[SP/CAMP] Black Lands

[Undeceived]

First the black Skoda isn't locked

The most important car. Thanks! It's locked now.

During the briefing to Setting-up time, it was mentioned that we are running low on medical supplies. I kinda doubt that, I took like 20 medikits from the last mission.

Yeah, I thought about this, too. I'll change it this way that the needed medical equipment for Tomek is empty (whatever that might be ).


Thank you!

[Clayman]

So today I spent some time with Setting-up time. I hadn't planed to play that mission for so long, in the end it where nearly four hours ingame, disregarding some breaks I took and the countless reloads. I guess I got lost in the process at some point. It has been a long day.^^


Overall it was a disappointing affair, no vehicles to steal, no ammoboxes to loot. It made my life a lot harder trying to prepare my men for the next world war... As it seems my constant nagging finally shows some effect. 
On a more serious note, most of the mission went pretty flawless. No major bugs or showstoppers where spotted. I was always keeping my eyes open if I could find anything new to discover, like additional sidetasks or other hidden secrets. But the mission already is massive with lots of stuff to uncover.


However, there have been a few smaller flaws I encountered.
There seemed to be some missing buildings in Zelenogorsk. Looked kinda odd. Unless my graphics a going completely nuts.

I still couldn't get Matai to repair any vehicles. While I can talk to him and he will join my group, when I tell him to repair a vehicle, he immediately leaves my group and goes back to repair his own truck. After that I couldn't talk to him anymore.

On my way to Kamils house I took a detour to blow up the gas station. Although I destroyed both the actual fuel station and the fuel tanks in the yard, the objective didn't tick off. But therefore Matais dialog options suddenly showed up again. As I just wanted to end the mission at that point I didn't try to interact with him again.

While rescuing Pvt Radik, I noticed one unarmed russian soldier running all over the place. As he was no threat to me I spared him. Sergej however didn't show no mercy and killed the poor guy on the spot.

While I do appreciate that I can't capture a whole fleet of vehicles anymore, it would be nice if there would be at least one truck I could use. Either from the fuel depot or at Radiks house. Besides the fuel truck, the only vehicles I could obtain where two UAZs. Apart from the limited storage capabilities, getting Sergej to drive one of the UAZs back to the camp without running into one of the many patrols was not that much fun.
Talking of vehicles, I felt that a few parked trucks or something would do well at the depot. I looked a bit empty overall.

After I had stolen the motorbike it didn't take long for the police to show up. However, they were still searching the village three hours later. Doesn't the police in Chernarus have anything better to do? Actually I would be willing to return the motorbike after I had obtained a better vehicle. But the cops always started shooting at me on sight so I had to take a detour around the village every time on my way from the camp or back.

When I arrived at Kamils house, I noticed a dead civilian lying in front of a parked truck and some other guys standing around him. But noone seemed to bother.
When Kamil asked about our equipment and Tomas answered "almost nothing", I thought "well, except for hundreds of weapons an a ton of ammunition...". While looting the hell out of this mission still is fun, getting all the stuff back to the camp would greatly benefit from a larger vehicle. 

I guess as soon as I attack any russians, there is no way to go undercover again? There where several situations where a random patrol would shoot at me from afar, while I was in the UAZ and had no weapon equipped.


Overall I had a blast playing this. I guess I kinda fell in love with this mission (again). You can easily get lost in the atmosphere and the open gameplay. It was really fun and by times quite challenging. A great mission overall and I'm looking forward to your plans regarding Dalibor and the Salesman.

[Undeceived]

Thanks!

I will adress some of the things. And ok, one truck cannot hurt. You should keep the limits of the crate in the camp in mind though (yes, everything, even vehicle cargo, is transferred to the crate at mission end)! I'm not planning to expand the storage capacities, especially because upcoming missions are not designed for an whole army, but for a small but effective group.

I guess as soon as I attack any russians, there is no way to go undercover again?

Exactly. I don't remember why, think, because it was to complex and buggy otherwise. This is why I wrote in the briefing that they'll send a person description to all units in the area.

Matei not working again?... Phew... I'll take a look what's the problem.

