I think empires has pretty much got to a wonderful stage where the gameplay, at least before aircraft come and ruin it all, is almost at perfect. so what do people complain about when they play? "it's a little rough around the edges" and all that BS.. ---------------------------------- This thread is basically an unofficial call to ask: 1) Are you an artist? can you help empires? 2) What Partical Effects would you like to see in empires, things that COULD be done with the current engine (no self shadowing etc) 3) Any graphical tweaks? I for one, would like to see: -A (dynamic) light produced from the barrel of cannons when they fire, e.g a mussle flash -More smoke from all barrels, infantry included, and this smoke being smoke that lingers for about 5 seconds -The shells that come out of each weapon, tank or infantry, stay around for longer. as in 20 - 30 seconds. if i've just fire off an entire clip of my MG, i want to see a load of casings beside me as i reload -decals (e.g burn marks) on vehicles and buildings after they are damaged anything small but good looking that you would like to possibly see included, what would you like?
Ooh, I would really like to see that, but I'm afraid the same thing would happen as if you tried it in Gmod: the decal would get stretched all across the model for some reason I don't know so it's not a scorch but a weird mess of black lines and blots.
From a graphical perspective, I wouldn't mind seeing some smoke from cannons when fired. Pieces of tanks coming apart when destroyed would be nice to see too
I was working on some explosiony scorch mark decals, but for some strange reason the decals that are applied to models and the ones applied to the ground are different.
What dee said. I'd like to see that little project about vehicle gibs resurrected. In my book, graphical polish can make a world of difference between versions, and we need it for 1.08.
i was gunna suggest dead tank wreck models, but i didn't think that counted as a "minor" change still, it would be a hundred times better than just going black like they do at the moment.
To anyone intrested, I do some simple to medium graphics work for my robotics team, and can help out if needed. But I do not have the skill to do anything apart from a 2d rendering. If we building tiles i can try my hand at that but I cant make particle effects or anything. On the note of ideas, I would personally like to see more dynamic textures for maps. where when you look at the ground, you dont see the same bloody grass tile for the entire map, but that is a mapping problem. Another thing is that when I fire a gun, as with what sandbag said, I would like to see the casing lie around. But take it further and take anything that comes out of a shell, and leave it on the ground. Tank shells, missily casings after they hit, mortar pieces, anything that is shot or explodes should be left there to see. Third, what dee said but a little more in depth. Not only tank parts coming off, but anything that is hit should be blown apart. People too, if you step on a mind, you are not going to stay in one piece. And if you shoot the enemy radar dish enough, the dish should fal off or atleast have holes in it. My 2cents
This is all very nice, but remember that the game should remain playable. Not only should these things be made, but it should be coded in so that you don't get all these fancy things when you lower your graphic settings. So far I like Mr. Weedy's idea: And Dee's:
Decals on vehicles/buildings would be a major step forwards. Plus, it would mean that you can... SPRAY YOUR TANK!
Players models get scorched occasionally, I'd like to see the tanks get scorched too. And smoke... smoke would be awesome. Smoke from barrels, explosions, damaged vehicles. Damaged vehicles should burn, too! Smoke should also fly in the wind... wind direction could be random. Here's an example of smoke effects: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=qdWDEmJ74RI Since I mentioned player models getting scorched... what about applying other sorts of decals in chosen areas? Like placing clan symbols on the helmet sides/front, front of vest/jacket, or shoulders? Tanks and vehicles too.
There were plans to customize your own tanks, but i think it got lost along the way. Red dots on tanks for plasma weapons could be done using sprites.
the way forward for FPS's is to make them realistic with damage and such, and to balance this by having the battlefield so crazy and chaotic that surviving is still reasonably easy. Empires can lead this movement.
You know, we could have one or two 'damaged' textures for yellow and red health for buildings and vehicles with some holes/burns/scorches/paint gone on the texture to give the impression that it's damaged without having to mess around with decals on phys objects. It would be a lot easier to do than trying to get a decal to work on a tank without stretching, and would probably look better.
Or we could make totally new models for buildings and vehicles when they get damaged like in command & conquer games. There're total of three different models for them, I think, normal, damaged and heavily damaged. Then it gets blown up but this would require a lot of work because you need at least 3 models for each stage of damage. That's 6 more models for each vehicle and building. So I think it would be easier to do it in the way as Picard says even the model thing would look a lot better with some texture changes. Also... Different sounds for different engines.
