What to do about special animation features

[zookeeper]

There have been big improvements in the animation engine allowing many new kinds of animations to potentially be implemented, such as directional attack animations (a bit older) and directional standing frames (very new). The capabilities of the engine are now big enough that I think it's time to start thinking about guidelines about what should and should not be done in mainline.

The fundamental problem is that if only a few arbitrary units implement some special animations, like a standing animation, the game will as a whole simply look more inconsistent and worse. This is because the player will immediately see that such and such animations can be done, but for some reason 99% of the units don't have them and are thus visibly incomplete. I don't think this is a good thing. If the case is standing animations, then it will simply look wrong that some units move in place (even if it's just a feather) while some don't. If the case is directional standing frames, it will look very wrong, for which I hope to be obvious reasons. If every unit, or even the majority of units, had the animation then obviously it would be fine, since the art would be internally consistent.

If something like directional standing animations (or just directional standing frames, whichever) will start to get in, then the unit art will stay in a highly inconsistent state probably forever, or at least for the next several years (I'd guess over 5). As nice it is to think that this can be solved by training more people to be able to draw unit graphics, the sheer number of units in the game still makes it really unrealistic to be able to finish the task. Something like Warcraft II, for example, probably had at most a few dozen units (I don't really remember), whereas Wesnoth has a few hundred. I'd rather see the game as polished and consistent as possible as opposed to a sort of a sketchbook that showcases a flashy animation here and there while leaving the overall appearance ragged. The latter doesn't make the game any more enjoyable.

Even if Wesnoth is OSS and all that, I don't think it's good to keep everything as "work in progress" forever by starting projects that are very unrealistic to ever be finished. Instead, clear and achievable goals should be set, such as getting basic attack animations for all units, or TC'ing all possible units. I'm not necessarily suggesting that adding new types of animations such as directional standing frames or whatever is a bad idea as such, but I also believe they shouldn't be added to mainline until a reasonable amount of units could have them. For example, they could be developed in a separate branch.

So, I'd basically want some sort of decisions about what kind of animations and other unit graphics candy should be allowed in mainline, so mainline doesn't become an aforementioned-like "sketch book". And if making hard decisions is too difficult, then at least some discussion about this would probably be healthy.

[freim]

I share the same sentiment. Put movement anims and directional anims on hold for now and don't put just a few of them in. This is better to add as batches.

Of course people are free to work on whatever they want, but I still believe in trying to strive for consistency and completeness in mainline.

[Darth Fool]

I am not sure that I agree with this, although I do understand the sentiment. Certainly for the upcoming stable release this is true, but there is an advantage to having even a few sample animations in the mainline. People who see the animation and wonder why there aren't more sometimes decide that this is the sort of task that they can do, and thus we gain contributions that fill the animation need. I grant you that for any particular animation, what is needed is someone that has the skill to do the animations, and the will to plug away at them one by one. Such an individual actually has more value than just their own effort because their work inspires others to contribute and they can take the lead on deciding when the other contributions are worthy of commital. This is in fact how many of our current developers got to be developers.

Now, in particular, I don't like the feather standing animation for the duelist. If any units were the first to be given standing animations, I would think that it should be the goblin pillager and any other unit with fire, since fire looks strange when frozen in time.

Perhaps what is needed is an ordering of the animations for a given unit. For example, adding animations without TCing first is wasted effort. Directional attacks probably should come after getting directional standing frames.

A first crack at the order should be something like:
1) TC base standing frame
2) base attack animation
3) base defense animation
4) base leading/healing and other specials
5) directional standing
6) directional attack
7) directinal defense
directional movement

Have I forgot something? Or should something be moved?

Anyway, I don't think that we should reject good animations for some unit just because we don't have enough other units with that animation. Art that does not get used soon after completion often gets forgotten, and the artist may well leave without the encouragement of seeing their work in game. Besides, we can always declare the rare unit that has some animation that few others have to be an Easter Egg.

[freim]

Now, in particular, I don't like the feather standing animation for the duelist.

I made this as a test frame for boucman. I never tested it myself and didn't know boucman intended to commit it. It should be replaced.

Anyway, I don't think that we should reject good animations for some unit just because we don't have enough other units with that animation. Art that does not get used soon after completion often gets forgotten, and the artist may well leave without the encouragement of seeing their work in game. Besides, we can always declare the rare unit that has some animation that few others have to be an Easter Egg.

We could have them in trunk, but still decide to disable some stuff when releasing a stable version (although I don't really like this solution). Consistency and completeness gives a better overall feel than a few extra flashy anims which only makes people realise 95% of the units lack them.

I also don't see it as realistic to finish some 5,6,7 and 8 in any reasonable timeframe and I fear it will only become an endless time sink which will delay the overall completeness and burn out the art devs involved. Being an Open Source project doesn't exlude us showing some sense of whats realistic to accomplish.

[scott]

1) TC base standing frame
2) base attack animation
3) base defense animation
3a) death animations
4) base leading/healing and other specials
4a) portraits
4b) base standing animations
6->5) directional attack
6) directional defense
8->7) directional movement
5->8) directional standing

All I would recommend is that the field be kept open but keep emphasis on the earlier priorities. I don't think having just one or two animations of a certain type (especially if they're a proof-of-concept) destroys the feel.

Having half-done and half-not-done is more noticeable, but as long as it's being actively worked on it's fine. Thus, something like missing portraits is far more noticeable than the spearman's directional attack frames.

Despite some contributors' best efforts to ignore him, Jetryl is giving fine direction as to what he wants done. As far as I can see he's concentrating on 1-4.


