What interesting things caught your eye in the e3 clips?

[PatPwnt]

oh yah... I guess it just freezes the model

 

[SLH]

it kinda sets a question about the grenade times. Cause the timing on the grenade seems all wrong. I get it to 4 seconds from thrown(including the part we can't see) to blown up.

And although you can set it to what you will in real life, wouldn't it be more normal with 3 and 5 sec nades? So it kinda makes me think that the grenade is "frozen" for action until released again, cause he does hold it for about 1 second, which would fit with it being a 3 second nade.

What about the rollermines, they're always changing status, but they weren't with the manipulator? Could it be that it is "freezing" some items when held?

Perhaps the combines like 4 second grenades.

Re. the rollermines, i think their status depends on how close to the player they are/ whether they're going for him. Because when got by the manipulator they don't move relative to the player they're status won't change.

 

[Axyon]

I make it about 5 seconds, it's hard to tell when they throw it though.

 

[Sprafa]

I wuved the Antlions kamikazing.

And bringing the buggy up with the Manipulator.

 

[DEATH eVADER]

The coastline vid (the one where he uses the crane) struck me. Mainly because the use of colours has changed from the coatline2003 vid.

2003= Murkier, Tide out, Sand is Brown/Grey (as if volcanic)
2004= Brighter, Tide in, Sand is Yellowish and the use of green in the vid

So, we now know that we can drive the buggy, and a Fan assisted Bike/Boat and we can also use the crane (Could we take the weapons from the combine using the magnet)

 

[Baal]

One thing that caught my eye, besides the shear awesomeness of the game, was that when gordon shot the barrels and the combine guard moved out of the way of the explosion so he wouldn't die.

it wasn't anything that special, but it was just something that you don't usually see in other games. They'll usually just stand there and get lit on fire.

Also, I loved how the zombies would scream when they would get on fire.

 

[DEATH eVADER]

Finally, enemies move and shoot at the same time (the AI do this the same time as gets out of the way of the exploding barrel)

 

[Razak]

I meant that that kind of detail was almost impossible to make on a small model, so I think they made a model of the G-Man as big as a building so they could add that kind of detail (and do all the lighting tricks). I don't think such a thing would work out properly with a small model.

What?? That is the game model. It is just being zoomed in to see the facial expressions more clearly. Why do you think its impossible to have high quality "small models" as you say. There is only one model.

 

[TriggerHappy]

Sorry if this has been posted, but did anyone else notice the squad icons during the strider scene? It said Squad: Following and there were icons for 3 people. As the battle wore on, the icons eventually all dimmed out, presumably as the squad members were killed off.

I wonder how many kinds of orders we will be able to give to our squads, how well they follow them, and whether you can be part of an AI-led squad?

 

[FISKER_Q]

I make it about 5 seconds, it's hard to tell when they throw it though.

When he's fighting the combines after the rollermines they also throw grenades there, which has a 3 second trigger.

 

[junco]

why did valve disable HDR for the demos? i'm worried they did that because they thought it might cause skips or framerate loss.

bad thing i noticed was when going down the elevator to see Eli, you pass a floor with some of those aliens and it skips. thats not cool, especially for an e3 demo.

good things i noticed that i liked was how realistic that apartment scene looked, how sweet it looked when gordon broke the wood going into the shed, and how the striders would flick cars away with their legs.

 

[Baal]

HDR = ?

Heavy...Damage Rendering?

 

[Spiffae]

I noticed one thing... that auto-zoom from the kleiner's lab demo last year was noticeably missing. do you think they took it out for practicality issues?

 

[SLH]

HDR = ?

Heavy...Damage Rendering?

High dynamic range - when you get a glow around a window when it's bright outside (and similar effects).

 

[Mr. Redundant]

the animations were awesome
but the animation blending between scripted animations was horrid.
you could visually see models "tick" when switching animations :/
big detraction from the immersion
you see this great fluid, believable animation followed by an obvious skip/jerk/tick while the game loads/allocates/switches to the characters next animation.

EDIT: also did anyone notice how much they re-use that Hl1 walk/run sound effect?

right foot hit (light concrete sound) left foot hit (same, then scrape/scuff)
its easily heard in the train station, and even in the Father gregori scene, where you are running on grass.. which is when its most obvious/out of place.

 

[junco]

forgot something... just wanted to add in the CS:source demo when the first shots are fired from above, you see the bullets hit the water and move up and kill that terrorist. a flurry of blood and water... that was awesome.

