Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[CobaltKobold]

I know we have fully-3d (visualfortress), isometric (stonesense), and some in-between.

Presently the format I'm thinking of is like Might and Magic (before VI) where you move at right angles and everything's prerendered planes, like M&M3: Isles of Terra, or Arcana (SNES), Phantasy Star 1, or a host of others.

Question 1: What is this style of rendering called? "First-person perspective" is what a little research yields, but I want to know what the term is specifically that would exclude D°°M, etc. if one exists.
edit2: Think it's "Fixed first-person perspective"
Question 2: Does a DF visualiser exist for this (for Adventure mode, I'm mainly considering)?

[Deon]

Adventurer mode has no "facing" thus the best you can get is a "randomly rotated" First Person view. The best usable thing you can get is an isometric perspective, and I often use Stonesense for it (to understand my surrounding landscape better and to see creatures nearby, for example when I need to find a person in a town, or a dwarven mayor in a mountain hall, or a dragon in a cave).

[CobaltKobold]

Well, not "random" but you could control it without cost to the adventurer, looking whiche'er way.

[Deon]

I meant random in comparison to the actual movement. Of course it's possible to control the camera rotation .

[CobaltKobold]

Unfortunately to be properly 'useful' it would need to have diagonal look/move too. Which would roughly double the art resources needed if done in the old manner.

[Deon]

Double art resources? If you make it 3d, then there's no problem .

[CobaltKobold]

Yeah, but then the entire effect is covered by VF or the like with some minor restrictions on camera location/orientation.

[Jay]

Adventurer mode has no "facing" thus the best you can get is a "randomly rotated" First Person view. The best usable thing you can get is an isometric perspective, and I often use Stonesense for it (to understand my surrounding landscape better and to see creatures nearby, for example when I need to find a person in a town, or a dwarven mayor in a mountain hall, or a dragon in a cave).

It does.
Whatever direction you're moving, that's what direction you're facing.
Whatever direction you're attacking in, that's what direction you're facing.
That's how others get attacks "from behind".

[Cavalcadeofcats]

no

please

not this argument again

(A fixed first-person perspective could be interesting, but it's not really to my tastes. Still, eight directions per sprite isn't really that many. Seems like it could work.)

[Deon]

Yeah, thanks Cavalcadeofcats, now I don't need to look for those posts .

Toady One stated that there's no way to read the direction at all for now, and "attack direction" is a temporary parameter which is a clever workaround, nothing else.

You can simulate it of course but then you will have crazy camera which turns around with your every move, and is it good? I'd prefer at least "working" isometric view.

Still, eight directions per sprite isn't really that many

Do you mean stonesense-style sprites? I actually prefer 3d visualizers, but for each his own . Also as I said it's easier, because you don't have to redraw every object 4 times. Still different styles are nice (but you can simulate a "drawn" look with a cell-shading anyway).

P.S. It's funny how we craved for real 3d objects in the times of  Doom and Duke 3d, and now we want it backwards . Ah, the strangeness of the human likes and dislikes .