HL2 Crowbar... erhm

[Sandman]

Hey, I dunno if any of you other guys thought about it, but when I watched the e3 demo, Gordon seemed to be pushing the crowbar forward more than swinging it. I am not sure if I'm just weird or if it's not plausible to really hurt someone that way, but if it was me swingin' that badboy, I'd be throwin' it down almost overhand... or at least with a more dramatic swing. Get some real arm movement in there, know what I mean?

 

[Reaper978]

Its just the video. And I know what you mean, but they would fix it if it looked gay.

 

[Pressure]

I think they said that they kept that swing but I dunno.

 

[Sandman]

I'm pretty sure they kept it. Seriously though... did you guys think the swing could have been stronger, or would you leave it the way it is?

 

[eediot]

its the video. ITS THE VIDEO.

been discussed before

 

[MIWojo11]

Yah it seems like if you swung at anything it wouldnt hurt. Is it the video because its slower since its not a direct feed?

 

[Sandman]

Haha, okay already! You eediot!!! :-D I love ren and stimpy...
Anyways I saw a discussion about the crowbar, but it was only indirectly about the crowbar. It was about the breaking of the boards being off timing with the swing of the crowbar, but it was said that it was due to the video lag.

 

[Wsh]

This has been discussed and Valve said it will be fixed too

 

[JunkieXL]

LOL LOL AND MORE LOL .

 

[Dile]

Its a demo playback bug, the crowbar is physically simulated, and will look like it hit the target in the game.

This and lots of other things have been fixed since, thats why the media on steam will not just be better quality.

 

[Sandman]

Oo baby, I knew that already! Just didn't know that the actual crowbar animation was also a playback bug

 

[Calm_Blue_Ocean]

And more importantly it was stated that the crowbar is modelled as a physical bar moving through space - i.e. it will hopefully interact realistically with whatever it hits (impart momentum to small objects etc). Hmmm......anyone up for a little golf?

 

[Sandman]

Haha, did you guys play Postal2? You can smack people's lopped-off heads around with the shovel, or even kick the head like a soccerball!

 

[Dile]

Originally posted by Sandman
Haha, did you guys play Postal2? You can smack people's lopped-off heads around with the shovel, or even kick the head like a soccerball!

But in Postal 2 the shovel had fixed animation, so if you hit the wall, the shovel doesnt seem to have hit the wall.

 

[Sandman]

Yeah... that's true, but it never stopped me from lighting a decapitated head on fire and using the shovel to whack it at someone and catch them on fire, thereby creating a chain reaction in which they panic and catch everyone else on fire too. That certainly was fun

 

[Dile]

Originally posted by Sandman
Yeah... that's true, but it never stopped me from lighting a decapitated head on fire and using the shovel to whack it at someone and catch them on fire, thereby creating a chain reaction in which they panic and catch everyone else on fire too. That certainly was fun

Hey, I havent tried that, good idea:cheers:

 

[Sandman]

You just have to be careful not to catch yourself on fire in the process lol. And if you do, don't forget to piss yourself out haha.

 

[worldspawn]

Originally posted by Sandman
Oo baby, I knew that already! Just didn't know that the actual crowbar animation was also a playback bug

it wasn't.. they will be changing the animation for the final build.

 

[Sandman]

You know this for certain? Woo-hoo! I'm not uninformed afterall!

 

[Mountain Man]

I remember reading a statement from Gabe Newall that the crowbar animation seen in the video was a last minute addition just before E3 and is essentially a placeholder. The crowbar swing animation will look a little more manly in the final game, I'm sure.

 

[PriNcE oF SpAcE]

hopefully...in the video it looks like Gordon is Prodding his enemies with the crowbar instead of hitting them...

 

[rootbin]

i remember reading it was a placeholder as well.

 

[el Chi]

Originally posted by Sandman
Yeah... that's true, but it never stopped me from lighting a decapitated head on fire and using the shovel to whack it at someone and catch them on fire, thereby creating a chain reaction in which they panic and catch everyone else on fire too. That certainly was fun

So much that I've read about Postal2 makes it sound like an incredibly complex game. But then it's...well, it's Postal

 

[SnowBall]

I think Gabe said when they finish the crowbar, it should feel a lot like the one in HL1

 

[switch]

it would be nice if there was a second function, like pulling back and taking a massive lunge with the crowbar, or hitting them to the side, knocking them off a platform or whatever

 

[ferd]

k, lets go get some admins

 

[Spiffae]

the thing that worries me about this crowbar business is what if the bar swinging through space hits something unbreakable...like a wall for example. will it go through the wall? will it bounce off realistically, will the animation continue on, like in HL1? will it be possible to hook the crowbar on things? this whole "physically simulated" business makes me suspicious. i think they will just have an animation of the crowbar that is coupled with an impact in the world that has a direction and a strength, so that it looks like the crowbar actually impacted whatever it hits.

