Thirdperson Multiplayer Shooter?

[Spike]

Just thinking to start a project now that I think I know enough about programming (3rd year at university).

I've got an idea to start, problem is people use to play first person shooters, and third person shooters are considered to be "console games". So what do you think about a non competitive (no CSS or TF2 for teh pros) thirdperson shooter?

Gameplay would be similar to Battle Royale film, everyone spawns with a random weapon and the map starts getting smaller and smaller until there is only one person left (that's the basics). Player would be able to use cover (Gears of War style), use and move enviroment objects (boxes, barrels, etc). So it's not the kind of competitive pro gamming you use to play in FPS.

Do you think a thirdperson shooter like that would work? Pros & Cons?

[TicTac]

one thing I don't like about 3rd person is that you can corner-peek without exposing yourself Specifically about your game, it'd be arcade/arena style fighting?

[Gary]

one thing I don't like about 3rd person is that you can corner-peek without exposing yourself [...]

Glad someone said this. I completely agree, it's like being invisible.

And I have always liked first person better, third person can be cool, I like seeing a kick-ass player model beating the crap out of people. But I find first person to give me the feeling that I "am" the guy.

[Spike]

one thing I don't like about 3rd person is that you can corner-peek without exposing yourself Specifically about your game, it'd be arcade/arena style fighting?

No, it would be open areas & buildings where big blocks of the map are marked as "Dead Zones" as times goes down. If you're inside a "Dead Zone" you die. It's just like the Battle Royale film, if you haven't watched it I recommend you do it, it's not the best film in the world but it's pretty interesting

[Major Banter]

What happens if you get stuck with an absolutely shitty weapon? Like a sniper rifle in a close-quarters area or a pistol in an open area? What happens if you've got a rocket launcher one round then a pistol the next? You're fucked the second time around, it's totally unbalanced.

Pickups are always better. Imagine a system where the players have a short period of time to hunt for randomly spawned weapons. Those who know the map and have some experience get a weapon, those without have to make use of the environment in some way; explosives barrels or something, to kill opponents.

How would the map get smaller as well? A sorta AVP shifting temple would be cool but what about an office? Do you just slam doors shut at random and kill anyone outside or hope that bastard camping in a corner of a map moves somewhere closer to the centre and you're able to seal off that area?

In 3rd person you have a massive, sometimes up to 80 degree FOV. GoW for example. MGO and MW2 3rd Person Hardcore are two other examples. This means there's going to be a lot of limitation in terms of stealth elements. MGO isn't really about stealth, but there's elements that give massive advantages to players who have the skill to use stealth. GoW on the other hand rewards gunplay, with CQB and long range headshots often giving one-hit-one-kill scenarios to benefit the player.

What about spawning? 32 players would be utterly epic, but in CSS I've often seen it get down to two guys. Then the match drags on as they hunt each other. You'd need a definable objective and time limit for the players to get thier arses in gear and fight one another agressively, or incorporate a "last man standing" system with the player having 3 lives or so; the longer they stay in, the better weapons they can salvage later on.

I hope I've helped you with some very key flaws, and would also like to state my interest in mapping if this is for Source, or prop texturing otherwise. I wish you the best of luck.

[Major Banter]

Note! I love the Dead Zone idea.

[Dr. Delta]

Titans Peak is kinda something, 3rd person mp shooter for source
http://www.moddb.com/mods/titans-peak/videos

[Gary]

Need something that slowly cause the map to become smaller. Not just a "if your not here in X seconds your dead".

Maybe some could have a fire that is slowly taking over the room, slowly making it smaller. Also, have close combat weapons in the middle of the map, so as the arena gets smaller, there is already short range guns where the combat will become short-range.

[Major Banter]

You could really have fun with dead zones. As said, the temple thing, or Gary's burning building. A spaceship sealing off compartments would be pretty cool. There's plenty of scope.

[Spike]

I wanted this thread to be focused on the thirdperson aspect of gamming in general, but anyway, thanks for the comments they're going to be useful for sure.

I do agree the thirdperson view has some major problems like seeing what the eye can't see (corners, etc), but in the other hand it's fucking cool to see your character kicking ass, as Gary said. The idea is to have an over-the-shoulder camera close to the player, so you can't really see much of what's going out behind you.

Other reason I want to explore the thirdperson view is because the idea is to allow the player to pick objects and move them, so you can actually see the animation of carrying a box for example.

About the gameplay stuff, it's only a sketch, but the main idea is to make the players kill eachother or group killing where you're in a squad and you have to help eachother to kill the other squads while the map gets smaller.

In the film Battle Royale, a group of students of the same class have to kill eachother, they wear necklace that explodes when it's inside a dead zone. It easily could be modified to make it "enviroment dead zone" where fire or explosions kills the players.

Imagine the map as a grid where each X time some zones are closed (with Y time to leave the zone) until everyone's killed or there's only one survivor. Players starts in a base and they run around the map looking for better weapons or preparing traps while the map keeps getting smaller, until there's just a few grid squares left and everyone encounters. Grid closing would be random, but following a pattern.

Gameplay could be complemented with some sort of "hacking" system so you can open closed zones, or even attack the "NPC base" where you spawn. I don't know, that's just ideas.

The maps would be in open areas with some buildings but with natural enviroments (forests, deserts, tundra, post apocalyptic, etc), at the beggining of the round it will be difficult to find someone, but as the map gets smaller the action increases. Maps should have lots of places to hide and sniper rifles should be rare to find.

Randomising the player weapons is a problem as Banter said, but maybe there could be a way to let the player choose some weapons from a random collection before the spawn. What I want to avoid is players always using the same weapons (CSS, MW, BC2, etc...) and to prevent the top player to have always the best weapons. This could be compatible with a buying system, you gain credits from kills and stuff, and the you buy weapons from random collections each round. Anyway the idea was to have random weapon spawnings around the map too.

[Gary]

Also, if you just want to see the player's arms and legs doing something, you can always create a code version of this lua addon for GMOD.

http://www.garrysmod.org/downloads/?a=view&id=93127

Will read your big post later, too tired.

[dewkl]

If this is just a private project you're doing for yourself, don't be afraid to experiment. This is the best opportunity to try everything. Make something that is fun, then worry about balancing. I don't think you can stop people from seeing you behind walls, but you can somehow make the other player know they're there (anti-motion sensor radar or other kinds of clues). I like the idea of random starting weapons. If there's pickups, then there's even less to worry about.

Is this for source or udk?

[Major Banter]

Lua will definitely be the way to go if this is for Source.

[Surfa]

Lua will definitely be the way to go if this is for Source.

HUH?

[Major Banter]

Fucking easy to code for and there's an absolutely bunch of it on Gmod forums.

As far as I'm aware, incorporating the Lua system and then making massive modification like this is very, very easy.

Course, I may be utterly wrong, but that's hardly my fault is it.