Fantastic update! I'm super pleased with this especially the options of going for REAL customisation over costumes as I keep saying I'd rather MWM take their time and get it right then rush to release an unfinished or unpolished end product and the fact that they are taking such pride in the little details fills me with endless hope....Thanks @MWorldsMedia

"And there’s another feature I’m not talking about till we’re sure it works - you’d [I]kilt[/I] me if I couldn’t follow up."

Hmmmm? Typo - or shall we warm up the bagpipes?

"Our gloves can be of any length, our boots of any height. Other games, they fix what you can swap out, making sure that things match, making sure that this zone is for gloves, this zone is for sleeves."

So instead of having the clothing item "biker boots" and the separate clothing item "biker knee-high boots", you will have ONE item called "biker boots" that you can have as low as ankles or as high as the hips? Sounds neat! Does this also mean we could potentially have that control on hair for a "make your own hairstyle" customization? So instead of "medium hair" and "long hair" we just have "straight hair" and control the length with a slider? Just a thought...

Interdictor wrote:

"And there’s another feature I’m not talking about till we’re sure it works - you’d kilt me if I couldn’t follow up."
Hmmmm? Typo - or shall we warm up the bagpipes?

Forget the bagpipes. If [url=http://thedevilspanties.com/]Jenny Breeden[/url] hears about this, she'll break out the leaf blower. ^_^

I love updates like this. Thank you!

Reserving comment until I see more of what it can *actually* do. What has been shown so far appears to be either displacement mapping (old enough, as a technique, that it could be done in the CoX engine) or vertex morphing (nearly as old, but certainly more powerful). Unless there is a whole lot under the hood that isn't actually being shown off by this example, which I will cheerfully admit to the possibility of.

Even if it *is* just that, it doesn't mean it isn't a big step for MWM/CoT. On the other hand, both of those techniques have some fairly significant limitations that generally makes trying to use them for the things being discussed... well, let us say that using them that way tends to remain in the "in theory" stages due to practical problems. Or starts to bite people when they hit the fiftieth costume piece, or the hundredth, due to scaling issues (APB is a good example of this situation).

On the other hand, it may well *be* all that and a bag of chips -- I'm simply saying that what has been shown so far doesn't actually demonstrate that, at least so far as I can tell. And depending on some of the details which are admittedly difficult to make out properly in the images, it *seems* to be hinting the other direction. So I await the more-than-proof-of-concept (I'm sorry, but a handful of still images of one application is *not* a demo, it is a proof) and hope that my habitual cynicism is proven pleasantly unfounded.

[hr]

As a separate note from past experience (in multiple cases, actually):

Beware the trap of "we'll release it when it is ready". Even on small and well defined projects it can easily lead to excessive delays; on large projects, it can lead to multiple-year release cycles. And that's when you already *have* a product in the wild and are just updating it.

Whether or not you publicize it, *having* a schedule is critical, because that is the only way that you have to put a limit on "fish or cut bait" that isn't purely emotional. If something can't go into the release because it isn't ready, then don't put it into the release. If you truly cannot release without it, then push your release date out, but keep in mind that you do have a finite budget, which means a finite time line.

As it has been put before: "if you do not plan for failure, then you are failing to plan -- and almost certainly *guaranteeing* failure in doing so". Understanding how to do this usefully is the difference between an entrepreneur and a wishful thinker.

Damn it's too good, I already imagine the personal with five and ten sweater pants.

The real question is:

Can I wear a trenchcoat over my trenchcoat? I will worship a game that lets me rock dual trenchcoats.

Well, I for one enjoyed the update, I spent far too much time in Icon over the years and this was really interesting to me :p

I LOVE reading tech updates such as [url=https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/missingworldsmedia/the-phoenix-project-city-of-titans/posts/1330175?ref=backer_project_update]this[/url]! :)

So, here's a little question; does this mean if we go for more monstrous bodies - say, a werewolf, or a character who's demonic in nature, or a girl with tentacles instead of legs - We'll be able to apply clothing overtop of it without issues?