 

[Slash]

wtf this was discussed when the movies first surfaced... It's an incomplete version of the crowbar, quickly added for the E3 presentation, it implies nothing about the final product except it will be better

 

[NiteStalker]

This reminds me of several HL mods and Delta Force. When you use the knife you just push it a bit forward, with the edge up in the sky. That wouldn't hurt a fly=)

 

[el Chi]

Originally posted by Spiffae
the thing that worries me about this crowbar business is what if the bar swinging through space hits something unbreakable...like a wall for example. will it go through the wall? will it bounce off realistically, will the animation continue on, like in HL1? will it be possible to hook the crowbar on things? this whole "physically simulated" business makes me suspicious. i think they will just have an animation of the crowbar that is coupled with an impact in the world that has a direction and a strength, so that it looks like the crowbar actually impacted whatever it hits.

Wow, I never thought about that. I kind of hope it just carries on a la HL1 because it'd real annoying if you're in an airduct, say, and as you swing to hit a headcrab the crowbar simply pings off the wall...

 

[dscowboy]

Spiffae, exactly what I was thinking. I suspect that either the crowbar animation is separate from the physical simulation of the crowbar, or the physical simulation of the crowbar is allowed to affect other objects in the game but those objects are not able to affect the path of the crowbar. For instance, buzzsaw video where gordon is knocking the flying buzzsaw things out of the way: if the impact between a crowbar and a big flying metal thing were truely modeled in the game, both the board and the crowbar would be affected by the impact; the crowbar would slow down or bounce off the object it was hitting. Apparently the swinging animation plays the same regardless of whether the crowbar hits anything or not. So either the crowbar's swing cannot be affected by what it is hitting (meaning two swinging crowbars would just pass through each other), or the animation just does not reflect this. Either way, having any kind of 'swordplay' in a mod looks like it would be difficult.

 

[Spiffae]

i think that they will stick with a sort of Half Life 1 "plus" sort of effect.

In HL1, when you swung the crowbar, it projected a hit, like a bullet, directly in front of you, to a certain range. when you hit the wall, it would leave a bullet hole, same as any other weapon.

I think that in hl2, the hit will still be projected in the same way, but let's say the crowbar moves left-right, if the crowbar impacts, it will tell the item "you've been smacked, left-right...now go!" and the item, enemy, alyx, whatever, will get smacked with the same speed and direction as your crowbar blow. A very convincing effect, but not true weapon-world interaction.

still, we can dream about swinging the crowbar and having it embed in a combine's head, so that he was dragging from the hook of your crowbar. Realistically, though, that would cause so many problems i can't imagine it being worth it in the end.

 

[dscowboy]

Originally posted by Spiffae
"you've been smacked, left-right...now go!" and the item, enemy, alyx, whatever

Heh, smacking Alyx. Someone needs to mod in a PimpHand weapon. :afro:

On a more serious note, can someone check the buzzsaw video and see if the direction the crowbar is swinging affects how the buzzsaws get smacked around? If the crowbar swings right to left but the buzzsaw gets pushed straight back from the player, clearly the interaction between the crowbar and the stuff it hits is not fully modeled. However, if there's some angle to the direction the buzzsaw gets smacked, I think Spiffae's explanation would be pretty accurate.

I would check, but I'm at work. Anyone?

 

[Dile]

Originally posted by dscowboy
Heh, smacking Alyx. Someone needs to mod in a PimpHand weapon. :afro:

On a more serious note, can someone check the buzzsaw video and see if the direction the crowbar is swinging affects how the buzzsaws get smacked around? If the crowbar swings right to left but the buzzsaw gets pushed straight back from the player, clearly the interaction between the crowbar and the stuff it hits is not fully modeled. However, if there's some angle to the direction the buzzsaw gets smacked, I think Spiffae's explanation would be pretty accurate.

I would check, but I'm at work. Anyone?

We cant check it, because it has a demo playback bug, that the crowbar doesnt seem to hit things. However this,and tons of other things have been fixed by now, and the coming media will contain the fixed version.

 

[dscowboy]

The timing is irrelevant, this is not about how stuff breaks before the crowbar hits it. This is about whether or not the angle the crowbar hits it has any effect on the object it is hitting. If someone wanted to do a mod involving swordplay this is very important. EricJ has said that the crowbar is physically modeled as a bar swinging through space, but the extent to which it is modeled is in doubt.

The demo playback bug has to do with the various animations not synching perfectly, it would not affect the angle at which the crowbar struck something.

 

[el Chi]

Originally posted by Spiffae
we can dream about swinging the crowbar and having it embed in a combine's head, so that he was dragging from the hook of your crowbar.

Well, it could be done more simply... If you hit someone/something in the head with your crowbar then it just becomes a little more difficult to pull back/out of the wound. You don't have to drag them along, just dislodge your weapon. What a violent question this is...

 

[el Chi]

Originally posted by dscowboy
Someone needs to mod in a PimpHand weapon. :afro:

Is it just me, or does the farmer actually look rather pimpish? :farmer: