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Pupil Dilation?


firoso

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As I have mentioned - twice - in this thread already, Thief 1 and 2 both have brightness adjustment. Both automatic (your screen turns slightly brighter a few seconds after you enter a dark room) and manual.

 

And you are absolutely sure that the "automatic" adjustment is in fact a code-level feature, and not some aspect of your monitor setup or eyesight?

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A magical lantern eh? Hey, I have a good idea. How about one of the Dark Mod missions having a either a side or main objective of stealing it from somewhere? A Gypsy (Pagan) magic lantern? Something along those lines? Maybe even writing some story about it to make it mystical. Like a ghost story ;-)

 

Also, the lantern as a droppable item was mostly in my mind for distraction purposes.

Edited by Ombrenuit
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Well, I already said I don't mind if the lantern is droppable by default (the author can change it either way, like every other inventory item). I'm just happy to have eventually convinced you guys it was a good idea to have in the game in the first place.

 

But I would still preffer if it was non-droppable by default, and will continue to explain why.

 

There is also no gameplay reason to have a silver cup and a golden one as loot. And if the player wants to do something stupid, then it should be his choice. We don't have to hold hands for every potential case. We already had this discussion a hundred times and now it's started here again?

Because we always go around in circles with you, Spar. I say - the compass can't be dropped. You say, because the compass is essential. And I say, the lantern is essential because the author needs to rely on it to make pitch black areas if he or she wants to avoid placing mushrooms or raising the ambient light.

 

Your loot example shows you don't understand or have forgotten everything again. Nothing bad will happen if there are different types of loot...

 

I continue to see why (by your own admission) that you're difficult to work with. If only you had a better short term memory and a more open mind, this would not be so much the case.

 

In that case it is up to the author to ensure that the level can be completed in some other way, without relying on the presence of particular pieces of equipment.

 

Yeah and the alternative was to place ambient lights or mushroom lights, which is what the lantern idea is supposed to avoid in the first place.

 

Or, provide an alternate path to reach the same objective, which is more unessecary work.

 

You'll find that smart FM authors have made keys undroppable for this same reason.

 

As I have mentioned - twice - in this thread already, Thief 1 and 2 both have brightness adjustment. Both automatic (your screen turns slightly brighter a few seconds after you enter a dark room) and manual.

Actually I have seen what you're talking about - the HUD on T2 does get brigher or darker. It seems to have 2 brightness levels. The darker one kicks in when you have a darker screen. But it doesn't seem to detect a "dark screen" very well in my experience.

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You're arguing the lantern should be undroppable by default, because the player might accidentally drop it somewhere they can never get it again? IMO, the player doesn't need to be babied like that. Let them deal with the consequences of their actions.

 

When the player draws back a fire arrow, there's a danger that they might fire it into the wall in front of them and kill themselves. Due to this property of fire arrows, the player has some ability to screw themselves over. Do we remove fire arrows or make them not damage the player because of this? No. We let the player deal with the consequences of their actions, even if that means screwing themselves over.

 

The situation of a player screwing themself over by throwing their lantern down a bottomless pit or into lava seems analogous to me. The only difference is they may not realise that they're screwed until later on when they come to a pitch black area, but they should at least realize that destroying their lantern is probably not a good idea. Do we remove the ability to set down the lantern and light the area while you do something else with your hands, because the player could potentially screw themselves over? IMO, the answer is still "No."

 

Even if they did lose their lantern, they're not completely screwed. There are other options, like picking up a candle and carrying it as a junk item that casts light (or I suppose we could even add it to the inventory), or if you don't have any light and must get through a pitch black area, and really don't want to reload, you can navigate by sound and by swinging the blackjack in front of you, seeing if it hits walls in order to "feel" your way through.

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The only difference is they may not realise that they're screwed until later on when they come to a pitch black area, but they should at least realize that destroying their lantern is probably not a good idea.

This is exactly the difference between shooting a fire arrow at a wall in front of you and dropping a lantern down a well. It's ok to let a player kill themselves, but it's bad game design if they can save after getting stuck.

 

Take a look at older adventure games compared to newer ones. In older adventure games, it was easy for the player to get stuck and not realise it, which was extremely frustrating. In newer ones, they realized that letting players get stuck is a Bad Thing , and modern adventure games are designed to be impossible to get stuck in, even if it's possible to die in them.

 

Imagine a level with a twist to it - it starts off appearing like it won't have much use for a lantern, and the player drops it someplace irretreivable, to see if there's anything hidden down there. Latern on, the player discovers they need to explore some caves, but can't do so effectively because they don't have a lantern.

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I don't have a lot of sympathy for such a player. If you are provided with a lantern at the begining of the game, it's a fair assumption that it will be useful somewhere. Dropping it somewhere that you can't get it would be pretty stupid. It's like being given a combination on a piece of paper at the start of a mission and throwing it away before you find out where to use it.

 

And, as Ish said, the lantern isn't the last option for getting through dark areas. You can go back and pick up another light source from somewhere, or try your best to feel your way through.

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I think a rational player will assume that it's a bad idea to drop their lantern somewhere irretrievable and try to avoid that. :)

 

You could screw yourself over and save with the fire arrow too: Suppose it only takes off 80% of your health, then you save, but part of the FM absolutely requires dropping off of something later that takes up 20% of your health in the fall. You might say that's bad FM design and could be avoided by not forcing the player to take a fall that will cause damage. Well, having to go thru a pitch black area with no light source could be avoided too by placing some carryable candles or torches around in the map in case they somehow lose one light source.

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Yes, I would say forcing the player to take damage no matter what is probably bad game design. Is it so bad to allow the player to drop torches they find in the map, but force them to keep their lantern as a last resort?

 

Why even bother making frobbable torches if there is a lantern?

 

As for dropping the lantern, I could see how someone might, say, drop it down a shaft and be unable to retrieve it. Then again, if they quicksave right before a patrol turns the corner strait into them, that is also an irretrievable mistake. It think we have to put a little more trust in the players to be responsible with their tools.

Edited by Ombrenuit
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I continue to see why (by your own admission) that you're difficult to work with. If only you had a better short term memory and a more open mind, this would not be so much the case.

 

If not everything would be chewed up again and again there would be no need to exercise excessive memory stunts, because once we agreed upon something and there is no reason to bring it up, it would be settled. Instead somebody comes up with an old chewing gum every few weeks.

 

Or, provide an alternate path to reach the same objective, which is more unessecary work.

 

Which would be the authors problem...

 

You'll find that smart FM authors have made keys undroppable for this same reason.

 

And you'll find that even samrter authors provided some in-game mechanics to ensure that it can be solved without resorting to such metarequirements.

Gerhard

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This is exactly the difference between shooting a fire arrow at a wall in front of you and dropping a lantern down a well. It's ok to let a player kill themselves, but it's bad game design if they can save after getting stuck.

 

So for this reason it is bad to include traps, because traps may not be noticed and the player is screwed up. *GASP* The player may not win the gold medal the first time he starts down the slope!!! How can this be allowed??!???

Gerhard

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Then again, if they quicksave right before a patrol turns the corner strait into them, that is also an irretrievable mistake. It think we have to put a little more trust in the players to be responsible with their tools.

 

That's an excellent example. :) It would mean that we should not allow the player to save if an AI is nearby, or we should create a backup save where the AI is removed.

Gerhard

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In Casing in TII I found the HUD went bright when I saw or was near the ghost in the library.

I know you say there is dynamic light changing but the way you say it, and the fact no-one seems to back you up particularly only engenders scepticism in me, not that you are lying, but maybe that you play in a dark room and your eyes or monitor do it for you.

I have never heard anyone else mention it, and the way you say it doesn't sound very authoratitive.

 

The lantern should be droppable: why would anyone drop it in lava?