I don't remember when directional standing animations became an official priority... and I assume it means that units would all be standing in different orientations at any one time based on where their last interaction was... but I think this would be a complete disaster should players ever assume or expect there to be a gameplay implication of units facing in various directions.

[torangan]

Despite some contributors' best efforts to ignore him, Jetryl is giving fine direction as to what he wants done. As far as I can see he's concentrating on 1-4.

I think this is the most important part. Make it clear and obvious which type of contributions is wanted most strongly and provide feedback on things posted for those areas as soon as (resaonably) possible. Looking at the progress with attack icons and TC frames it looks very much like clearly stated goals draw in the highest number of usefull contributions.
Just stating - provide some of the missing animations - isn't nearly as usefull IMHO.

[Darth Fool]

I don't remember when directional standing animations became an official priority... and I assume it means that units would all be standing in different orientations at any one time based on where their last interaction was... but I think this would be a complete disaster should players ever assume or expect there to be a gameplay implication of units facing in various directions.

As the capability to do this has only been recently introduced, it is not a very high priority. I haven't tested in game, but my understanding was that this was to be used as the basic frame during combat so that a unit didn't have to turn around to attack, come back to face S, turn to defend, come back to face s, etc... rather, the unit turns to face the combat, and in between attack and defend animations returns to the standing frame in the direction that it is facing. At the end of combat it would return to its default standing animation. At least, that is how I thought it was going to work, Boucman can answer for sure. If that is how it works than the directional standing, directional attacking and directional defense all really need to be done at once. My impression about the directional stuff is that some units naturally need it more than others. I do agree that generally it is less important than what is currently being worked on. For it to be really used we would need someone to take charge of it who is skilled enough to do the work and has the desire to coordinate the effort. I doubt that we will have such an individual before 1-4 is closer to being done.

[Boucman]

since I'm the one who added the feature, here is my stand on it

I will NOT remove directional standing animation, or directional movement or any other capability...


the animation code has been simplified and streamlined a lot. directional standing is only a consequence of "standing anims work like all other anims and use the same code"

so disabling the standing directional anim is not removing a feature... it's adding one...

now, I'm perfectly fine with a policy that says that these features should not be used at all in 1.2 or reserved for special units (I'm all for easter eggs on special units )

that's especially true for standing directional anims....

[Darth Fool]

since I'm the one who added the feature, here is my stand on it

I will NOT remove directional standing animation, or directional movement or any other capability...


the animation code has been simplified and streamlined a lot. directional standing is only a consequence of "standing anims work like all other anims and use the same code"

so disabling the standing directional anim is not removing a feature... it's adding one...

now, I'm perfectly fine with a policy that says that these features should not be used at all in 1.2 or reserved for special units (I'm all for easter eggs on special units )

that's especially true for standing directional anims....

I don't think we are talking about removing the code but rather just whether we implement any units with it in the mainline. I agree that regardless of whether we use it for units in the mainline the code should not be removed.

[zookeeper]

Indeed, I'm definitely not suggesting removing code support for all kinds of funky things. Those can be of use to user-made content and special characters - I'm merely suggesting a possibly a more strict policy on which of those features to use for the normal mainline units.

As for directional standing animations...I had assumed those were meant to be used all the time, so if you moved a unit to the northeast, he would stop facing northeast and stay that way on the main map. It makes much more sense to have directional standing frames during a fight (if there are directional attack animations, too, of course, not otherwise), so the unit doesn't flip back and forth. However, in that case you'd also need the defense frames to be directional...

[scott]

my understanding was that this was to be used as the basic frame during combat so that a unit didn't have to turn around to attack, come back to face S, turn to defend, come back to face s, etc...

That sounds like a good idea.

I had assumed those were meant to be used all the time, so if you moved a unit to the northeast, he would stop facing northeast and stay that way on the main map.

That doesn't.


So, which is it again?

[Jetrel]

As the capability to do this has only been recently introduced, it is not a very high priority. I haven't tested in game, but my understanding was that this was to be used as the basic frame during combat so that a unit didn't have to turn around to attack, come back to face S, turn to defend, come back to face s, etc... rather, the unit turns to face the combat, and in between attack and defend animations returns to the standing frame in the direction that it is facing.

Yeah - this is the problem that that is intended to fix, and it was a natural outgrowth of the ability to have directional attacking animations.

I don't really care whether it gets used for normal standing frames or not - though that might be worth experimenting with _after_ they are all done.



As for the walking animations, I'd been thinking about this myself, and had actually sent an email to Boucman about this - I'd been meaning to forward it to the list, but hadn't gotten around to it yet. Basically, I think that walking animations should get added to the "Advanced Options" tab, and should be off by default.

The user class that would muck around in such a place looking to get more out of their wesnoth, would also be precisely the same group that would be willing to contribute more of them.

Not to mention that this could solve any and all arguments between those who don't want to wait for walking animations to play decently, and those who would like the units to move slower, but animate more fluidly. Right now we're at somewhat of an impasse between those two camps (really, between Dave and I, respectively), and this looks to be the most sensible way to resolve that, since the option would make such a clean win-win situation.

[Boucman]

I had assumed those were meant to be used all the time, so if you moved a unit to the northeast, he would stop facing northeast and stay that way on the main map.

That doesn't.


So, which is it again?[/quote]


that's what it does, if a unit is moved north-east, it will stay facing north east from that point onward...


as for jumping back to a non-directional standing frame... this was a bug and has been fixed. units now move directly from the (directional) attack animation to the (directional) defense animation, they don't show their (directional) standing animation in the middle

[freim]

Basically, I think that walking animations should get added to the "Advanced Options" tab, and should be off by default.

I'm in favor of this solution.

[Boucman]

removing moving animation is another question... one that we are still discussing and are not sure how to fix yet.