Character Animations

[TheComet]

I got this idea a little earlier, It'd be great if there were a set of little animations you can make your character do in the game, like typing #anim_BattleCry would make your character raise their weapon over their head, or #anim_Laugh would make your char laugh or giggle a little, that type of idea. I can supply sounds for these btw if you guys like Many developers have used this idea for several online games and they really make the game more fun and diverse, not to mention you can always play around doing anims to make funny scenes for screenshots

 

Here's my little list of neat ideas for the anims, the name would be after #anim_ :

BattleCry-Raises your weapon over your head and you scream

Laugh-a short laugh like from hearing a good joke

EvilLaugh-A more meniacal criminal laugh

HandOver-Could be used when a trade is succesful, your character takes something from their pocket and hands it out in front of him

Threaten-Character makes a fist or points their weapon out in front of them

Pray-Character drops to their knees and prays silently

Failure-Character drops to their knees but instead to start crying from defeat

Victory-Character sheaths their weapon for a moment, throws their fist into the air while cheering for a few seconds, and draws their weapon again

Talk-Casual talking animation, maybe have a couple like Talk1,Talk2,Talk3, ect

Compliment-Pats whatever's in front of you in the shoulder

ThumbsUp-pretty straightforward

SitDown-Your character sits down, but for chairs

GetUp-Get up from a chair (this should just be hard-coded into the game for sitting in chairs)

 

I know it's not too difficult to create these animations because I'm an animator myself, and if I can help I use Swift 3D and Macromedia Flash MX 6 (flash is a 2D prog tho). Also, if you can't script it so the chars go up to and look at each other for some of these anims, you can just leave it up to the players to line them up

[Brom]

Of course. I think these are in the works already.

[Kendai]

Oooh, those would be awesome Could we do facial expressions as well, or would it be too difficult? Imagine smiling, crying, blushing... I'd like that a lot hehe.

[Josie]

omg

That sounds cool kendai

hehehe

[crusadingknight]

SitDown-Your character sits down, but for chairs

GetUp-Get up from a chair (this should just be hard-coded into the game for sitting in chairs)

207867[/snapback]

Do we want to spent processor cycles doing things which make the entire game better, or checking if you're in the same location as a chair and responding accordingly? (Though, I suppose it could be done roughly using heightmap assumptions, but you'd do the same on hills as on chairs...)

[Derin]

Sounds great

 

BattleCry- I like this lot

Laugh- sounds good

EvilLaugh-I think one laugh is enough tho

HandOver- could be part of the "Trade icon" animation

Threaten- could be replaced by "point"

Pray- wow! I love this one

Failure- I don't like this one

Victory- I don't like this one

Talk- Not very useful I think

Compliment- Too difficult I think

ThumbsUp- good one, but will be hard to see

SitDown- the one we have is good enough

GetUp- the one we have is good enough

Edited October 10, 2005 by Derin

[Infamous]

i think just movements are better like a dance.

sound would just drive you crazy at places like storage

 

Victory-Character sheaths their weapon for a moment, throws their fist into the air while cheering for a few seconds, and draws their weapon again

 

meh holding ur weapon high up in the sky would look better

like they do in movies

Edited October 10, 2005 by Hardcore

[Brom]

meh holding ur weapon high up in the sky would look better smile.gif

like they do in movies tongue.gif

Which is battlecry.

[freeone3000]

(Though, I suppose it could be done roughly using heightmap assumptions, but you'd do the same on hills as on chairs...)

208025[/snapback]

Which would also look pretty nice. What would be wrong with sitting on a hillside? Assuming we have a stop-motion when solid object A touches solid object B, otherwise we could go through items. Like deer.

Edited October 10, 2005 by freeone3000

[crusadingknight]

Which would also look pretty nice. What would be wrong with sitting on a hillside? Assuming we have a stop-motion when solid object A touches solid object B, otherwise we could go through items. Like deer.

208108[/snapback]

Nope, our only collision detection relies on heightmap tiles.

[MagpieLee]

I'd personally like to see big swings with punches, roundhouse kicks and the occassional critical hit with a flying kick. It should be better then the pansy looking jabs and kicks to the shin then again..those attacks can cause some pretty decent damage anyway.

[TheComet]

I'd personally like to see big swings with punches, roundhouse kicks and the occassional critical hit with a flying kick. It should be better then the pansy looking jabs and kicks to the shin then again..those attacks can cause some pretty decent damage anyway.

208138[/snapback]

 

lol, yeah, the game could use that and more vicous looking attacks and different kinds of swings for each weapon instead of the 2 or 3 anims now

[Brom]

lol, yeah, the game could use that and more vicous looking attacks and different kinds of swings for each weapon instead of the 2 or 3 anims now 

208176[/snapback]

It will happen of course. Give it time.

[TheComet]

It will happen of course. Give it time.

208401[/snapback]

 

kk, A really cool effect would be a motion blur from swinging weapons an such, that can be done with a 2 piece (one for in front of the char and one for behind) white blur pic and a little alpha/transparency adjusting

[Nintenduh]

I think a bow emote would rock!

[gilthanas]

united swords- 3 or more players gather in a circle and they point their swords in the middle, then raise them up all together

[Andrew]

That would be cool, I wouldn't mind just an emotion face above the head, but actual animation would be better.

[trollson]

Could these be interpreted from the 'emotive' messages (the ':<msg>' syntax I think?). The client already receives these, so it should be able to interpret them as animations on the appropriate character.

[TheComet]

I think a bow emote would rock!

208479[/snapback]

EDIT: I meant the 3 swords thing

 

That would be tight! Maybe the game could detect if the 3 players were within a small distance of each other and if all 3 players do the battle cry that close within 5 sec of each other they'd point towards the center of the 3 (This isn't difficult to do, just have the game make a circle around all 3 players and the center would be where all 3 intercept, same concept use for pinpointing earthquakes) and do that.

I really wish I had the prog they use for animations, I use Swift 3d. I can't tell you guys how much I want to make some anims of it as examples but I can't use the models in Swift 3D the game uses (so I don't know how many joints and such are used)

Edited October 12, 2005 by TheComet

[Entris]

I like this idea would be cool 2 be able 2 actually laugh instead of lol all the time

 

Would be cool if u could make ur char put the sword infront of u with the edge straight up 2 solut (tired can't remember how it's spelled) some1.

Edited October 12, 2005 by Entris

[rasberrybeard]

You guys need to keep in mind that there are only about 2 animators for the game, so it's hard to make things dynamic.

[TheComet]

You guys need to keep in mind that there are only about 2 animators for the game, so it's hard to make things dynamic.

208888[/snapback]

 

Yeah but it's not difficult to make a bunch of animations. All they need to do is make 1 animation per mesh for each animation, not alot of work (and before people try to start to flame me about that, I'm an animator, so shush.)

[Nintenduh]

To do anything like this you would need motion sensing equipment (like the ones from Intersense) and the suits (like from GypsyGyro). Not to mention the software to track it. I love the idea's here I wish I had the knowhow and 10's of thousands of USD to contribute.

Edited September 21, 2006 by Nintenduh