Kids in TDM?

[MirceaKitsune]

I've been wondering whether it might make sense to consider adding child NPC's to character arsenal of TDM. If of course we had a model artist wanting to create one, and a real life teen willing to record a new voice package. Currently I'm thinking of two categories: Children from poor families who are dirty and dressed in rags, and children from rich families who are dressed as lords.

 

Art wise, I think it would add more detail and diversity to the populations of towns, which is the same reason why I suggested pets a while ago. It could also help put more accent on family life in the medieval age, as actual families (man + woman + children) could be found living in homes which the player can visit. Another reason is that the story of a mission might want to include kids as actors, especially since we have artists who create TDM missions based on books.

 

Hint: Until official child NPC's would exist, a hack to do this with the existing ones might be possible. You could create an entity definition which scales down the model and bounding box of a normal NPC, then scales the head up slightly to make it larger than the body. Main problem is they would still use the voices of adults, which would probably sound very weird in most cases.

 

Also, because I know someone will eventually bring this up: I'm aware that certain people will find the idea controversial, simply because kids could (like every other NPC) get killed by the player, which is known to make some people angry even when it's just art. Hopefully everyone understands this is a suggestion intended for extra detail, and to give more artistic choices to the mapper. Unless the mission will require it as an objective, which I seriously doubt anyone will do, no one will have to watch kids die unless they intentionally want to be evil. So that's hopefully out of the way.

[Bikerdude]

I have asked for this myself, we have them in thief so why not in tdm.

[grayman]

Short answer: No kids.

 

Longer answer (or observation):

 

Given your recent posted threads, I'm wondering if you're digging through the archives looking for topics that have already been discussed to death. Folks here then end up spending a lot of time talking through them again, revisiting old arguments, and taking time away from other, more productive, activities they should be working on. Sorry if that sounds a bit paranoid, but that's the impression I get.

[MirceaKitsune]

Short answer: No kids.

 

Longer answer (or observation):

 

Given your recent posted threads, I'm wondering if you're digging through the archives looking for topics that have already been discussed to death. Folks here then end up spending a lot of time talking through them again, revisiting old arguments, and taking time away from other, more productive, activities they should be working on. Sorry if that sounds a bit paranoid, but that's the impression I get.

 

Sorry, that's not the case at all... quite surprised someone got that impression really. I don't know everything that was discussed in the past... and it seems I'm not very talented with search engines, even if I try to look for previous threads on my ideas sometimes. I often assume no one thought of it before, so I just go ahead and post an idea, but I shall be more careful from now on in this case.

Edited October 2, 2015 by MirceaKitsune

[Springheel]

The forum search feature is pretty poor. Google works better.

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/16527-children-in-tdm/

[MirceaKitsune]

The forum search feature is pretty poor. Google works better.

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/16527-children-in-tdm/

 

Thanks, read through it and subscribed. Seems there were quite a few threads about this. I'd delete this one now to keep it from pointlessly taking up space on the forum, maybe post further thoughts there if anything. Sorry again for the repetitiveness!

Edited October 2, 2015 by MirceaKitsune

[SeriousToni]

You should REALLY try out the Google site search as Springheel suggested! It's much better than the forum search and preserves you the rolling eyes of the forum members reading another topic that came up twice

[Springheel]

Just for clarification, I don't mind if topics come up again...not everyone was here the first time and positions may even change over time. But old-timers don't always want to go back over the same points, so don't be surprised if there's not a huge response.

 

Besides, if only new things can be discussed, then there will be fewer and fewer posts as time goes on, which isn't great for community building.

[the_deep]

I think kids would be another cool addition to TDM. But like animals, these are AIs whose behaviour and animations doesn't have to be too elaborate. Picture, for instance, creeping outside a cracked window where two children before falling asleep talk and reveal secrets they've overheard the grown ups talking about. Perhaps just sitting on their beds dangling their feet, or even just lying there. But it could also be done just using voice overs as well, of course.

[Noordung]

Without seeing pages of old topics... Was there no one who would be willing to make children or was there "no" to children in TDM?

[stumpy]

I think its the case of new models, body head clothes, textures, skeleton, rigging, animation, vocal sets, ragdoll, boy girl.

 

would they be armed or not, and would there be zombie version's in different states of decay, and maybe a undead skeleton.

[Deadlove]

I'd be the guy that made the objective to kill the kid.

 

It's a game, it's supposed to play with you as much as you play with it.

 

Imagine the feeling of taking on a guild of thieves or necromancers that were all children. Twisted.

[Airship Ballet]

child soldiers that kiiiiiiiiiiill

Edited October 5, 2015 by Airship Ballet

[MirceaKitsune]

Child soldiers would be an interesting concept. The mission would need to have a warning then, for those who can't bare the thought of a child dying in a game regardless.

 

Also, since I saw a comment about this either here or in the other thread: I don't think people becoming soldiers as early as 14 was a reason war was more frequent in medieval times. If anything it would have made it less likely, since from many perspectives children seem to be more mature gentle than adults... or at least I get that impression.

 

The main reason we have less wars today is technology: We can exploit resources better and survival is less threatened, thus less need to fight over things. We also have the internet and air travel, which connects people all across the world more quickly and helps them establish a connection... civilians and politicians alike. This helped push humanity into an era where (although human stupidity remains predominant) we have stronger beliefs about killing / invading / etc being wrong and syndicates who fight for them publicly (often stopping politicians themselves). Whereas in medieval times, if your country went to war and you said "war is unacceptable because we should all be nice to each other", you were either laughed at or considered a traitor... telling it to your king's face would get you beheaded.

[OrbWeaver]

The TLDR summary is that an author who wants children (or cats, dogs, pigeons, Tyrannosaurus Rexes or flying cars) in their missions is going to have to find someone to create the assets themselves. The TDM team is not exactly overflowing with character animators, and those that do exist are likely to want spend their limited time on content that will have the broadest possible appeal, rather than stuff that is going to be used by a relative minority of mappers.

[MirceaKitsune]

The TLDR summary is that an author who wants children (or cats, dogs, pigeons, Tyrannosaurus Rexes or flying cars) in their missions is going to have to find someone to create the assets themselves. The TDM team is not exactly overflowing with character animators, and those that do exist are likely to want spend their limited time on content that will have the broadest possible appeal, rather than stuff that is going to be used by a relative minority of mappers.

 

I think children and cats / dogs would be used by the vast majority of missions, since both can normally be found in any house or mansion (rich or poor). Unlike dinosaurs and flying cars

 

But other than that I agree: There are many things people might want, and not every developer can put effort into them... the story of FOSS software everywhere. Considering I'll eventually make stuff for TDM myself, I might tackle stuff like pets, then propose them for inclusion if and when that's done.

[Deadlove]

TDM is not puppeteered by the masses.

 

Add 3d models of kids so we can kill them with modeled weapons and programming malarkey.

 

It's a game. Push the envelope.

 

 

 

For the record, I love POSTAL, just...unnecessary violence, but totally awesome.