After having read about a, now expired, [url=http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/12/loading-screen-boredom-may-behind-us-thanks-to-expiring-patent/]patent for having mini-games during loading screens[/url] and its comments and it got me thinking of what what kind of interactive capabilities we could have during any loading screens in CoT. Of course what can actually be done depends a bit on at which "stage" the loading takes place (character load, between zones and so on).
Generally speaking I see anything that doesn't strictly interact with the game world like inventory, character sheet, ability sheet, power tray, chat window and similar.
Character load would be the tricky one but I think that chat would be fairly easy, comparatively speaking, to get working if the chat settings are loaded first.
I've always considered "loading screens" as something that games use only because they have to. In a perfect world games shouldn't be concentrating on how to make loading screens somehow more "tolerable" but instead how to get rid of them completely. Besides even back in CoH I don't remember loading screens lasting anywhere near long enough to have any real time to type more than a chat or two or look at any other GUI anyway.
Also I hate to be blunt about it but if the computer you're playing games like this on is slow enough to make you think "I wish I could do something while I'm waiting for it to load something" then you probably don't want it to be wasting any more time trying to run extra "distractions" like the ones you're suggesting at the same time. If anything that might make it take even longer to load. *shrugs*
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
In the early days of the games life (or at least I remember it more common around the EU launch) when we were teaming and on voice chat at the same time, it wasn't uncommon for 2 out of 8 people to spend a disproportionate amount of time stuck on the loading screen just entering a mission.
It wasn't even always the same members each and every time that took a long time either.
Anyway, as a distraction here: I think that part of the problem here is because of how *fast* you could cross zones in, it lead to a perception difference in time. When travelling by a non slotted hover, the loading screen didn't seem to take as long.
"When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity." - Albert Einstein.
Me I would like to see a Comic Book like page with your character. From time to time a Splash page or action sequence. So picture this...
You get a mission and go to the location and enter. Loading screen pops up and you see your character interacting comic book style with the mission contact. So you see what happened as if it was in the comics. Same with the ending you leave the location and see your character deliver the final punch complete with witty dialog.
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I wasn't really saying that some people don't experience longer load times than others. I was just pointing out the irony that if your load times are long enough to make you want to have "distractions" while waiting the very act of running those extra "distractions" would more than likely make your load times even longer.
Remember that most of time involved with "load times" comes from the relative slowness of your client running on your computer, not from any lag coming from the server or your Internet connection. I saw that first hand during my years playing CoH - I played on several different computers and the typical length of my load times (using the same Internet connection) was overwhelmingly dependent on whether I was playing on a fast or slow computer.
CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012
[IMG=400x225]https://i.imgur.com/NHUthWM.jpeg[/IMG]
I like the idea of making the loading screen look like something comicbooky.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
I would like something like this also. But it sounds like some development time would need to be spent on the mechanics. So...while it would be neat, I'd say it can wait.
I would propose that a general instance loading screen, (if one is needed) be just a "comic book panel" style graphic of the contact speaking to the un-pictured player. This is just 2D art and doesn't require any coding. (Not that 2D art doesn't require time and effort, mind you. Just a less rarified skill set, at least from my perspective as a 2D artist (: )
While I'm talking about it, I'd like to encourage folks to do the 'story' content. So what if your log in screen was something that was generated in-game. Say a screen shot of your fight with the last Major Villain. Not completely random, maybe the initial 'confrontation' set-up, for instance. So farm-babies never really get anything but the original generic screen, and others can get excited anticipating what their next screen might look like!
Some sort of mini game for a load screen could have almost no noticeable effect on the actual loading of the map depending on the size of the mini game itself. A simple tower defence or match 3 style game could be made with almost no memory or cpu drain on computers born in the last 5 years. But I doubt it would be worth it. As I understand it (and I could be wrong) UE4 is better at maps all around which will make zoning or instances a much quicker process...even for older machines. Mini games on load screens are really only useful if the game has a lot of load screens or they take an inordinate amount of time to load (uggh dreamcast flashbacks) otherwise they just don't seem needed to me.
