Breakpoints.

[ShinRa]

Believe me, the physics in singleplayer are much better. About the breakpoints... i don't remember.

Well I know the PHYSICS are. I meant breakpoints. Dude they break everything down the middle every time. Why? Cuz they know theres only one breakpoint. They know they cant show off wood breaking realistically cuz they havent done anything to the wood models to MAKE it break realistically. Sure the physics will act realistically (float, friction, bouyancy, gravity, weight, velocity, magnitude, momentum, etc) but the physics apparently wont BREAK realistically. and it looks stupid.

 

[Danimal]

Well, the lack of breakpoints might be becouse the physics where toned down for multiplayer...

That is the most logical answer I have heard all day Hunter

 

[DannoHung]

The only real complaint against the physics in CS:S as I see it are that tables are just about impossible to push and push over (also those wooden barrels! Stupid barrels... I'll get you yet!)

That can be tweaked. Everything else is a decision made to ensure that performance stays high on all platforms that run it.

 

[MetEoRA]

I'm pretty sure HL2 SP will have much better breaking points. Go watch the old demo vid w/ the giant pickinko machine. When he shoots that wood it looks pretty realistic to me. Also in the Ravenholm vid, when he crowbars the piece of wood that he already broke once, it looks pretty good. I dunno, looked fine to me.

 

[Captain M4d]

This is just the freaking beggining of games that have close-to-real-life physics. You can't expect the first few games to get it right completely. You guys and your ridiculous demands. Can't you just be happy with what you're given?

 

[Platinum]

interesting observation of the bink players always aiming at middle of wood ... hmmm ... well maybe thats where he instinctively shoots ... for example if you wanted to shoot an enemy you shoot it in its chest ... same for wood ... but we will see when we get hl2 ... i'd bet gabe and the gang put more than 1 break point in each piece of wood ... think about it ... how difficult could it be ... and how many wooden plank models are there in hl2 ... hmmm ... my point stated ... dont worry guinny ... :naughty:

 

[Cooper]

That has got to be the worst picture for Source I have ever seen. Just look at those horrible graphics and details!

http://www.halflife2.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=10726

They can't model the Hydrogen atom right! It's missing all of its electrons. If I ever decided to take out my nuclear powered microscope and look at the atoms before the terrorists come kill me between firefights I will notice the horribly detailed atoms and it will completely kill the immersion. Source sucks and somebody at Valve needs to get off their butt and do their job! I thoughts this engine was supposed to be Real Life? Obviously it isn't, UE3 is better. They even have the alpha particles projection path calculated when a atom is unstable.

Yes, I'm done. :E

 

[Slime]

I remember reading that the breaking things are modified by the map creator. The map maker for CSS might have decided to decrease breakpoints to simplify things. Those wood planks ARE NOT a special supermodel in Source, they are adjusted by the map maker! Although we don't know if they'll be better in HL-2, I think we can assume they are.

 

[Yellonet]

interesting observation of the bink players always aiming at middle of wood ... hmmm ... well maybe thats where he instinctively shoots ... for example if you wanted to shoot an enemy you shoot it in its chest ... same for wood ... but we will see when we get hl2 ... i'd bet gabe and the gang put more than 1 break point in each piece of wood ... think about it ... how difficult could it be ... and how many wooden plank models are there in hl2 ... hmmm ... my point stated ... dont worry guinny ... :naughty:

Most probably the "bink-player" hit the wood where he knew it would break, just to make it look better.

 

[Neutrino]

Now:

Ok, so we cleared the clouds about the confusion over dynamic breaking points and pre-made breaking points well over a year ago. But after playing it in cs:s, and noticing how they show it to u in the videos, the breakpoints absolutely suck ass. Do you know in cs:s office, if you shoot that monitor, only THAT piece breaks off, no matter where u shoot it? Its rediculous. The wood, you shoot it on the edge, and the middle breaks. Surely, if you shoot it where the ONE breakpoint is on every object, it looks cool, but wtf. The amount of breakpoints suck, and it looks terrible unless you shoot it in the right spot.

Earlier:

Ah, I was waiting for someone to post a whining/bitching/complaining/crying thread.

