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List of major console variables and commands: PLAYER tdm_holdfrob_* --- set of variables that affect the reworked frob controls. tdm_autosearch_bodies --- automatically take items attached to unconscious bodies on frob. pm_headbob_mod, pm_lean_* --- allows to reduce some player movements. HELPER tdm_show_viewpos, screenshot_viewpos --- embedding viewpos into screenshot for better bug reports. tdm_open_doors, tdm_close_doors --- cheats to make mission testing faster. TROUBLESHOOTING r_useLightPortalFlow, r_useLightPortalFlowCulling --- improved light-entity interaction culling. Most major effect on shadows. This cvar is responsible for causing light leaks with stencil shadows, please report all of them! (thread) r_useNewRenderPasses --- selects from several renderer backend code paths. This is similar to the old r_useNewBackend cvar which has been deleted. r_shadowMapSinglePass --- faster code path for filling shadow maps. r_useEntityScissors, r_animationBounds --- improved bounds estimates for rendered entities. r_postprocess_dither --- new dithering in tonemap postprocessing for less color banding. r_shadowMapAlphaTested --- experimental mode for alpha-tested surfaces with shadow maps, where transparent areas of texture don't cast shadows. s_realTimeDecoding --- selects code path for decoding sound samples. tdm_subtitles_* --- many cvars for subtitle improvements (location cue, duration extension, debug text).

GAMEPLAY * Frob controls have been reworked completely. Previously players were annoyed by having to do three presses to extinguish a light. Also, some player didn't even know that bodies could be shouldered and were limited with dragging bodies. Now simply clicking the frob button performs the action player needs most of the time, and pressing-and-holding the same button performs alternative actions like dragging bodies and extinguishing candles (thread). * Several aspects of mantling has been improved: overhead mantling has become faster, mantling over low obstacles is allowed while carrying an item or a body. Also it is possible to switch weapon while being on rope/ladder or mantling. Pressing crouch button on rope/ladder now starts slide-down immediately. * Some aspects of gameplay can be further simplified. Auto-search bodies is for players who don't want to waste time searching for keys and purses on guard bodies. Lockpicking "Auto" difficulty now indeed trivializes lockpicking (thread). * Leaning animation has been improved with lower head tilt (thread). * Player footstep sounds have been rebalanced. Metal and water sounds were especially painful previously. * Further improvements of subtitles: revised location and font to avoid overlapping with other GUI elements, added directional cue, better slot allocation. Each subtitle is now displayed for at least one second even if the sound is very short. * More settings to reduce camera bobbing/rolling/shaking, which is good for players who feel motion sickness from default camera animations. * Now several script addons can coexist and work independently (thread). ENGINE * Optimized generation of light-entity interactions in rendering frontend. Also greatly optimized shadow processing, especially for moving lights. Unfortunately, many existing missions are not compatible with these changes, so you might see light leaking through walls (mainly with stencil shadows). Please report all such cases, we'll apply workaround on case by case basis (thread). * The "old" and "new" rendering backends are finally merged into one. It is as nice to program as the new backend, and as old-fashioned and reliable as the old backend. Single-pass shadow maps enabled by default and now respect noselfshadow. * Materials with polygonoffset now interact with lights. So static decals can have bumpmap and specular lighting. Note however: dynamic decals still don't interact with lights. * Revised parallelSky lights and marked shadowing parallel lights as deprecated (thread). * PNG image format now behaves equally to other supported formats. In particular, it is not required to explicitly specify its extension, and it can be referenced directly in GUI code. * Added functions min/max to material expressions, which can be useful for clamping. * Fixed minor culling bugs on animated entities and enabled entity scissors by default. * Reduced color banding for fog with some dithering at tonemapping stage. * Finally our C++ code can compress and decompress all texture formats we use, meaning that we no longer depend on occasionally buggy/slow vendor implementations. BUGS * Now both OGG and WAV sounds work the same way and stop playing while in main menu. * Fixed "gui::startSelect" as a feature that allows to choose player starting location in GUI briefing. * Fixed warnings in newspaper_bridgeport0X core readable GUI. ASSETS * Added automatic turrets, to be combined with security cameras (Thread). * Added more covered furniture models (6289). * Added wall models from Seeking Lady Leicester (6293). * New and fixed versions of atdm:lamp_electric_square_3_lit_unattached (6315). * Fixed UV map on Stove models (6312). * Fixed some issues with moor AI (6345).

