Topic: The Conduit

[Stogi]

For one, there might be the ability to customize your own category.

And two, "you can only talk to people near you" doesn't specify whether it's throughout the entire multiplayer or just in certain modes, like free-for-all (where it would make the most sense).

[ShyGuy]

Conduit occurs in the age before walkie talkies.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

The exclusion of ear-to-ear radio style chatter is odd.

The proximity system is, different.

If players' voices were subdued according to distance and are a part of the game's positional surround audio, that would be neat and immersive.

First person shooters have gone
1.  No major communication, to
2.  Text chat, then suddenly to
3.  Everyone having a voice and taking up space "on the air waves" aka sending more noise straight to your head/ear

There have been in-betweeny combinations of the above.  I'm not aware of any current in-game chat concepts that take further steps in inserting the player as an entity in the game world, particularly by voice.

Imagine you're camping beyond some corner.  You have opposing players approaching your corner, casually chatting.  Luckily for you, you can easily sense their approach because you can hear/track their voices coming around since the game processes their chat as in-game positional audio objects.  Close people can speak softly, far people can shout like idiots.

Not saying The CondumUnit went this far.  Just, imagine that.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Hopefully there is a team speak (only to people on your team)
and then vicinity speak (those people closest to you).
& like Kashogi was leading towards, those should be determined by the play mode

Imagine you're camping beyond some corner.  You have opposing players approaching your corner, casually chatting.  Luckily for you, you can easily sense their approach because you can hear/track their voices coming around since the game processes their chat as in-game positional audio objects.  Close people can speak softly, far people can shout like idiots.

That sounds really good. Strategize your chater to only moments when you are sure that you aren't being listened to.
or being able to lure someone out of hiding by giving false intentions and positions through chatter.

[EasyCure]

The exclusion of ear-to-ear radio style chatter is odd.

The proximity system is, different.

If players' voices were subdued according to distance and are a part of the game's positional surround audio, that would be neat and immersive.

First person shooters have gone
1.  No major communication, to
2.  Text chat, then suddenly to
3.  Everyone having a voice and taking up space "on the air waves" aka sending more noise straight to your head/ear

There have been in-betweeny combinations of the above.  I'm not aware of any current in-game chat concepts that take further steps in inserting the player as an entity in the game world, particularly by voice.

Imagine you're camping beyond some corner.  You have opposing players approaching your corner, casually chatting.  Luckily for you, you can easily sense their approach because you can hear/track their voices coming around since the game processes their chat as in-game positional audio objects.  Close people can speak softly, far people can shout like idiots.

Not saying The CondumUnit went this far.  Just, imagine that.

Like XIII did with visual ques, just with, well audio

[UltimatePartyBear]

There have been in-betweeny combinations of the above.  I'm not aware of any current in-game chat concepts that take further steps in inserting the player as an entity in the game world, particularly by voice.

One of Tycho's recent posts on Penny Arcade seems relevant.  He talks about the difference between voice communication being part of the game and simply being a chatroom running concurrently.

[NWR_Lindy]

I highly disagree GP, I'm pretty sure we have the same amount of douchey people in the Nintendo fanbase as Sony and MS does. Personal experience sometimes makes these opinions.

You would also have 5-year-old kids, which I'm sure would get annoying as well.

XBL voice chat can get pretty ridiculous, but the user can also completely control it.  In-game muting and ignoring aside, you can easily set it up so that you can only voice chat with people on your friends list.  Yet everybody seems to act like 360 players have NO CHOICE but to listen to 13-year-old douchebags all day.  That's not the case.  And it's not like most 360 games have gameplay that requires group communication anyways, so muting people is usually no loss (which is exactly what UltimatePartyBear is getting at above).

The only reason you have a higher amount of douchebags with XBL is because there's probably ten times as many people playing online at any given time.  Thus, ten times the amount of douchebags.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

"Like XIII did with visual ques, just with, well audio"

Hmm but those were specific videogame-world cues that were meant to grab attention.  I'm thinking of a seamless audio experience meant to mimic natural spatial interpretation.  I want to believe there are gameplay scenarios where other online players aren't just your TV talking to you.

[NWR_Lindy]

As an aside, the one game that I've played that does use voice chat in a sensible manner is SOCOM: Confrontation on PS3.  That's because you literally use voice chat like a walkie-talkie, using R2 (?) as a push-to-talk button.  The game requires coordination, collaboration, and strategy, and the walkie-talkie-style chat is something that makes sense within its game world.  In most first-person shooters, the voice chat is super-annoying and serves no purpose, and is in fact no better than a Skype session between two strangers.

[Snipper64]

Wow! I just heard about that proximity chat, SO cool! you could sneak up and easedrop on battle plans, you could confuse your opponent for talking in one place, and flanking him as he walks aimlessly towds your voice, or better yet, have one person be bait, crying for help, and as three baddies go to find him, you sneak behind and bazooka them.... There are so many options!

I have a personal vendetta against Sega, but this game could Completely change my out look at this party.

[EasyCure]

"Like XIII did with visual ques, just with, well audio"

Hmm but those were specific videogame-world cues that were meant to grab attention.  I'm thinking of a seamless audio experience meant to mimic natural spatial interpretation.  I want to believe there are gameplay scenarios where other online players aren't just your TV talking to you.

I should of rephrased it as "but better" and not "just audio"; True immersion that devs are too lazy to work on, so we'll never see it implimented.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Wow! I just heard about that proximity chat, SO cool! you could sneak up and easedrop on battle plans, you could confuse your opponent for talking in one place, and flanking him as he walks aimlessly towds your voice, or better yet, have one person be bait, crying for help, and as three baddies go to find him, you sneak behind and bazooka them.... There are so many options!

