Proposal for updating the Cave

[MasterDos]

Hello everyone! First of all, congratulations to the KLEI team on the release of the new short film, and also to the entire community of this wonderful game. Thank you!

Since the new developer post was about a small update to the caves, I would like to share my ideas on this matter.

In my opinion, the caves lack one important detail - limiting the player's view. I will try to explain in detail and clearly so that you understand me.

In all the short films that showed the caves, they really look like caves. With a large number of interesting and creepy passages that are limited by conventional walls and a ceiling (like real caves). In these caves, there are various passages, forks, and so on.

In reality, we observe caves almost the same as the mainland on the surface. Yes, there are forks, but we literally see the opposite bank (which is another tunnel of the caves).

In the game, this is shown as a kind of abyss, into which objects can fall, among other things. But is this right? I find an inconsistency in this, and it seems to me that such a fix would benefit the game)

I suggest that the developers consider adding a viewing angle for players in caves. But I don't mean that the view should be in the segment area, as if the character is shining a flashlight. I rather mean that the walls should limit the view.

Approximately as it happens in other games (perhaps these are games where the gameplay is tied to stealth). Of course, the characters have an equal range of view, but if the character is standing behind the wall of the cave (in the tunnel), this should limit the view?

Sorry, I just made this fragment in Photoshop, based on the screenshot above) I have depicted a wall in the background, but I don't yet understand how it might look in the foreground. Or rather, how it should not look.

A similar mechanic could be implemented taking into account high walls and columns - this would diversify the gameplay and make the atmosphere more creepy (just imagine the shadows from the thulecite walls in the village of cave monkeys, I'm scared by the very thought of it)

Another interesting fact is that Winona, with her nightmare side skills, is not able to create bridges between parts of the caves. In my opinion, this is logical, because it is more likely that there should literally be stone walls that do not allow this.

Yes, there is indeed a nuance with the Lazy Explorer. Considering the mechanics I proposed, it simply won't work properly. But I personally don't use the lazy hermit for teleportation while I'm walking around caves. But for example, Wortox will be able to teleport to an ancient pseudo-scientific station without any problems)

I hope that a heated discussion will arise under this topic. In my opinion, this is the place to be in a game with such an atmosphere. And I would like to know the opinion of the developers on this matter. Probably, similar ideas were before and I wonder why this was not implemented.

[Evelo]

This was removed from the initial creation of the cave because of increased hardware requirements, as well as made the caves less enjoyable.
Sorry to burst your hope here. It is possible it is re-implemented, but I doubt it, considering it was removed before.
 

[Mike23Ua]

2 minutes ago, Evelo said:

This was removed from the initial creation of the cave because of increased hardware requirements, as well as made the caves less enjoyable.
Sorry to burst your hope here. It is possible it is re-implemented, but I doubt it, considering it was removed before.
 

This looks ugly as sin… and I would prefer Klei update the “walls” to instead be pits of Lava that we the players can build rope bridges across as long as we put a stake in one side of the map to “claim” it and then place the connecting stakes on the other side to then “Roll” the bridge across the gap.

or basically, take the same animation Klei uses for rolling out and laying down a bed roll and stretch it to make Indiana Jones style rope bridges over the cave gaps.

[Evelo]

Just now, Mike23Ua said:

This looks ugly as sin…

well it was from 2013, and in "pre-alpha". My point was the walls existed in the past but was removed for numerous reasons (that I don't fully remember).

[lowercase skye]

21 minutes ago, Mike23Ua said:

This looks ugly as sin…

It's a screenshot of a bug, they only looked like that for the initial update before being fixed to properly display their textures.

The reason they were removed, to my knowledge, was visibility issues (especially since lots of new players don't even rotate their camera) and the fact that entities would clip into them from certain angles. I think Klei could make it work better NOW though compared to back in 2013.

[Evelo]

14 minutes ago, finn from human said:

It's a screenshot of a bug, they only looked like that for the initial update before being fixed to properly display their textures.

Thx for better images, much appreciated.

[Pruinae]

They could work like The Sims walls maybe

The ones that would be obstructing the view are clipped down

[kipper0k]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2841637965

[DegenerateFurry]

On 8/1/2024 at 9:12 PM, finn from human said:

It's a screenshot of a bug, they only looked like that for the initial update before being fixed to properly display their textures.

The reason they were removed, to my knowledge, was visibility issues (especially since lots of new players don't even rotate their camera) and the fact that entities would clip into them from certain angles. I think Klei could make it work better NOW though compared to back in 2013.

Dagnabbit, you're making me nostalgic. Now I kind of miss the cave walls.

[Echsrick]

On 8/2/2024 at 5:44 AM, Evelo said:

This was removed from the initial creation of the cave because of increased hardware requirements, as well as made the caves less enjoyable.
Sorry to burst your hope here. It is possible it is re-implemented, but I doubt it, considering it was removed before.
 

those pre alpha cave walls....i dont know about you but they do have there own charme...maybe if it was not old 2000 stretched game textures, but they do look kind of more...well...more interesting then just litteraly nothing...maybe if it was only some places had walls and some had the pit

[Jorvalt]

2 hours ago, kipper0k said:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2841637965

According to comments this doesn't work anymore sadly, or at least conflicts with very frequently used mods.

[Cheggf]

I agree, the caves should show walls instead of pits (the pits to my knowledge are non-canon except in the labyrinth and only displayed that way due to claustrophobia complaints caused by the original implementation of the cave walls 10,000 years ago).