Unofficial v2.2 Discussion Thread

Tried Analog mode once, made my stomach hurt because of how fast the camera turns whenever I do any fast action like Sonic's Air Thok or Knuckles' glide, and downright unplayable as tails because I couldn't turn the camera. even worse when I get the Speedsneakers.
i usually play with tails and don't understand your issue there. tails doesn't change anything wrt camera movement. it's the same as sonic or knuckles or any other character
 
I get stuck in areas where I can't see the character because either the camera gets stuck behind something or something blocks my view of the character.
 
that sounds really situational (along with your stomach issue honestly) and i still don't get what it has to do with tails specifically
 
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I can't properly judge where I'm going to land after flying because I have no control over the camera, and this isn't exclusive to tails. the camera screws me over with the other two characters too but even more with tails because he can fly. this leads to many situations where I keep falling into areas where the camera isn't positioned properly.
 
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i don't move the camera up or down ever and i never have any trouble judging where i'm landing, at least not in the vanilla maps. and i mean i play in software so i don't like moving the camera up and down anyway because of the y-shearing distortion
 
so with analog going bye-bye, does that mean people playing keyboard-only are just kinda screwed? analog is by far the most comfortable way to play that way imo

I've been playing with a keyboard for well over a decade now and I can assure you that analog is worse. It's nowhere near as precise, is a lot less nuanced, and simply isn't a good control setup.


loving the new title screen though

Awesome. The best part is that it is a WIP. The final should look a lot better.
 
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i don't know why you guys are so convinced that i can't trust my own judgement here. i've used the default controls before kb-only and i think theyre cumbersome and inappropriate. there's a reason why you can't use the keyboard only in fps games and there's a reason why platform games (like srb2) usually have more automatic camera systems. it's more convenient and accommodates more controller setups. i know some of you are somehow used to the default controls kb-only but you absolutely cannot expect that of newer players. i'm sure you'd get used to any control setup in the world after using it for 10+ years. doesn't mean the control setup is necessarily good and no-less that it's what everyone else should have to use
 
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so with analog going bye-bye, does that mean people playing keyboard-only are just kinda screwed? analog is by far the most comfortable way to play that way imo

Doubt it. I play with semi-tank controls (WASD for movement, Arrow keys for turning, jumping and spinning) and not only does it feel very natural and comfortable for me, but I also like to think I'm bretty gud at this here game :)

Not gonna miss Analog mode at all, personally speaking.
 
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i don't mind that other people are more comfortable with other control schemes. it's this developer dogma of "i like it this way, so EVERYONE has to like it this way!" that i take issue with. if anything i just want analog to still be a regularly-accessible option. i know i can't be the only one who prefers it
 
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So, in a perfect world, we could offer that. We could have a feature that offers a traditional, third-person platformer control scheme that works well and is effective, unlike analog mode. The problem is that that is a really hard feature to add.

One of the problems that Sonic has always had in 3D is the camera. I don't think I need to explain how much the camera, especially in earlier 3D Sonic games like Sonic Adventure, sucks. The camera is designed to try to point in the direction it thinks that you want to move in, but it gets it wrong often, and heaven help you if you try to do something that the game fully isn't expecting, like run down the stage backwards. The eventual solution that SEGA came up with is to make the game extremely linear, so that the camera can be always facing forward like Crash Bandicoot. This works okay for SEGA, but it doesn't work at all for us, because unlike official Sonic games, SRB2 actually features exploration and levels which you can go in any direction. We can't just fix the camera to always face forward, and thus the camera needs to be able to move around freely.

Mario games have this type of exploration in 3D as well, but unlike Sonic their camera works fine because the pacing in a Mario game is much slower. There is way more time for the camera to adjust to what it thinks that you want to do, and not only that, the game pacing is slow enough that there's absolutely no significant issue if the player does need to adjust the camera manually. In Sonic, if the camera suddenly isn't pointing in an appropriate direction, this can immediately lead to your death because by the time you've gotten it pointing in a direction you want it to be, you've already run into something bad.

This is the main reason why analog mode in SRB2 is problematic. It attempts to guess which direction you actually want the camera to be facing based on your recent movement, and it's frequently wrong. In many situations this leads to a frustrating death because by the time you've manually told the camera where you actually want it to point, it's too late and you've already flown into a pit.

The whole reason why the FPS control scheme works so well for SRB2 is because it gets around this inherent limitation. Instead of attempting to guess where we think the player wants to be looking, the player just tells the game where they want to look directly. The camera is never out of the player's control and therefore most of the severe camera issues are resolved.

