Looking and listening through a keyhole

[Guest]

I'd also suggest a screen prompt, like with safe lock, so players can get used to new convention. Personally I'm for something like "Press rmb to open door, hold rmb to look through the keyhole".

[Bikerdude]

I also crouch a lot of the time, and the leaning mechanic was usable crouch and standing up in thief1/2.

[Bikerdude]

"Press rmb to open door, hold rmb to look through the keyhole".

Would have to be other keys, as RMB is attach and rmb is walk forward, I use w to frob things so for example W frobs door as normal and Alt-W does keyhole view but only when crouched etc.

[grayman]

At this point, what I'm leaning toward is:

 

1 - Doors and door handles require frobbing for opening the door. No separate pop-ups. All existing doors work the same as they did.

 

2 - To invoke peeping:

 

a - encounter door with new handle plate that shows keyhole

 

b - position yourself in front of the door, looking at the door

 

c - crouch

 

d - lean forward into the door

 

3 - Peeping itself gives you:

 

a - a screen-filling GUI (similar to spyglass GUI) that shows you what's on the far side of the door

 

b - you can hear what's on the far side of the door (identical to leaning against the door and hearing what's there)

 

4 - To exit peeping:

 

a - back up

 

b - stand up

 

c - stop leaning forward

 

 

 

 

Let's work with that design for a while and see what comments come in.

 

thx.

[RPGista]

Sounds pretty good to me.

[grayman]

Any other comments?

[Guest]

Would have to be other keys, as RMB is attach and rmb is walk forward, I use w to frob things so for example W frobs door as normal and Alt-W does keyhole view but only when crouched etc.

 

Seems like a weird configuration, far from typical WASD-based control scheme. I suggest not to introduce any more weird or complicated setups than absolutely necessary, as people simply won't use them. E.g. lean forward requires a separate key, and you can't use key combos (Alt+W). Not sure if we can use key press & hold, but that might be useful IMO.

[grayman]

I missed the 5 likes on my proposal, so now that I see them, I'm going to move forward and see if I can get it to work.

 

Thanks.

[Bikerdude]

Any other comments?

I assume leaning into the door while standing will activate thge listeing feature as previously proposed..?

[grayman]

Leaning into the door from the side or front while standing or couched works the same as it does today

[NeonsStyle]

What's wrong with the same idea Thief had?

[grayman]

What's wrong with the same idea Thief had?

 

Remind me what that was?

[chedap]

Wasn't it that player's body and head are represented internally as two spheres, and leaning against a door would just clip the head-sphere through? I'm not 100% sure.

[grayman]

Keyhole peeping appears to be about 95% there. The only difference from my specs above is that you only need to stop leaning forward to bring the view back to normal.

 

No need to back up and no need to stand up, so players don't increase their chance of being seen when peeping stops.

 

The only thing a mapper needs to do is attach a new entity to the door. The entity will have a new handle plate model to differentiate it from the plates in use today. I'll ask Arcturus if he's available to create the new model.

 

No cameras are used, so there's no fiddling with cinematics or placing extra entities; you just need the new handle plate.

 

The model will have plates for both sides of the door, and you can peep through either side.

[Obsttorte]

Wahnsinn.

[Arcturus]

Your plan is to attach tiny portal screens to handle plates like in this video?

 

https://youtu.be/gojaewa6SNU?t=32s

[grayman]

No camera, no display surfaces. When I get a moment, I'll write some specs for you.

[Arcturus]

How about such effect (quick mockup):

 

 

It could appear as player gets close to door.

[grayman]

Looks nice, but...

 

1. Appearing as you approach requires a sense of player presence. Stim or thinking or trigger.

 

2. Dim light on far side might not be enough to create a light cone on the near side. Requires a sense of available light.

 

3. Player will be lit up while peeking.

 

4. Cone needs to bind to the door as it opens, which requires a sense of how available light is generating the cone. Lots of work. Cones on both sides will need to fade in and out with door movement.

 

 

 

Folks should discuss.

[Arcturus]

This would have to be only a visual effect, not a real light.

[VanishedOne]

So something similar to the light shaft materials used for rays from windows, etc? It might be possible to use LOD to handle player proximity, in which case the effect could be faded in/out via shaderParm3. But then you'd want to override LOD with whatever mechanism hides the cone when the door is open.

 

I agree that it would look odd to have a light shaft coming from a darker room.

[Outlooker]

May I suggest two different kinds of keyhole-based reconnaissance?

The naked-eye-peeking-through version seems already established and is nicely quaint - a keyhole-shaped shroud - and useful enough.

 

But there could easily be a more advanced version for a more professional thief based on an advanced tool, something like a periscope - after all, DM's steam punk elements already have a lot of tech, including a looking glass/scope;

the more advanced tool would be a short thin tube with a mirror shard on its one end, and a lens on the other. The tube would be used on the door, put through the keyhole, and then a more or less freely rotatable camera view

could simulate the looking through the tube and perceiving the situation on the other side of the door from the perspective of the tube's end.

 

This method would have the advantage of making able to see not only what is straightly behind the door, but also (by rotating the "tube/mirror") what is right next to and even above and under the door.

 

 

If my description is not clear enough, I mean a steam-punk version of something like this:

 

 

 

Technically like a Thief 2 scouting orb a bit behind the door on elevation of the key hole.

Edited September 22, 2018 by Outlooker

[Obsttorte]

Besides the possible culprits it looks a bit artificial to me. Mappers are free to add it if they think it suits the visual style of their missions, but as a standard feature it might not be worth the effort. That beeing said some mappers may even dislike it and want to turn it off and others may argue that it would be inconsistent if some missions uses a light cone and others not. Better to not have it by default imho.

[Epifire]

The light shaft from the keyhole seems like a step in the right direction. To me I see it like frobbing. Sure the frob isn't realistic but it's a necessary gameplay indicator we've all accepted to denote an interactive surface. Modern games do fine with an on screen prompt to convey options and since we will not be perusing that design philosophy, we need to consider the options available.

 

I would suggest a flat highlight of some kind (2D effect). We could tie in a keyhole icon/outline that would act as a frob enabled decal below the door handle.

 

Otherwise the alternative to no visual indicator is that if new players don't read the update log, it wont even be apparent that this feature exists. It would then be all together missed if we don't point it out somehow. That being said, is it possible to target a specific additional texture in the frob feature? Because then FM authors could replace the material resource if they so desired. My vote is to keep it inline with the existing frob feature so that it only shows itself when the player investigates that door. It would remain apparent that it's purely gameplay specific if the highlight only reveals itself when the handle is frobbed and would be the least visually intrusive method of getting the point across.

Does the keyhole icon appear in the frob? Then we know it's peekable and if not, there's no fuss; it's just a plain old regular door.

[Bikerdude]

No cameras are used, so there's no fiddling with cinematics or placing extra entities; you just need the new handle plate.

sweet.