Interesting. Probably user error then. Possibly I grabbed the loot through the chest while trying to open it? I can reload to an earlier slot from before entering the building and have another look - otherwise it's possible that I wasn't able to highlight it. Either way, if it's just loot that's less of a concern. I was more worried it was part of a puzzle I had missed. EDIT: Okay, with the stuff in the chest, I cannot frob the contents in my main savegame, it simply doesn't work. However, if I wind back to an earlier point from before I entered the building, it will work. Strange. I still can't find that key, though.

The devs didn't title this thread, and @datiswous said they're attempting to mislead people by using Russell's name and a retro style to make it resemble Thief, which is cynical. I grew up on forums like I'm sure anyone who likes a game from '98 did. I actually left the Discord immediately after joining it because it was more off-topic doom-posting than anything relevant to the mod. I thought the forums might be better, but it's mostly just grown men yelling at clouds and telling strangers how mature they are, and a few brave souls actually developing anything. Depressing place, I'll just stick to enjoying new missions every 6 months without an account.

True, but, 1. this thread is called "Western stealth FPS with Stephen Russell", and, 2. nothing you said changes anything for me. The gameplay still doesn't look like something I'd enjoy. And, if you really think this forum is cynical, then you don't visit forums much. Actually, the majority of the users are are pretty mature, unlike in other forums.

This pinned thread's purpose is to collect links to all the discussion threads for new features to be added in 2.12: [2.12] Multi-addons support [2.12] Auto-search bodies [2.12] Turrets Allow mantling while carrying a body New lean for 2.12 Frob to use world items [2.12] Viewpos on player HUD and screenshots English Subtitles for AI Barks Subtitle Enhancements [2.12] Improved Interaction Culling and a related bug report thread HERE As well as older feature collection threads: [2.10] Feature discussion threads [2.11] Feature discussion threads

That has been said before but I don't understand it. Isn't this a simple "if short-frob then do x elif long-frob do y" situation?

Kinda feels like I threw a live grenade into a dung pit by necroing this thread. Anyway, it seems like there is some agreement with my current work on both sides of the pit, as it will make the control scheme a bit more consistent, while leaving the general new control scheme intact. I have a working prototype that implements the following table. Contrary to the previous table, hold-type-grabber for loot and tools is not possible, as the long-press frob is already tied to multiloot (pickup multiple items successively without releasing the frob button). This extension is enabled via cvar, i.e., completely optional.

I believe Snatcher already did this in detail. To me it really is about consistency. As far as I remember we wanted to include the long-frob for new players who don't know about shouldering/eating/whatever. For me it never was about the second I gain while shouldering because I actually don't shoulder that much. I knock out everybody so I rarely need to move bodies around. I shoulder most often to see if a body has a key and to get it when it is dropped on the other side, so short-frob to loot would be more important to me than quicker shouldering! So IMHO TDM should be consistent in itself to make new players learn the actions easier. Comparisons to other games don't help as new and old games use different methods.

Didn't play Deus Ex, Dishonored 1/2 or etc but, can you manipulate body limps in these games? And, don't you have to hold frob to shoulder bodies in dishonored games? Patiently waiting for a hold frob to shoulder / unshoulder bodies prototype. If anything, to prove how wrong some of us are.

I get that and full disclosure: I did not read the full thread, it's just too much! I was absent in recent months, so I missed all of this. That makes a lot of sense. Although, to solve this, one could communicate via audio cue ("uh uh") that no use-type-interaction is available for that entity. Anyway, there is an incredibly easy way to solve the inconsistency while staying true to the original control scheme and that is to simply swap shouldering and grabber. Entity type Short Press Long Press ...Release Button Junk Grabber Nothing Nothing Food Grabber Eat Nothing Loot Pick-up Nothing Nothing Bodies Grabber Shoulder Nothing Lights Grabber Exstinguish Nothing Tools Inventory Nothing Nothing This way, every interaction that was originally "frob + use" (shouldering, eat, exstinguish) will the become long-press-frob. So, the long-press simply becomes a shorthand for special action, nice and clean. While I do love the hold-type-grabber to death, I'd be willing to sacrifice it for a consistent control-scheme. (@stgatilov @Daft Mugi) Right now, we have this weird mixture of hold-type- and toggle-type-grabber that I guarantee you, will confuse new players (and streamers). I say, either fully embrace the lovely new hold-type-grabber (which I am still all for) or drop it completely.

Regardless of what is used in the end, I think we should move auto-loot to that too for everything to be consistent. Right now auto-loot is long-frob, bodies and lights are double-frob and consumables are frob+use! Rather an unintuitive mess.