[Clayman]

Hey, I don't have much time right now, but I wanted to tell you that I did another very quick run of the mission to check how Matai is doing. This time everything worked out just fine. Unlike yesterday, I made sure that the vehicle is in fact damaged. Last time I guess the car was still intact. Might have something to do with that.

[Gruntage]

Man I really wanted to dive back into this as soon as the Beta post popped up, but I'm sadly swamped with IRL crap and so free time is in short supply. However, I've put aside a few hours today to post some of my thoughts. It's been a while since I played this so it feels like playing a new campaign again. Hopefully I won't repeat anything I've said previously. I won't be able to test as many missions in one sitting unfortunately.

But let's jump in;

Introduction Cutscene: Invasion

Starts off brilliantly; beautiful music and scenery with silky smooth camera angles. Very cinematic feel that makes me forget I'm playing a game and instead watching a movie. It's about as good as it can get. The scene with the camera panning over a lake with night turning to day was sublime. Every frame was a painting...which is exactly what a cutscene should be.

One little thing that made chuckle though was in the bar when we have the radio broadcast, the radio looks like it's on a stove. I could be wrong though  . It's not the first place I'd put a radio but hey, I'm not judgin'. There is a bit of camera stuttering when the camera zooms in on the radio (might want to transition to the next scene a little earlier in the zoom).

Later in the cutscene however we have what I think is a rather odd music track that I'm not convinced is entirely appropriate for what's happening on screen and what's been said in text. I don't know the name of the track, only that it accompanies a scene with CDF (or Resistance?) soldiers attacking Russian tanks with Mi24s flying in.

The reason why I found it odd was because it has a more 'uplifting' tone compared to the previous track, yet the tone of the scenes and of the text hasn't changed; the scenes don't depict positivity but rather the opposite. The previous track was perfect ( think it was from OFP originally) because it has a gloomy and foreboding tone; very appropriate for an invasion force. But when that track ends we fade very quickly into a much more positive sounding track. It made me think 'oh so things aren't so bad after all then'.

There are also moments around the same time where the music and the text aren't really working together in terms of tone. You've basically got this uplifting music combined with text saying that the Russians are 'smashing our hope to pieces'. It doesn't quite work for me.

An example of how this could be done would be to have scenes of the guerillas fighting and winning a battle against the Russians accompanied by the uplifting music and only hopeful text. You could then switch to a darker tone of music in order to convey the notion that no matter how hard the Resistance try, the Russians still have greater material might. You would have scenes showing the Russians gaining the upperhand and text driving home the point.

To be honest, I wonder whether you could try reducing the amount of text you have. You do have a lot of expository text in the cutscene. I like what you've written in terms of the wording, but I think you should try and let the scenes tell the story a little more. The more text you have, the more likely it is you'll have tonal clash with the music.

It's not easy I'll admit. You have a lot of background to set up and you have to get it out quickly. I would however try and reduce your reliance on the text for story telling. Less is more.

Yes, you did just read seven paragraphs of me criticising a single music track....THIS IS WHY IT TAKES ME YEARS TO MAKE MISSIONS 

Obviously this is not the first time I've seen this cutscene but the last time would have been 6 years ago, and so how I perceive things now is likely very different to how I perceived things then. When it comes to stuff like this I'm extremely nitpicky.

Is this a good cutscene? Of course, it's brilliant in so many ways and does exactly what it's supposed to do.
Can it be improved? YES. Even a small thing like changing a music track can make a huge difference.
But does it need improving? That's a question that I leave to you as the designer.

I'll move onto 'Death Came Upon Me' very soon and post my thoughts on it. I didn't think I'd spend so long on a cutscene 

[Undeceived]

Welcome to the party, Gruntage.

A real lecture on music selection and mood creation.

I choose this track back then to "introduce" the CDF which at first has courage and morale, hence a more positive and modern, west oriented track. Then the Russians destroy everything.

I don't care too much what track it is. I'll keep my ears open.

[Gruntage]

So, let's continue the journey...