However the dropping down a chasm to see what's there, couldn't that be done better with a torch they nicked off the wall?

And don't forgot holding a drawn fire arrow will do the job. It will punish people though because it's so slow walking like that. They could complete the mission but they would learn to not lose their torches.

 

But how to avoid problem with torches, that you may as well use them, not the lantern? So that you had to use the dim creepy lantern in the caves maybe it could be programmed that the torches go out after a while, or you could code that the damp creepy caves put them out, too much moisture.

 

Either players should notice the lantern after playing a few "OMs" which introduce the concept, come with TDM, and think "caves! Don't lose it!" or the FM author should hint beforehand that it'd be best to keep the lantern.

Edited by bob_arctor
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And you are absolutely sure that the "automatic" adjustment is in fact a code-level feature, and not some aspect of your monitor setup or eyesight?

Yep, I'm sure. That's quite easy to confirm since this "brightening process" goes quite choppy, it works exactly (and probably uses the same code) as when you change your gamma settings with +/- keys (for instance) ingame.

 

Why don't you just try it yourself? Go into a dark room, stand still, and notice how the gamma slightly increases a few steps.

Actually I have seen what you're talking about - the HUD on T2 does get brigher or darker. It seems to have 2 brightness levels. The darker one kicks in when you have a darker screen. But it doesn't seem to detect a "dark screen" very well in my experience.

Actually, I think the dark one kicks in when you're in a bright room, and the bright when you enter a dark one. Wouldn't make much sense otherwise. :)

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But how to avoid problem with torches, that you may as well use them, not the lantern? So that you had to use the dim creepy lantern in the caves maybe it could be programmed that the torches go out after a while, or you could code that the damp creepy caves put them out, too much moisture.

 

We haven't fully defined all the details yet, but current thinking is that torches, candles, etc, will not be inventory items. You can carry them like a junk object, but you'd have to put them down to do anything else. The lantern is hooded, so you can cover it and put it away (into your inventory) to use later.

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Is the suggestion to have two different gamma corrections for the dark mod team to implement? Is it a feature that would slightly increase the global gamma when in a dark room but also reduce the brightness of the hud at the same time. Implementing this could considerably delay the project for the dark mod team. :o

 

BTW, I have not seen the gamma change in T2 on the hud or in the game as is suggested. The bright light gem fades away, so maybe it is an optical illusion that everything else is adjusting. The only thing I notice is my eyes adjusting to a dark room. IMHO, the hud had always stuck out like a sore thumb in a dark room, which is why I modified DARK.CFG settings to shrink it more and not interfere with the dark game. There was one FM I played that did affect my gamma settings once, but that was a special situation and not average gameplay.

 

Actually, I think the dark one kicks in when you're in a bright room, and the bright when you enter a dark one. Wouldn't make much sense otherwise.
Wasn't Domarius referring to only the hud being darker in a dark room so it is not so blinding bright? You are correct that a dark room should not get even more dark. :blink:
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adding a bloom effect should be a simple process, basicly its just keeping track of leaving/entering a light to

dark or vise-versa area and transitioning the r_lightscale from its current setting either 1 up/down over a

few seconds.

 

the bloom effect does add another level of reality to your overall perception of the game, but when to and not

to use it would have to be debated on, if its worth the effort to even implement such a thing.

 

you can start up your doom3 and enter a level, and goto the console and ajust it one down/up from its

current setting to see this effect overall.

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One problem though is how do we tell if bright light is hitting the player's eyes? We can't really use the lightgem to tell if the player is looking at a bright light, because it could be that the player is lit from behind and can't see the direct light, so it wouldn't saturate their eyes. Maybe we could go into the lightgem image analysis and identify a point on the model closest to the player's eyes and see how much light is striking it. I'm not sure if the image currently has high enough resolution for that.

 

I'm not arguing that we should do this effect, just thinking about whether we could. Also, any hardcoded gamma adjustment would be relative to the player's current gamma setting, leading to very different effects for different users.

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the only time i remember seeing the bloom effect in tds is when you exited a shop after buying your equipment.

entering a dark outside caused your eyes to see everything darker as it transitioned to your normal lighting over a few seconds or so.

 

i really cant see a bloom effect when turning to a light source directly to tell you the truth.. it shouldnt make

any difference at all in that situtation. the only way i can see that type of effect coming off, say a torch would

be a sort of a larger frob box over the torch itself.. so if you looked directly at it, it wouldnt change anything

since your not transitioning anything major, but turning away and back to view somewhere else in a level

could cause it to bloom from darker to normal light again.

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A lantern would be a great idea. However, missions should be set up so that it doesn't rely on the lantern completely. It would help out when you enter a dark cave, but it wouldn't be necessary. If it is necessary then the FM creator could simply make it so that you can't drop the lantern. The Dark Mod is a toolset for FM makers. Rather than limiting their options it would be best to give them the biggest set of tools to play with, then let them decide. Obviously time available is first. If it is really time consuming to make the lantern droppable then don't worry about it, but if it won't take too long but will give a wider variety of choices to the FM maker, then why not?

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the only time i remember seeing the bloom effect in tds is when you exited a shop after buying your equipment.

entering a dark outside caused your eyes to see everything darker as it transitioned to your normal lighting over a few seconds or so.

 

i really cant see a bloom effect when turning to a light source directly to tell you the truth.. it shouldnt make

any difference at all in that situtation. the only way i can see that type of effect coming off, say a torch would

be a sort of a larger frob box over the torch itself.. so if you looked directly at it, it wouldnt change anything

since your not transitioning anything major, but turning away and back to view somewhere else in a level

could cause it to bloom from darker to normal light again.

 

 

Aren´t you guys mistaken Bloom with HDR, bloom as i know is just some tecnic to make lights even more bright and make a Halo around them. HDR is this. :)

 

Light blooming "spreads" out a light source. For example, a bright light in the background will appear to bleed over onto objects in the foreground. This effect is achieved by multiplying the image of the screen (lighten lighter areas and darken darker areas,) blurring the image, and drawing it over top of the original image. If there's a light source that is "brighter" than what the monitor can show, light blooming helps to create an illusion that makes the object appear brighter than it is, but at the cost of softening the scene. A common misconception is that a game that uses a bloom filter uses HDR. This is untrue, however, as blooming is just a component of HDR.
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If not everything would be chewed up again and again there would be no need to exercise excessive memory stunts, because once we agreed upon something and there is no reason to bring it up, it would be settled. Instead somebody comes up with an old chewing gum every few weeks.

Sure we reached a desicion and its been documented, but I'm not happy with it and here's why;

 

Everyone conveniently forgets that the blackjack, sword, and compass are all undroppable.

 

Think about it - do you see an "alternate blackjack" item lying around in every mission? No, because it's impossible to lose the one you have.

 

Gildoran has the right idea. It's a last resort so that the player can't get permanently stuck. You try to avoid this from happening in game design as best you can.

 

 

And if you expect the author to make an alternate "non-lantern" way to complete the level, you would also expect them to make an alternate "non-blackjack" way to complete the level if they dropped the blackjack? I like Spar's boneheaded response - "That's the author's problem." Wow, you convinced me, very well thought out :) Why should they go to the extra work? They might want to focus on other things in their FM.

 

Wasn't Domarius referring to only the hud being darker in a dark room so it is not so blinding bright?

Yep, I did specifically say HUD, and not screen.

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Yep, I did specifically say HUD, and not screen.
Actually, I think the dark one kicks in when you're in a bright room, and the bright when you enter a dark one. Wouldn't make much sense otherwise.
So. The hud could be darker in a dark room. The screen could be darker in a bright room. For now, I can live without this feature. Would be good if there really is time to implement it. Edited by jtbalogh
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