Crouching, Climbing, Jumping and Swimming

[Norman]

My condolences and prayers for those who lost loved ones in the tsunami.

I have been exploring Eorzea and I have been seeking techniques for safely navigating
the terrain. I feel that the addition of the following features would greatly increase gameplay enjoyment and make the game more fun to play:

1. Crouch
2. Climb
3. Jump
4. Swim


I feel that these commands should each have a specific dedicated control button, although initial implementation might be easier by using the menu system.


1. Crouch

A typical crouch could lower the top of the head to that of a sitting position or to waist height.

An advantage to crouching could be reduced visibility allowing adventurers to more closely approach dangerous enemies and creatures.

A disadvantage could be reduced movement speed while crouching.

The Lalafell would obviously be the best at this, while the Roegadyn would be hard to miss in almost position.

I feel this would be the easiest of the features to implement.

2. Climb

There are numerous ladders throughout the game that would benefit from being climbable.

Any object that is reachable with the arms could be climbable.

The Highlanders would likely be the best climbers, due to being from mountainous terrain.

Larger objects could be climbed by jumping, then climbing.

Lalafell would probably have to use this technique to climb, due to their small stature, but they might be able to find unseen handholds and footholds as well.

3. Jump

This seems to be one of the most contentious issues I've come across. There seems to be a fairly vocal group opposed to improving the game in this way. To these I say, imagine Super Mario without jump, How fun would that be?

I would suggest putting boundaries that bring up the exclamation mark, (similar to Fishing) that allows the user to know when they can jump in addition to a dedicated button for these users.

If Hydaelyn has similar gravity to Earth's I would suggest that a reasonable jump height would be between knee height and waist height.

The Miquote and Elezen seem like they would be the best leapers, while the Roegadyn and Lalafell would not be able to jump as high, due to size and girth for the former, and stature of height for the latter.

An idea to limit jumping, if required, would be to implement a fatigue system, similar to that used in World of Warcraft for swimming. Jumping height could be reduced if used excessively.

4. Swimming

Swimming is fun! I played a World of Warcraft trial account during the hiatus and was extremely impressed by their swimming system.

When a player swims too far from shore a fatigue meter pops up, notifying the player that they must return to shore or risk drowning.

There is also a breath meter for underwater swimming, that limits how deep and far a player can swim.

I think being able to swim the Strait of Merlthor would be very cool!

Swimming could also allow the introduction of underwater battles (ie. with Sahagin!, etc.)

The Roegadyn should be the best swimmers due to the fact that they are pirates, people of the sea, and they need to be good swimmers.

The Miquote would probably be the worst swimmers. You know felines and water!


One of these features could be released with each of the next four patches, or one per month, allowing the programmers and animators enough to time perfect these features. A quest could be used to introduce each of these features into gameplay.

Please let me know what you think, whether this is feasible or not. Thanks!

[DeadRiser]

I want more interactions with environments.. sounds awesome

[Munba]

More interactions with the enviroment is truly needed (for the immersion) and fun indeed. But it could be also useful for the gameplay as well. Some thoughts,

- Crouch or Hide is a nice idea and this could be effective with some kind of monsters (those that use the 'sight' to find you).
- I'd add also a 'Silent Movements' animation too, to avoid the monsters that use 'hearing' to find you. But this ability should have some type of 'mini-game' method and not automatic (if not it would destroy the challenge). For example a sensor icon (green/red) that shows you the 'hearing sense' of the mob and when this becomes red, you have to stop to make return it in green status. Obviously it'll be more difficult or easier depending of the enemy strenght/level.

- For the Jump ability, i would use a method like in Zelda. It activates only in specific situations: to jump holes or small chasms, to jump down from small cliffs (like in FF13) and to surpass obstacles (like fences or rocks). And when chocobo will be implemented, a jump ability for it would be nice to reach higher places and to jump larger holes.

- Climb i think it'd be neat, because like Norman said, there are already many situations (ex. ladders) in the game this would bring to new ways. And to climb some cliffs of course.

- Swimming, to conclude, would be a nice addition (also on the surface only like in LoTRO). Also fighting in high water (like in FF10) would add more fun.

[Betelgeuzah]

http://i177.photobucket.com/albums/w...andicootav.jpg

[Neptune]

I want to climb mountains in Coerthas!

[Norman]

Dev Tags

[dev1000], [dev1008]

[dev1000] Tutorials for new players
[dev1008] Character jump feature

I didn't realize we were supposed to post tags!