As for the comic panel screens....it should not be overly difficult to set up...maybe not for launch but soon after. The images used would be pre-generated...possibly upon character creation... and stored on your computer then its a matter of having the load screens access those images for splash as opposed to any the game comes with. Its a nice personal touch and I like it a lot....but I would prefer Comic covers as opposed to panels.
The way I see it is you get a comic book logo of your name based off your current class (big bold block letters for stalwarts for example) then a background with your current mission arcs name somewhere on the cover. This way they only need to make one or two generic backgrounds for most missions then a few for big arcs... it adds a personal touch without being taxing on development and with it being a cover there is only one image without dialogue or actions your character might not engage in. Just an opinion.
Hopefully loading screens will be short experiences - not long enough to even worry about "minigames" for them. If there are going to be loading screens, I'd suggest simply showing some static artwork along with some random game tips.
Loading screens always seem out of place to me. I remember them back on old 8-bit computers, as the super-slow 1541 floppy disk drive pushed its 250 bytes/second along for minutes at a time. But today, when we have hard drives and flash drives with 6 Gb/s interfaces, video cards with 16 times that bandwidth, CPUs with gigatransfers per second, gigabytes of RAM...
To paraphrase Don Knuth, "Premature optimization is the root of all evil... but seriously, [i]fuck this noise,[/i] your framework needs work."
In a game such as CoT, it shouldn't be a loading screen. It should be a "our servers were at the bar too late last night and we're paying for it now" screen.
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
I think just an awesome, mood and world setting picture is best. That way if it's short as it should be, it's just a flash of a nice visual. Not exactly a new or exciting idea, I know, but it serves well.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
I always enjoyed in CoX how it was just a snapshot of the place you were going to. Sweet and simple
The Carnival of Light in the Phoenix Rising
"We never lose our demons, we only learn to live above them." - The Ancient One
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I always wondered why there werent Alternate Loading Screenshots for certain Zones back in CoH.
I really, really, really wanted to see Different shots of Founders Falls or other areas in that particular zone. If there happens to be an exploration Badge there where the Shot was taken, all the better! ;D
If you're current character's alignment or path or whatever is leaning a certain way, try to show Loading Screenshots that set the Mood , if applicable. :]
If you can fit the whole game into RAM, then you can avoid the loading screen. Past that point... you will have some form of loading, even if it is behind the scenes data streaming.
WoW only does loading screens when you jump from one end of the continent to the other, or you change continent. Wildstar is similar (although on continent summons don't have a loading screen directly, there is still a quick fade in/fade out). But that is what happens when you don't heavily instance the game world. Apart from that... no loading screen.
But then again, seeing as you will be instancing the game world (for indoor missions) it looks like there will be *some* form of loading. As to how long it will take is another matter.
Of course, this is just optimisation and how well can you can hide the "loads" behind the scenes.
Elite Dangerous doesn't really have loading screens, although when you suddenly go past a star/planet you can get texture pop as it loads up/works out what needs to be shown, and that can be a jarring experience. But I doubt that you can easily fit the amount of data that it needs into GPU RAM (seeing as it isn't all precomputed ahead of time... I doubt you can hold the amount of data uniquely for it all in RAM on a normal server farm[1]
[1] It should be noted that in Elite Dangerous you can get server lag as it tries to calculate everything for something that you are first person to see/visit/scan. But that is because holding all the information pre calculated would take a long time.....
Provided a loading screen is a longer time frame then having the chat client load so you can say "wait something is wrong I'm still loading" before your team kicks you would be nice. Not that I ran into this situation very often (if ever) but we always wondered when someone was taking a long time to zone if they had been discoed. If the chat client was there and usable at least we could reach out and get an idea of that was going on.
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