[Mystic]

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 09:42 AM, said:

Well, you can say that, but it doesn't change the fact that you've made something that looks like a duck but only sort of quacks like one. What you are suggesting is less a fix and more of a workaround for what should be seen as a significant issue />/>/>

WASD is "pro-mode" but not everyone wants that. I certainly don't!

Honestly, the issue is more that we've made something that CAN sort of quack like a duck and because of people's expectations, they set up the controls that way and find the controls heavily lacking. I do agree that the controller support could use some work, but playing the game in analog mode is like trying to play Super Mario 64 in an emulator with only a keyboard. Sure, you can do it, but it'll be painfully clear your controls are suboptimal. Analog mode is slippery and has a camera bad enough that we jokingly compare it to Sonic Adventure's camera. In retrospect I kinda wish analog never existed so people came in with a blank slate and we could sculpt people's understanding of the controls without expectations that it'll work like Sonic Adventure.

SRB2 really is an entirely different animal and I don't consider using FPS controls to be "pro mode" as much as actually using an analog stick to play SM64 like it was designed for. You're welcome to play it with analog, but just remember that it's suboptimal when you encounter things that seem more difficult than they ought to be.

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

The game just quit to desktop in the middle of Deep Sea Zone Act 1. (OpenGL, Windowed mode) I got crushed, restarted from a checkpoint near the first room with the bomb-dropping surface skimming robots. Kept going, fell in to the water in a section with a lot of Detons (?) after losing the magnet shield. Tails got hit by one, and the game immediately closed.

This is fixed in the 2.1.1 patch posted earlier in the thread. Update your copy and that crash won't happen.

winterhell, on 16 March 2014 - 10:06 AM, said:

Analogue control does not have much of a reason to mess with the networking code. For the direction you are probably using at least 3 bits(8 directions),so if you increase it to 8 bits you can have 256 degrees. Position wise, you can be at the same spot with 8 and with 256 directions, so that variable does not have to change.

The reason analog mode doesn't work in netplay at all is because the camera, and all the variables attached to the camera, are client-side. The server of the game does not have any knowledge of how you've chosen to display your view, which works fine for the normal control scheme because it doesn't care about the camera's location. Analog mode uses the camera's position to determine which direction your movement keys correspond to. Since the server doesn't know where your camera is positioned, it's impossible for the server to know which direction your inputs would correspond to. This is why analog doesn't work in netplay, and it's impossible to fix this without completely rewriting the netcode to transfer camera information.

[Tiller]

How the hell do I get past that one part of Egg Rock where you have to roll under something on a moving platform. No matter if I tap rolling once I get under the ledge it shoots me off into the electric wall next to the emerdude and you get knockbacked into the pit? After that gravity room ate my lives this finally got me to waste my first continue. Then I realized I wasn't playing on a saved game so I gotta do it over again.

I played this before but had massive issues with graphical errors and inverted random colors, but running it in window has fixed those problems from the last time. Finally sitting down with it properly, and it is fun as all hell.

[BlazeHedgehog]

Mystic, on 16 March 2014 - 03:25 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 09:42 AM, said:

Well, you can say that, but it doesn't change the fact that you've made something that looks like a duck but only sort of quacks like one. What you are suggesting is less a fix and more of a workaround for what should be seen as a significant issue />/>

WASD is "pro-mode" but not everyone wants that. I certainly don't!

Honestly, the issue is more that we've made something that CAN sort of quack like a duck and because of people's expectations, they set up the controls that way and find the controls heavily lacking. I do agree that the controller support could use some work, but playing the game in analog mode is like trying to play Super Mario 64 in an emulator with only a keyboard. Sure, you can do it, but it'll be painfully clear your controls are suboptimal. Analog mode is slippery and has a camera bad enough that we jokingly compare it to Sonic Adventure's camera. In retrospect I kinda wish analog never existed so people came in with a blank slate and we could sculpt people's understanding of the controls without expectations that it'll work like Sonic Adventure.

SRB2 really is an entirely different animal and I don't consider using FPS controls to be "pro mode" as much as actually using an analog stick to play SM64 like it was designed for. You're welcome to play it with analog, but just remember that it's suboptimal when you encounter things that seem more difficult than they ought to be.

