Hello everyone, I'm designing a 3rd person action game which uses slow-motion as its central mechanic, however slow-motion is a difficult concept to implement in a multiplayer game, which is probably why we haven't seen it in many commercial titles yet, if any at all. As far as I can see, there are only a few ways it can be implemented, please let me know which method you think would be best from a players perspective, or if you have any other ideas. 1.) After the player activates slowmo, all players (globally) slow down, and the activator moves slightly faster than the rest, or has a higher rate of fire - your classic slow-motion effect. 2.) After the player activates slowmo, everyone else slows down and the player moves at normal speed, basically the opposite of slow-motion. I don't like this idea as the activator wants to experience combat in slowmo himself, not the other way around. 3.) Same as options 1 and 2, except the slow-motion only effects players within a certain radius of the activator. This would alleviate the problem of players slowing down half way across the level and not knowing why, however this might end up looking a bit strange. 4.) At random time intervals or after a specific event, everyone slows down without a particular player having any advantage. This option doesn't appeal to my competitive spirit :D I found a recent article by Finnish researchers here, I read the paper, although I don't believe this would work well in an action game were accuracy is paramount. Personally I'm learning towards option 1, with the levels being quite small and unobstructed so everyone has a good chance of seeing who actually activated slow-motion and getting in on the action, rather than just feeling pissed off that they slowed down again for no apparent reason.

Make time speed a scalar value of space and apply time reduction with soft degradation effect.

i.e.: Time flows at speed 1 unless you're 10m or close from the bullet-timer, in which case it flows at speeds from 1(exactly 10m distance) to 0.5 (bullet-timer position).

If this is a combat type game, why not activate the slo-mo automatically for two players that engage in battle? Bullits fired at both of them by other players will get slowed down accordingly, so they do not have an advantage.

hth,
CipherCraft

Quote:Original post by Zanshibumi
Make time speed a scalar value of space and apply time reduction with soft degradation effect.

i.e.: Time flows at speed 1 unless you're 10m or close from the bullet-timer, in which case it flows at speeds from 1(exactly 10m distance) to 0.5 (bullet-timer position).

That is actually a very cool idea, I could imagine a stream of bullets flying towards the player who activated bullet-time and then they come slowly to a stop, would be good for a defensive situation.

Yeah, I've posted about The Specialists a few times on these forums, I believe it's the only game in existence with slow-motion based multiplayer. It seems to be in development hell at the moment though, with no Half-Life 2 version planned, although a new update for HL1 should be released soon.

">Let's all bask in the glory of that trailer one last time.

see/read jojo, it has a character named dio, who has a power named the world which can stop time and when he does that he moves normal and the other guys are slowed down/ paused, i think that is the best way to implement bullet time, obviously the effect it has would be very pissing off in a multiplayer game, so it should be indeed limited to a certain ratio.

To get the gameplay feel your after, slowing down time within a certain radius of the initiator but not slowing him as much as everyone else sounds like a really good idea. The only problem I can see, is that then whoever uses bullet time is going to have an advantage in that bubble, but will still be moving slower than players outside of the bubble. Non slowed players will then have a pretty big advantage.

They can: continue racking up kills against other non-slowled players, giving them an advantage in deathmatch.
Get the good items.
Line up shots for when slow down wears off.
Capture flags, get objectives, etc.

If I saw a couple of bullet timing players, I would spray that area with bullets anyway, even if the bullets would slow down when they hit the bubble. If everyone else thought the same and shot at the players, then when the slowdown wore off, they would get pelted by bullets from every angle.

So while it would be fun, you'd have to introduce a bunch of fixes to get most game types to work (eg, bullet time kills give more points, buy instead of find weapons, bullets inside the bubble drop to the ground/rockets detonate when slow mo wears off).