Project Reality Forums

[Disclaimer: The following is my oppinion, you may not agree, but I did not post it to annoy you. The topics may be covered in older threads in some form, but from my searching I didn't find the following two points covered (blindly as I have no threads that pop up in my memory).]

PR is realistic in many ways, but there are a few areas that are not and they create a few problems.

1.
When you are kneeling, take aim with the crosshair, you can pop up quickly and aim with 100% accuracy. Imagine getting up from prone or even kneeling position without moving your aim even slightly (there is a little wobble and no fire period from prone though, but aim stays accurate).

Realism aside it also fits badly into the rest of the game that are quite realistic, seen from a gameplay perspective. It's too easy to exploit the prone/kneeling to standing precision shooting. It's as bad as bunny hopping in my oppinion.

From kneeling to standing you could look through the crosshair/scope durring your movement, but I doubt you could keep the aim accurately. I would like to see this simulated some way. Perhaps the iron sight moves a bit randomly when getting up.

From prone to standing/kneeling I don't find it resonable that you can keep looking down the iron sights durring the movement. I suggest going out of sight view at least and perhaps a little random wobble to prevent super precision shooting.

Increasing the time it takes to change posture would also help, but please keep the "throwing yourself to the ground" feature as it is good for gameplay. But throwing yourself on the ground and firing accurately instantly should of course not be possible.


2.
Aiming in general is a bit easy. Your aim does not drift at all. You keep your gun completely still. In BF2142 the sniper rifles has a "hold your breath" feature which is nice, although a bit easy as well.

I don't have a solution for this as I find the constant drift in some games a bit annoying and adding too much luck to the mix.

Perhaps a drift dependant on movement of your body and sights. If you turn fast there will be some iron sight drift until you get a steady aim. If you move there will be quile a good dead of sight movement although the bullet will always go where the gun points, so you can still aim. The drift shouldn't be too fast.

I don't know exactly what to do about it and what would work best to keep both realism and gameplay intact... but I find it a problem that aiming seems too easy on tiny dots very far away.

The drift should increase with zoom of course (in the end it's the same deviance on the same distance, you just notice it more when zomed.) Balance it for best gameplay.

Agreed on number 1.

Don't think number 2 is possible in BF2...

And it has been suggested before.

Both are not possible given engine limitations.

KP wrote:Agreed on number 1.

Don't think number 2 is possible in BF2...

And it has been suggested before.

Yes I know breathing system has been suggested. But that's not the main point. The problem is still there in my oppinion, I just hope there is a solution that works. Breathing may not work with the engine, but it may not be the best solution either.

3.
I played as a sniper for a very long time today. It's hard to get the kit and no wonder. It's Rambo with a scoped rifle inserted into Full Metal Jacket. It's completely out of place.

You can stand, move, pronespam and fire while dancing like a dirty pig and nail the suckers in the head. Sniping is so incredibly easy.

Shooting in itself is arcadish, but sniping is just off the chart.

IMO the best solution would be to remove the sniper rifles entirely until they can be done in a proper and balanced manner.

And I am not talking about sniper rifles not being useful or better than normal rifles in real life.

I am talking about the arcade shooting mechanics being amplified to lame proportions in the sniper rifle.

2 snipers + 2 marksmen is just way too much zoomage for the current game mechanics.

Maybe give the sniper rifle M95 accuracy settings? I dont mean, by making the bullets extra large, but make it harder to kill someone standing, kneeling...in vanilla, the only accurate way to use the M95 is by proning....

I sincerely hope all this isn't hardcoded... that would mean that BF2 is hardcoded arcade forever - no matter what PR tries to do.

PR shouldn't be pure realism though, there are other games out there that provide pure realism, America's Army and ArmA to name but two. PR should be more realistic than BF2, but keeping the feel of BF2 imo, obviously I don't know what they devs themselves think on this.

I have no problem with the aiming in, no wobble is fine, that kind of thing is more irritating than realistic imo, I can hold a rifle fairly steady in real life, doesn't mean I can hit what I'm aiming at though, even if it's dead on in the sights.

I share your sentiments, for everything aside from 2142. engine does limit us as others have said... i would be happy to do away with prone diving with some more hacking around with the code, as they did a bit with the MG ironsight visuals.

Snipers are fine as is. I have never had a problem with them(With enemy snipers being very deadly). I do agaree with point #1 though.

The other changes to the game sort of balance out any arcade element and they will continue to make whatever hardcoded arcade parts less important.

ArmedDrunk&Angry wrote:The other changes to the game sort of balance out any arcade element and they will continue to make whatever hardcoded arcade parts less important.

No it's quite the opposite really. As the game becomes more realistic and gets more realistic features... the arcadeness of the aiming and shooting will be amplified through their increased importance for gameplay.

In a total arcade game like BF2 the arcade shooting feels right at home, because it is balanced by the other arcade systems, like the fact that you can take a few shots beforew dying and the fact the guns have random spread.