I think analog mode is absolutely fine. The camera sucks, but given the nature of the Doom engine it's not as though I find myself wishing I could look up or down often; levels do not seem to be built with the type of verticality that makes me wish I could see what was above me. SRB2 largely deals in flat planes, so levels get viewed as a series of "floors". Like 2nd floor, 1st floor, basement, etc. It would be better if I had more traditional stick-based camera controls, certainly, but I've been playing with analog mode exclusively since it was introduced and it's actually, seriously never been a problem for me.

The opinions you hold about it are also probably hurting the appeal of the game. I say it every SAGE, but Sonic is a console game character, there are standards regarding those kinds of controls, and straying from them will just make people frustrated. It makes me frustrated. It's not just that people come in expecting Sonic Adventure, people come in expecting the entire, 20-year-old 3D platformer genre. Everyone comes in expecting a motorbike and you hand them a unicycle, saying "Trust me, it's more maneuverable."

Gamepads on the PC are a thing now, because if you have bluetooth and any "modern" game console, then chances are you can tether a controller to your computer. It's no longer a niche you can just brush aside for your weird non-standardly functional solution. As somebody who's used analog mode all this time, trust me, SRB2 isn't that different of an animal outside of multiplayer (and maybe the eternally frustrating, high-specific EggRock Zone)

Heck, there's games being sold on Steam now that only function if you have a controller; they absolutely will not take keyboard or mouse input whatsoever. Gotta get with the times.

Mystic, on 16 March 2014 - 03:25 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

The game just quit to desktop in the middle of Deep Sea Zone Act 1. (OpenGL, Windowed mode) I got crushed, restarted from a checkpoint near the first room with the bomb-dropping surface skimming robots. Kept going, fell in to the water in a section with a lot of Detons (?) after losing the magnet shield. Tails got hit by one, and the game immediately closed.

This is fixed in the 2.1.1 patch posted earlier in the thread. Update your copy and that crash won't happen.

My mistake; I figured the torrent linked in the OP had everything.

This post has been edited by BlazeHedgehog: 16 March 2014 - 05:07 PM

[.Luke]

Mystic, on 16 March 2014 - 03:25 PM, said:

Honestly, the issue is more that we've made something that CAN sort of quack like a duck and because of people's expectations, they set up the controls that way and find the controls heavily lacking. I do agree that the controller support could use some work, but playing the game in analog mode is like trying to play Super Mario 64 in an emulator with only a keyboard. Sure, you can do it, but it'll be painfully clear your controls are suboptimal. Analog mode is slippery and has a camera bad enough that we jokingly compare it to Sonic Adventure's camera. In retrospect I kinda wish analog never existed so people came in with a blank slate and we could sculpt people's understanding of the controls without expectations that it'll work like Sonic Adventure.

SRB2 really is an entirely different animal and I don't consider using FPS controls to be "pro mode" as much as actually using an analog stick to play SM64 like it was designed for. You're welcome to play it with analog, but just remember that it's suboptimal when you encounter things that seem more difficult than they ought to be.

That's kinda the problem, virtually nothing is difficult to pull off with analog mode; (I can breeze through both Egg Rock acts easily with analog.) it all depends on your play style. Multiplayer is where I think analog would be more of a hindrance because of the nature of shooting and aiming. I do tons of running and jumping as any character but Sonic in single player, so I need proportional controls and the ability to rotate the camera; that allows me to see and observe everything about the platforms around me. People who get around by thoking and ridiculously well-timed jumps, on the other hand, won't have need for any of that.

If analog never existed, I wouldn't have kept SRB2 after the first five minutes I spent fumbling around with the control settings. Non-analog felt slippery, slow turning like a tank, watching the character wobble unnaturally while strafing, and seeing the camera lag behind your every move, didn't feel too good. For all of SRB2's excellent presentation, coding, and music, I felt like I was playing a twitchy, clunky Doom mod that could have been scripted together without compiling modified builds of the engine. For some older players, it won't feel ancient to them, but it did for me.