Death Came Upon Me

Good introduction cinematic; consistent with what I've seen so far. Nothing to change there. As far as the mission is concerned, I seem to remember it playing out a little differently to last time...for some reason I have this memory of starting in a forest. I dealt with the three guys by the house easily enough...though those guys couldn't hit a can off a fence which was of course a benefit to me 

But anyway, as far as functionality goes, there aren't any issues as far as I can see. I went to check out the UAZ and dealt with the officer who was there and grabbed the documents he had. I kinda expected another objective to pop up in relation to said documents but nothing happened. I don't know if something was supposed to happen but I think it would have been cool to have another objective to serve as a payoff for going to the UAZ. At the moment, from what I can see, there isn't any benefit to going to the UAZ. It seemed like it was road that didn't go anywhere, so to speak. Unless I'm missing something.

After the UAZ I went northwest to dodge the patrol I saw. After about 10 minutes I reached the task location the mission concluded without any issues.

It's certainly a simple mission but open to opportunities for adding content, like hidden objectives for example. Whether you feel like adding to it, is up to you. Maybe the only thing I would consider adding is some occasional quiet music just to serve as a mood multiplier. Maybe more gloomy weather with rain might also make the atmosphere more interesting.  But other than that, short and sweet without bugs.

As for the outro, it's every bit as great as I remember it. Love the choice of music; the Dark Knight's score is some of Hans Zimmer's best work and it works really well here. Also really like the Gladiator vibe as well; like when Maximus is trying to get to his family as quickly as possible. Love the idea of Tomas throwing his weapon away; like he doesn't give a shit about his own life anymore and all he cares about at that point is his family.

I mean it's an amazing cutscene, pure and simple. Don't change anything about it.

Anyway, I'll play Awakening next and report back...

[Undeceived]

Unless I'm missing something.

It seems so. The reports on the officer's note show what Tomas has to expect when moving on. It describes how the Russians found and killed the men, tortured Petja and sent the intel to the department in the south, which is, where Tomas' home is. Of course someone who doesn't know the campaign won't be able to understand it at first.

Other than that the officer orders help that will arrive after some minutes. There's a NV goggles in the repair truck.

[Gruntage]

Alright so it was essentially a piece of foreshadowing, similar to a movie Easter egg, that's fine.

I think I was just expecting more from the UAZ section since the vehicle breaking down was a very noticeable event (the loud sound and Tomas' comment). It seemed like a very easy opportunity to add more substance. I guess my core issue with it is that the intel doesn't effect how the mission plays out particularly; Tomas still makes the shocking discovery at the barn regardless of whether he picks up the intel. The intel feels rather inconsequential if I'm being brutally honest.

It would have been very interesting if Tomas was able to connect the dots when reading the intel (regardless of whether the player did) and then have the rest of the mission play out entirely differently. Potentially you'd have Tomas sprinting south far sooner and bypass returning to his men. But that would require extensive redesign.

My first impression of the intel was that of 'ok' and waiting for something to happen. If I knew the campaign well, then I would already know about Petja's torture and his 'betrayal' and so the intel isn't presenting me with anything new and groundbreaking particularly; nothing that I didn't really know before. Especially if the events that the intel describes are revealed about 5 minutes later. Perhaps a better way of executing this easter egg would be to foreshadow an event that happen far later in the campaign. I suppose the danger then is the player having forgotten about the intel when said events play out. This is a tricky problem to solve and I probably would have opted for a different purpose for the intel.

Alternatively, when reading the intel, a task could have popped up for the player to inflict some damage in revenge for Dmitri; like sabotaging an enemy asset for instance. The intel could have given the location of said asset. It might make some sense narratively for the character to do some last minute damage before returning to his men. Tomas' grief for Dmitri could give way to rage, and so he would naturally jump at the opportunity to inflict damage. The UAZ breaking down seems like a very easy route to achieve this.

From a meta standpoint, the UAZ breaking down would essentially be presenting the player with a question/choice, 'Do you want to more stuff to do?'. The player can choose to play safe and bypass the UAZ altogether if they want, or they could take a more dangerous path to do some damage to the enemy. Player's choice and I like seeing this in missions. There's an element of role play there as well that I love to see.

Lastly, if nothing else, I probably would have put the NV goggles in the UAZ instead of the Repair Truck, so there's more of a payoff.

That's my take on it anyway. You don't have to act on any of this; it was just some thoughts I had...been a long time since I played this campaign so every mission feels new.