I have a personal vendetta against Sega, but this game could Completely change my out look at this party.

You're jumping to conclusions.  We have no clue it really works that way.  All it might be is an invisible box that determines if you can group chat with someone to or not at all.  If a map has only 6 players in it, does that mean you can communicate with all 6 regardless of distance?  Is there a specific distance required?  We don't know.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

As an aside, the one game that I've played that does use voice chat in a sensible manner is SOCOM: Confrontation on PS3.  That's because you literally use voice chat like a walkie-talkie, using R2 (?) as a push-to-talk button.  The game requires coordination, collaboration, and strategy, and the walkie-talkie-style chat is something that makes sense within its game world.  In most first-person shooters, the voice chat is super-annoying and serves no purpose, and is in fact no better than a Skype session between two strangers.

This was common in the late 90s with PC gaming, where helper programs like Roger Wilco allowed walkie-talkie style chat.  A lot of solutions were trying to make a name for themselves, since many in-game voice methods sucked ass.  It was a time before broadband had widespread usage, so we didn't yet see any leading standards.

[ShyGuy]

As long as I can scream "L2P N00B" it's all good. I remember when voice chat first came around in Counter Strike. It wasn't really used productively.

[UltimatePartyBear]

And it's not like most 360 games have gameplay that requires group communication anyways, so muting people is usually no loss (which is exactly what UltimatePartyBear is getting at above).

Not really.  Tycho was lamenting that system-wide voice chat overrode more immersive uses of voice, such as the necessity to capture towers in Chromehounds to extend your in-game radio's range.  I think the point is that being able or unable to communicate with other players could have as much of an impact on gameplay as being able or unable to shoot them.  That's a game design opportunity that system-wide voice chat has simply nullified.

[Dirk Temporo]

As an aside, the one game that I've played that does use voice chat in a sensible manner is SOCOM: Confrontation on PS3.  That's because you literally use voice chat like a walkie-talkie, using R2 (?) as a push-to-talk button.

I don't see how that's any more sensible than voice-activated chat.

Anyway, if I can't communicate with people on my team, I'm going to be incredibly disappointed.

Of course, I probably shouldn't care since I'm still put off by the whole WiiSpeak thing anyway. What the hell is so hard about a headset?

[Plugabugz]

I like the idea of proximity based chat but unless the wii speak module is wireless all that will happen is the mic will pick up the vibrations from the wii on my desk and not actually me talking 6-7 feet away.

[Dirk Temporo]

In theory you're supposed to put WiiSpeak on top of your display.

Either way I still wish there was a headset.

[Flames_of_chaos]

I like the idea of proximity based chat but unless the wii speak module is wireless all that will happen is the mic will pick up the vibrations from the wii on my desk and not actually me talking 6-7 feet away.

Wii Speak has a noise canceling tech in it so the only issue is if you put the microphone in front of a speaker or if you have a loud surround sound setup.

[Snipper64]

You're jumping to conclusions.  We have no clue it really works that way.  All it might be is an invisible box that determines if you can group chat with someone to or not at all.  If a map has only 6 players in it, does that mean you can communicate with all 6 regardless of distance?  Is there a specific distance required?  We don't know.

Take it easy, I'm just a hopefull kid

Besides I understand the details are not confirmed yet. Just wanted to point out IF it does work that way, many possibilities would be open up. Besides just spamming grenades, there would be a added huge element to the gameplay I have never seen on a FPS such as this one, and kudos to Sega for trying something new *Cough*... Lets hope they made a good choice.

On another note, does anybody have ANY idea how big the on-line maps will be? My guess there will the small, med. and large ones such as in Medal of Honor 2: Hero (A 32 player on-line game for wii that I HIGHLY recremand to anyone looking for a good online battle). I heard of the hospital level for online, sounds like there will be many rooms to hide in, long hallways open for fire, debris, and perhaps an outside? (hopefully). Please post if you know anything

[GoldenPhoenix]

12 players seems to be a fair number. Really the only games that work with a TON of people are games like Battlefield where the maps are massive with tons of different vehicles, classes, and squads.

[BeautifulShy]

I don't know if this was posted or not but June 23rd is the final release date for America. All I have to say is Happy Birthday to me.
June 26th is the Aussie Release date.

[DAaaMan64]

Personally, the online multi sounds great. And not disappointing. Proximity chat could be cool.

[KDR_11k]

Split screen sucks to begin with

Split screen doesn't suck as much as having this great game with multiplayer support and friends over but being unable to play it with them.

That's retarded. That's going to make teamwork completely impossible unless you all gather in your base to discuss your strategy first. What sort of idiot idea is that?

I think that's limited to messages to everybody, team messages would obviously go to your whole team (with 12 players max the 6 closest players on your team are going to be your entire team). Of course it would be kinda cool if you could hear enemy chat if you get close enough to them...

- Team Objective 2: one ASE in a level, grab it and bring it back to your base to score

Yikes, doesn't one flag CTF usually require bringing the flag to the ENEMY base since it's much harder to stop someone who's running away from you than towards you and it should be easier to defend than score? If the enemy base isn't involved whoever holds the center can score as often as they want while going to the enemy base would mean encountering resistance on the way since they respawn there. Also it looks like they split deathmatch with a point and time limit into two modes and have two LMS modes with one being forced to 3 lives...

[rbtr]

I'm pretty sure Killzone 2 has "proximity chat", at least this is what I have gathered from watching my roommate play the game.  And I think I overheard the PS3 guy at work using it as a selling point for something or another. BLU RAYZ HOLD MORE, MORE CONTENTS (textures really...),  MORE GOODLIER GAMES...every time I talk to that guy I get pretty down on videogames...

Either way it's neat.