Competitive Gamming....
MPG|RED HOOK
Join Date: 2012-09-03 Member: 157598Members
Join Date: 2012-09-03 Member: 157598Members
I am just going to leave this here
penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/pro-gaming
penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/pro-gaming
Comments
8->
That was a great video though. I commend Hugh and the commentators that cast NS2 games, but I think they must be very difficult to cast. Starcraft 2 is much easier to both cast and watch, for obvious reasons, and that scene has dedicated observers (cameramen, whatever they're called) to make it easier for the casters to talk.
I think one of the big problems with NS2 casting is that if you play, you know that so much rides on the individual players. The 1st person engagements are captured sometimes, but sometimes missed, and just watching this from the commanders perspective is a bit less than exciting.
Been thinking about this for awhile, but if it were possible to get spectators for each player during a comp/pro match, and cobble together highlight reels or just switch to epic 1st-person moments in a post-production edit, that would be so great.
The other major problem, of course, is that the rules are often too complex for games to work as spectator events. In another Extra Credits video the concept of "elegance" is discussed. Basically, every good game should be easy enough for people to quickly learn how it functions, yet still have room for great amounts of strategy to be derived from that basic rule set, keeping things exciting. Perhaps the greatest example of this is Go, which might be the most elegant game ever created: Go has only two rules, and yet there are a tremendous number of different possible scenarios that can play out (more than there are atoms in the observable universe).
Unfortunately, I would say NS2 doesn't do that hot in either of those categories: it is very complex and it takes a long time for new players to learn everything they need to know, and yet there isn't really that much depth of strategy. Games, strategies, and build orders tend to be pretty much the same at all times. Things have improved since sewlek took over the development, as he's been able to streamline a bunch of things to make the game less needlessly complex while also slightly increasing the depth of strategy, but there's still a looooong way to go in that regard still.
It's much a much more thrilling experience to watch somebody land a twitch shot on a fade, or take down a hive with jetpacks, or do some amazing lerking, if you have a view of what it actually looks like on the player's screen rather than just blips on a birds eye overview of the map. Also, whilst there is a bit of depth to the RTS side of NS2, and it's good to present that, there's also a lot of depth to the FPS play too. With competitive gaming, you need to showcase talent, and it's a lot harder to do this for a niche game that not a lot of people know that well if you present it's RTS side, whereas somebody's incredible aim or fading is immediately noticeable. Sure, there is talent in strategy too, and this should feature in the broadcast and casters should always be talking about what's going on in terms of team movements and strategy, and suggesting potential vulnerabilities a team might the opportunity to exploit and all of that. But there is still simply too much focus on birds-eye view.
I'll concede, however, it may sometimes be difficult to get the first person on the right person at the right time, especially without breaking the flow of the broadcast, as sometimes engagements can even be missed on birds-eye. I personally would suck at just controlling the birds eye camera without having to worry about FPS too. Although, it would be interesting to see somebody attempt to set up a weekly game to record everybody's first person POV, and a birds eye camera too, and go through the footage and mix it all together and really present something awesome. Might miss the live "feel" and the outcome will probably already be known to the competitive community anyway, but it wouldn't really be for the comp scene, but for more casual players and e-sports fans who haven't seen/played/heard-of ns2. You could always have casters record live, use that predominantly, and dub in extra audio if they've missed something. Or even keep the audio and make a joke about it when they do like put a subtitle saying "[casters unaware of what's about to transpire]" while they're ranting on about gorge plushies or something - meanwhile we're seeing a first person cam of a bunch of gorges grouping up outside the marine base for a bile or hydra rush, until we here the casters finally click and explode into the microphone shouting and screaming about it. I'd also like to hear the clans mumble audio mixed in to give an idea of how they're coordinating attacks and stuff, and is another example of something that could be incorporated into the video post game.
Anyway, I think that would be a good idea, as a good competitive game of ns2 can be amazing, but it's not entirely reflected in watching it live. If we had the occasional footage put together after a comp game that really presents it well, and gives you the best view of every single engagement, whilst not neglecting the RTS element too, I would be so happy. I guess the issue is nobody's got the time to do that. And lots of people don't have computers good enough to record and play with a decent framerate, so good luck getting every single member of both clans to record their gameplay footage.
