[Suggestion] Max camera distance

[Zhronne]

Some third party tool developers confirmed that it's a simple memory address that needs to get changed to allow the Camera max distance limit to be set more further away from your character's shoulders.

The current in-game limit is the same we used to have in 2002, and things have changed a lot since then.
The typical average resolution the game gets played at, for example, or the hardware that runs it.

Since this addition would be very simple for the developers to add (we're talking about a few minutes here) I was wondering if it could be possible to have this limit raised up in the future?

[Kaisha]

[EDIT] Whoops, brain farted the OP.

As for the actual positioning of the camera, I wouldn't mind an option for it. All we got currently is a first person view, and then a fixed-distance third person angle where you can only 'zoom' the view in and out.

[FrankReynolds]

If this will fix the issue where in I can't see my character when meleeing huge NMs like Amhuluk and Glavoid, then I am all for this. I could see where it might cause some wackiness in dungeons etc, but who cares? people could just turn it down / off.

[wish12oz]

You make it sound so easy! I like easy to implement improvements, so I support this idea. Increasing the distance you can see in-game would be awesome too!

[Riggs]

There were some screen shots in alla a few years back where some one had increased the max distance, they looked pretty fantastic standing on a mountain and could see nearly the whole zone ahead of you.
Was just a matter of editing some of the values i think

[Mifaco]

It's a simple memory address, but if it's set too far out, you get a weird "fish-eye" view, hence the limit.

[Modoru]

I hate to bring this up, but ps2limitations!

In all seriousness, this could be feasible nowadays, not a lot of people run FFXI on toasters anymore, let's hope it happens.

[Zhronne]

You make it sound so easy! I like easy to implement improvements, so I support this idea. Increasing the distance you can see in-game would be awesome too!
It's already possible to increase the max zoom-out distance through third party tools, which as we all know, are not good to use.

Basically there is a "limit" in how much you can zoom out the camera and it's ok, no big deal, most games have such a limit. Problem is that the limit FFXI currently has is a bit too small, the camera often continues to stay too close to your character (especially when you're engaged with target lock on). It would have been ok in 2002 maybe, but in 2012 standards are different.
This "limit" is just a value set in the game engine data. It's literally a 5 mins trouble to increase this value at least slightly.
Zooming out more will require faster PCs of course, but then again nobody forces you to zoom more than you currently do.


@Riggs:
You're confused. You're talking about "DrawDistance", that's the max distance the game engine renderize and visualizes on your screen the stuff that's currently around your character.
With a low draw distance, the very far objects/items won't be renderized, and will appear all of a sudden as you get closer ot them.
With a high draw distance, you can virtually see everything. Of course this requires more computational power.

What I'm talking of is simply the max ZOOM OUT, that is the max allowed distance the in-game camera can take from your character's shoulders.
You can increase and lower this value with the keys "3" and "9" in your numpad. The currently max zoomout value is very small and reflects the standard that used to be common in 2002.
We're in 2012 now though, so I warmly suggest they increase this max limit a bit, since it's really not such a big deal to implement. They just have to change a number say from 80 to 100, and it's done. They don't have to do anything else.

[Zhronne]

It's a simple memory address, but if it's set too far out, you get a weird "fish-eye" view, hence the limit.
They don't need to go that far tbh. Just increasing it a small bit would be enough, I'm not asking for a sky camera or something. I just want to put it a bit more further behind my character's shoulders compared to what I can do today in-game.

[Riggs]

@Riggs:
You're confused. You're talking about "DrawDistance", that's the max distance the game engine renderize and visualizes on your screen the stuff that's currently around your character.
With a low draw distance, the very far objects/items won't be renderized, and will appear all of a sudden as you get closer ot them.
With a high draw distance, you can virtually see everything. Of course this requires more computational power.

What I'm talking of is simply the max ZOOM OUT, that is the max allowed distance the in-game camera can take from your character's shoulders.
You can increase and lower this value with the keys "3" and "9" in your numpad. The currently max zoomout value is very small and reflects the standard that used to be common in 2002.
We're in 2012 now though, so I warmly suggest they increase this max limit a bit, since it's really not such a big deal to implement. They just have to change a number say from 80 to 100, and it's done. They don't have to do anything else.

Yep i'm often confused but my post was in reply to what wish said not the op, btw if you know the setting to change for the draw distance please share, i think my pc can handle it been a bit better than current

[wish12oz]

Yep i'm often confused but my post was in reply to what wish said not the op, btw if you know the setting to change for the draw distance please share, i think my pc can handle it been a bit better than current

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/21536-UI-updates-and-Graphics-adjustments

[Zhronne]

Yep i'm often confused but my post was in reply to what wish said not the op, btw if you know the setting to change for the draw distance please share, i think my pc can handle it been a bit better than current
You need third party tools to do that to you, or other third party tools to directly overwrite the value in the memory.
Both these things are not suggested to be used because they could potentially be the cause of a ban.
It's the reason why I'm asking SE to do that in a "legal" way, if I just wanted to change the setting for myself I could do it right away.