I get that this is not industry standard behavior. While there are most definitely other platformers that use this control scheme, there is not an official Sonic game that does this, and thus players are going to be surprised to see a different setup than they were expecting. SRB2 is trying to do things that SEGA doesn't want to touch, and therefore if we want players to have a good experience that doesn't involve the camera fucking them over constantly, we're going to have to make some compromises somewhere for playability, because we simply do not have the technical ability to create a camera that reads your mind.
 
So, in a perfect world, we could offer that. We could have a feature that offers a traditional, third-person platformer control scheme that works well and is effective, unlike analog mode. The problem is that that is a really hard feature to add.
i understand that. it's not like i think analog is ideal or even that it should be improved (though that would be nice), i just prefer it to the default and would like it to be an off-by-default option like it always was. and maybe be given a better name and some kind of description in the options to give a better idea of what it does
One of the problems that Sonic has always had in 3D is the camera. I don't think I need to explain how much the camera, especially in earlier 3D Sonic games like Sonic Adventure, sucks. The camera is designed to try to point in the direction it thinks that you want to move in, but it gets it wrong often, and heaven help you if you try to do something that the game fully isn't expecting, like run down the stage backwards.
alright? good thing this isn't how analog works.
The eventual solution that SEGA came up with is to make the game extremely linear, so that the camera can be always facing forward like Crash Bandicoot. This works okay for SEGA, but it doesn't work at all for us, because unlike official Sonic games, SRB2 actually features exploration and levels which you can go in any direction. We can't just fix the camera to always face forward, and thus the camera needs to be able to move around freely.
and analog accommodates for this fine. srb2's aforementioned open-level design is actually perfect for camera systems like this. a big problem with the early 3d sonic cameras were that the level design was often more linear, over-detailed and closed-off, leading to the camera getting confused and snagging on things more etc. i don't see how it's relevant considering srb2's more open-ended approach.
Mario games have this type of exploration in 3D as well, but unlike Sonic their camera works fine because the pacing in a Mario game is much slower. There is way more time for the camera to adjust to what it thinks that you want to do, and not only that, the game pacing is slow enough that there's absolutely no significant issue if the player does need to adjust the camera manually. In Sonic, if the camera suddenly isn't pointing in an appropriate direction, this can immediately lead to your death because by the time you've gotten it pointing in a direction you want it to be, you've already run into something bad.
EXACTLY!! this is why a camera that automatically adjusts itself absolutely has its place in a sonic game. and analog is the only option like that srb2 players have as it stands.
This is the main reason why analog mode in SRB2 is problematic. It attempts to guess which direction you actually want the camera to be facing based on your recent movement, and it's frequently wrong. In many situations this leads to a frustrating death because by the time you've manually told the camera where you actually want it to point, it's too late and you've already flown into a pit.
tbh i don't see this. all analog does is just point in the direction you've started to run, which works absolutely fine in a game about running. and for the few times it doesn't, can still be manually adjusted
The whole reason why the FPS control scheme works so well for SRB2 is because it gets around this inherent limitation. Instead of attempting to guess where we think the player wants to be looking, the player just tells the game where they want to look directly. The camera is never out of the player's control and therefore most of the severe camera issues are resolved.

I get that this is not industry standard behavior. While there are most definitely other platformers that use this control scheme, there is not an official Sonic game that does this, and thus players are going to be surprised to see a different setup than they were expecting. SRB2 is trying to do things that SEGA doesn't want to touch, and therefore if we want players to have a good experience that doesn't involve the camera fucking them over constantly, we're going to have to make some compromises somewhere for playability, because we simply do not have the technical ability to create a camera that reads your mind.
you just admitted yourself that manual camera control is a poor solution for a sonic game, and now you're insisting how awesome it is as the only option? ffs the only reason srb2 even has this fps control scheme at all is because it's the default doom control scheme the engine was built off of. i'm sorry but insisting that it's the best of all possible control schemes just seems like a copout. and like i've been saying this entire time, the fps controls do not accommodate well for kb-only players, so what are they to do now? you admitted that manual camera controls for a sonic game are inherently an inconvenience so i think it's fair to say that some accommodation should still exist for that, even if it isn't perfect.
 