 

[inert]

Don't know if this has been said yet but guy at the beginning telling you about the water looks an AWFUL lot like Doug Lombardi. Also, in the apartment, the guy standing next to the black guy looking out of the window. See what ya think but i'm pretty sure its him. Wouldn't be the first time a company has done this, Rareware used scans of the Goldeneye team in the game.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

Don't know if this has been said yet but guy at the beginning telling you about the water looks an AWFUL lot like Doug Lombardi. Also, in the apartment, the guy standing next to the black guy looking out of the window. See what ya think but i'm pretty sure its him. Wouldn't be the first time a company has done this, Rareware used scans of the Goldeneye team in the game.

hahah it does

first thing Im gonna do is get me some weapons find him, and start beating the living pants-juice out of him!

SEPT 30TH EH?!?! TAKE THIS
*WHACK* and THIS *WOOSH*

just kidding

 

[enthused]

what amazed me most was the scene with Father Gregory when you pass the fence, you see those howler-monkey things jump down from a distance, if you focus your attention at where they come from, i think the movement is awesome, they leap from the edge, it actually seems like they are excited to see their prey.

and i loved when Gordon entered the small house after fighting combine and those annoying rollermines. He kills the combine by shooting furniture at him, and picks up that last rollermine with his manipulator, shoots it out the front door and closes it. I actually thought to myself, "he's as annoyed by those things as I am!"

 

[Axyon]

When he's fighting the combines after the rollermines they also throw grenades there, which has a 3 second trigger.

Maybe the Combine cook the grenades in some situations, like the one you describe. If so, that's just fantastic.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

Maybe the Combine cook the grenades in some situations, like the one you describe. If so, that's just fantastic.

yeah that would be.
the animations on the combine.. movement-wise blew me away,
I loved it when Gordon was battling them at the house (where they blow the rocks to block the road) and the combine strafe run and fire etc.
very cool.

the muscle system in animation (with weights etc) really make things shine, like shifting weight from one leg to the other, or how the legs/arms deform when they move and flex.

 

[Axyon]

yeah that would be.
the animations on the combine.. movement-wise blew me away,
I loved it when Gordon was battling them at the house (where they blow the rocks to block the road) and the combine strafe run and fire etc.
very cool.

the muscle system in animation (with weights etc) really make things shine, like shifting weight from one leg to the other, or how the legs/arms deform when they move and flex.

The game's just about perfected the physics and animations, from what I can see. Everything's just... so damn good. I was stunned with excitement when the resistance were fighting the Striders - one man got picked off by the Strider machine gun, the physics blew his body back, but his legs stayed in the air when his body was on the floor, then moments later they sprawled back to the ground again. I mean, up until recently, animations would do things like that... but to have physics making it looks like that. Brilliant.

 

[Ownzed]

my favorite thing that caught my eye/ear was the awesome screaming of the zombies burning alive. :flame: :naughty: :thumbs:

 

[Victor2]

When the pistol was "holstered" near friendlies.

Yeah, that´s was realy cool and the Breencasts

 

[Brian Damage]

Heheh, "Breencasts"... there's a term that could stick...

 

[shadow stalker]

lol 'breencasts' nice

The bit i thought was good, was when you where fighting the striders, one of the striders walks of one of the resistance and spikes him with his leg, but the strider just carries on shooting. A short time after that, you see the strider relise he has a body attached to his leg and shakes it off. I thought that was neat. how he didn't shake it off amediatly.

 

[Sorze]

I think I just noticed some of that reactive scripting concerning npcs...

Notice how Eli says "Feel free to look around" and seems to actually wait until gordon starts looking around!
First Eli looks like he's about to leave, but then looks at gordon again, and only after gordon starts turning away to look at the surroundings Eli turns around and walks away.

We've all heard about how the npcs will deliver their lines differently depending on how the player is behaving. Like if the player is always running/jumping around and seems like he wants to get going, the characters will only say the most important stuff, to get the player going faster.

I think this might have been a case of that, as if he would've talked some more if Gordon would've just kept staring at him..


Hope I'm not wrong, if it works, it'll be awesome !

EDIT: The 664 meg movie, about 18:00.

 

[FISKER_Q]

Maybe the Combine cook the grenades in some situations, like the one you describe. If so, that's just fantastic.

Well seeing the clip again and again gives me some doubt though, so i tried mailing Gabe

 

[Bling]

-Nade throw back
-Crain box owning combine (steel box from hell)
-anything to do with the "tool shed"
-voice acting is very well done
-using the minipulator to push the buggy into a guy
-swinging human legs

 

[bate18]

i dont know if anyone mentioned this, but the thing i just kept watching over and over is when gordon is on the second story of the house picking up ammo, he smashes the window with a box with the manipulator, then he looks outside and launches a grenade into the fence, the way the fence blew up and flew across the screen made me realize that this game is going to be the end all be all of games. the scene occurs 6:37 into the presentation. its so awesome

 

[A2597]

something else, when he pulled the saw blade out of that one zombie, the top half fell. (Then chopping the head off the other one...)


as for G'Man, it's one of two things:

The in game model (My best bet)
a higher detail one.

