher base difficulty of TDM is likely caused by having more game mechanics that take longer to master (it took years until i realized that i can ceil-water-arrow torch bearers and i still didn't try the crate knockout myself).
But there are difficulty levels for the Missions and extra difficulty settings in the options menu. So it probably is possible to make most missions as easy as the old thiefs by just making the AI almost deaf and blind.
And i am definitely not an elite player - i can't finish most of Fieldmedics missions and never completed "Swing".
Like at the start of the Cleighmoor mission. I mean, don't get me wrong, nice mission and all, but, 4 elite guards with flares in the sewers right at the start is a bit way over the top, especially when you're supposed to pickpocket them for maximum loot results. Why would 4 elite guards guard sewers anyway?
Yes, Cleighmoor sewers where a challenge. I do not remember elite guards though. But they had lanterns and the noisy water made sneaking up on them a lot harder.
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Was fun to blackjack all the bad guys.
For blackjack-oriented players, this mission is too easy even on expert - despite having invisible light gem brighteners in random places on the exterior.
I would expect ghosting to be hard though.
If you update the mission, fix the patrol routes so that you can't blackjack-camp that easy. I blackjacked most AI at my spawn, and all but one in the other outside areas. The missing one i found sleeping in his bed in the extra barracks. There literally was no human AI left as i entered the church for the first time. Was a real surprise as i realized, how easy that was.
The Revenants are a nice touch. But somehow they see the player even when the lightgem is black and need massive amounts of holy water arrows to die (explosive mines work as expected though). So i decided to not engage with tem but took the exit out of the crypt that i used to get in (because it leads to the shortest path to the spawn). I then hid behind a pillar until they have all passed by. Then i ran to the spawn and finished the mission without using any consumables.
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Languages are implementation details, anyone with correct algorithmic approach and capable of abstract reasoning can adapt in any of these languages in less than a couple of month.
That implementation detail is responsible for almost all of todays software security bugs in all big operating systems. It is the reason, why we can enjoy games featuring pathfinding AI with 60 FPS. And it also has a huge impact on bug density, code maintainability and development time in every non-trivial project - even for the most experienced teams.
Chosing the right language for the job is really important if you don't want to make the task unneccessarily hard and lengthy.
I started with Basic and ASM on the C64 too. But the two are horrible languages to get anything done.
It is possible. But it is much harder and takes much more time than doing it in most of the more modern languages.
If you are an experienced programmer seeking the challenge, go ahead and try some serious ASM, C(++), Whitespace, Brainfuck... And Shenzhen I/O is fun too.
But if you are a programming noob, have a low attention span, or don't like bugs that much - chose something that is less error prone and easier to code in. Doesn't have to be Python - every modern so-called "scripting language" are much better suited for the job than ASM, C(++), or that Basic v2 from the C64.
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The coordinates display would help a lot when reporting bugs while betatesting. Would prefer a toggle as we already have for FPS.
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I guess what I'm trying to say is that the standard mechanics only help if the map isn't set up like a fortress, and of course some are.
Consider using your blackjack. If guards patrol the room you are in and there is shadow in the same room, then you can probably blackjack camp in that room. Lurk in the shadow until a guard comes in and blackjack it while it's closing the door or on its way out. Stash the body somewhere safe and repeat until no AI has entered that room for some time. Then proceed to the next room and either switch back to casual thievery or continue securing the area depending on prefered playstyle.
A few areas in TDM missions do exhibit layouts and patrols like you would expect them to be like if an experienced guard's captain did his job right. That areas are really hard to ghost by (by intention i would guess). But they are far from being common and you still got your tools and all that movable clutter, authors place in their missions. Apart from blackjack camping (wich is absurdly effective in stealth games in general - to the point where it feels like cheating if you do it in non-fortress areas), there are:
- Bait: Turn off some light and wait in the shadows near that switch. Blackjack the guard as it tries to turn that light back on. Also works with doors left open and rope arrow ropes. Light baiting and door baiting obviously don't work with AI that isn't configured to react to such things (but in fortress-like areas they likely are configured to react).
- Patrol pattern timing manipulation: Distract a guard using a noisemaker, opened door, thrown clutter... to make it leave his patrol pattern for a short time so its pattern becomes out of sync regarding the patterns of other guards. Use the tactic to turn efficient patrol timings into inefficient ones. Patrols might get resynced at certain points on the map, but most authors do not bother to implement that.
- Indirect water arrow torch removal: Aim a water arrow at the ceiling above a torch-wielding guard to extinguish the torch without alerting the guard (in most missions, it will just drop the torch and continue its patrol). Also works with a nearby wall if the water from the arrow reaches the torch while falling down. I experienced a guard wich came back with a fresh torch after i extinguished its old one and let it complete his patrol once (you can still use the darkness right after dousing his torch though).
- Imprisonment: Drop two movables in front of a door so that they block each other to prevent that door from opening towards the movables. Always works when using crates on any moving door with any AI trying to open it. This probably is bug-using at least (probably even considered cheating by most). AI will not cry for help in such situations. The door will try to push the movables aside but the physics engine doesn't handle inertia propagation past the first blocking movable. The guard sometimes tries to use another way though, so make sure to apply that tactic to an already cleaned room that only features one exit just after the AI entered it. I only use that method as a last resort when the author throws un-ko-able AI or arbitrary knockout restrictions at me.
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I just replayed this well made mission and found some minor stuff to fix in the next update. Tried to chose good names for the screenshots.
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... and patience. Which is why, so far, i always failed to sit down and really learn something. I began with C# and Java, but, never had the stamina. Maybe one day.
Try Python.
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There's a game called TIS-100 which makes a game or puzzle out of coding. I just got it recently but haven't really delved into it. It opens up like an old '80s computer with and it comes with an obscure manual. I think it might be for machine or even assembly code though, like the lowest level of coding, since you're playing directly with cycles and memory allocations. I don't know if I can recommend it, but it is interesting and you are still technically learning coding, like the pure logic puzzle part of it. And it's still a game, so it's better for motivation.
Zachtronics has some good games for people interested in tech. But TIS-100 is rather hardcore. Same with Shenzhen I/O (though not as much as TIS-100). Both are mostly about concurrency-oriented space-efficient programming in fictional flavors of assembly language. That games are frustratingly difficult at times even if you already have some experience programming micro controllers.
So that stuff might more be a recommendation for the entertainment of the parent than the child.
Zachtronics has less hardcore games too. But that are not about programming at all.
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Python is the best programming language to start with. It is general purpose, easy to write and read, and it comes with a huge and easy to use standard library.
Whatever language you chose - don't chose ASM, C, C++ or any language that does not come with automatic memory management and bounds checking for a first language! It is absurdly hard to get code right in that languages - to the point, where the best coders on earth still create code that makes important infrastructure vulnerable to remote code execution attacks.
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Ah sorry I thought you were talking about the environmental ropes. I actually found a bug with those. Not sure about whats happening with rope arrows in 2.06 though.
Luckily i experienced no bugs with any ropes yet.
Rope arrows work fine - i just got the impression that they wiggle around a bit longer and more erratic before comming to rest and becomming climbable in 2.06. But i am not sure about that anymore - could also be that i just see more frames of the unfolding process of rope arrows now than in 2.05...
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I looked into this and it seems there was some error made when saving out ragdoll locations when I built the map. It appears the engine also saved out these properties to the ropes. Not sure why this is only showing up in 2.06. Regardless, It's been fixed
Ragdoll positions? I did not notice bodies lying around. Did i miss something?
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Regarding the spiders: They use the AAS48, which also descibes the boundaries not too well. The standard spider requires an area of 74 x 68 and aheight of 24 (as measured in DR). The AAS48 covers an area that is smaller than the area required by the spider (48 x 48) and requires a height of 82, which is much too high for a spider that only has a height of 24. I am not sure for which entities these AAS types were made, but I would suggest to create new ones. I will have a look at suitable sizes, when I find the time.
Could this explain why spiders exhibit odd behaviour (getting temporarily stuck or circling for a time) in many missions?
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Yes, i only too had that problem here.
it must be extreme heavy, like gravity change, or physics update.
Different collision matrix or movement update.
You guys do realize this has something todo with the ropes glitching out right? 2.06 invented all kinds of new bugs.
I got stuck a lot in the Cauldron and maybe the rope arrows wiggle a lot around more than in 2.05 before getting climbable (but not sure about that) - but they did not glitch to the point where they would not become climbable in my countless hours of playing the 2.06 beta (i had to reduce my TDM time a lot before 2.06 became stable though).
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Implementing limited inventory requires an altered mission design to not become tedious quickly.
Bethesda included a lot of (rather similar) linear caves/crypts/dungeons of medium length in Skyrim. To avoid having the player backtrack all the way to the entrance at the end of the crawl, they often implemented sort of a shortcut that is only usable from the inside - mostly eliminating any backtracking.
Most often elevation or unpickable doors with a lever on the inside where used to block that shortcuts when coming in and make them available when on the way out. On a few occasions they even had a deity teleport the player to the outside after completing a quest.
TDM is no Skyrim, but backtracking almost never is a thing, the player likes.
In most TDM missions, i had to visit most coridors multiple times. That experience changed my playstyle from trying to ghost through to blackjacking everyone (including sleeping people), so i can move faster the second time i have to visit a room.
One way to maybe make inventory limits a fun game mechanic might be to allow the player to leave loot in any place like already possible with other movables. AI would somehow react to finding piles of loot as it already sometimes react to finding some loot items missing. The player could have a loot bag wich can be shouldered like a body when filled with enough stuff. That bag could be dropped at any place (like a body) and the player would make some distinctively satisfying noise of expensive gem encrusted stuff clunking against eachother when moving while carrying a filled loot bag (with the noise being louder if the bag is not shouldered).
In mansion missions without an accessible perimeter, the player could just drop stuff out of windows into the garden and pretend to collect it on the way out (after ending the mission).
There also really are missions, where the loot is a bit excessive. But looting never gets old. I never had the feeling of tediousness when looting the shelf full of golden plates. There certainly is a limit to the amount of lootable items, where exceeding it would make looting boring. But i never saw that reached.
Even in Thief 4 the boringness did not came from the loot itself but from having to endure the same animation over and over. And they really tried hard to make looting seem as pointless as possible by mostly placing stuff as shiny loot that barely makes a coin when hauled to a fence. Looting still was fun even in Thief 4 (we will see whether it still is fun in Thief 5, where i would expect them to feature literal piles of crap marked as loot).
So having a reasonable amount of loot is fine. But don't go as far as in Styx where i always had the feeling that something is missing because you could only loot that special coins and equippment. Also, players not interesting in looting could just ignore it if looting is not one of the mission objectives.
It also feels rather odd when i see on the debriefing that i got all the loot (there are only few such missions though). I do search rooms for loot, but don't expect to find it all. It somehow adds to the feeling of a more alive world, that there is some minor stuff hidden in random places wich keeps beeing hard to find even when searching all the rooms carefully.
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Mrs. Garrett obviously stores all the stuff in her soundproofed handbag.
There is at least one bank heist mission where you have to carry the gold bars one for one to the drop point - and that was the sucking part of an otherwise good mission.
If you are not convinced: Try it yourself. Play any mission and backtrack to your spawn point after every tenth medium-sized object you steal.
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As the list of stuff to support for backwards-compatibility reasons will never shrink, i would recommend to start as small as possible with only roq, mp4, h264, aac.
Also the restricted FFmpeg should be released as a "quick fix" for 2.06. As no assets change, it would be a rather small one and would prevent any problems when 2.07 gets released around xmas or later.
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I never really bothered with Wine, because it's a pain for me to make stuff work which doesn't work natively, but, ok... as long as no copy protection is involved that may be right. Let's just say it is nothing for the typical gamer, who just wants to game.
Wine only works well, if you are running a pretty standard multilib distribution like Ubuntu. It is also mostly good for running older games. The same applies to Windows XP now and will apply to Windows 7 after end of life gives the game devs more confidence in using the latest DirectX wich will be unavailable for older Windows versions.
For copy protection there are Good old Games (shop specialized in DRM-free games) and gamecopyworld.com (wich provides cracks to apply on your legit version to remove / disable the protection from games not bought on GoG).
Of course, the typical gamer is, and will not be, on Linux. But neither is he running any end-of-life Windows (Windows 7 currently still has 36% share among gamers according to Steam (the typical PC gamer has games requiring Steam) - but it is not end of life and DX12 has not become mandatory for new games just yet.
Also, the typical gamer does not play TDM.
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I don't know which games you play, but... not sure if that IS even a decision for most gamers. About 1% of games are available for Linux. Which makes sense, considering its market share, especially on the gaming market.
The games available for Linux are not only the games that are released natively for Linux. You have to add those that run okay with Wine.
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I wonder if a better approach would be to always default to the native monitor resolution in fullscreen mode and calculate r_fovRatio based on that resolution assuming square pixels.
Do displays with non-square pixels still exist?
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Switched from XP to Windows 7 long ago. But with Windows 7 support ending 2020, the status of the native Linux x64 version seems to be much more important than any Windows before 10. Microsoft seems to be determined to keep on pushing Windows 10.
So everyone that is using old Windows versions now (including me) will have to decide whether to switch to Windows 10 or Linux for gaming anyway. Therefore this two platforms should get all the developer love.
P.S.: This month, the support for Firefox on Windows XP and Vista ends. IE, Chrome and Opera already stopped supporting Windows XP.
Windows 10: Why you should NOT upgrade...
in Off-Topic
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Microsoft's browsers where among the first having settings for blocking JavaScript (this is not an endorsement).
As you already block javaScript, try to also block all 3rd party requests by default too (uMatrix addon recommended). You will have to tailor your settings the first few weeks until you have more permissive rules for the big sites and blogs you want to keep working. But the web gets even faster.
They have to provide service without cookies that are not technically required. If they provide a login, also providing a session cookie storing your serssion ID is okay. They do not have to ask about that, because it is technically implied (but they have to mention it in their privacy policy text, wich they do not have to shove into your face - providing a link in the menu is fine).
But if the cookie is for some marketing or other tracking stuff, they have to ask and yes, the site has to work without it if the user does not explicitly opt in.
But you should never rely on law alone. Even with the new and shiny GDPR (wich is a big leap forward) nobody will get fined for setting a cookie - and they all know that. So they will keep trying to track you (not only by using cookies).
Deny 3rd party cookies in your browser settings (every major browser lets you do that now) and never ever think about cookies again. Additionally tell the browser to forget all cookies, cache, browsing history and domstorage data (if you do not play browser games) on exit to reduce tracking potential even further.
If you want to accept cookies for a site, don't add that site's nagscreen to your stylish CSS file. It is not hard to make your own CSS file if all you want is just to hide some stuff on some sites. Every major browser comes with a DOM inspector this day. Just get the id or class of the elements to hide and hide them. Look at my example, it is rather small because without JavaScript you don't see much nag dialogs anyway.