Anyway, onto...

Awakening

Not much needs to be said about this one other than that it works fine from what I can see. I travelled south and approached the meeting point from near the coast. In the past I think I tried going through the town and that was much harder. The patrolling vehicles were a nice touch and the music was well chosen. The only point of criticism I would add is I felt that the cinematic inside the church was a little too dark. I would consider adding some form of low light, just so we can see the characters' faces a little better. Maybe a lantern although use a different light from the default. I would say add a couple of candles to fit the location but I know you're limited to what objects are available.

Other than that, good. Will move onto 'Starting to Inflame Again' soon.

Just something else I remembered as well when playing. I noticed that you draw particular attention to a certain black Skoda during one of the cinematics. I think the car is of significance from when I last played. The drawing attention to the car is quite on-the-nose, so to speak. I wonder if there's a way of doing so it that's more subtle. Like, if I had two characters talking and this car was in the background, then I wonder if that's enough for the player to remember the car. This is a bit of nitpick and isn't really important.

[Undeceived]

Thanks!

I won't change much in these missions, just as a small info. I'm rather focused on the technical side of things here. But I love to read all the thoughts and ideas on the missions and their details, so keep it up.

In the later missions this is different. For example, there is this one mission that no one except me has played so far (it's completely new). It's a very complex and long mission and I definitely need feedback on the design and the mission flow. But in the missions that were published already, that is especially 1-13, I don't need that much of design feedback. Exceptions are Petrovka Strike (9) and The Picture (12), which were vastly changed after our discussions in the last version.

Thanks a lot for the time you guys are investing in this.

[Clayman]

there is this one mission that no one except me has played so far

Okay, now I'm exited of what is to come... 

I kinda like the idea of an optional / hidden task for the first mission. On the other hand I guess after Tomas just lost his best friend and is surrounded by enemies, he probably wants to return to his men as quickly as possible. And as none of the equipment is carried over to the next mission, any 'rewards' collected in the first mission are pretty much useless anyways. But gameplay wise it would be cool, nonetheless. Just my 2 cents.^^


So, meanwhile I played both Martins List missions. Both worked pretty flawless.

Martins List 1:
I found something to loot.  While all the vehicles in Novy Sobor are empty as expected, there are a few smoke shells in the bus. Nothing really useful though.

When placing the dogtags in the church, there is no task complete hint or any other indication and the action to place the dogtags doesn't disappear. I wasn't sure if I had missed something at first, especially regarding the russian soldier  standing in the church, but in the briefing the task showed as completed so I thought it should be fine and I moved on.

The rest of the mission played out very well, except that I suck at preparing an ambush. Took me several tries to take out the trucks.
One small quality of life improvement regarding the teamswitch I would have appreciated: Whenever I switch to a different unit, AI Tomas tends to give orders to his squadmates and in the worst case, they could run off and come across some russians somewhere, provoking an unwanted firefight. It would be cool if the player unit would always be the group leader, just to keep control of the AI.


Martins List 2:
This was a very fun little mission. I remember the last time I played this mission, it was a real struggle to get away from the base at the end, with lots of infantry, several boats and a hind chasing me down. This time it was a much better experience. While there were still some boats around and eventually the hind showed up too, I didn't get shot to pieces time after time again. Once I reached the coast and ran to the forest, I didn't encounter any enemies at all. It was almost a bit too easy.^^

After the cutscene at the fishery harbor, Kamil immediately opened fire on the russians before I could actually spot them and eventually killed them all by himself. Quite handy that guy. 

After blowing up the generators, there again was no task hint. But at least Kamil said the job was done.

During the cutscene at the end of the mission there was a fullsceen nvg overlay. Not sure if that is intentional or because I had the nvg equipped when triggering the cutscene. While it makes it easier to see what's going on, it doesn't fit too well to the overall guerilla vibe of the mission and none of my men were actually wearing one during the scene.

One small mistake I noticed during the briefing in the Plan section:
"To infiltrate the harbour, we'll to steal a boat..."


So far I really had a lot of fun with these missions. They both seem very solid with no bugs or showstoppers.
Looking forward to play the next ones.