Like, we take a 'gator man, complete with scales and spinal ridges. He puts on a shirt and rather than it compressing his back into a normal, human body, we can actually see the spinal ridges through the shirt?

Hmm.. i'm excited and dissappointed (some of both of these emotions could be attributed to other things)

The idea of having clothes work without clipping issues is obviously a huge step forward (look at how many games still deal with that).. but then you slipped in:

"Of course, it means we have to redo our male and female characters to make this work for them. But we’ve learned a few things since the last time."

Can you define "redo"? It's basically September 2015 and it sounds like there's no functional rig for human male and female characters..

Glad to see further progress. Also very happy to see the desire for things not to be rushed, or even leading to bug-riddled releases (unlike Bli...--umm, another company's expansion "seemed" to be recently). And especially if these lead to easier/faster ways to design/apply future costumes. I am very pleased to wait for this type of quality design and production.

So, layered clothes...

Do we get emotes/costume changes that say, take off a trench coat and show a superman costume underneath? Where instead of covering up a costume change, we actually see the trench coat peal off, fly/float away, leaving the tights that were underneath on still. Though I do not know how the hero would get that trench coat back on later--pull it out of thin air? The whole fun idea of showing up as a "common person" and then, cloak/trench coat flies off, and the surprised bad guys are "Hey that's so-and-so!!! Get them!"

Just tossing in some difficult and fun ideas. And keep that "soon (tm)" going. Don't commit to disclosing estimated dates and end up leaving people disappointed due to misinterpreted "promises".

I was super excited when I saw the news. I am still super excited after reading this thread.

I wonder if Unreal Engine 4 has a feature to force a LOD level on a model to a lower LOD when raids with lots of people are right beside you?

[img]http://i.imgur.com/ryxRf8p.png[/img]

I think i remember seeing very low poly models in Rikti Invasions.

Ohhh wait... hehe.. its prob. because i lowered the Graphics Quality all the way down. ;)

warcabbit wrote:

As far as clothing emotes: Love to. Want to. Want to SO BAD. Probably not at launch - it's not simple, even if it is possible, and it'll take money better focused on making the game.

Nooooo..... not at release?? Come on, put hurry a new "kickstarter" and we are all giving a lot of money for having it for the release (with french translation too of course :) )

Aww, I was just imagining a character who, through a costume change, or even a Fury-like mechanism, could cause his boots and/or gloves to expand to Butt--Kicking Size!

Not a true Growth power, but pseudo-growth, at the costume-level.

Be Well!
Fireheart

Lothic wrote:

Weirdly enough one of her biggest gripes was that CoH never provided a good pair of "ankle boots". Of course that might not have been a big deal to most of us, but when you think about it we probably all had that ONE THING that we really, really wished CoH provided that it never did, no matter how silly/unimportant that one thing might have been to anyone else.

Although I never stopped playing like your friend, I was frustrated by the lack of any ankle boots. I was just completely baffled why neither the steampunk or gunslinger sets had them. It was as though some dev just hated ankle boots and conspired to keep them out of the game.

syntaxerror37 wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Weirdly enough one of her biggest gripes was that CoH never provided a good pair of "ankle boots". Of course that might not have been a big deal to most of us, but when you think about it we probably all had that ONE THING that we really, really wished CoH provided that it never did, no matter how silly/unimportant that one thing might have been to anyone else.
Although I never stopped playing like your friend, I was frustrated by the lack of any ankle boots. I was just completely baffled why neither the steampunk or gunslinger sets had them. It was as though some dev just hated ankle boots and conspired to keep them out of the game.

The ankle boot issue wasn't the only thing that finally drove my friend from being a regular player of CoH. But she did occasionaly return to the game in the final years and when she did the first thing she'd usually ask was "Did they finally give us an ankle boot?" Take from that what you will. ;)

Wikipedia wrote:

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_boot#Ankle_Boot)
Ankle Boot

These are the most widely-worn style of fashion boots, usually under pants.[101] Ankle boots are also the only type of fashion boot commonly worn by both men and women, and the only one to have remained popular without a break since the 19th Century. They vary in length from booties or shoe boots (effectively a shoe that skims the ankle[102]) to boots that cover the lower part of the calf.

The best image of a popular type of ankle boot I could find:
[url=https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Marines_in_formation.jpg][img]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Marines_in_formation.jpg[/img][/url]
Mine, however, were jet black and highly polished. Back when I wore such things. ^_^

High-tops, OTOH, are easy to describe: Sneakers that cover to over the ankle. So, yes, some Ankle Boots will be about the same height as the High-tops.

The differences? Material, although that may be less of an issue depending on the abilities of the Avatar Builder. High-tops will have flat soles and Ankle Boots will likely have at least a bit of heel.

warcabbit wrote:

For the fashion impaired cabbit, what's the difference between ankle boots and high-tops? Just more boot-ish, same height?

Well, there's this image-spam: [url=https://www.google.com/search?q=ankle+boots&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAmoVChMI7fuxqqnCxwIVxaSICh2XQgTv&biw=1543&bih=1045]Google Search "Ankle Boots"[/url]

But, basically, yes. Boots that reach to the ankle, or a little above. Also actual hiking boots and 'construction' boots and 'combat' boots and 'boxing' boots - None of which actually go up to the Knee, like they did in CoH.

That said, _I_ want boots that are knee-high as well as the ankle-boots, because, sometimes, you want to protect your shins and knees.

Be Well!
Fireheart

Foradain wrote:

Lothic wrote:
If anything the term "ankle boot" may be better associated towards fashionable styles versus utilitarian.

So if they're being purchased for a function, people think "Combat Boot", "Hiking Boot", "Work Boot", etc.; but if they're being purchased for looks we go with Ankle Boot? I can live with that distinction.
From an Avatar Builder design consideration, I'd like to see several choices of height of boot, each with several choices of heel, ornamentation, etc.
And a choice of whether the trousers go over the boot or are tucked in. ^_^

Yeah there's clearly lots of terms for this general kind of footwear so I'm not going to stress too much about exactly what the game might end up calling these things. I didn't mean to cause any confusion over a term which I now realize wasn't universally defined/accepted.

If CoT ends up giving us many possiblities for textures, heel shapes and boot height then basically we should be able to get as much out of this as we can no matter what we call them. ;)

I like what I am seeing and reading

Looking good! Can't wait for it to be out

Gorgon wrote:

Sounds like it means I can have my fishnets and strappy heels and not have the fishnet stop mid-calf because "that's where the boot slot starts"!

Yes I think this'll be one of the many advantages of this system.

Gorgon wrote:

Also, it sounds like they will still have the "spandex" look for that painted on outfit look so famous in comics, for those who want?

Painted on spandex outfits are a staple of the comic book genre so I'd be amazed if they weren't available in CoT.

But this question does raise an important point that I always wondered about when it came to spandex and a typical female's cleavage. In real life spandex tends to do the following when stretched across a female chest:

[img=300x300]http://www.cheerfactoryonline.com/index/components/com_virtuemart/shop_image/product/Metallic_Crop_To_4d40ca5e083d1.jpg[/img]

Note that there's no real visible cleavage because the spandex doesn't drop down between the breasts.

On the other hand most comic book heroines tend to have the magical "spray paint" type of spandex that perfectly conforms to every contour of their ample bosoms such as the following:

[img=250x320]http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/injusticegodsamongus/images/b/b9/Rogue-x-men-24957901-942-1250.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20130718052054[/img]

Now ideally it would be nice if we could choose between either of these appearances for our characters. I realize most people might tend to stay with the "painted on" version, but having more options is always better and some people might actually prefer the more realistic look when it comes to how spandex would behave on the human body.

Redlynne wrote:

Yet another difference between Reality (monoboob) and Fantasy (unexplainable cleavage).

Yep there's clearly a difference whether you love or hate either version. I can think of character concepts of mine where I'd prefer the "monoboob" look as well as others who'd go with the spray painted look.

For what it's worth I'm hoping that with the new "clothing physics" technology being used for this game there will be some ability to account for whether different materials would "stretch" over various body parts or "drape" over them. If we had some control over this then maybe we could decide for ourselves if we wanted any specific outfit to look spray-painted on or not.

Shadow Elusive wrote:

Yes, we can make the spandex either perfectly contour or not. The second kind will be modeled off 'Marvel Cinematic Universe' spandex, you know that thick stuff that acts realistically.

This is good news. So it sounds like not only will we have "spray painted" skin tight options but also things like the following:

[img=200x300]https://scifibulletin.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/famke-janssen-4.jpg[/img][img=200x300]http://cdn.collider.com/wp-content/uploads/x-men-storm-halle-berry.jpg[/img]

which are more like stiffer "leather/pleather" items.

The goal of course is to be able to set a female character's chest size/shape independently from the type of clothes she wears. In CoH some of the costume items literally had "hardwired cleavage" that forced your characters to have a specific (typically huge) breast size if you wanted them to wear those items.

Clothes in CoT should properly react to the chest sizes we set big or small. Whether things "stretch across" or "drape over" should be under our control as much as possible.

So... in the engine, that Spandex will act like a UniBra... silly play on words from a uniBrow. ;)

[img]http://www.worldwideinterweb.com/component/joomgallery/image.raw?view=image&type=img&id=6420[/img]
;)

Lothic wrote:

Izzy wrote:
So... in the engine, that Spandex will act like a UniBra... silly play on words from a uniBrow. ;)

At least a Unibra would be better that a Uniboob...

Oh No.. :o
*turns head away*

*Looks again*
:o
*turns head away*

*Looks again*
:o
*turns head away*

*Looks again*
:o
*turns head away*

....

:s

Interdictor wrote:

I must apologize for Wimp Lo - he is an idiot. We have purposely trained him wrong .... as a joke.

Wimp Lo: I'm bleeding, making me the victor.

Cyclops wrote:

Great. Lothic makes an innocent joke, and the artists will offer yet ANOTHER option!
Noooooo! Artists...RESIST the temptation!

If the Devs of this game ever have enough time to offer us a "uniboob female" model they better have given us everything else any player has ever asked for first. This means we'll probably get a uniboob female in CoT about 10 minutes before the official heat death of the universe.

Ohhh - can I play a ball? I'll bounce on you until you're flat!

Looks awesome. So excited. Yes I also want booties!

And we'd better get http://i.imgur.com/f4qmPfi.jpg the day before we get that uniboob.

Tinkhard wrote:

And we'd better get
[img=200x200]http://i.imgur.com/f4qmPfi.jpg[/img]
the day before we get that uniboob.

I've got a quick silly story about the famous "triple breasted" girl from Total Recall.

Now we all know the original Schwarzenegger version from 1990 introduced her as a funny little sight-gag to add some humor to the movie and of course she became one of the more memorable bits from that film. So it was practically a given that when they re-did the movie in 2012 with Colin Farrell they were going to figure out a way have another quick cameo with a "triple breasted" girl just to pay homage to the original film.

Turns out I read a review of the 2012 film where the reviewer claimed as soon as he saw the that film's version of the "triple breasted" girl (who was on screen maybe a grand total of about 2 seconds) he instantly stopped watching the film and sight-unseen assumed the rest of the film was some kind of spawn-of-Satan sex-filled X-rated porn. It just made me laugh because again the girl was hardly on screen long enough to begin with and then to get the shocked reaction of the naive reviewer to something he somehow didn't expect to see while the rest of us were just waiting to see how she would be handled (like the ever-present Stan Lee cameos in the Marvel movies).

