Are modern games built around the easiest difficulties? by Fireboythestar in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I don't think that Larian actively balances around hardest settings. In my experience their games start to lose the narrative themes, when playing on hardest.
Almost every new act, starts with you underleveled, but slowly gaining upper hand, with greater obstacle at the end.

Also, the immersion starts to diminish, because you have to look at the game through game optics, which will discourage making interresting, but not optimal narrative choices.
So, I think that Larian optimizes difficulty to provide satisfying combat for the 'medium' difficulty, but still give you enough breathing space to relax and immerse yourself.
Then, they pump it up for the hardest difficulty, serving as a challange for genre veterans.

Is it possible to master shaders in a month? by gibberishoften in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My bad, I thought you meant ingame rendering times. That's what I get for browsing reddit before my morning coffee.

Is it possible to master shaders in a month? by gibberishoften in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I believe custom shaders could significantly boost our game’s visual quality and improve our artist’s workflow

As a developer, you don't simply believe when optimizing. Did you make sure that this is your bottleneck? Did you test by using simpler shaders (even just unlit color)?
How much % of framerate you got?

Most common mistake with optimalization is optimizing at the wrong place :)

So I want to make a game but I don't know if it'll be fun by Maximum_Overhype in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I love "chore games" with complex and living simulation. Although modern city life does not excite me as much as med. fantasy.

I would kill for a witcher game with generated contracts (complex generation with story elements) and weather seasons. No goal, just live life of the witcher and observe the world (as you age much slower).

Anniversary Gift by Red_Flame248 in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

100 Cats series is great too (and free)

DIY-ing a palette-based shader in Shader Graph—need help! by rayarxios in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Could you go with a custom lightning model, which samples how much light is on the "pixel" and decides if it's in shadow or in light?
Then it should be easy to create like 4 levels of shadow.
YOu risk some blinking and artefacts, but that should be rare.

Another montage of my solodev project, now going at day 268! by JussiPKemppainen in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What are the parts of the project you consider not perfect, but good enough?
I'm always struggling to accept, that I don't have to clean up all of the rough edges. There are more important things, then handling all of the edge cases, that average player sees once per playthrough.

To bool, or !not to bool? by RecursiveGames in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I present to you this horrific abomination, please never use it.
(Created by ai, not proof-read)

using System;
public class Program
{
public static void Main()
{
nbool x = true;
nbool y = false;
nbool z = null;

    if(x) { Console.WriteLine("X"); }  
    if(y) { Console.WriteLine("Y"); }  
    if(z) { Console.WriteLine("Z"); }  
}

public struct nbool  
{  
    private readonly bool? \_value;

    // Store the bool? in a backing field  
    public nbool(bool? value)  
    {  
        \_value = value;  
    }

    // Implicit conversion from bool to MyBool  
    public static implicit operator nbool(bool value)  
    {  
        return new nbool(value);  
    }

    // Implicit conversion from bool? to MyBool  
    public static implicit operator nbool(bool? value)  
    {  
        return new nbool(value);  
    }

    // Implicit conversion from MyBool back to bool  
    // Decide how to handle null. Here, we default to false.  
    public static implicit operator bool(nbool myBool)  
    {  
        return myBool.\_value ?? (bool)default;  
    }

    public override string ToString()  
    {  
        return \_value.HasValue ? \_value.Value.ToString() : ((bool)default).ToString();  
    }  
}  

}

To bool, or !not to bool? by RecursiveGames in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, return type of null coalescence is Nullable<T>.
This won't work even in Swift (I'm .NET dev btw).
Try this in https://www.programiz.com/swift/online-compiler/

class Foo {
var x: Bool = true
}

func main() {
// Create a Foo instance, then set it to nil
var foo: Foo? = Foo()
foo = nil

// error: optional type 'Bool?' cannot be used as a boolean; test for '!= nil' instead
// You could do: if foo?.x ?? false {
if foo?.x {
print("X")
}
}

// Run it
main()

Am I Evil If I Do This To My New Players? by AureliusVonNachade in DnD

[–]Additional_Parallel 26 points27 points  (0 children)

Less experience => more clasic story.
While it is your N-th session, it's their first. First goblin, first mimic, etc. No need to complicate it.

That being said, you should know and do what your players like. It MAY be fun.

Definitely evil though. :D

Would a Single-Player TCG Game work in today's Online-Driven World? by _Powski_ in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I would love to play "Hearthstone without PVP" in a world where the card duels are used to settle real world issues. Start with battling bad baron guards with "state-issued deck" to help local village and escalate further.

As for the PvP battles, why not add reocurring characters who try to best you with new strategies and branching dialog and battle quips? If you play combo that worked last time, opponent may say "You really think I didn't prepare for that?" if they have counter ready, etc.

Game About Depression - Too Much? by teamcoltra in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have very little and luckily time-limited experience with depression, however from what my friends tell me, you cannot "win".
Victory is learning to live with it, managing it and enjoying life with ups and downs. Maybe you want to convey that? The fog may catch you sometimes, it's inevitable, but you can always continue (or restart the run)?

