Some Suggestions To Improve Fast, Ninja Gameplay

[Vidia]

I just thought I'd post some small things I thought could change the overall feel of the game to improve responsiveness and speed towards some control aspects which could allow players to feel more ninja-y without majorly impacting the overall existing gameplay.

These suggestions can cause movement controls to feel more responsive, which can allow players to quickly react in fast-paced situations.

-Tumbling sensitivity

Tumbling is cool, but it is frustrating when trying to be, well, fast, especially when its automatic. When you jump a -little- too high and land, the landing is often followed by a tumble. This is frustrating because the tumble is really slow and takes out all the velocity you built up. The tumble can be remedied by air-kicking, but there are occassions when you can't or don't want to air-kick (you can only use it when you maintain a certain horizontal velocity, and it also reduces landing velocity). Perhaps removing the tumbling mechanic on landing or simply tweaking the sensitivity of tumbling while landing can make moving feel less slow and more responsive.

-Improve sprint controls.

There are a couple of ways to improve sprinting to make it feel more reliable and less confusing, especially to new players. It is sometimes hard to tell when you are sprinting and when you are not.

1) Speed up the accelleration of sprint speed from standard running or standing, or simply make the speed-up an instant velocity change.

2) After jumping, the sprint goes away and must be re-activated and re-accellerated. This can be remedied by allowing the "sprint status" to be remembered before the jump and continued after landing without re-activating.

3) Currently, you can achieve a far greater jump distance with sprint>crouch>jump, or sprint>jump>crouch. But utilizing crouch often decreases your final velocity after landing (or causing you to tumble, putting you at a stand-still after landing). This can simply be remedied by allowing a greater horizontal dash distance when jumping while sprinting (while perhaps sacrificing additional stamina) like a long-jump that can achieve the same distance as sprint-crouch-jumping or sprint-jumping-crouching.

-Reduce the weapon switching animation.

Currently, it takes a bit too long to change weapons, especially when the situation changes faster than you can change weapons (shooting an infected charger with lex, but switching to shotgun when its running at you).

-Reducing the jump animation.

Jumping currently isn't exactly instant, there is some time between the time you press the space bar and the time your Tenno actually jumps. This can cause some problems in many control situations, and can cause the game to feel glitchy at times (especially when doing combination maneuvers like slide jumping). Improving the jump animation, or simply removing the pre-jump animation can improve responsiveness and allow players to react quicker.

-Improve ADS tumbling mechanics

The backflip and side dash is really cool, but there are limitations to them in all practicality.

1) you can only use it when aiming down the sights.

2) the animation is slower, both during the animation and after the animation (between animations), than the regular, forward, non-ADS tumble.

Maybe you can improve the speed of the side dash and backflip to be on par with the forwards tumble, and replace those animations when double-shifting backwards and sideways with the regular forward tumble, if just to make full use of those cool animations.

-Improve wall-running

Developers already probably knows that wall-running is currently really glitchy, and often teleports you to random places, and can discourage players from utilizing this cool technique.

[tony1922]

I would like to see running up walls last a bit longer to reach those "just out of reach places".

[GrenoiR]

OK well I am sorry but I personally disagree with every point here. And here is why:

1. Tumbling is there to make it more realistic, look at parkour guys, they either roll or just TUMBLE (occasionaly). Moreover, if you jump in any direction and hold forward button you will toll instead of tumbling. Tumble only happens when you jump and then just wait until you land without pressing any direction keys. I for one actually love this feature and tend to force it as it reminds me I am still in the world that has some reference to laws of physics.

2. Sprint speed HAS to build up. Thats how it is in real life you know. you cant just start running 4 mph faster without building up that speed; Again I dont see how sprint crouch sprint breaks the momentum, it would be to arcady like if you could do evertything indefinitely like sprint crouch srpint crouch sprint crouch it woul look ridiculous;

3. There is nothing wrong with weapon change speed. For the fact, I actually hate the part where youcan melee with your weapon out of nowhere with your previously held weapon just dissapearing in the air (thats a topic for another post);

4. Seriously? Again its not obl*v*on where you press space bar and the stiff animation just plays out. Again the devs did this on purpose to add gravity and ultimately mass to the warframes` movements.