WarBird wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Painted on spandex outfits are a staple of the comic book genre so I'd be amazed if they weren't available in CoT.
But this question does raise an important point that I always wondered about when it came to spandex and a typical female's cleavage. In real life spandex tends to do the following when stretched across a female chest:

Note that there's no real visible cleavage because the spandex doesn't drop down between the breasts.
On the other hand most comic book heroines tend to have the magical "spray paint" type of spandex that perfectly conforms to every contour of their ample bosoms such as the following:

Now ideally it would be nice if we could choose between either of these appearances for our characters. I realize most people might tend to stay with the "painted on" version, but having more options is always better and some people might actually prefer the more realistic look when it comes to how spandex would behave on the human body.

Funny, this same phenomena holds true for the male physique. The well developed "pecs & abs" don't really come across in real life spandex they way the do on drawn comic figures. But everybody seems to take the "painted on" fabric of the male costume for granted. Hm.
At any rate, I now expect there to be a scale, or at least an alternative, to "clinginess" that is gender agnostic, yes?

Sure I'd hope that being able to control the degree of "clothing clinginess" as you put it would be something that would apply to any body model this game provides regardless of gender.

To be clear I have nothing against the classic "spray painted" outfits in general. They've been a staple in comic books for decades and I'll be looking forward to making outfits like that for some of my characters. I just want to have the OPTION to have clothing materials (like spandex) react in more realistic ways as well. I think the newer games like this will make that possible.

JayBezz wrote:

I don't see the intrinsic value of colored nudity. I'm not going to argue its merits. Some cool concepts however (Rebecca Romijn's Mystique for example) use nudity in expressive, even political ways.
I simply hope that I never have to engage with a person I dont agree with (the ERP crowd for instance). Simply please allow me to ignore the character and no longer view their avatar

For what it's worth I also haven't really been pro or con the modern day political or moral implications of "spray painted" superhero outfits. Not really sure why ERP was specifically mentioned in response to this topic in any event.

Regardless, it's completely axiomatic to assert that spray painted style superhero outfits have been a comic book staple for well over half a century and for a superhero based game to not at least offer its players the choice to wear such items would be the very definitions of insanity and/or stupidity, take your pick. It'd be kind of like claiming that the next computerized basketball game should not display basketballs because an extreme minority suddenly decided that basketballs are too round for their own good. Do you see how silly that sounds?

Now I understand that some folks take the over-sexualization of comic book characters to be a very significant issue and pretty much everyone can agree that the track record of the comic book industry in regards to gender issues in general has been less than stellar to say the least. But desperately trying to negatively cast "spray painted clothing" as some kind of modern-day swastika symbology is not going to gain you much serious sympathy one way or the other. As long as spray painted clothing options are equally available to both the male and female body models being used by CoT you don't really a have a leg to stand on with this.

Still if by some chance you do see an outfit in CoT you find offensive you can always do what any of us could do - report it to a GM and let them handle it. As far as "not having to look at it anymore" just turn the other way; there's not going to be any kind of "ignore avatar's costume" feature in this game for a million years if ever.

Godling wrote:

Such as causing long hear to flow in the same dimensions of the cape, Or are capes more likely to phase through long hair.

These are good questions. Hopefully a Dev will answer but based on how Unreal 4 is supposed to be able to handle generic clothing physics I would think that capes in CoT would actually be "substantial" and not allow other objects to pass through them. This would mean that animating hair shouldn't regularly pass through flapping capes. Also I would expect that objects like hair, capes, dresses, etc. would all be affected by wind coming from the same directions so it would make sense that hair and capes would blow around together.

Hair and capes will both be Apex objects, which means they are using the same physics system and will recognize and react to each other appropriately. No clipping, actually you'll get very realistic interactions.

Shadow Elusive wrote:

Hair and capes will both be Apex objects, which means they are using the same physics system and will recognize and react to each other appropriately. No clipping, actually you'll get very realistic interactions.

That's very good but what about capes and tails? One of my biggest pet-peeves and why I very rarely utilize capes when having such an option.