Given all that, I'd like to know what makes the analog camera so terrible. I can actually make SRB2's camera do what I want, instead of wrestling for dominance with it like in Sonic Adventure. The animations simply aren't timed properly with the player's movement, (Hard to pull off in a high speed platformer, I know.) like in the classic Sonic games, so of course it's slippery. The game has much bigger problems outside of keyboard/mouse versus analog that make both control schemes horrible in their own ways.

tl;dr, you have no sense of traction regardless of your preferences, none at all, so you either deal with it, or screw it and go first-person. However, I've learned to put up with it because everything else about the game outshines that, and I think it speaks volumes for SRB2, honestly.

[sonicblur]

Finally got around to playing it, now that I've built myself a working copy.

I love the Jello in THZ, that is a pretty neat change. I don't think I actually finished 2.0.1, (don't remember anything after the desert zone) so I'm hoping I get around to finishing this one.
Congratulations on the new release!

[W.A.C.]

winterhell, on 16 March 2014 - 10:06 AM, said:

Analogue control does not have much of a reason to mess with the networking code. For the direction you are probably using at least 3 bits(8 directions),so if you increase it to 8 bits you can have 256 degrees. Position wise, you can be at the same spot with 8 and with 256 directions, so that variable does not have to change.

Movement wise it should be pretty straightforward, depending on how the engine is coded.

pos.x+=cos(stigckAngle)*currentVelocity;
pos.z+=sin(stickAngle)*currentVelocity;

Has anybody tried this code or made a code to improve the analog controls? I'm an idiot with coding, so I have no idea how to implement something like that.

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

• Did the Green Flower Zone boss really need the second phase with the spike balls? The timing window for hitting him is ultra-specific now and in my opinion, way too complicated for the first boss of the game. Maybe drop it down from 4 to 2 or even 1.

I really like the changes to the first boss. I feel like it makes it less repetitive and more interesting.

.Luke, on 16 March 2014 - 03:12 PM, said:

Oh God, Xpadder. I loved it dearly before it stopped being freeware, but SRB2's analog mode is still 2x smoother than emulating mouse movement in Xpadder.

SRB2's analog mode with the official controller support doesn't work as well for me as having it emulate a mouse. Are you able to go in more than eight directions?

Mystic, on 16 March 2014 - 03:25 PM, said:

Honestly, the issue is more that we've made something that CAN sort of quack like a duck and because of people's expectations, they set up the controls that way and find the controls heavily lacking. I do agree that the controller support could use some work, but playing the game in analog mode is like trying to play Super Mario 64 in an emulator with only a keyboard. Sure, you can do it, but it'll be painfully clear your controls are suboptimal. Analog mode is slippery and has a camera bad enough that we jokingly compare it to Sonic Adventure's camera. In retrospect I kinda wish analog never existed so people came in with a blank slate and we could sculpt people's understanding of the controls without expectations that it'll work like Sonic Adventure.

If the game never had analog mode, I don't think I would've ever gotten into the game, especially back in early 2003 where I never played an FPS in my life. Considering how controller support is pretty much the norm now for platformers on PC, any chance you guys might make improvements to it like going in more than 8 directions and a much better camera system? It's evident in this thread that there's definitely a demand for it. For the camera, I mostly use my DualShock 4's L2 and R2 buttons which is nowhere near as fast or sensitive compared to when I have XPadder emulate the mouse based camera with the default controls.

[BlazeHedgehog]

W.A.C., on 16 March 2014 - 06:55 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

• Did the Green Flower Zone boss really need the second phase with the spike balls? The timing window for hitting him is ultra-specific now and in my opinion, way too complicated for the first boss of the game. Maybe drop it down from 4 to 2 or even 1.

I really like the changes to the first boss. I feel like it makes it less repetitive and more interesting.

Yeah, but look at like, the first boss of Sonic 2. Or Sonic CD. First bosses don't usually need to be so complex or difficult.

I spent several minutes trying to figure out the timing to get the last hit in on him and I couldn't find it; I got lucky and he just happened to fly in to me (from the sky, where I couldn't even reach him) when I was jumping trying to re-collect a lost ring.

[W.A.C.]

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 07:26 PM, said:

Yeah, but look at like, the first boss of Sonic 2. Or Sonic CD. First bosses don't usually need to be so complex or difficult.