In PR however many of the arcade features that restrict players have been removed while the arcade shooting style has been retained. That creates an imbalance both from a gameplay perspective and a realism perspective.

It is where teamwork comes in.
In the military you are INTERDEPENDENT. meaning you are working with one another. and helping each other out.
So if the map is 'unbalanced' Bf2 Arcade Style, doesnt mean to say that PR is unbalanced, because unlike vBF2, for maps to work it requires teamwork. Not just going round the map firing on automatic gun ho.

It requires the players to work together in sections/squads to get the job done. and on the point of the commander to apply tactics.
So the Commander could say, move 1 section to point A and hold this position and while 2+3 section go round the sides. and 4 section comes in as a reinforcement. It is combination of teamwork and tactics that makes it work, unlike the rubbish vBF2, which really we want to get rid of.

On the drift thing: totally agree, however prolly not possible in the BF2 engine. Does anyone know if 2142 is run on another engine (or a modified one) than BF2? I tried the demo for it and when you run the camera "bounces". Gives a cool effect. Other than that the game sucked imao.

Army Musician wrote:It is where teamwork comes in.
In the military you are INTERDEPENDENT. meaning you are working with one another. and helping each other out.
So if the map is 'unbalanced' Bf2 Arcade Style, doesnt mean to say that PR is unbalanced, because unlike vBF2, for maps to work it requires teamwork. Not just going round the map firing on automatic gun ho.

It requires the players to work together in sections/squads to get the job done. and on the point of the commander to apply tactics.
So the Commander could say, move 1 section to point A and hold this position and while 2+3 section go round the sides. and 4 section comes in as a reinforcement. It is combination of teamwork and tactics that makes it work, unlike the rubbish vBF2, which really we want to get rid of.

Team work can happend with the arcade systems in place or not. Team work will not make the arcade systems any less visible in the gameplay.

The problem is the arcade systems can interfere with realistic squad tactics. Realistic squad tactics make the team work more fun in my oppinion.

Aiming is what aiming is no matter how people work together. The easy shooting is there to create an unbalance wether people play as a team or not.

Since it is equally arcade for both teams, it will not unbalance the game in relation to who's going to win... but it will create a gameplay unbalance where certain cheasy tactics will rob gameplay of cool moments of squad play we could have seen if the arcade systems were not there.

Rambo in a war documentary is as out of place as this aiming system is in PR.

It does not mean the game is unplayable... I just believe the game could achieve much more.

arcade moments for me are

1. medic reviving people blown up by suicide cars

2. huge recoil from small calibre weapons

3. people using rpgs against other people and tanks using main cannon on infantry. although it happens, its usually on concealed infantry i.e behind obstacles or in a bunker. not someone standing in the middle of the desert

4. cobra gunships that hover in battle. (too bad our crazy rpgs can punish them for that critical error). also i might add their very accurate cannon. which isn't so

5. cobras that survive rpg hits. an rpg hit on a lucky cobra should force it down

Harrelson wrote: 2. huge recoil from small calibre weapons

I wouldn't call that 'arcadey', even if it might not be totally accurate.
And besides, how would you know what recoil a certain type of gun should have; unless you have actually fired that weapon....

cobra gunships that hover in battle. (too bad our crazy rpgs can punish them for that critical error). also i might add their very accurate cannon. which isn't so

There is no error if you don't get shot down!

How's the gunner going to shoot if the pilots not hovering?

Only the pilots who know how to fly in this game use their gunner.

the "sway" stuff in 2142 is a change to the BF2 engine (which 2142 is built on).

There's probably a couple hundred actual engine changes and a few of them are fairly meaningful (like the sway mechanism).

There are some ways we can improve this to make it less sterile, but most of them are animation related so we need to have an animator dedicated to it for a good chunk of time.

The most beneficial arcade related change would be to improve the "reactions on contact" dynamics that the BF2 engine causes players to adopt. The prone spamming is what I am referring to here.

We'll continue to work on this stuff .. but I can assure you some of the behaviours you experience in PR around these issues are not intentional heh.

Harrelson wrote:arcade moments for me are

1. medic reviving people blown up by suicide cars

2. huge recoil from small calibre weapons

3. people using rpgs against other people and tanks using main cannon on infantry. although it happens, its usually on concealed infantry i.e behind obstacles or in a bunker. not someone standing in the middle of the desert

4. cobra gunships that hover in battle. (too bad our crazy rpgs can punish them for that critical error). also i might add their very accurate cannon. which isn't so

5. cobras that survive rpg hits. an rpg hit on a lucky cobra should force it down

None of these are unrealistic or problems. Suicide cars often cause more injuries than deaths. Recoil exists and is not that bad in game. Full auto is impractical on assault rifles in most cases. RPGs are used against infantry in Iraq and Afghanistan. Tanks do use HEAT on enemy positions. Helicopter gunships often hover or move slowly which can sometimes be seen in news fooage in Israel or Iraq. Helicopters can sometimes survive big hits and the rotors keep them from landing too hard depending on the situation.