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tbh i don't see this. all analog does is just point in the direction you've started to run, which works absolutely fine in a game about running. and for the few times it doesn't, can still be manually adjusted
I have seen a preponderance of evidence that shows that for most players, analog's camera is woefully inadequate. It may be that for you, you've managed to figure it out to the point where it actually is reading your mind and you've got it down. Great! We're not removing it from the game, so you can continue to use it. We're simply removing its ease of accessibility because we have determined, through genuine research, that easily being able to access analog mode causes the vast majority of players who use it to become frustrated and think the game controls terribly. The new players who try out this weird FPS platformer hybrid scheme tend to do much better.

you just admitted yourself that manual camera control is a poor solution for a sonic game, and now you're insisting how awesome it is as the only option?
You are misunderstanding me. The problem is not manual camera control. The problem is when the camera does something undesired or unexpected. Analog's camera attempts to face the direction you are going in, but with many situations this is not the behavior you want. In those situations, by the time you realize that the camera is doing something you did not expect and fix it, the damage is done.

With a completely manual camera, it can't do something unexpected because you are in direct control. It cannot suddenly face in a bad direction unless you explicitly told it to.

like i've been saying this entire time, the fps controls do not accommodate well for kb-only players, so what are they to do now?
Well, most of the keyboard-only players won't have to change a thing, because they're already using this control scheme. The players that are using analog without a controller (which I will note are an insanely small minority) will need to either try out the tutorial and learn the better control scheme or look up how to enable the feature again.

At the end of the day, this is a decision being made based on effectiveness. Analog is being called a bad control scheme because it is objectively less effective at controlling the game. Players who switch to the FPS control scheme from analog, after a small adjustment period, perform dramatically better. Why would we want to have an option visible on the menu that literally handicaps the player using it? Players who are more successful to start out are more likely to have fun, and that's the end goal of all of this.
 
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not sure why you're removing its ease of accessibility besides as some roundabout way of spiting players who do prefer analog. like i said, i don't see how keeping it in and maybe making what it does more clear in the options isn't the better solution no matter how you look at it. i understand that not everyone and probably even the majority of players prefer analog. it's clearly the inferior scheme for players who use kb+m or dual-stick controllers. i just think it should still be a regular, possibly better-described option for players who don't or can't play that way. that's it really

you keep insisting that everyone else has nothing but problems with analog and that people who use analog are just naive babies who need to be forced to "adjust" to the default. well what about my case? i was very well-adjusted both the bubsytank and the fps control scheme keyboard-only until i turned on analog for the first time on an absolute whim and found myself much preferring it and realizing how cumbersome and uncomfortable both the default and bubsytank controls were in comparison to it. it's not that i just was some poor fool who somehow wasn't accustomed to the glorious, perfect default doom controls. its just that analog was and is flat-out the better way to play the game for me. i don't believe for a second that i'm the only player ever that has had this experience. all i ask is that i not have to jump through hoops once 2.2 comes out just to play the game how i want, and neither should anyone else in my position

---------- Post added at 11:52 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:34 AM ----------

also
With a completely manual camera, it can't do something unexpected because you are in direct control. It cannot suddenly face in a bad direction unless you explicitly told it to.
you admitted in your last post that this is still very easily done with manual controls in a game where you're almost constantly moving fast and making sharp turns etc. a player can easily make just as many mistakes if not more with the camera than an automatic system would make. sorry but i don't think the default doom controls are the magic bullet here. using them at all was only ever a compromise to begin with. if you guys are so concerned with issues like this, maybe an alternative actually based around sonic gameplay should be looked into.
 
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When I first started out at SRB2 15 years ago, I used to move around by jumping and aiming my thoks rather than dealing with the tank controls I couldn't get behind after playing Sonic Adventure.(you could hardly strafe while thokking back then anyway) I never used analog since it's only 8-directional instead of truly analog, and there's no use for gentle control stick pushing since the only way to go fast anyway was the speed thok.

But I know plenty of players who only continued playing BECAUSE there was an analog mode. It's usually by playing match/CTF in first person that they learned to get good with the default control scheme and slowly get good that way. That's how I warmed up to playing the game "properly" too.

So I'm just glad you guys are keeping in the option rather than tossing it. It might be a pain to uphold the feature, but it'll mean a lot to people.


 
they're not really keeping it in lol. they're taking it out of the options menu and have apparently come up with some intentionally obtuse unknown method every analog player'll have to do in order to re-enable it. they certainly aren't upholding it in any way. and i have a feeling that if the dev attitude here about it doesn't change, it's probably gonna be outright removed at some point

but yeah i agree that the whole 'analog' part of analog is kinda false advertising and doesn't exactly convey what it does anyway. it's why it took me so long to even think to turn it on. i don't care at all about the directional aspect of it, i just prefer the automatic camera
 
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I'm pretty sure it was implied it would become a console cvar (hidden from the conventional player, but if you know how to work out the console you can enable it straight away within 10 seconds), not... whatever you might be thinking about.
 
not sure why you're removing its ease of accessibility besides as some roundabout way of spiting players who do prefer analog.
This was answered in the post above yours. We want new players to use the default. Analog being in options causes this to not happen. Taking the option out of the menu means that they won't encounter it, and therefor have a better experience.
like i said, i don't see how keeping it in and maybe making what it does more clear in the options isn't the better solution no matter how you look at it.
The goal is to reduce use and accessibility for new players. Having it in the options menu will not accomplish this.

i understand that not everyone and probably even the majority of players prefer analog. it's clearly the inferior scheme for players who use kb+m or dual-stick controllers. i just think it should still be a regular, possibly better-described option for players who don't or can't play that way. that's it really
You're trying to invoke an entire group for your position. I do not play with a mouse. I play keyboard only. I find analog inaccurate, clunky, and genuinely awful to use. I am in the category of people you are suggesting would benefit from it being accessible. I think, based on my own experience and the research we have done on this problem, that you are incorrect here.

you keep insisting that everyone else has nothing but problems with analog and that people who use analog are just naive and need to make time to "adjust" to the default. well what about my case? i was very well-adjusted both the bubsytank and the fps control scheme keyboard-only until i turned on analog for the first time on an absolute whim and found myself much preferring it and realizing how cumbersome and uncomfortable both the default and bubsytank controls were in comparison to it. it's not that i just was some poor fool who somehow wasn't accustomed to the glorious, perfect default doom controls. its just that analog was and is flat-out the better way to play the game for me. i don't believe for a second that i'm the only player ever that has had this experience. all i ask is that i not have to jump through hoops once 2.2 comes out just to play the game how i want, and neither should anyone else in my position
The exception that proves the rule. Your individual experience here is unique. What you're missing is that we have deliberately done lots of new player testing and trials for 2.2, as well as had experienced people try something new via direct suggestions, and observed the result. Consistently we see better experiences coming from these people without analog than with. Your argument is exactly why we're not deleting analog outright, because it does have a section of people that want it. But we don't want to expose new people to it. Your solution still allows for people to whimsically turn on a control scheme that we know, based on evidence, causes issue. We outright do not want people doing that. That's why it's being taken out of options. I'm sorry you don't like it, but at the end of the day "I'm sure there are other people like me" doesn't hold weight compared to several years of targeted testing with the deliberate goal of improving new player experience. We've gone over the results of this testing. We know what causes issues and we've been working hard on solving them. The evidence just isn't in your favor.

you admitted in your last post that this is still very easily done with manual controls in a game where you're almost constantly moving fast and making sharp turns etc. a player can easily make just as many mistakes if not more with the camera than an automatic system would make. sorry but i don't think the default doom controls are the magic bullet here. using them at all was only ever a compromise to begin with. if you guys are so concerned with issues like this, maybe an alternative actually based around sonic gameplay should be looked into.

Except this doesn't happen in practice. When we see people playing better and making fewer mistakes with the defaults, that's a demonstration that something is wrong with analog. This position just doesn't hold water.

I get that you're unhappy that your control scheme is being obscured, but at the end of the day we're going to go with a decision that optimizes the game experience. If we found that analog was, in fact, better, we'd be using that. But it doesn't. And until you can demonstrate, with lots of evidence that it works at least as well as the default, we're going to continue with the plan to remove it from the options menu
 
I think everyone is missing the forest for the trees here, which is that both control schemes are inadequate for comfortable keyboard only play, and that srb2 likely does not do enough in 2.2 to address this in its current state. The debate shouldn't be "which substandard control setup do we keep" but "how do we improve our existing setup for everyone's benefit?"

Standardizing a recommended keyboard control setup only addresses half of the issue, the other half is making the standard camera easier to work with. I think there are relatively easy to solutions to this, for example changing turning with the arrow keys to be more natural and with customizable turning speeds, or providing some key control action that would quickly switch the camera into a new position based on the player's current movement input. I don't believe this is as complicated or controversial an issue as everyone is making it out to be.
 
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maybe. still a completely unnecessary change.

Just wondering, why do you care so much that the option is going to be hidden? you'll still be able to use it (just like many other features that aren't accessible via the menu) and it's as simple as toggling an option on and off, it just means it won't be there to confuse or scare away new players.
 
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