[Clayman]

...and the journey continues...
Again I'll keep this short for now, until I reach the new / updated missions.


Inner Abscess:
This starts off with a very atmospheric walk through foggy woods. It sets a really great mood for the mission to come and I particularly enjoyed it when Miroslav started coughing. A great little detail that adds really well to the feel.

When I came close to the river and the cutscene kicked in, in the first scenes some of my men didn't have any weapons.

After I had killed the Red Star guys and took the Manifest, Kamil refused to move. No matter what I ordered him, he just stood there not moving at all. I had to restart the mission. Second time everything worked fine.


Alexej Pribotow:
In the briefing it says "It's crazy how it goes go sometimes!" And the next sentence should probably say "sooner or later" rather than "earlier or later".

I kinda expected to get shot at the roadblock while searching the parked vehicles for any loot. But the russians didn't seem to care a lot.

While driving into the town, I liked Sergej telling me the way. At least for the first two turns, he went silent after that. I have to say, I still believe the mission would benefit from the player doing the different tasks themselfs. Going to the bar as Miroslav and placing the GPS as Sergej. But the cutscene was executed very well, nonetheless.

At the end when capturing Pribotow, the autosave was a bit too early. When reloading that save, I ended up in the shack again with the fade to black effect and being teleported outside again. You might put the autosave after the teleport, if you know what I mean.


Petrovka Strike:
As I had already covered this one before, I don't have that much to add, except of course that this mission turned out really great. 

Only two smaller issues I noticed:
I took the truck from the ambush and drove to Grishino, jumped out and grabbed the sniper rifle. After I was finished gearing up, I couldn't find the pilot anywhere. As the marker for the task was exactly where I had parked the truck, I was afraid I had accidentally ran him over. Obviously I missed that I had already triggered the conversation. It took some time until I found him sitting in the helicopter waiting for Kamil and me.

You might want to wait for the player to have actually taken the rifle from the truck and he is on foot before you continue with the pilot conversation.

Also the 'Talk to Pilot' task didn't tick off at all.

I went for Tomek in this take, as it is closer to how the campaign originally played out and an additional group member could come in handy later on. Looking forward to see how the aftermath turns out on my next playtrough, when I go for Gvozdno.


Resurrection:
I guess I will never get tired of watching this cutscene. It's so perfectly orchestrated. The camera angles, the music accompanying the scenes. It's almost like watching a movie. Just pure epicness.

Just two questions that came to my mind while playing:
Who is that woman?
When Dimitri's goal was only to stop Tomas, wouldn't it been easier for him to just kill Tomas in the beginning?
Yes, it would result in a very short campaign... but still, Dimi's plan doesn't make too much sense to me when thinking about it. 


Edit: Almost forgot, there was an error message in Resurrection after the scene at Lucies grave:

Code: [Select]

Error in expression <ep 1;

if (hatnvg) then {tomas linkItem _nvGoggle; };

setAccTime 1;

TitleCut [>
Error position: <_nvGoggle; };

setAccTime 1;

TitleCut [>
Error Undefined variable in expression: _nvgoggle

[Undeceived]

Thanks! Notes taken.

 

Who is that woman?

Ehm, what woman? The one at Miroslav's broken car? That's just a random woman the Red Star used to lure Tomas into the trap.

When Dimitri's goal was only to stop Tomas, wouldn't it been easier for him to just kill Tomas in the beginning?
Yes, it would result in a very short campaign... but still, Dimi's plan doesn't make too much sense to me when thinking about it. 

Hm, never thought about that. I guess Dimitri doesn't want to kill him necessarily. He only hopes that Tomas stops after so many losses and let's it rest. Maybe he even wanted to turn him... Do you think that this needs further clarification at any part of the campaign?

[Clayman]

Yes, that woman. I thought the Red Star guys used Miroslav to lure Tomas into the trap. At least I didn't notice her before the cutscene triggered.

Regarding Dimitri, I don't know. As I have played the campaign several times and this was the first time I thought about that, I guess it should be fine. It was just an idea that crossed my mind and I felt like sharing it.^^

[Undeceived]

When you approached Miroslav's car, didn't you hear the woman, crying out in pain?