If you're more interested in these matters I suggest you use google :)

[Kaisha]

It's a simple memory address, but if it's set too far out, you get a weird "fish-eye" view, hence the limit.
That's where you ask for the means of physically moving the camera, not just zooming it out farther from where it's always been.

I don't know any other MMO that even zooms the camera. All the ones I played beside XI just moved the camera closer/farther from the character.

[wish12oz]

You need third party tools to do that to you, or other third party tools to directly overwrite the value in the memory.
Both these things are not suggested to be used because they could potentially be the cause of a ban.
It's the reason why I'm asking SE to do that in a "legal" way, if I just wanted to change the setting for myself I could do it right away.

To bad SE doesnt seem to care, these would be amazing updates =/

[Zhronne]

Bump! Hoping the dev guys will be able to give some info about this.

[Meyi]

I hate to bring this up, but ps2limitations!


Incoming Computer/XBox only update!

[Okipuit]

Greetings!

We can relate to those of you who have wanted to extend the third person camera distance especially when fighting larger monsters. I wish we could just say "Let's do it!" but there are quite a few obstacles we must overcome before we can make this possible.

The geographical data and game system are designed around the current camera system, so if we allow the camera to zoom out more or allow for more viewing angles, there is a risk that you will view things you are not supposed to, or the camera can even get stuck!

Moving forward, there are a few things we need to consider before we can make such adjustments to the camera:


When using the page up/down keys, it may seem that the position of both character and camera are moving, but the actual position remains the same. It's just the angle that is being adjusted. If we were to make it so the angle becomes wider while the distance remains the same, the view can become so obscured that players may actually get sick from the 3D graphics while the character is moving.


If we were to add a function allowing to physically move the camera away from the character, you should be able to see more, but again there are concerns for geographical conflicts.


Nevertheless, the Development Team would like to implement this feature so they are going test out what will happen when physically moving the camera backwards, along with a variety of settings in order to verify this. We can't guarantee anything but we'll be sure to keep you updated as we progress!

[saevel]

This is what I'm talking about. Thanks Oki.

The developers are willing to work with the players. Obviously some things might not be possibly without large amounts of work investment that could better be used elsewhere, but at least the developers are willing to try and find out. Their communicating with us and wanting to move things forward.

Oki let the devs know that the player base deeply thanks them for their attention and willingness to work with us.

[Nawesemo]

Didn't read previous comments so sorry in advance if I'm echoing another taru, .....but for us specifically, can we raise our camera to say the hight of what a galkas is at? Is that possible?

[wish12oz]

increase the clipping plane while you're at it, thanks!

[Mayoyama]

If we were to make it so the angle becomes wider while the distance remains the same, the view can become so obscured that players may actually get sick from the 3D graphics while the character is moving.

This made me spill my coffee... lool. I guess it would cause a similar effect to how many people can't play the 3DS without turning the 3D image off lol (myself included... dumb spatial inabilities)

[Samosa]

I would also like to pass on my thanks, we made a request, we got a response and a reason why it may or may not be possible. Looks like this could be the start of something great.

[Zhronne]

Greetings!

We can relate to those of you who have wanted to extend the third party camera distance
Surely you meant third person? :p

Jokes aside, thanks a lot Oki for your reply :)

[Sp1cyryan]

Greetings!

We can relate to those of you who have wanted to extend the third party camera distance especially when fighting larger monsters. I wish we could just say "Let's do it!" but there are quite a few obstacles we must overcome before we can make this possible.

The geographical data and game system are designed around the current camera system, so if we allow the camera to zoom out more or allow for more viewing angles, there is a risk that you will view things you are not supposed to, or the camera can even get stuck!

Moving forward, there are a few things we need to consider before we can make such adjustments to the camera:


When using the page up/down keys, it may seem that the position of both character and camera are moving, but the actual position remains the same. It's just the angle that is being adjusted. If we were to make it so the angle becomes wider while the distance remains the same, the view can become so obscured that players may actually get sick from the 3D graphics while the character is moving.


If we were to add a function allowing to physically move the camera away from the character, you should be able to see more, but again there are concerns for geographical conflicts.


Nevertheless, the Development Team would like to implement this feature so they are going test out what will happen when physically moving the camera backwards, along with a variety of settings in order to verify this. We can't guarantee anything but we'll be sure to keep you updated as we progress!

