Things that could be improved

[Dave the Taffer]

I would have a couple of observations/suggestions for this beautiful game, hoping that they're not silly things to say. I also hope this is the correct thread for this kind of suggestions, and please forgive me if this has already been said by someone else.

Right now, the main folder of a The Dark Mod installation (even new ones) isn't very clean to the eyes. There are a lot .pk4 and text files everywhere. It's true that the executables are easy to find, but a great feeling of confusion remains. It's also true that probably most players use some kind of desktop launcher and rarely/never open this folder. But my question remains: there is a reason for this specific directory structure? Couldn't those files be put in some subdirectories? Obviously I'm referring to future updates, I suppose that the engine needs to be updated for this. Maybe these subdirectories could be called something like "assets" (or "base"), "docs", and so on. Would something like this be a sensible thing to do?

Ok, now I forgot the other question/suggestion if I can remember it I'll post it later, excuse me. What a broken brain I have!

Edited February 20, 2022 by Dave the Taffer

[SirGen]

Adding the options to invert vertical and horizontal attacks and parries separately, would be a nice improvement.

Edited April 25, 2022 by SirGen

[thebigh]

We definitely need more fonts; especially some additional neat handwriting fonts. It's annoying when you've got handwritten documents by a number of different people and the only thing left is something illegible.

[thebigh]

Sometimes you have to lean forward to read a document, for example a book in a chest or on a desk. If you keep the F key pressed you should continue leaning forward even when the document opens instead of automatically leaning back.

[wesp5]

1 hour ago, thebigh said:

If you keep the F key pressed you should continue leaning forward even when the document opens instead of automatically leaning back.

If you mean the frob key with F that sounds like a good idea, which could get rid of the "lean forward" key which is rarely used otherwise!

Edited March 5, 2022 by wesp5

[peter_spy]

Or, you could design assets around player standing / crouching height, so the lean forward key is obsolete, like in all other video games.

[thebigh]

I use lean forward pretty frequently. It's not obsolete in TDM at all.

[wesp5]

I only need it to frob stuff out of containers or other areas where they can't be reached otherwise. Merging the frob key with the lean forward key would be an easy solution. Dragofer/Obsttorte, could this be done via scripts so I could at least add it to my patch?

[thebigh]

The problem I was trying to explain is this: suppose you have to lean forward to read a scroll or something. When the scroll opens you stop leaning forward even if you continue to hold the lean forward button. If that takes you back out of frobbing range the scroll closes again, which is annoying.

I don't think combining the frob and lean-forward keys would solve that, and it isn't something I would ever want. How would it work, for example, in Thief Den 2 where you need to lean forward to drop the fake crown in place of the real one?

[AluminumHaste]

12 hours ago, wesp5 said:

If you mean the frob key with F that sounds like a good idea, which could get rid of the "lean forward" key which is rarely used otherwise!

Maybe you don't use it I use it all the time to look over ledges and stuff.

[wesp5]

Maybe this is a matter of personal playing style, I never lean either ;). I have some other suggestions though after having played the great missions that were released with 2.10 final! Either include them in the core mod or into my patch :)...

- Can it be made that we can take all the food with us as some of these missions did?

- Can it be made that fire arrows actually set multiple enemies on fire as in Hazard Pay?

- Can it be made that broadhead arrow headshots can kill zombies as in Hazard Pay?

- Can the invisibility potion become one of the core features or is it and I never knew?

Edited March 8, 2022 by wesp5

[Anderson]

Will there be more work to improve performance? For example include common performance workaround tweaks into standard game settings? I mean particularly ”Disabling standard graphics features” I use a fairly newer budget laptop. The new patch helped loading times a lot and I'm glad to see this. But standard performance seems to be inconsistent, especially with EAX. I really want to keep native resolution and EAX on. Everything else doesn't matter to me.

Minimum graphics solutions are also described on the forums here:

here:

And on the wiki here:

https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Performance_Tweaks#Disabling_standard_graphics_features

Edited March 10, 2022 by Anderson

[Xolvix]

Since people are talking about leaning, I have to say I use it a fair bit as well. For example, sometimes I need to lean to get a good shot with a water arrow at a lamp that's near a doorway I want to enter. If I get too close I'm illuminated enough for the AI in the room to respond, however if I lean a bit I can often get the shot I need without being lit so much that I get seen.

Additionally, there are times where there's loot on a table or something that if I get too close I'll be spotted, but if I lean forward I can just reach it with only a moderate increase in visibility. These are just some scenarios I've encountered where leaning has proven useful, and it's one of those tools in my bag of tricks that I'd hate to lose.

As for other improvements, I just want to give a shout-out to those who improved load times in 2.10. It's seriously noticeable just how much shorter loads are, not just for initial loads but also especially when loading quick-saves.

EDIT: Oh and another thing - the download servers for both the main game as well as the in-game downloader for missions seem to be much, much better than they were. I dunno if slow servers were removed and/or bandwidth was increased, but regardless I'm getting fast downloads for the most part with the vast majority of mirrors.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Xolvix

[datiswous]

1 hour ago, Xolvix said:

however if I lean a bit I can often get the shot I need without being lit so much that I get seen.

This does feel a bit like cheating to me at times. I mean, if you lean forward, you're supposed to be lit as well, but often that isn't the case.

[thebigh]

3 minutes ago, datiswous said:

This does feel a bit like cheating to me at times. I mean, if you lean forward, you're supposed to be lit as well, but often that isn't the case.

It can depend. If you're leaning forward so that just your head and torso are in the light you obviously should be less visible than if you step forward and your entire body is in the light.

[New Horizon]

1 hour ago, datiswous said:

This does feel a bit like cheating to me at times. I mean, if you lean forward, you're supposed to be lit as well, but often that isn't the case.

 

It's not cheating if less of your body is leaning into a lit area.  The light gem will pick up less light.  Makes sense.  There are situations where you lean into bright light though so it does balance out.

[Xolvix]

What all these folks said. Leaning is partial visibility, if you can keep only part of your body exposed to lighting sources then it affords you the opportunities as I presented. That's not cheating - that's literally how real life works too.

The best parts of this game are when I apply real-world thought processes to it, like "hmm, if I do this as I would in real-life, I expect this outcome" and you try it in the game and it actually does what you expect (for better or worse). That's one of the greatest strengths of the immersive sim sub-genre.

EDIT: Also for what it's worth, leaning in TDM feels realistic and introduces some danger still. There are a number of games that have the lean capability, but my favourite worst example is Soldier of Fortune of all things. That game has a lean mechanic for some reason, but it's totally broken. If you lean around a corner, the game doesn't modify your visibility to the AI to compensate. So you can lean around corners as much as you like, shoot the shit out of your enemies and they'll never see you until you actually start walking. It was quite a feature to abuse when low on health though.

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Xolvix

[datiswous]

Ok, I think I might had some specific situations that seemed unrealistic, but this is not always the case.

7 hours ago, Xolvix said:

but my favourite worst example is Soldier of Fortune of all things. That game has a lean mechanic for some reason, but it's totally broken. If you lean around a corner, the game doesn't modify your visibility to the AI to compensate. So you can lean around corners as much as you like, shoot the shit out of your enemies and they'll never see you until you actually start walking. It was quite a feature to abuse when low on health though.

Ah, that's why headshot were so easy..

I think FEAR has a similar issue, at least in the multiplayer, where you can lean, but others will not see you.

[Xolvix]

22 minutes ago, datiswous said:

Ah, that's why headshot were so easy..

I think FEAR has a similar issue, at least in the multiplayer, where you can lean, but others will not see you.

The original Dishonored has a similar issue, even on the hardest difficulty level. You can lean and the AI doesn't notice shit, but they fixed this in Dishonored 2. In the sequel, depending on the difficulty level (or if you choose a custom difficulty and adjust it yourself), leaning will either cause you to have zero visibility to the AI, the AI will notice you but slowly (my preference), or you'll be seen as easily as if you popped out entirely from cover.

[datiswous]

Can the Use inv. item setting be changed to simply Use and moved to Actions menu? It is not only used for Inv. items, but also for picking up bodies, etc.

 

Also, in the Actions menu there is Crouch, Jump and Mantle, which are actually movements, I think, so they should be in the Movement menu.

[Anderson]

I feel like me stupid, me no understand but how to use a slow match? I've probably asked about this before and I forgot.

Does the training mission or the tutorial FM's have any hints on this?

Edited March 11, 2022 by Anderson

[thebigh]

1 hour ago, Anderson said:

I feel like me stupid, me no understand but how to use a slow match? I've probably asked about this before and I forgot.

Does the training mission or the tutorial FM's have any hints on this?

Use the object handling controls to rotate it and touch the bright end on the candle or torch you want to light.

It's just like picking up a lit candle and using it to light another.

[wesp5]

2 hours ago, datiswous said:

Can the Use inv. item setting be changed to simply Use and moved to Actions menu? It is not only used for Inv. items, but also for picking up bodies, etc.

You don't pick up bodies with USE, you do that with FROB. But you USE held items like candles and bodies so I edited that entry to be "Use Inv. Item/Use Held Item".

[datiswous]

Yeah ok, but it shouldn't be in the inventory menu, because then new players can't find it.

[peter_spy]

By the way, that stuff with so many Settings' subsections has to go, if we want to talk about good UX. One continuous scrolling list per category, and there options can be grouped by subcategories. The order of main categories needs to be changed too, from most to least often changed settings (not alphabetical or any other).