So I’d thought I share some more of the creative development work I’ve been doing lately in animation land. Basically I’m trying to get a bunch of the most key interaction animations for the playable character held ready in stasis, so when the team is ready we can start building on the key game-play features again. (I’m told as soon as later next month - yay!)
Here’s a ‘behind the scenes’ view on the trading animation system for when you want to trade items between players instead of purchasing by shopping. The designers and I imagined it a little like this…
However please note this is ‘work in progress’ and so when it actually comes down to working with a programmer to get it working in game - things may change to create a better user experience.
Trading Flow Chart:
So a player wishing to trade executes a ‘I wish to trade’ which strikes a held ‘trading offer’ animation. I created it to look a little like you’re opening your own personal store.
Everyone else can see that you are in a ‘trading stance’ and can choose to interact with you by going up to the player and accept to engage in trading.
The 2 actively trading players go into a trading menu system with GUI similar to your crafting screen. In the meantime the animation shown to you and everyone else is the longish ‘trading animation’ loop which generically show the player having a ponder and weighing up the deal.
When you have a deal you would like to make, the player strikes a ‘do we have a deal?’ pose. That is held until the other player decides one of the next 3 outcomes…
Reject Deal… and go back to trading.
Decline Deal… and walk away.
Accept Deal… and walk away happy with either goodies or money.
Here are the 8 part animations I’ve captured in gif form so you can see the animations and how they all fit together with the flow above.
Trade Offer
Trade Offer Loop (held until you either engage or walk away)
Trading
Deal?
Deal Loop (held until the other player responds)
Deal Rejected
Deal Accepted
Deal Declined
That’s the rough overview of trading as we have it right now, if any of you have any thoughts please let me know as always. I’ve generally tried to keep it close to the style of the emotes in terms of body language and the timing in particular.
I’ve loved doing these - I hope it works as well as I imagine it will.
Oh yes! So we decided for the common language when doing key interactions like trading, chatting, shopping, working with machines, crafting and other such things, all equipped items simply *disappear so the character can interact with both hands and can be free do more sophisticated full body animations that can work alongside the appropriate GUI/menu system. (The camera work will also be a part of this common language). This also avoids us having to worry about all the possible equipped varieties of tools, items and weaponry we’ll have and also having to store them in some sort of bag or place on the body.
When I say disappear, we can make that as charming as possible, with either something done in VFX or piece of illusionary magic from code that will seamlessly allow us to do this in an eye pleasing unobstructed and hopefully fast transition.
Only a slight concern about the option for everybody to come and trade with you. imagine griefing where two people wants to trade and a random guy just keeps “hijacking” the trade. But that is only nitpicking.
I love that you can see when people are doing something visually. so this is a big plus for me
Ooooohh good point! I wonder if some sort of unwritten Boundless etiquette will be naturally established within the community or if ‘hijacking’ could be such a problem that we would have to create a solution like the ability to selected a player for nominated trade in the gui or something similar to bring back the peace?
I guess the chat system that we’d like to create would allow talk between players to talk about trading before engaging in the activity. Who knows! But it’ll be interesting finding that out!
Just to clarify, the way the trade system works is that you interact with another player and then they confirm they want to trade, so hijacking isn’t possible.
Do the requests stack on top / to the side of eachother? because if they overwrite eachother then yes you can still Hi-Jack. Ofc i know you guys have thought about it but i needed something to nit pick at because it is just such a cool systemxD
Who knows what social rules apply? There are cultures in which using the left hand in social or economic interactions is considered to be insulting. (Which is not to say that would be the rule here, but to recognize that precedent.) In certain Asian cultures cards (business or credit, for example) should be presented with two hands, and accepted with two hands. Details like this add to the overall ambiance of the game and might increase immersion.
You’re preaching to a guy that is married to a Chinese woman here ^^
Traditionally Ang Pow (Lucky Red Envelope given over Chinese New Year) is given and received with 2 hands as well. Another example would be a Chinese Tea Ceremony involving a newly married couples parents, where the man would pour tea for their partners parents as a sign of respect - also presented and received with both hands.
I personally don’t think that level of depth would be required in a game which will be played throughout the world and by many existing cultures. You wouldn’t want someone to feel slighted or offended by some made up predefined idiosyncrasy that they have no real control over.
Just wanted to say thanks Nevir and to all the feedback and posts. It makes my day very worthwhile, fun and inspired to do either more of the same or to fix the issues highlighted.
(Off to buy that cake clexarews, for my coffee break)
