I pulled our (very brief) comments on underwater stuff out of the costume request thread, as it might lead to some discussion which would be rather off topic of costumes.

Following on from a variety of aquatic costume suggestions by me, which don't need repeating here:

Lothic wrote:

Tranquil Flower wrote:

Probably a lot more relevant if we end up having underwater zones, but even without them, scuba, diving gear and aquatic body modifications.

Actually I recall a thread on this forum not too long ago where a Redname more or less admitted that an underwater zone/area is being planned for. At least it was made pretty clear that they want to have underwater areas so it would seem suggesting water-based costume items and props would not be pointless for CoT. ;)

TheInternetJanitor wrote:

Underwater/space/void/whatever content would be cool, but introduces some additional work for artists and content creators. Swimming animations, idle floaty animations, all content in the area has to be designed with three dimensions in mind (though that isn't a huge change in a game where players are able to fly already).

As far as I remember CoH never did anything like that and kept all water as "swim on the surface only".

I would love to see content like that, certainly. They'd have to handwave some reason why everyone can survive the airless crushing depths (or vacuum of space, or whatever). That itself might be an interesting way to introduce some stage hazards to an area and change up gameplay. Fire and falling and explosives and the like are well and good but an environment that is naturally inhospitable and requires you to play around it could be really interesting. You could apply that to more than underwater environments of course. Space, desert, high altitude, the void between worlds, magical scary darkness that does bad things to you if you venture out of the light for too long....

There are lots of opportunities for environmental effects to change up gameplay.

Of course, underwater environments also have a lot of potential from an aesthetic standpoint. Creepy lovecraftian unknowable depths, bright colorful coral reef, kelp forests, huge piles of floating (or sunken) garbage... not to mention the myriad of interesting critters.

Lothic wrote:

TheInternetJanitor wrote:

As far as I remember CoH never did anything like that and kept all water as "swim on the surface only".

CoH actually experimented with "submersible water" in a couple of very specific isolated places. There was a unique mission map in the Cimerora zone that allowed players to swim underwater in a small pool of water and let you swim underneath (while underwater) a bridge that spanned the pool. There was also a tiny spot in Grandville where you could jump down into a small pocket of water that let you swim down under the surface of the water. So it was clearly something they were working on but obviously never fully implemented before the end of the game.

I would love to see CoT manage to eventually provide "alternate environments" that might require extra equipment/tech to live/move in. They might even be able to provide for specialized extra temp or permanent powers geared for those environments (i.e. being able to breathe underwater).

I'd be perfectly happy with a somewhat 'down and dirty' implementation of underwater zones. Basically you have new enemies and aesthetics, but leave the mechanics fundamentally unchanged.

Terror From the Deep, the underwater sequel to the original X-Com Enemy Unknown did it this way. Your characters walk along the bottom in underwater zones, unless they can fly in which case they can move in 3D as normal.

Because of the huge variation in animations and backstory available to characters, trying to implement traditional underwater tropes (like need to have a source of air, can't use fire, blunt weapons are poor) just aren't going to work.

I still think some underwater action would be fabulous even if there aren't the mechanical zone differences you'd see in a game that offers less freedom in character generation. Come on, for any character who wears any kind of 'regular' costume, it provides an excuse to have a Nite-Owl style underwater version, if nothing else.