I hope maybe now you have a bit better understanding of why some of us criticize things and would like them to be better.

 

[subtlesnake]

No game has ever modeled realistically breaking materials, aside from Red Faction. And I believe the 'breakpoints' system is the first of it's kind.

So HL2 is ahead however you look at it. I just hope they've been able to incorporated enough break points.

 

[Gunner]

I hope maybe now you have a bit better understanding of why some of us criticize things and would like them to be better.

Hah! Owned

 

[Absinthe]

She is a person who says what she(?) thinks and doesn't care that everyone doesn't agree. Refreshing. Mostly She's right too. Stop bashing her for no reason. Or rather for the reason that you don't like that she complains about your favourite game. If no one points out the errors, how will you know they are there? And be able to do something about them?

She behaves like a barely-literate whiner that overreacts to anything imperfect with the Source engine. Pointing out errors and constructive criticism is one thing. But She doesn't do that. She's posts tend to go something like this...

"lol those shadow suck WHY CAN'T VALVE BE AS GOOD AS ID SOFTWARE THEY DID GOOD SHADOWS
and the spec mapping is like too much! it everywhere!
omg i smell bad programmers why cant see gordon's hands pick stuff up. why didnt they make a grab engine that would be SO easy

oh and gabe has a FAT ASS"

Practically every one of She's posts is an insulting, condescending, hypocritical, and poorly structured overreaction aimed at painting the Source engine as complete shit when it's obvious that it's not the case. And you wonder why She gets such a negative reaction whenever he/she posts? I thought the reason was obvious.

 

[The Bait]

She behaves like a barely-literate whiner that overreacts to anything imperfect with the Source engine. Pointing out errors and constructive criticism is one thing. But She doesn't do that. She's posts tend to go something like this...

"lol those shadow suck WHY CAN'T VALVE BE AS GOOD AS ID SOFTWARE THEY DID GOOD SHADOWS
and the spec mapping is like too much! it everywhere!
omg i smell bad programmers why cant see gordon's hands pick stuff up. why didnt they make a grab engine that would be SO easy

oh and gabe has a FAT ASS"

Practically every one of She's posts is an insulting, condescending, hypocritical, and poorly structured overreaction aimed at painting the Source engine as complete shit when it's obvious that it's not the case. And you wonder why She gets such a negative reaction whenever he/she posts? I thought the reason was obvious.

Woot, someone points out the truth once again.

 

[The Brick]

How about that wooden construction in the engine showcase from e3 2003, were that dynamic breakpoints? I'd like to see wood break like that.

 

[She]

hahahahaha..

omg.. face the facts...
engine sux... gameplay greate..
im out.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

hahahahaha..

omg.. face my opinion
engine sux... gameplay greate..
im out.

Quoted and corrected.

 

[Patton]

That has got to be the worst picture for Source I have ever seen. Just look at those horrible graphics and details!

http://www.halflife2.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=10726

I don't know if anyone else checked, but that part of that map doesn't look like that on my PC.

I think you all need to relax. "She" is getting exactly what she wanted when she/he/it made this post: attention. So if you like the game, just play it. If this particular poster doesn't, why try to convince her otherwise? You're all just banging your heads against walls that will never ever break. Just chill, guys. I never thought I'd see anger on a HL2 forum when its so close to release.

 

[Intamin]

just greate... awfull trouth... Get out.. breathe some fresh air.. and come back..

...Get out, read the dictionary... and come back--or, actually, don't come back...

But seriously, none of this matters. Everyone (as in, whoever is) is picking the game apart b/c over a year ago they had in their head that it would be real life--it's not going to be and no game ever will be. Minor flaws have no affect on overall enjoyment of a game, IMO, and if something happens once or twice, who's to care about it?

However, I can understand why soemone would care about an issue if it happened 18 times every map and affected playability, but c'mon! "The shadows are a shade too light and the angle of incedence is just 10 degrees too small, I HATE this game!" or "Ice on the wall in the middle of the dessert! Oh no! I think I might die b/c this game is not perfect in every way. I mean, I can't even pick up an electron microscope and check out all the little atoms in the wood ONLINE! What was Valve thinking? Stupid stupid stupid!!!!"

Three words for ya: Get. Over. It.

Thank you.

EDIT: Patton is so right. So right.

 

[City17Citizen01]

I agree with all the aforementioned shortcomings, they still don't change the fact I enjoy the game (CSS) and I know HL2 will be far more superior in capturing my attention as a gamer. Thats really all I can ask of a game. :/

 

[Yellonet]

She behaves like a barely-literate whiner that overreacts to anything imperfect with the Source engine. Pointing out errors and constructive criticism is one thing. But She doesn't do that. She's posts tend to go something like this...

"lol those shadow suck WHY CAN'T VALVE BE AS GOOD AS ID SOFTWARE THEY DID GOOD SHADOWS
and the spec mapping is like too much! it everywhere!
omg i smell bad programmers why cant see gordon's hands pick stuff up. why didnt they make a grab engine that would be SO easy

oh and gabe has a FAT ASS"

Practically every one of She's posts is an insulting, condescending, hypocritical, and poorly structured overreaction aimed at painting the Source engine as complete shit when it's obvious that it's not the case. And you wonder why She gets such a negative reaction whenever he/she posts? I thought the reason was obvious.

I might have defended her because of some male instinct to protect women... sure hope She isn't a guy
And yeah... a little more constructive criticism backed up with facts would be welcome from her(him? )

 

[ShinRa]

Alright, just woke up to all these new posts. You can own me all you want, it doesn't change the fact breakpoints are terrible. It doesnt matter if its the first game to have real life physics, the fact that they CAN make it better right now than what it is and they haven't is what irritates me. And as for the guy who said the e3 physics room when he shot the wood looked realistic, he also SHOT THE MIDDLE. He aimed EXACTLY where he knew the 1-2 break points were and shot them. Hell, he even aimed lower than the breakpoint and even there you can see it. Either they should make things break right, or dont make them break at all.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

guinny:

This is a case of your expectations. Not a case of HL2/Source being faulty. There's major performance reasons why objects don't break dynamically. I suggest you either get over it and move on, or wait a few years until games are all capable of doing it in realtime.

 

[Gunner]

Alright, just woke up to all these new posts. You can own me all you want, it doesn't change the fact breakpoints are terrible. It doesnt matter if its the first game to have real life physics, the fact that they CAN make it better right now than what it is and they haven't is what irritates me. And as for the guy who said the e3 physics room when he shot the wood looked realistic, he also SHOT THE MIDDLE. He aimed EXACTLY where he knew the 1-2 break points were and shot them. Hell, he even aimed lower than the breakpoint and even there you can see it. Either they should make things break right, or dont make them break at all.

Get the SDK when it comes out and re-mod the singleplayer to your liking. Learn to code too before you slam programmers for something you can't do.

 

[ShinRa]

What the hell is with you guys and your constant defending of valve? Pi I must have said at least once in every post I made here I know it can't break dynamically, but they should add more breakpoints at least to make it more believeable.

And para wtf I'm not "slamming" the programmers. I'd just like to have a better experience than that. Your telling me you'd rather shoot the edge of a piece of wood, and have it break in the middle, than just not have it break at all?

Jesus Christ chill out people.

 

[Gunner]

No I'm telling you I really don't care about furniture. I really really don't care! And you shouldn't care either. It's just furniture for crying out loud!

 

[Mr-Fusion]

Breaking furniture has minimal to zero effect on gameplay. It's a fairly pointless eye-candy feature from my perspective.

We're not defending Valve. We're looking at this feature holistically and making a judgement on how important it is to the game. Most of us seem to think it's not important , some people think it's critical to the enjoyment of the game. I find the latter opinion weird and disturbing.

 

[RoyaleWithCheese]

If you let yourself get hyped up about a game this much (I know, I did), you're bound to get disappointed.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

What the hell is with you guys and your constant defending of valve? Pi I must have said at least once in every post I made here I know it can't break dynamically, but they should add more breakpoints at least to make it more believeable.