New expansion, new two hours, new salvage, and you want to spend even a second of time on camera adjustments that we have played with for 10 years?

[Zhronne]

Supposing there's nothing else behind this thing, people who created XI-UI Version 2.15 say it's a simple memory access to change.
Atm it's limited to, say, the value of 50. They should raise that value to, say, 80.
That's it.
Doesn't really take more than 1 hour of work?

[Mirage]

Just wanted to say that I too am In favor of being able to zoom further in and out. It would also be nice if we could set our camera "zoom" to actually move the camera, not just change the field of vision angle.

[tyrantsyn]

Greetings!

We can relate to those of you who have wanted to extend the third party camera distance especially when fighting larger monsters. I wish we could just say "Let's do it!" but there are quite a few obstacles we must overcome before we can make this possible.

The geographical data and game system are designed around the current camera system, so if we allow the camera to zoom out more or allow for more viewing angles, there is a risk that you will view things you are not supposed to, or the camera can even get stuck!

Moving forward, there are a few things we need to consider before we can make such adjustments to the camera:


When using the page up/down keys, it may seem that the position of both character and camera are moving, but the actual position remains the same. It's just the angle that is being adjusted. If we were to make it so the angle becomes wider while the distance remains the same, the view can become so obscured that players may actually get sick from the 3D graphics while the character is moving.


If we were to add a function allowing to physically move the camera away from the character, you should be able to see more, but again there are concerns for geographical conflicts.


Nevertheless, the Development Team would like to implement this feature so they are going test out what will happen when physically moving the camera backwards, along with a variety of settings in order to verify this. We can't guarantee anything but we'll be sure to keep you updated as we progress! This is how you make player's happy. :D

[Vivivivi]

Didn't read previous comments so sorry in advance if I'm echoing another taru, .....but for us specifically, can we raise our camera to say the hight of what a galkas is at? Is that possible?

This^
90% of the time I have no problem with the current camera, however when fighting monsters such as Glavoid, often times I have to rely solely on the chat log to determine what I should be doing because my entire screen is just one giant red mess. I hear from other, less vertically challenged players that this is not the case for them.

I don't think we need a radical overhaul to the camera, but tweaks to make content like this more enjoyable would be much welcomed :D

[Kaisha]

If we were to make it so the angle becomes wider while the distance remains the same, the view can become so obscured that players may actually get sick from the 3D graphics while the character is moving.

Speaking of sick, when the heck are the devs going to get around to fixing the camera spazzing out every frame when it gets set against a wall in a way that seems to annoy it? Been an issue on PC for years, and can't recall if it was a problem on the PS2.

[Cowardlybabooon]

Yeah this is definitely not a priority to me, but I can certainly agree it has always been a small annoyance, and I'm even galka which I believe has the best view of them all. Either way, I much appreciate the way that Okipuit's post was written. We like that type of information a lot. Details help us to understand a lot better than "technical challenges" so keep it up.

[Reiterpallasch]

People have already pointed out how simple it should be to implement. I highly doubt we're going to lose out on some potentially awesome content because they had one guy take a few minutes to change how far we can zoom the camera.

[Zhronne]

Nevertheless, the Development Team would like to implement this feature so they are going test out what will happen when physically moving the camera backwards, along with a variety of settings in order to verify this. We can't guarantee anything but we'll be sure to keep you updated as we progress!
Any update on this Okipuit?

[Midorikaze]

Camera height adjustment like in FFXIV would be lovely. Whenever I zoom in I get a faceful of Elvaan boobies. :o


Speaking of sick, when the heck are the devs going to get around to fixing the camera spazzing out every frame when it gets set against a wall in a way that seems to annoy it? Been an issue on PC for years, and can't recall if it was a problem on the PS2.
Every time I enter the Port Sandy dock after passing the 200 gil fee checkpoint. :eek:

I don't remember running into that issue when I was still playing on PS2...

[Zhronne]

Bumpity Bump

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

We should be able to pull the camera waaay back and position it overhead!

In fact, make the game 2D!

[Vanfrano]

Any update regarding this matter ? It's been more than two years ;p

[Zhronne]

Any update on this issue by any chance?

[Raydeus]

Personally I have no complaint about the max distance for the free camera. HOWEVER, for the lock-on/fight camera we really reaaaally need to be able to zoom out that much further. This is very apparent when fighting larger enemies because you end up only being able to see a fraction of their bodies while fighting them.

PS > Fighting Shin I just had someone staying at max distance so they could tell me if he had the wings extended or not because of how annoying it was trying to see for myself. :confused: