Star Citizen: Happy Hour w/ Todd Papy & Alex Marschal
Todd Papy and Alex Marschal look back at the first Star Marine release in 2.6 and the Demien and Echo 11 maps, then cover planned features: stamina, oxygen, limb damage, grenades and gadgets, armor weights, new weapon types, REC rewards, AI and radar tuning.
It felt very good. For the longest time, you're working on all of these features, you're thinking about them, and you're playing it, and you're just like, God, that sucks. And you've just got to polish and polish and polish. And then towards the end, Alex and I actually sit right next to each other in Frankfurt, and so he and I are always in each other's ears talking about it. And then we got to a point where we looked at each other and we're like, finally, finally. It's a good feeling.
Also for the team, to see all the stuff coming together, putting that stuff out and having people getting their hands on it. We had pieces of that in the PU already, but it was just a small fraction of that, not the whole package. It's a great achievement feeling actually.
TL;DRThe Demien map is set in the Nexus system, where pirates took over and a massacre was meant to have happened, with Marines sent to clean up; blood effects are still planned.
Yeah, so basically this is supposed to be taking place in the Nexus system, which is where Arena Commander also takes place. So the idea is that there were pirates in here, and they'd kind of taken over the system, and actually this was supposed to be a massacre that happened here. I don't think that we have all the blood effects and everything, blood smears that we need in here, but that's one of the things that we're going to be adding. But the idea is that the Marines were sent to come in here and clean up the system. And so that's kind of the basis for the game mode as well as for the story in Echo 11 as well as Demien. So Echo 11 was supposed to be more like just a built-up area that had been surviving for quite a while. There was a walled city in China, and that was kind of the inspiration for Echo 11 as far as the art theme goes. From a gameplay standpoint, Sean had started working on that one. That was his original map. We had talked about a mining colony on a ravine, and then from our design standpoint, we always have things that we need to get in there. And then from there, we start adding believability passes, and that's working with Ian and Eddie and the team.
Yeah, I believe Mike Snowdon and his team worked on it. You do see it in the Gamescom demo. I think that's one of those things where effects and audio, they always come in so hot or so late into the process. So now it's going to be iterating and adding those features. And once we add it into the PU, it will also obviously be incorporated into Star Marine or vice versa. It really depends on which one is the focus. So either everything will be pulled in from the PU or everything will be pulled in from Star Marine to the PU.
TL;DRTodd Papy wants grenades, gadgets, stamina and downed/revived states added, with modular components (frag, throwable, drone, placeable) that can be combined with effects like EMP, but no specifics are committed.
So, with grenades and gadgets, those are a lot of the gameplay features that I want to add. Same with breathing and stamina, even downed and revived state, because as soon as we add downed and revived, it makes it very easy for us to actually turn off spawning and encourage versus force certain types of gameplay and the way we want the players to play the game, so it's more like the Persistent Universe. But for grenades and gadgets, we have a couple of different things in mind. However, I would like to make them a little bit more modular and scalable. So the idea is that you get components, like you get a frag component or you get a throwable component or you get a drone component or you get a placeable frame. So then at that point you can kind of mix and match these different things together. So if you want to take an EMP, you can put it on a grenade or a throwable component or you can put it on a drone or you can put it on basically a turret. So then at that point, it's more about us figuring out what kind of gameplay we need to take care of and then go from there.
Well, actually, Last Stand is probably closer to what it is. For us, I would love to work on basically what I would consider an asymmetrical mode, from a gameplay standpoint, meaning incorporating our vehicles or incorporating our ships as well as FPS. It'd be a love child between Arena Commander and Star Marine.
TL;DRA ballistic sniper rifle is on the plan, along with more projectile and damage types such as armor-piercing and incendiary, to support more distinct armor theming.
That is on the plan. And even then, it's increasing the different projectile types. So for example, we've got lasers, but we don't have, for ballistics, being able to do armor-piercing versus incendiary versus a slug for shotgun. And then what are some of the other ones we have, like plasma, white phosphorus, and some other things that would either be more Vanduul-influenced or more Xi'an-influenced. And that way we're pushing new things. So we talked about ship upgrade weapons just this past summit, as well as our projectiles and our damage types, just because with the damage types, the player understands from an armor perspective, I want to build my armor to protect more against, let's say, radiation or, sorry, biochemical versus thermal versus kinetic. So then we get a little bit more hard theming on the armors, and then somebody that would be built for combat, maybe they can't last very long on a planet or be very close to a sun or a star or something like that.
TL;DRTodd Papy would like light armor fast on the ground, heavy slow but better in EVA and carrying more gadgets, and medium in between, pending Chris's approval; heavy armor is more likely around 3.0.
So for me, this is something I've got to get approved by Chris, so don't take it to heart, is basically for me, light armor, I would like it to be that light armor is very fast on the ground and heavy armor is very slow on the ground. And in EVA, just because of the boosters and everything like that that the heavy armor can have, because of the extra power supplies and these types of things, it would be faster in EVA and the light would be slower. And the medium is supposed to be kind of the jack of all trades, master of none. So that's the way we'd be pushing it, and even with heavy, maybe you don't go prone, but in other ones you can go prone. Heavy, you'd be able to carry more, some more grenades, not more weapons, but more gadgets, and then obviously take more of a beating from a combat perspective. But you'd definitely move slower and you'd definitely feel the difference in running around. But Alex, do you know when we have those coming online, or are we aiming for like 2.7, 3.0 or something like that?
I think that's more towards 3.0 overall, because they would need to be built on the character side. We need to make the code implementation on that and also the balancing, which we shouldn't forget about. So I think that's more longer term.
TL;DRThey agree Star Marine is too fast and are working on stamina, oxygen, limb damage penalties, knockdowns, revives and vertical cover, plus armor differences, to make it more tactical and fit the Persistent Universe.
Yeah, no, I completely agree. We were just talking about this. So there are base features that we feel are missing. So the first one would be stamina, so you can't run forever. And there's breath associated with that. And even oxygen, so basically you can't be running all the time. It's also, from an oxygen standpoint, it would be fixing people being able to go outside in the PU completely naked, so they would be out there for X amount of seconds and then die, suffocate. So there's limb damage penalties that we're working on as well. So basically blurry vision, your stamina gets decreased the more hits that you take in your legs or in your core. And then your recoil and stuff like that increases when you take damage in the arms, those types of things. Then from there, we're also pushing on the knockdown, the drags, the revives. So when you're in the Persistent Universe, you don't have a respawn. Well, you do have a respawn, but you're going to lose a hell of a lot of things to go back to a different state. So this would give the players a chance to basically respawn or have somebody save them. And then what are some of the other big ones? We just went through the list.
Well, also on the tactical side, what you mentioned before with the different armor types that we have eventually. So they would be matched against each other, and each of them has different advantages, disadvantages, hit reactions and so forth. So I think all these things that come in over time just build towards getting the FPS component more and more tactical.
Yeah. We definitely are very aware that it needs to slow down. It is very, very fast. And also, obviously, if we completely took out respawning right now, then players, I think, would be working a lot slower. They might group up a little bit more. The fake teammates, where, hey, you and I, we group up and then we'll figure out when we're going to shoot each other in the back kind of thing. The fake allegiances.
Yes. So it works very similar to what it does in Arena Commander. And then what we're trying to do, and it doesn't work this way right now, but obviously REC would only be used in Arena Commander as well as Star Marine, so this would be our way of renting weapons and trying out new things, and then from there you'd be able to go into the Persistent Universe and use UEC that you earn via playing and doing missions and/or doing piratey things, and use that to buy there.
TL;DRRanks currently depend only on score using base values from internal tests, to be adjusted with community feedback; a live team handles short-term releases while others work on long-term ones.
It's really just the score right now. Yeah, for now. Basically, that went in, I think Luke Pressley did a pass on it pretty close to, I want to say, two, three weeks before we went out, and then even then we need to adjust the numbers and adjust the timing of how long it takes to shoot him in the butt.
It's basically base values right now based on our internal tests, and then we just get all the feedback from the community, see how things are tracking there in addition to the internal tests, and then figure out what the good values are.
Exactly. So obviously with Arena Commander, the first version that went out and how long it's taken to get to the point it is right now, it took them quite a while. But now, obviously with our team size being grown, we have a live team that is solely focused on Star Marine and Arena Commander and basically the Persistent Universe from a short-term release schedule, and then we have other designers and coders working on more of a long-term release. So the space stations or planetary outposts that you guys have seen when Brian talks about those in Around the Verse, those kind of things. So we have our short-term teams and then we have our long-term teams, and then it's just Alex and I trying to plan out everything, make sure that the goals are aligned with Jens and Steve Bender.
It is something that we've talked about, and it would be more of a way to test things so that we can actually go through and build up the AI and work out some of the issues that maybe our internal test team doesn't see, and obviously having a bigger platform to test these out and see what's working, what the community's liking and not. It is something that we've talked about, it's just not ready for prime time just yet.
It doesn't work as fully designed right now. Basically, Graham and Lee and the audio guys got the decibel feature working pretty late in development just because they had other focuses that they needed to do. It needs tuning. It's the same thing for Arena Commander. Right now, everybody just pops on instantly. There's no concept of stealth, there's no concept of being able to hide at all or to go dark or go cold. So these are things that we are going to be working towards and pushing on. A lot of that is incorporated with Item 2.0. So as soon as those really start coming online, then we need to adjust the radar. And in fact, radar is one of the things I'll be looking at this coming next week.
TL;DRThe Marines are being built up for Squadron 42 per Chris's look, while the Outlaws are just a developing style for outlaws in Star Citizen, with no deeper backstory given.
Well, for us, the Marines, this is something that we need to build up for Squadron 42. So that was one of the things that we focused on, to make sure from a concept standpoint, this is the way Chris wants it to look. And then from an outlaw perspective, it's just us figuring out what is an outlaw style that is in Star Citizen as a whole, and then starting to develop that style. So, for example, looking at Dutch Special Forces or something like that. I don't know if you guys have ever seen those guys, but they are scary. I don't want to say costumes, but the way that their gear looks. So it's just kind of figuring out what works for us and what's not working for us. And then at the same time, building up the library of things that we need to work on and build towards. If you look at what we did in Homestead, there's a way for us to actually do cloth on characters and those types of things. It's just really building up the mix and match things for the outfits.
Yeah, in fact, I expect you guys to be able to go through and adjust, if you want to wear a heavy helmet, which will impair more of the screen, or if you want to wear a light helmet or a medium helmet, and then being able to wear a different chest piece, do you want to wear a light, medium, or heavy, or do you want to wear light legs or arms, and then that adjusts your play speed, how fast you can actually move, as well as how much damage you can take and those types of things.
TL;DRTodd Papy personally wants gear customization like colors and capes, but decals or weapon skins would need investigation and the current focus is on building the content library first.
Personally, I would love that. I would go for the pink unicorn one. Alex would agree with that one. I am serious. To me, it's like beating the player with Dan in Street Fighter. That, to me, is the ultimate insult. You got beat by a pink unicorn and a 40-year-old man. At least for me, yeah, I want to be able to customize it. I want to be able to not only do color variants, but also do I want to have cloth or a cape or that kind of stuff.
I think it's some of the stuff that we've talked about, but I don't know if we're going to do like snow variant on a weapon versus tiger skin or those types of things. I think that would require some investigation from Toby's standpoint, our lead weapons artist in Frankfurt, and then Josh, who's the character art director here. It's something that I think we've briefly talked about, but right now we're more worried about building up the content library and then from there being able to adjust it.
TL;DRGoals include a railgun for taking down vehicles, SMGs, shotguns, snipers, LMGs, HMGs and launchers; each weapon goes through a long pipeline taking roughly three weeks to a month just to model.
Yeah. So one of the goals would be getting in the railgun. And in particular, if we do something that is based off of our game mode that is vehicles as well as players, you need a way to take down a vehicle, because we've all seen what a ship can do to a player at Gamescom. That was awesome, by the way. Mr. Air Support, Chris Speak. So it's just working through those types of features. And then, for example, right now we don't have SMGs, but getting a laser variant or an energy variant as well as ballistic variants. And then same with shotguns, like Tyler said with the sniper rifle, LMGs, HMGs, any sort of special weapons like rocket launchers or missile launchers or railguns, those types of things. So it's just really building up our library. And we have a fairly extensive list of some of the stuff that we're working on. And the pipeline that basically Alex has put together with the leads is pretty extensive. It goes from concept art to basically doing quick 3D models of those and then animation being able to look at it and making sure it looks good in first person. Just because, again, when you do a concept, looking at it on paper, you're like, okay, yeah, that looks really cool. And then you get in first person, you're missing a lot of details, or a lot of the details that you do put in are not seen. And so working through those types of things, it takes a lot of back and forth. And then I think it takes roughly about three weeks to a month to actually model it, and then at that point there's animations that need to be created for it and rigging, and then design needs to do their balance pass, and effects needs to do their pass, audio needs to do their pass, and some of these work in tandem, but some of them like audio and effects have to wait for us to actually finish a fair amount of it.