I wish you'd understand that there's a cost for everything like that. I very much doubt that Valve sat round in a design meeting decided to piss everyone off by drastically reducing the number of breakpoints in a model from the internationally-established "fun level".

It's a non-scalable method of maintaining performance on lower-end hardware. (by non-scalable I mean that it's not something that can be adapted dynamically)

For any of the non-play-affecting objects, you'll be able to replace the model with one that has as many breakpoints as you like!

 

[ShinRa]

I under stand that. I want to know why valve is so concerned for people with 800 mhz pc's. Its rediculous. Source can do this and source can do that. Well, why dont they DO this and that? For the 2% of people who have a 1.2ghz machine and lower? Idk, and by sayings it unimportant doesn't change the fact that it still looks terrible. They said nothing would break in cs:s, and i wish they kept it that way, because it looks really sad.

 

[PvtRyan]

I under stand that. I want to know why valve is so concerned for people with 800 mhz pc's. Its rediculous. Source can do this and source can do that. Well, why dont they DO this and that? For the 2% of people who have a 1.2ghz machine and lower? Idk, and by sayings it unimportant doesn't change the fact that it still looks terrible. They said nothing would break in cs:s, and i wish they kept it that way, because it looks really sad.

For good fun, check the survey stats, the leading graphics card is the GF4MX. Have fun with that and rendering hundreds of polygons for a single wooden plank (every piece of extra wood generates AT LEAST 12 triangles).

 

[RoyaleWithCheese]

I under stand that. I want to know why valve is so concerned for people with 800 mhz pc's. Its rediculous. Source can do this and source can do that. Well, why dont they DO this and that? For the 2% of people who have a 1.2ghz machine and lower? Idk, and by sayings it unimportant doesn't change the fact that it still looks terrible. They said nothing would break in cs:s, and i wish they kept it that way, because it looks really sad.

Well appararently VALVe made the decision to make HL2 enjoyable/avalailable to as much people possible, even the ones with lower spec pc's. And maybe they evaluated this particular engine feature in a way that doesn't meet your expectations, that is bound to happen with a lot of things in life. Just enjoy the game for what it is, and not for it's flaws. It can save you a lot of energy and time.

 

[ShinRa]

So why couldn't they make options for people with higher end comps that CAN handle stuff like that? I should be able to go into options, pick insanely high detail, and it should be able to do everything source is capable of. I dont see why the people with newer comps have to get dragged down because of people with older comps.

 

[Gunner]

So why couldn't they make options for people with higher end comps that CAN handle stuff like that? I should be able to go into options, pick insanely high detail, and it should be able to do everything source is capable of. I dont see why the people with newer comps have to get dragged down because of people with older comps.

They're not making HL² for your sake only you do know that don't you?

 

[The Brick]

So why couldn't they make options for people with higher end comps that CAN handle stuff like that? I should be able to go into options, pick insanely high detail, and it should be able to do everything source is capable of. I dont see why the people with newer comps have to get dragged down because of people with older comps.

Because things you want to be better aren't scalable.

 

[ShinRa]

Yea, so I guess they're not making it for the sake of 5 million people who have 2ghz comps and higher.

 

[|Jz|]

Aren't you guys realising that you are expecting Source to be perfect?

Sit back one second, think about something else and you might realise that Source is indeed a great engine.

I'm afraid some ppl won't like HL2 just because they're expecting it to be like reallife (graphically).

 

[RoyaleWithCheese]

Okay, valid point. I'm not very technical but for a lot of eyecandy-options gamers should be able to tweak the options they want to add or leave out.

But my guttfeeling is that this is an intra-engine option which you would not be able to alter by yourself.

/VALVe answer machine

maybe a mod could do this

/end VALVe answer machine

 

[Gunner]

Yea, so I guess they're not making it for the sake of 5 million people who have 2ghz comps and higher.

Here's a clue for you: a 2.4 ghz will struggle when shit starts flying around in cs_office.

 

[ShinRa]

Omg I'm not asking for life like graphics! And I'm DEFINATELY not asking for alot when I ask that the source engine be used to its full potential. So now mods are going to make their mods "scalable" as well, when they could do something amazing with source.