It is quite litigated in the thread already whether it is particularly important or common in games for a context sensitive input be "consistent" or whether this inherently means something is intuitive - so I won't repeat my thoughts on it. I will say It seemed like it was quite difficult to get this change as it is into the game, so while I think anything can be improved I am not sure anyone wants to go through another 10 pages, polls, etc. So I hope I don’t sound short or dismissive, it’s really not my intention, it’s just been a very long thread. I will say if an object is frob highlighted, ie subject to an interaction prompt, if frobbing it then does not do anything or provide any feedback the game immediately feels very strange and broken. I do not think it is good a idea to have objects which can only be interacted with via long press. The current design is around primary interactions being on short press and the secondary more situational actions being on hold, while also retaining compatibility with all legacy interactions. There is some disagreement as far as what is a "primary" interaction, but I find it pretty intuitive in practice as it is today. There are some exceptions that did not work out in testing. I will the example of candles/lanterns - having extinguish as the primary interaction makes a lot of sense, but in practice didn't work very well. The game is full of extinguished candles, empty candle holders, etc that are now simple physics objects that require a long press to pickup and have no primary interaction - see issue above. You also have to handle lanterns differently, which can be toggled off/on. You could code in the TDS method which is extinguish a lit candle on frob, then it becomes a physics object (“junk” in the parlance of your table) so the primary interaction should then be grabber. There seemed in general to be a lot of concern about keeping the code clean. Being able to grab moveable inventory objects on hold without having to do the current dance of bringing them into inventory first and then “dropping” them - like keys and tools - could be a nice addition. Many loot objects are not moveables so these might be a bit of issue?

I did play Thief and FMs, but I don't play it any more, except for major things like Black Parade. The clunky movement and antiquated Dromed editor is what discouraged me from interacting with it over the years. I regularly play and sometimes make content for TDM, because it has much better movement model than Thief. I know that most missions don't use it well, but if you construct your geometry (gaps, ledges, distances) using power of two measurements, movement and mantling feels fast and snappy. There's no need for regression in that regard, in my opinion, there's a need for assets and missions made with the movement model in mind, to showcase its strengths properly. Even if TDM originally intended to "simulate the stealth gameplay of Thief, many things will be familiar to veteran Thief players" the actual mod history was a bit different. The team came up with a mission platform that has its own identity when it comes to mechanics. The way assets were made might have been a huge mistake, but that didn't prevent the platform from growing. Since you like anecdotal evidence, noone other Skacky once said that TDM movement model was super clunky, after playing The Painter's Wife. It was really hard to convince him that if a mapper places geometry this poorly, and isn't aware what spatial measurements play to the strengths of a movement model, no movement model will save his mission. And there is no fixing of this problem on the engine side, although it's not the first time when TDM team tries to address the asset problem with engine changes, which I suspect will ultimately lead to even more problems down the line. In game development, things like core mechanics and player tools are locked-down first, in one of the pre-production phases, because all the levels will be constructed around them. Making changes in core mechanics in a project this mature is very risky, I assume you don't plan on going through all playable spaces in all released TDM FMs to check for errors. Instead of making incremental changes in fundamental mechanics, I'd encourage you to create a fork, or some kind of major version bump candidate, like 3.0, where all things could be revamped: movement, player tools, UI, new frob mechanics, perhaps with UI contextual icons, new training map to incorporate all that, etc. Once all new elements fall into place and create something new, with a map or maps to back it up as relevant changes, it will be easier to convince existing player/author base that it was worth it. I assume the existing fanbase is already fragmented, as a result of all those heated discussions around the topic. But with multiple versions available for download, the transition to hypothetical "TDM 3.0" should be easier. It could be similar to UE2 and UE3, and you could also use this as an occasion to draw the line for backwards compatibility. I know there are old systems and variables kept in place just in order not to break existing missions. This way you could e.g. redo the LOD system, implement lights using math functions instead of textures, etc.

No, I remembered the old system, but I also was using my patch so I suspected at first I messed something up before I remembered that the handling of bodies and lights are so counter intuitive right now. I could easily add my own patch solution to make extinguishing lights short frob again, but I would rather see a consistent version of it in the core game! To provide some background information, I had just finished both the Cyberpunk DLC and The Outer Worlds DLCs, both of which use short-use and long-use systems too so my mindset somehow was expecting something more consistent ;).

We didn't make the holidays (such a busy time of year) so here's a New Year's gift, an unusual little mission. Window of Opportunity Recover an item for a regretful trader out in a wilderness setting, and discover more! Available within the in-game mission downloader or: Download: http://www.thedarkmo...ndetails/?id=79 Alternative: https://drive.google...WTMzQXZtMVFBSG8 Some unorthodox gameplay on regular/ghost difficulties. (Arachnophobes might prefer short mode...) Please expect to need your lantern in regular and ghost modes! Short ("easy") mode is a smaller map, so if you are looking for areas others reference below, or 100% of the loot, you'll need to play on another mode. I wanted to create my first mission before I became influenced by too many others' ideas, and limited myself to what has been done before. As such, this mission is not set in a city/town, and has some features that are likely to be provocative. There's a section some really like, which others don't, either way I kept it short to not last too long. That being said, I hope you do find it fun! :-) Special thanks to those who provided valuable testing and feedback: Goldwell, Kyyrma, plotzzz, 161803398874989, PPoe & Bikerdude (who also contributed a sound). (Please remember spoiler tags to not expose things meant to be discovered by playing.) Like so: [spoiler]secrets[/spoiler] If you are having trouble finding the main objective, here's what to pay attention to in the mission for hints: There is a spot it's possible to get stuck on the ground in the corner by the cliff/rockfall where there's a rope laying on the ground, please take care if you poke around there!

Again, this could be fixed by reversing short frob and long frob for bodies. Is it really that much of a problem to hold frob 200 ms longer to shoulder a body?

There's a bug I've been noticing for a long time, but for some reason it didn't click with me to mention it till someone else just mentioned seeing the same thing and I realized I'm not the only one. The contents of some chests and small containers like drawers will sometimes not become frobable when you open that container: You may need to close the door and open it again, after which you can frob any scrolls / keys / etc inside. Most likely something is happening with target_setfrobable getting triggered at the wrong time. Even when they are frobable, tiny items in small containers will sometimes only highlight from a very specific position and angle: I've had cases where I needed to lean forward and look at a coin just right and it would only highlight when my crosshair was on that one pixel. I'm sorry I didn't think to note down a FM and viewpos where to test it; If you need I'll keep that mind for when I play the next one. This doesn't happen a lot any might be hard to catch, but often enough as to be noticeable... in most recent FM's it seems to occur at least once in some drawer or lockbox.

I like that we can extinguish candles and light on/off lanterns with a long frob. A lot. It feels very natural. Congratulations for the idea and execution. From an usability point of view I disagree with the default 200ms but since members here are confident players will always get the desired result consider me and oddball. Thanks for having provided a cvar for me to change the timing. I don't like the fact that the toying with bodies or body limbs mechanic has been rendered unusable. People that don't use this mechanic to its full extent won't understand the reasons: take a limb and painfully carry the body to another room, hide a body carefully in the most peculiar place and position, recreate a crime or comic scene... Only TDM provides this fun, for those seeking it. The potential of the mechanic is gone for both existing and new players: too much long frob / key press to bother. Don't try to convince me of the opposite. Please make a cvar for snatcher to shoulder and unshoulder bodies on long frob, just like with candles. This is, in my opinion, the wisest of the solutions. Many thanks in advance.

It's enabled by default in 2.12. Most players will keep it, I guess. On second thought I think we better not. The text on frob servers three purposes: Get to know the name of AI (if any) without the need of shouldering. Get to know the status (KO/Dead) of AI without the need of shouldering. Get to know if something is in the grabber, but this is minor, and it could only be considered a feature if all objects had a proper name. The player triggers the text with his/her actions. If we do it on highlight then it is us who is triggering it, and the player may or may not want it displayed at that moment. Back on topic, Yeah, this is something I noticed too. I like this idea very much. I think it could work. Also, a new arg for mappers: on_death_tongue_out.

Another reason for long-press frob for special action: 2.11 already has one, multiloot. Quick-press frob to loot. Long-press frob to multiloot.

I believe TDM takes a minimalistic approach to he HUD, which I think is a good idea since we prefer realism and focusing on the environment rather than having icons and indicators everywhere. Something like modifying the frob helper crosshair when looking at a body could work though, eg: Empty circle when AI is dead or the normal white dot when alive. It works that way by default yeah, it's what I was referring to: If you pick up a body the text confirms it, will say "person" or "person's body" accordingly. It does require picking up and moving the AI: A solution might be the text appearing just by highlighting the body, still relies on the HUD confirming it but that would be like checking the AI's pulse so it works.

You can look at the andersarken mask pedestal in an attic in The Painter's Wife. It has multiple ways of placing the mask on the pedestal: - Use the mask on the pedestal - Frob the pedestal while the mask is selected - Possibly also holding the mask near the pedestal (this is based on stim/response). Might not be implemented in this example, though. Seeking Lady Leicester also has similar setups wherever you can use the torc.

Approach the body and frob it, available in the TDM Modpack & the Unofficial Patch for some time now. (Not really useful in 2.12 with default settings)

I would rather have an icon show the status of the body when it is frob-highlighted. So a skull icon or an healthy face with closed eyes icon, for example.