Concerning combat and running animations

Im reading many negative reviews about that (animations) on steam and on videos. So lets go deeper and lets try to compare them (the animations) with another unity game and the 21st century standards in video games.
By animations , i mean the character's movements, not the fluff around it (the special effects).

Lets just start softly with the running animation.

Okay, lets talk first about the running avatar :
The character looks like hes sliding on the ground.
Why is the avatar running with straight arms when hes in combat and dual wielding (like wearing 2 wands or Swords). It just looks ridiculous (to not say ugly) to see a character running like that in combat.
Theres is no different running animation if the character is wearing a light or a heavy armor. Its like the HEAVY armor has no weight.
This is very important because we spend most of our game time running!

So maybe add a particle effect to give the illusion that the character is truly running/walking ON the ground. That particle effect should ofc dépends on the nature of the ground: like if the character is running on the snow, add snow effect particles near the feet and foot prints, same thing for mud, water, sand, ect ... For sure running animations in combat should be reworked! We want to see arms moving and we want to see the weight of the armor ! You will see later in my article that this is essential for the synchronization (between the mouse clic , the action , the animation and the damage applied)

Lets talk about the running bandit (hostile npc with human shape):
They are running like the avatar (the player) with straight arms ... So same thing as above.

Now lets go in the hard part: the combat animations!

Lets begin with the animation of the avatar during combat:

Spell casting animations are kinda ok.
I mean you see gestures and after a spell goes out, ok and i love the new effects. BUT, there is from time to time, depending the speed at which you cast (clic in a random deck) a synchronization problem. You use the focus , you even see the spell, you almost dont see the animation ( at least the complete animation) and you dont deal any damage! So its like the animation is not linked to the act (casting a spell) . It does happen very often and i must say that i havent truly tried this release (40). The de-synch is easily seen with emergency Healing (you clic on several Healing touch and not all of them are Healing you) That synchronization problem is more obvious in melee combat.

Melee combat animations are not ok (and i repeat: im talking about the character animation, not the special effects like the trails in the air that melee weapons do).
Thats why many ppl are saying that combat is looking "klonky" or Something like that.
We have seen above that armor looks like it has no weight. Add to that the "straight arms running animation in combat" and the fact that weapons look like they have no weight also !!
I mean, im manipulating my 2 handed flamberge like it was a thin bamboo stick !
There is no collision between the weapon and the target! Its like the enemy is a ghost or just made of air.
So the logical consequence is that i can swing as fast as i can clic but doing that the desynch problem begins !
I clic on double slash and its just doing the special effect (the double trail in the air) but my avatar is not swinging his sword; TBH : how could you really swing a 2 handed sword so fast if it has its weight?? Cast Healing touch and right after a double slash and you will see what i mean...

So add 2 new parameters in your animations : WEIGHT and CONSISTANCE (to make collisions between weapons and targets); everything will look smoother and more natural. The combat will feel more realistic. The combat movements will be slower but they will be synchronized with the damage dealt.

Lets end with the animation of the bandit (hostile npc with human shape) during combat:

Same thing as for the avatar's animations and the bandit doesnt use his weapon for some animations, hes hitting with his hand... (that one was eazy but also true).

Conclusion:

Animations (especially combat animations) need alot alot alot of love as i didnt see any evolution since r17 (when i joined the SOTA community). As you can see, they are linked to the overal gameplay! They are actually not meeting the criterias of a 21st century video game. For comparison, go check the animations in the game named "the forest" >> its unity made and was out in 2014 (alpha) you will see what i mean with weight of a weapon and collision with target...
Animations are so important that im very surprised they are not on the Q2 Schedule....

Thank you for reading this. I hope it will catch your attention.

 

The straight-arm running also looks goofy if you have a shield. It looks painful, awkward, and would provide no protection while being held out there. Maybe someone with SCA experience could confirm this but I suspect your arm would fall off after running with a wooden shield this way for more than a moment.

Actually, that is the only gripe I have about my avatar's animations, but I have not tried many other combat styles.

 

Yeah i havent written all the combat stances and weapons and monsters animations (look how the troll is animated vs the attacks hes making, its hillarious, thats just an exemple)
Im not a SOTA hater (or i woulndt have played so much time) but @Lord British and his team: the animations (especially the combat ones) are one of the biggest weak point of the game and its urgent to get those fixed and improved.

 

A few things.

Reviewers review this game as it were Wow or UO which has had 10 years behind them in production with hundreds of millions behind them (well, wow) over that period of time. Besides the fact that as you grow older you realize that most the people doing things like "reviews" are actually not really qualified to do so (hate to say it) or are commercial and slanted by their media outlet much in the way politics is.

1) These are the things they are working on now. I have noticed some serious animation issues in R40 now. They will be fixed which is why we are still in Beta/alpha/pre-release however people want to define it.
2) They hired an FX person just a few months ago because this is the time when that stuff is done. We have seen them sticking in now. R40 had FX added to the "fist" lines.
3) Animations in general have also gone though a lot of change in the past few months and will continue to be polished.


The *best* thing you can do is report in the R40 bugs area every and all weird animations and SF you find. They may not even know there is an issue yet.

 

@2112Starman the combat animations havent change at all (at least for sword combat) since release 17 from what i noticed, just more SFX were added.
When im talking about animations, its the way the character moves, not the sfx attached to it (if theres any). All i hope is that actual animations are just place holders and will be totally replaced by more accurate animations.
Yeah, you are right about steam reviews but that doesnt mean that they are all wrong.

 

Bandits are way worse than avatars, they are more like rofling. These guys are slow, how can you run that slow and still look like you're running? Maybe they should be power walking.

 

But @2112Starman is right, they will probably be getting a major overhaul, as so many things are getting now. It's actually good that they've ignored it since R17, because any work they put into that system before they have the other stuff nailed down, like how combat will ultimately work, could potentially be wasted.

 

@Vladamir Begemot lets keep our fingers crossed

 

Animation still needs some work. But I have to say that I'm enjoying combat animations in SOTA already more than I do in the Elder Scrolls Online. I logged back into that game to compare and still feel that way. So, for me at least, I think we have something good here that is only getting better.

 

Someone please make a "Shooting Stars" video with the bandits running!

 

Haha that's hilarious

 

Too late! The bandits look good now.

 

You can't compare SOTA to typical games these days, since almost all of those are using mocap for their animations and AFAIK most stuff in SOTA is not. That would add another layer of expense .. maybe down the road if things work out well ...

 

I think they look fine now, that was from March when they were still white and doing the moonwalk.