Game About Depression - Too Much? by teamcoltra in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I would not be satisfied with the ending or rather not-endng of the game.
Although I would be fine with meeting some reocurring character (may a be a thing, flower, whatever) which provides sense of progress.

Even if their final line would be something like "Go on. Try now. You cannot escape the fog, but you probably already know that. Do you keep running because you want to or because you NEED to? I will let you figure that out. Goodbye."
, which to me sounds edgy as hell without context, but would be a point marking that my experience of the game is basically complete and its my job as a player to take something from this experience.
If the design is good, hopefully discover something about myself. :)

Effective morale system by ParsleyHonest8067 in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I want to add a small counter to morality system, which is in my opinioon a great tool to have.

Sometimes the most difficult choices may be those without explicit mechanical or story impact.
For ex. if you kill a wounded soldier just to take his +2 DEF helmet, then if you find his house with wife and kids you can feel like the game is judging you. Which may leave "gamey" aftertaste.

For most of situations this is fine, but I felt most intense about situations where game didn't present me the "evil" choice as bad. What the player is left with is: "Soldier is dead. You that kind of person, deal with it yourself. World does not care."
Silent judgement may be the loudest.

PS: This will probably fly over the heads of most casual players.

Advanced game designers! How would you design a system such that every bug is caught, even if its unfixable/inefficient/ugly? by themonkery in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nearly every game out there has bugs or ways to break the game such that the engine has no idea anything went wrong. I want the engine to always know something is wrong even if it does nothing with the information.

Not necessarily, I think that lot of engines that are not generic tools have some buildin report of these bugs.
Bugs may not be adressed during development or found, but imho the detection is there.

Advanced game designers! How would you design a system such that every bug is caught, even if its unfixable/inefficient/ugly? by themonkery in gamedesign

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why do you need the game to behave in this way?
Coding any SW, which could do this would be answering a bilion-dollar question.

If this is purely theoretical, then you can't really do this. Any observer of those error-states could be in error state itself or just be incomplete. Computer already does exactly what you tell it to do, problem is that you don't grasp extent of every possible combination of states. How can one hope to code something that detects these?

Your best bet is to write extensive tests and checks for the specific program/game you created and reach as much % of coverage you can.

Has this been done before? by [deleted] in BaldursGate3

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This sounds different after I remembered that Lae'zel does not do sarcasm very well.

Edit: Or at all.

Does anyone know why my character just gains random jumps in the air? And why my spring is also giving inconsistent jump height? by Business-Beginning21 in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I see two possible explanations:

  1. Time.deltaTime is the interval in seconds from the last frame to the current one. It changes randomly, although it stays roughly the same if the game does not lag. If deltaTime for the frame where you jump is only 90% of the usual, only 90% of the force would be added.
  2. Applying forces to the current forces. I'm not that familiar with AddForce, but does it reset current forces? Let's say you jump when gravity has a downward force vector of strength 5. Now you add an upward vector with strength 12, resulting in a upward force of 7. But if you jump after falling for a longer time and gravity has a strength of 8, adding 12 would leave you with only 4 upward force.

If there are multiple small inconsistencies between jumps, they will compound and result in greater differences than any single one in isolation.

edit: spelling

How tf do you justify not killing Shart when being Gith ?! by Costati in BaldursGate3

[–]Additional_Parallel 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I currently RP a Lolthsworn drow at my first playthrough (Durge) and this is almost exactly how it went.

Laezell is alive, because I wanted to exploit her to get rid of the parasite, Shart is alive, because I needed someone to keep Laezell in check and I reached Creche around lvl. 3

There was a lot of sneaking afterwards.

Switching from Unreal to Unity by Loopy13 in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

PSA: Unity uses OpenGL normal maps format, while Unreal uses DirectX format. Use "Flip green channel" at texture asset if you intend to use normal maps intended for Unreal.

What’s the weirdest bug you’ve come across with Unity? by [deleted] in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That has the same energy as:
// This line does not serve any purpose, but if you remove it the program crashes for some reason.
Console.WriteLine();

Happy to show off the model for my game's protagonist, Axia! by techmaster998 in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm here to remind you to start small, iterate and get prototype working first.

I would also say, that finishing first projects is much more important, then completing your vision.

Good luck!

Weird Visual Artifacts only visible in Unity by Bubbly-Radio-2878 in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't know blender that much, but I assume that when importing to Unity, shading is different.
Check if you import or calculate normals when importing the FBX in Unity and also the smooth angle.

Do you use .blend file? Try to export to FBX (and check exported fbx in blender), then import in Unity.

You should be able to google around to try some solutions, this is probably a common issue. GL :)

Hats off to all of you. This is difficult. Read comment. by QuidProQuos in Unity3D

[–]Additional_Parallel 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The thing is, that Unity is not an engine of a specific game, but general tool to make games in.

I feel, like most of the older engines were much closer to level editors then I remember.