I am sorry if I am too aggresive in commenting on this stuff but what you are asking here is to make "another" game where realism ( to an extent) is replaced by arcade gameplay of some fighting game... However I totally support the idea that those cool backflips and siderolls when aiming down the sights should be implemented more freely... maybe add them to melee as well

Edited April 5, 2013 by GrenoiR

[Dako_Shark]

I haven't really found any issues with the movement system. Unless you're using one of the slowest warframes, you can move around pretty damn fast and easily. The game has a good feel too it, I'd hate for them to change that so it feels... Floaty? I guess you could call it, a lot of various beat 'em up arcade like games have that issue, sprinting just goes to a full sprint without any build-up, and jumping is almost instantaneous.

Really the only big issue I have with movement, is that rolling isn't bindable to a seperate key. I like the rolling and tumbling but I dislike that I have to double tap sprint to do it, which is nearly impossible to do when you're in the midst of a firefight. Oh, someone is running towards you, gonna double tap shift to get outta the way. It's not as easy as it sounds. I would like if they added a double tap dodge, like double tap D or A and you dive to the side.

As for the weapon change speed, I am really on the fence about that. I don't mind the slower animations, it means you have to get out of the firefight fast to switch weapons if you need to. Again, if weapons just popped in and out of your hand then that would make it feel WAY to arcadey. I mean, don't get me wrong, but an arcade shooter would not fit what the game is going for. So I wouldn't mind is sped up a bit, but nothing excessive, or even add a mod that increases weapon switch speed.

[Vidia]

Was realism ever really a goal that prevented gameplay from being fast? Having fast animations doesn't mean that realism would go out the window. There are plenty of fast games with quick animations that are far more "realistic." Wall running infinitely isn't "realistic" since it defies all forms of physics, but it's cool. If warframes can wall run infinitely, why do they have to tumble every time they jump? In "real life" tumbling prevents damage being done to the legs when you jump off a high point. While if you wanted it to be realistic, surely, you can tumble after you jump if you like, but to force it on players every time they jump is tedious and frustrating. If anything, it makes it look silly to have the warframes tumble to reduce damage when they can fall from extremely high places without taking damage and do air kicks that can fling the player 50 additional feet and sliding for another 50.

There are plenty of games (even more "realistic" than warframe) that don't rev up when sprinting. I'm not saying it should be instant, but should at least be more responsive, or at least continue the sprint status after you've jumped or tumbled. Like I said, doing so wouldn't make the game any less realistic or more arcade-y.

Again, many things in the game already don't obey the laws of physics, and these are very small changes that wouldn't affect the game in such a way that you mention, but would only improve the feel.

If you wanted a "realistic" game which obeys physics, we would have Crysis or something. This game is meant to be faster and defy physics in many cases. The changes that I mentioned simply cater to that style, not to ruin or change the game.

And yes, I'm not suggesting anything mind-blowingly drastic changes like suggesting instant weapon changes or instead sprint speeds, only a slight speeding up of the animations to make it slightly faster to cater to the space-ninja style. If I can run horizontally along a wall for 5 seconds across an entire room without touching the ground, I am pretty sure I should be able to switch weapons slightly faster than an average person.

I would like if they added a double tap dodge, like double tap D or A and you dive to the side.

I was going to suggest that but I thought it would be too Gunz-y, which may or may not be the developer's intentions.

I would like to see running up walls last a bit longer to reach those "just out of reach places".

I forgot to mention that running up walls is really hard for beginners, especially those parts where you have to run up in order to get somewhere. Players will eventually get used to it, but there's got to be an easier way to do the wall running without frustrating new players and forcing them to get used to it.

Edited April 6, 2013 by Vidia

[Xtorma]

I don't really care about the other stuff, it's just nitpicky imo, but the weapon switch can not be sped up because it would take the place of a reload and negate the reload speed limitation. Sure it can only be done once before a reload but reloading is a limiting gameplay mechanic.

Also can you reload cancel in this game? because if you can then my reason goes out the window.

[MofineBovine]

i feel that being locked into a Roll animation after every freakin jump hinders gameplay. It limits any notion of platforming (ie you cant jump jump) and being constantly locked into a forced movement where you are unable to act is just frustrating and annoying. Im not saying get rid of the roll completely, just not after every jump.

I also personaly think that using stamina to sprint unnecessarily slows down the game. Warframe could probably do away with stamina alltogether.

[Fscreams]

I would love if the flip from sliding was enabled normally, like w + holding space does it or something. Also, wall running vertically should be increased a little, it's disappointing that you can't go further but run on a wall until stamina drains. Transition between wall running upwards and on the side should be better. It's hard to wall run up and then switch to on the side.

[Kindar]

The roll after a fall needs tweaking on the distance. "Oh, you dropped less than one meter while holding sprint? ROLL!" Minimum distance should be atleast one story of distance before you roll.