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I wonder if anyone can help me here?
My son is doing a final project for this third year at uni (Computer Gaming Technology). He is doing a study based on the effects of 'real life' physics on bullets in FPS games. We are specifically looking at snipers here.
Battlefield 3 has introduced it to a limited degree... bullet drop for long shots and 'waggle' on high mag scopes which is a start but there isn't much evidence of realistic physics in other popular games as far as I can recall - although there was one level in an early COD which introduced the whole erm...shooting match in the campaign albeit as a one off.
If a programmer was to introduce other variables such as:
1. Windage
2. Different bullet characteristics on different maps (trajectory and retained power seem to be different at sea level and higher altitudes)
3. Different bullet masses and so on
...would this sort of thing be a desirable change? (It might discourage campers looking for easy kills and thereby improve everyone else's game as one potential benefit.)
The result would be that snipers require a higher skill level to achieve a successful 'kill' but this might make the game boring or too hard.
He wants to measure the gut reaction of a sample of gamers and I thought this was probably as good a place to go as possible. He is not asking for anything here except people's thoughts on whether this would make the game 'better' or not, and why.
I hope I have explained this clearly. Forgive me if I haven't!
Thanks
While I am at it....is the a STW clan for Battlefield 3 on PS3? I'm getting kinda lonely on my own!
Used to play a little BF2. Bullet drop after 150m, bullet has velocity relative to the velocity of the shooter (eg: easy to hit someone when you're standing still, doing it from a moving helicopter is a whole other thing). Scope wiggled when you moved, but was static apart from that I think.
I don't think scope wiggle is a bad thing, specially in COD where you can hold your breath to steady it.
Different bullet speeds at different altitudes though? Also at different temperatures I guess. Sounds like a lot of effort for no good reason. Nothing more annoying then missing a shot for a reason you can't physically see.
Same with adding a wind element. And I'm no soldier, but how much does the wind actually effect a bullet? You don't really get many shots over 200m on games that I've played, would the wind really play that much into it?
As for different bullet masses, there was a bigger sniper in BF2 that fired a bigger bullet that could go through wind shields of helicopters and jets, but wasn't so good for infantry and it took longer to reload.
So yeah, I think adding too many variables makes it boring and too hard, unless it's just a sniper based game.
Can't say I disagree. His idea was that visual cues would be introduced such as litter blowing etc so you would see why you missed...if you did.
Wind does play a significant effect on accuracy over long distances. Whether it would on the sort of gun used in the games is maybe a moot point. 🙂
it would end up looking like a golf game, though the blowing leaves thing sounds like a good idea, many years of working on golf games, it isn't, you need a continual feed back of the wind direction and strength and leaves blowing past all the time just looks "unnatural" it is also difficult to get a true sense of direction and strength from the visual clues. So you have to have a permanent wind direction and strength indicator, usually a 2d arrow with a wind speed.
Have you sorted Jimmy out yet RealMan?
Wouldnt work due to any lag in game imo
hi slowjo, I play Battlefield 3 on the PS3, the gravity effect on bullets over distance does vary in the game, the more powerful rifles require less vertical adjustment to get a hit or headshot over distance.
windage would be good and add to what is one of the most realistic shooters available, but i like sniping 😀