Scale was RE: AC2 was RE: [MUD-Dev] Total Annilation of Downtime

[Brian Hook]

On Behalf Of Marc Fielding
 
> I've always been curious about this. Aren't scales (X units per
> "foot") locked down early in development? It's not just
> MMOGs. Many other games seem to have this issue to some extent. Is
> it a result of poor communication between level builders and
> characters modelers? Poor specifications? Varying builder/modeler
> skillsets?

A lot of times it's poor consistency (read: your art director is
failing), but sometimes it's actually purposeful.

In Doom, you were 3' tall and ran at like 60mph.  If you walked up
to some stairs, they were literally at eye level.  Railings were
often at head level in Quake.

People rarely noticed, and what it did was give a sense of
massiveness to everything.  It also gave you a sense of speed, which
was important.  As speeds have decreased to become more realistic,
games have felt slower and players have complained.

For a hoot, look at the size of a doorway in a typical FPS.  It's
about the size of a garage door in real life.  If you were to put in
a real sized doorway (30-36" wide), the amount of precision to
navigate through there at full speed (30mph) is tough to acquire.
It looks like a slot.  If the door was sized normally in height,
you'd constantly feel that you were about to slam your head into top
of it.

-Hook


_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
https://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev