New Animation Ideas

[Schoeler]

Now that Fliper (the genius) has cracked the OFP animation barrier, I thought it was time to introduce a topic asking for ideas for new animations that will enhance gameplay.  I will start with:

1. Smoking a cigarette
2. Drinking from a mug (useful in pub scenes)
3. A proper salute.
4. Fast roping from a chopper.
5. Rapelling down a cliff.
6. Hand to hand combat.
7. Writhing in agony (for wounded troops).
8. The almighty and oft requested Animal movements along with new animal models of course.
9.  Walking with weapon at the ready position instead of having that d@mn thing slung on the back.
10. Bolt action movements for sniper rifles.

Any other ideas?

[@cero]

Well, I'm this kind of people tha get very impresed with some of the intros around, I allways try to do something to my missions and I would apreciate some new theatrical animations like the tipical one streching the arms and arching the back wen you want the unit to loock ider bored or tired, like the ones from the game Hit Man, the missions in Honkong I'm about, that if some one ever played.
 Its lots of new animations, just lets see how dificult are them to get edited now that they found the way to get to them.
Later all.
@CERO.

[Mr_Shady]

i'd like to see different "at ease" animations, like having the rifle slung across the chest, cradled, held in one hand. I'd also like to see a crouched run, kinda doubled over. It'd be good for staying stealthy and covering ground quickly too.

And how about a variety of hand signals (stop, move on, get down etc.) to add to the atmosphere of black op missions?



Yay, I'm all excited about this now

[Schoeler]

Hand signals would be outstanding, I never even thought of those, but they would certainly enhance the realism of gameplay.  Combine the hand signals with commands like doStop or doWatch or using them in conjunction with commands to take cover would make a world of difference. Crew served weapon animations are a must too.  We need a real mortar crew and artillery units as well.

[Mr_Shady]

A nice addon using this would be a real LAW. The guy pulls it off his back, cracks it open, the sights pop up, BANG! When it's done he just chucks it to the ground and whips out his rifle. It'd be cool to see a rocket launcher that can be fired in the standing, crouched and prone positions too, as most shoulder launched weapons can be fired from all positions.

But does this mean we can make close combat addons now? I've been dying to make a security forces mission, with squaddies with batons and riot shields fighting angry mobs with bricks, bottles and knives.

And if anyone's interested, it looks like there will be a love scene in the Hoffman's Luck campaign!

[DeadMeatXM2]

what we must remember is that this is brand new technology, and we must not swamp the skilled people with request after request for complex animations.

Certain anims, such as whole body movement will be very hard to do without motion capture gear, so for the time being things like new proxies, hand movements, and extra motion on vehicles is all we MAY expect.

Give the guys time and they will come.

cheers

[ZIKAN]

What about being able to jump?
For example your running towards a small wall or obstacle and the quickest way past would be to jump or vault over it. I think this would be quite usefull, maybe its possible  

[Mr_Shady]

I wouldn't say that we're making requests yet, we're just saying what we think would be cool if it could be done. And on the whole-body movement thing, withing a few months of release, Max Payne had an unofficial Kung-Fu mod made by one guy, and it looks pretty cool. So it can't be mega hard... these are the words of a non-modder ;D

I agree with Zikan about the vaulting, I remember a great shot from a war film where a steadicam followed this soldier sprinting in slow motion, with bullets crackling all around him. He runs straight at this picket fence with rounds kicking at his heels, then jumps it. Rounds slam into the fence and smash chunks out of it and the dude stumbles and falls with a bullet in his back.....

Erm, I got a bit carried away, but the scene is ACE if you see it. Can't remember what it was in, but it was good anyway. Also, some nice new dying anims would be great, I'm sick of seeing three enemy squaddies I've just blatted with my 203 going down exactly the same way  

[Schoeler]

Yeah, sorry if the intent of this post was misinterpreted.  I only put it in this section because it seemed the most appropriate place for it to be.  These aren't requests per se, and in no way are they to be construed as demands, rather I wanted to elicit ideas from the community on what animations they would most like to see, so that the talented modders out there capable of making new animations could read the post and get a general consensus on what the community wants most.  This would probably be helpful information for those people out there considering the making of new animations but who don't know where to start.  For example, so far it seems everyone is in agreement that hand signals would be an excellent new animation, and perhaps this is where modders might consider beginning when making a new animation.  Keep the ideas coming, it can only improve the game to bring out new ideas from the members of this community.

[PunkerSXDX]

Start with Simple stuff like Mergeing Animations together, and so forth like have a guy sitting like normal but with the gun up so he's looking in his sights, simple stuff from what's already out there  

[Schoeler]

Ok, I was just over at official forums and it looks like new animations will be limited to use with the editor commands, there will be no new animations controllable from a keystroke as this requires altering the game engine itself.  However, I think the current walking with rifle slung on shoulder could be replaced entirely with a new hybrid animation where the soldier walks with weapon in hand, as this is more useful and realistic for gameplay.  The sling arms walk could be used in cutscenes and would be more valuable there in my opinion.

[Chomps]

I would expect that a hand signal pack would be one of the first new animation addons.  This would work great even with only editor commands.

[Wolf]

I think the jump animation wouls be great. I was trying to make a mission a while back, and it would have gone great in the intro.

Picture this if you will.
Your in charge of a border crossing, unfreindly soldiers just on the other side, a truck drives up, its checked, halfway through the checkpoint it blows up, and someone appears in a house window and starts fireing.
All h*ll break loose.
Your out in the open, you start running to a sandbag wall, a couple bullet hit near you, you get close to the sandbags and jump over coming down behind them and lying down, then you pop up on you knees and return fire.

Mind you, that animation would likely be hard, but combineing it with other commands would make it interesting.

But, anyway.
This new ability to edit animations, trully shows the intelenge, and ingenuity of the OFP community.

[Vera_Krieg]

Hand signals will be a definate must, i hate waiting for captain Masterbater to yell out his commands.

[1B1KSniper]

I'm going to need ones for the AT-At and AT-PT for my Star Wars mod, but that's beside the point.  I want to see some anims for when a unit is at ease and is bored and that type of stuff.  Hand signals would definitely be cool, although them ugly people hands wouldn't make it look as good as it could.

[ZIKAN]

A swimming animation would be a welcome addition also  :thumbsup:

[DeLiltMon]

One that would be essential for British units would be a "make a brew" animation, where he takes out his hexi stove(http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=718193582), lights it and brews a mug of tea  

[Wolf]

Along with a bored animation, you need one where a soldier is leaning against a wall, arms crossed and head down, like taking a unauthorized break.
lol

[Scratchdat]

I agree that swimming is definately needed. I mean, it would be really cool if in a black op mission on Nogova you could have the river in the middle of the island as a border, and then some black ops could swim accross.

Why are soldiers unable to swim in flashpoint anyway? BIS should have thought of it. Ah well, they did make a kick-arse game, so I'd better not knock em :-X.

[JFK]

There are already some hand signals, its just they were never used in any of the campaignes, well, they work for me anyway, lol

they are
switchmove....
commandformation
commandengageatwill
commandfireatwill
commandstop
commandforward

they keep on repeating the signal, i havnt found a way to stop them yet  

[PunkerSXDX]

What would be cool is some annimations of People Flying in a Blast like say an RPG goes off by you and your thrown a few feet, I thought that was the coolest thing when I had a Grenade go off by me ant I actualy went into the Air, but survived!

[Stalker]

A killed soldier sitting near the wall should be OK.

[Eviscerator]

i think this new possibility will best help new vehicle/gun emplacement addons, as at the minute most of the crews have to conform to ofp's vehicles shapes/gun heights so this should help with that

[Crassus]

On my wish list are:
~lean left/right
~high crawl (soldier is on hand and knees)
~hand and arm signals
~seated shooting position (soldier has legs out; another sitting position for the MG

~probably only workable in the game engine, but as for the animations, different "throw grenade" anims, depending on how long you held the mouse down. (Hint: I'd love a grenade with a time delay.)

~Vehicle ramps raise/lower
~Bradley Fighting Vehicle's TOW launcher erects/lowers
~I would fix that darn BFV driver's hatch. (See how it's opened now, with its "melting" into the turret when opened?)

[Eviscerator]

most of these changes you are asking for would need changes to the engine, which p3dedit cant do, things like adding lean left/right cant be done, only existing animations can be replaced (if wanting to be used for running etc) you can probably make as many as you want and use the mission editor thing, but adding new things like a high crawl or hand signals that the player can induce with a key press is not possible

[Schoeler]

Yeah, thats what I was trying to explain, you can't add new keyboard commands so animations would only be possible inside scripts and using the switchMove and playMove commands.  Still, its a major breakthrough and animations for artillery and mortar crews would be possible.

[Mr_Shady]

Who reckons a new running anim would be good? With the weapon across the body, like, rather than the dafault "at-the-hip" anim. Since it'd replace the existing one, it could technically be done. I think this'd be much more realistic than the existing one, even if it'd look daft trying to fire. But then again, who fires on the move anyway? Not me, that's for certain.  ;D


So...? What does everyone think. A better kneeling stance with the pistols would be welcome, as well as a new "at ease" anim.

Oh, and I agree with Crassus, an option to open the doors on the Bradley, BMP's and M-113's would be most welcome. And, for the sake of pedantry, the doors on the UH-60 would be cool if they slid open and shut.

[Messiah]

u can make ramps lower an raise in ofp. although the movemtn is restricted to 90 degrees.

as for new animations... hmmm

i would love to see a skydiving animation for proper HALO jumps...

but the fast rope animation is what has got my mouth watering. I really fancy making a mini BHD campaign (just the fun parts of the film) and fast rope would be cool.

dunno what else. Smoking sounds ok - but mos of these animations arent a great adition to ofp - but at least we have cracked the animation problem.

jeeze. I leave ofpec to get on with studies - come back to check up on the place and all this happens.

[Spliff air]

There arent enougth ways to die in ofp just about 6 and when u get blown up u should at least do a flip in the air

[ZIKAN]

A sleeping anim perhaps also, where a dude would be catching some zzzz lying on his back with his rifle lying next to him. I know there was a script for sleeping, but it just didnt look right in the game.

[Mr_Shady]

The problem is, we can't make any anims that can be activated by a keypress, so it's kind of hard to make anims that'd make a major difference. BUT- what if the anim was in the action menu? Like the salute, sit down etc. actions, could we have others, like, i don't know, sleep (like Zikan said)? But if BIS said we can't crack the anim files, how long til Fliper et al can get key-press anims working with their coding magic?

Those guys are seriously cool, and prove that OFP's community is the most ingenious or crafty  ;D