I never thought those boss battles were that great.

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 07:26 PM, said:

I spent several minutes trying to figure out the timing to get the last hit in on him and I couldn't find it; I got lucky and he just happened to fly in to me (from the sky, where I couldn't even reach him) when I was jumping trying to re-collect a lost ring.

My biggest problem with the boss was the slowness of the camera. If the camera could function a lot faster in analog mode, it would've helped a lot.

[BlazeHedgehog]

W.A.C., on 16 March 2014 - 07:47 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 07:26 PM, said:

Yeah, but look at like, the first boss of Sonic 2. Or Sonic CD. First bosses don't usually need to be so complex or difficult.

I never thought those boss battles were that great.

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 07:26 PM, said:

I spent several minutes trying to figure out the timing to get the last hit in on him and I couldn't find it; I got lucky and he just happened to fly in to me (from the sky, where I couldn't even reach him) when I was jumping trying to re-collect a lost ring.

My biggest problem with the boss was the slowness of the camera. If the camera could function a lot faster in analog mode, it would've helped a lot.

They aren't really meant to be great bosses, though. Not in the sense that they are epic, protracted battles for your life. First bosses are there to act as your introduction to the concept of bosses. To say, "here is an enemy that requires multiple hits in order to be defeated".

Nobody remembers the first bottomless pit in 1-1 Super Mario Bros., but it's still just as important that it exists, y'know?

[W.A.C.]

I suppose, but I don't feel the boss is too complex as an introductory boss battle. First half has you dodging lasers and the second half has you dodging spike balls. You're doing something similar for each phase but there's enough of a difference to prevent the fight from feeling repetitive. It also introduces you to how boss battles tend to vary things up in the second half of a fight.

This post has been edited by W.A.C.: 16 March 2014 - 07:57 PM

[Candescence]

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 05:06 PM, said:

Heck, there's games being sold on Steam now that only function if you have a controller; they absolutely will not take keyboard or mouse input whatsoever. Gotta get with the times.

No, that's called 'making a shitty PC port'. Having gamepad support is fine, but making a game without keyboard/mouse input on PC is inexcusable and makes the developer look like a lazy hack.

This post has been edited by Candescence: 16 March 2014 - 08:14 PM

[LordOfSquad]

Wow, the new Techno Hill is great! I had a ton of fun playing through it. On to Deep Sea.

[BlazeHedgehog]

Candescence, on 16 March 2014 - 08:13 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 05:06 PM, said:

Heck, there's games being sold on Steam now that only function if you have a controller; they absolutely will not take keyboard or mouse input whatsoever. Gotta get with the times.

No, that's called 'making a shitty PC port'. Having gamepad support is fine, but making a game without keyboard/mouse input on PC is inexcusable and makes the developer look like a lazy hack.

Go ahead then, tell me how Brothers would work on a keyboard and mouse.

That game is explicitly and exclusively designed around twin analog sticks. Period.

[Morph]

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 08:22 PM, said:

Go ahead then, tell me how Brothers would work on a keyboard and mouse.

That game is explicitly and exclusively designed around twin analog sticks. Period.

That game is in the minority. I personally can't recall a single game that has only gamepad support that wasn't the result of a bad PC port.

[Candescence]

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 08:22 PM, said:

Candescence, on 16 March 2014 - 08:13 PM, said:

BlazeHedgehog, on 16 March 2014 - 05:06 PM, said:

Heck, there's games being sold on Steam now that only function if you have a controller; they absolutely will not take keyboard or mouse input whatsoever. Gotta get with the times.

No, that's called 'making a shitty PC port'. Having gamepad support is fine, but making a game without keyboard/mouse input on PC is inexcusable and makes the developer look like a lazy hack.

Go ahead then, tell me how Brothers would work on a keyboard and mouse.

That game is explicitly and exclusively designed around twin analog sticks. Period.

Protip: Brothers has perfectly fine built-in keyboard controls. WASD, arrow keys, and any comfortable adjacent keys for actions. That's it. You can even rebind them. Not sure why the hell the Steam page claims it doesn't.

This post has been edited by Candescence: 16 March 2014 - 11:18 PM