NOW, as a 3D modeler and animator myself, I can say this for 100% certain
IT DOES NOT NEED TO BE BIGGER TO HAVE MORE DETAIL. I can make a super detailed 5 mile long station a millimeter wide, and there is NO loss of detail. I just have to make the camera a littler closer to the object to see it right.

 

[Spiffae]

i dont know if anyone mentioned this, but the thing i just kept watching over and over is when gordon is on the second story of the house picking up ammo, he smashes the window with a box with the manipulator, then he looks outside and launches a grenade into the fence, the way the fence blew up and flew across the screen made me realize that this game is going to be the end all be all of games. the scene occurs 6:37 into the presentation. its so awesome

also, notice when he shoots a rifle grenade out the window, it accidentally hits the tree, very close to the window. the explosion deafens the player, and he can't hear the combine shooting him from behind... i think that in the final game, they'll have some sort of "shell-shock" sound that isn't in yet, but it's a cool feature.

 

[Mechagodzilla]

Also, the tire swing on the tree swings around like crazy after the explosion.

 

[evil^milk]

Note

Just when Eli tells Gordon to go look around and Gordon starts looking around, you can see some monitors with some kind of ball that looks like a round head with a mask, with eye holes and a "breather" (like in the combines' masks, at the mouth). I just kept looking at this over and over again. Maybe it isn't really important.

Anyway another thing I noticed was something strange with the physics engine in the dune buggy segment (the one with the crane). After Gordon kills the combine dude with the shotgun, and then the other antlion is killed, Gordon shoots a grenade from the MP 7 to kill the other combine dude and pieces of wood shoot out, and some debris just "flies straight out" (like it just flys out straight, lol) instead of rolling and stuff. See this bit, it's kinda hard to explain.

Everything else is just awesome.

EDIT: Oh and in the same bit with Eli you see a framed, black and white picture with somebody who appears to be Eli and Alyx. The monitors I talked about before look REALLY cool, it really makes it look "LCD" type. In a game. Wow.

 

[noah]

2003= Murkier, Tide out, Sand is Brown/Grey (as if volcanic)
2004= Brighter, Tide in, Sand is Yellowish and the use of green in the vid

Yeah, I noticed this too...I think I like the older, grey sand better...it looks more creepy and atmospheric. I'm still not completely sure the two maps are the same. In the newer clip, the ramp leading up to the docks is gone and the skyline behind the shipping warehouses is very different. Some of the buildings are entirely different too. But the two maps are so similar in other areas though, that I find it hard to believe VALVe would have two different levels that look so similar to each other.

 

[Spiffae]

WOAH!

at 6:44 (the IR Gun in the 2nd floor of the house) watch it frame-by-frame. the one shot from the IR gun (which is like a big glowing ball) shoots from the gun, and hits the first combine - THEN it bounces back, and hits the second combine. then it bounces off the floor in a shower of sparks, and then goes off the screen.

Also, in an unfinished moment, all the rifle grenades go out the barrel sideways, rather than straight.

I'll upload some screenshots in a sec.

 

[DeltaBlast]

NOW, as a 3D modeler and animator myself, I can say this for 100% certain
IT DOES NOT NEED TO BE BIGGER TO HAVE MORE DETAIL. I can make a super detailed 5 mile long station a millimeter wide, and there is NO loss of detail. I just have to make the camera a littler closer to the object to see it right.

Yeah, duh... but how would you do the lighting effects? don't forget that those images from HL1 you see aren't done by video effects, but by the game itself. They probably gave his skin some kind of monitor texture and had a cam pointed ath some HL1 models. Now what I've seen from hammer, it would be really hard to produce such effects on a small model. And I doubt that they have modeled the g-mans eyebrows ingame because that would eat pointless cpu usage. Compared to the other ingame models the g-man looks faaaar better.
Also, objects that are further away have less problems with jaggies and such.

 

[madca7`]

What I noticed is the barrel which, as he shoots, doesnt explodes immediatly but first starts to be on fire and then blew up
its short after the buggy part

 

[Sparta]

yeah that was nifty. It'll be cool to see how fire reacts in the game. I wanna see it spread non-scriptedly

 

[Stryyder]

it kinda sets a question about the grenade times. Cause the timing on the grenade seems all wrong. I get it to 4 seconds from thrown(including the part we can't see) to blown up.

And although you can set it to what you will in real life, wouldn't it be more normal with 3 and 5 sec nades? So it kinda makes me think that the grenade is "frozen" for action until released again, cause he does hold it for about 1 second, which would fit with it being a 3 second nade.

What about the rollermines, they're always changing status, but they weren't with the manipulator? Could it be that it is "freezing" some items when held?

There really is no exact timing for a grenade. Standard US combat fragmentation grenades have a fuse dely between 4 and 4.8 seconds. You count on it being 4.