Flying vehicles in HL2

[TechnoHippyChic]

They could just have it low on fuel when Gordon gets to it, so he wouldn't be able to go very far...

 

[RoguePsi]

They could just have it low on fuel when Gordon gets to it, so he wouldn't be able to go very far...

But again, if you dont fly in the right direction, you'll go somewhere else, run out fuel, crash (and possibly die), and if you survive, the designers have to compensate for your journey on foot (in which case why not do the whole journey on foot to begin with?). If you did fly straight there successfully then there would be a huge environment the designers made which you would miss out on.

I think the basic idea of you being in control of flight would be you taking a short-cut through the game (and the city). You'd miss out on stuff.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

thing is, Hl2 unlike BF:1942/vietnam uses 3d skyboxes... therefore the sky above you actually ends somewhere (is a box) while BF, is just straight up open ended..

thats why Rick said

"It is possible to have sky vehicles, the big issue will be making sure you are careful with your map during design so you don't run into performance issues."

you can only have so much sky and the more you have, the more is rendered/eats cpu .. so I doubt any air vehicles (besides low flying/hovering vehicles) would be much fun
too bad since I was really looking forward to trying an air vehicle... I always just assumed HL2 would at least have one to fly around in at some point.

 

[RoguePsi]

:dozey: I think what Rick actually meant was, the engine would need to render the city below etc which would eat up most of the CPU power. I dunno where you got the idea of 3D skybox's from. HL2 will contain dynamic skybox's yes, but they're an advance from those seen in BF:1942 so the idea that you can only go so high in them is stupid. No invisible walls there (which is irrelevant because you wont go that high anyway). Plus, in BF:1942, the maps are sparsely populated with buildings and the quality of texture is low which allows the smooth running, but in HL2, there will be an entire living city beneath you.

 

[Scunna]

HL2 single player - no air vehicles
HL2 mods - only helicopters should be available

NO JETS OR PLANES ONLY HELICOPTERS.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

:dozey: I think what Rick actually meant was, the engine would need to render the city below etc which would eat up most of the CPU power. I dunno where you got the idea of 3D skybox's from. HL2 will contain dynamic skybox's yes, but they're an advance from those seen in BF:1942 so the idea that you can only go so high in them is stupid. No invisible walls there (which is irrelevant because you wont go that high anyway). Plus, in BF:1942, the maps are sparsely populated with buildings and the quality of texture is low which allows the smooth running, but in HL2, there will be an entire living city beneath you.

I get the idea that you can only go "so high" from the fact that the world is still BSP based.

Battlefield doesnt use skyboxes, its not BSP based, its terrain generated.

a skybox in HL is the box around the level you created that has your paralaxed sky texture on (hence the term "sky box") so when you look around you can see something behind the actual geometry of the bsp.

A 3d skybox used by Valve in source, has the ability to now put 3d geometry (models) into it and render it like that, however you can never reach the geometry (see The Citidal Tower) thats in the 3d skybox.

what you said about rendering things on the ground is true... unless of course they implement fog and clipping ala BF.
just the way he said it, leads me to believe that flight sims and a BF type mod cant really be achieved that well (BF being re-made in source would be awesome.... ragdolls... physics... decent fps "feel", awesome netcode etc.)


btw Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, makes me splurge my panties

 

[Mac]

bummer, i was looking forward to taking advantage of hl2's large map size with flying vehicles, but that doesnt look to be very possible. Oh well, there are still many great gameplay experiences to be had on the ground

only a minor gripe (sorry, i have some fascination for air vehicles)

 

[Mr. Redundant]

bummer, i was looking forward to taking advantage of hl2's large map size with flying vehicles, but that doesnt look to be very possible. Oh well, there are still many great gameplay experiences to be had on the ground

only a minor gripe (sorry, i have some fascination for air vehicles)

dont take my word as gold, Im merely speculating... however Flying vehicles in FSP games really tickle me pink.

the maps in Source are supposed to be huge, lets just wait and see what Source is capable of.

 

[Neutrino]

I dunno where you got the idea of 3D skybox's from. HL2 will contain dynamic skybox's yes, but they're an advance from those seen in BF:1942 so the idea that you can only go so high in them is stupid.

No, I don't think it is stupid. It looks like hl2 is still pretty similar to hl1 in a lot of respects and I bet that he was right that you will run into a skybox if you go too high. And what do you mean by dynamic skyboxes? I've read that you can have thing move such as clouds and the sun, but that has nothing to do with whether there is a invisible skybox or not. We'll see when the game comes out, but I don't think flying vehicles will work that well, unless some mod changes the way the game uses skyboxes.

 

[Flyingdebris]

why don't you do what BF does to keep you from hitting the edges?

in terms of hitting the "roof" of the map. just don't let the vehicle climb that high, you shouldn't be that high up anyway

in terms of leaving the map boundries, simply make the "deserters will be shot" thing happen and have the player lose health until he returns to the rest of the map. its not that hard.

Helis would work fine in this game, jets would have to be slowed down a tad for gameplay purposes.

and like i said, don't let gordon fly. just let him man the gunner seat and the player can experience a nice view without going where he's not supposed to

 

[Subz]

movie set like levles, i doubt you'll get to fly. maybe once or twice in a huge open dune.

besides does gordon know how to fly a helicopter?

 

[RoguePsi]

I've made a few maps in my time and skybox's can be altered quite easily. Never made one with a HL engine so it could be different, but never had a problem of 'hitting' a wall. For instance, when making maps for Raven Shield, you can change the attributes to allow the bullets not to hit it so, theoretically, you should be able to do the same with a vehicle. Raven Shield uses the current Unreal Engine and in UT2k4, they have flying vehicles.

[Slightly off topic, anyone noticed that the skybox in the FarCry demo is visible. If you look, you can see the corners and everything - how lame!]

 

[kaf11]

for mods, i dont think we should go in the BF direction. if you want to fly around vast distances, just play BF 1942 or vietnam. im not saying we shouldnt have flying vehicles, i just think we should take a different approach. maybe only one side (perhaps combine) has a helicopter that has limits on its distance/altitude but is also a very devastating vehicle. and the other team (resistance) needs to scramble around the rubble and destroyed buildings of city-17 trying to take it down. i think smaller scale implementation of such vehicles would still be able to capture the "feel" of HL that seems to me to be lacking from games like the BF series. even though i love those games, you dont really get the same feeling.