Number two, when you go into first person view you lose any sort of idea of what's going on elsewhere in the game. A lot of times I've seen a caster go into first person view and when he gets out things are drastically different and he hasn't noticed. For example I once saw a caster go into fpv and miss a fade kill somewhere else on the map (when in first person it doesn't give you that "Fade has died" popup)
The best would thing to do would be, as you suggested, having every player in the match record their gameplay and then have someone edit the best bits into a pre-recorded cast. But that would be extremely tiresome and I can imagine a fair number of players would not be happy about being forced to run a recording program in the background.
The technical challenges here would be tough to overcome (you would need some sort of intermediary broadcast server, especially with a game like NS2- and Ideally it would be an SDK or Platform that allowed it to be used or tacked onto a number for games), but it moves us away from trying to replicate an ESPN game and instead Replicating what it is like to attend a game.
edit: For #4 from the video, I made this thread a while back
http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/130620/community#latest
Didn't get much attention
Of course. RedDawg puts out great comp videos.
Was 2000+ (maybe even 3000+) watching live game (sauna vs the snails) last weekend, then the stream died unfortunatly.
Agree with this post 1000%. I think one of the main draws in watching professional sports (not just games) is the exhibition of a high level of individual skill. It's not that working as a team isn't important, it's just that the main rush is from an individual really putting on a show. If you want, you can relate this to the part of the video in the OP where he talks about vicarious enjoyment.
The overhead view gives you a nice view into how the game is progressing, but it's just not very exciting.
I understand it's hard to position yourself on the action in time, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. I think most observers these days pop on quickly and jump off if things aren't exploding in the fear that they're missing action elsewhere. Unfortunately that's the risk you have to take if you want to get a shot at seeing the action from a POV that actually displays individual skill.
Personally I would be 100% fine watching games with just a first-person cam on one of the top players. The RTS element of NS2 is overstated and it might be easy to forget that we actually play all the time in first person while still maintaining awareness of what's going in the game overall. If that means popping up the map / overview occasionally -- so be it. At least we wouldn't be watching all of the action from the nose bleed seats.
To continue the topic, it feels like since the game already supports up to 32 player servers, it wouldn't be too hard to have 1 spectator on each team (to start out) that could pay close attention to the players while the casters do their thing, and jump from hot spots through the match. This would allow the casters to switch to the team cams or whatever, or could even be edited together post-event to showcase the most exciting first-person moments that were captured.
I think that would be a good start, just have 2 players willing to follow a match from either side and try to catch the best moments from 1st person. Better than making the casters try and switch around cameras while keeping track of the larger game and casting simultaneously.
Most casters stick with the top down view for 90% of the time, and occasionally go in first person view during an engagement. I think that's ideal.
One of the issues, or arguments, I'm seeing people bring up is the FP spec mode. I agree - FPV lends more excitement in engagements and more energy to the stream. However, what people are doing is comparing NS2 to Counterstrike. Why don't we just run a cast with FPV on 100% of the time, switching thru players throughout the game? Well - because this game isn't some simple "deathmatch+plant/diffuse a bomb" type gameplay like CS is. It has a plethora of variables going on like map control, resource/economy management, base strikes, counter-attacks, positioning, upgrade/research management, multiple big engagements happening simultaneously, commander micro-management units, map foothold control spots, player timing, ambushes, and many others. A little different from CS's gameplay of: Headshots, plant/diffuse bomb, done.
In my casts, I do try extremely hard to catch FPV fights as much as I can. Most of the people I choose to spec however end up dying; hence my 'deathcam' reference. Lately, I've been doing more free-cam shots of the action, which gets the viewers into the fight holistically. However, the longer one stays in free-cam or FPV; the more battlefield awareness is lost by the caster. I would rather be able to catch a play that changes the entire game and momentum around than catch a marine killing a skulk with a shotgun in FPV. This actually happened to me in my early cast days. People were asking for more FPV, so I did. However, while I was doing that - a counter attack was launched from the losing team which completely changed the game. It was apparently a glorious move and there I was watching a gorge trying to take down 2 marines with his hydras. Suffice to say, the viewers were not happy lol. Learned a good lesson that day in FPV'ing.
One of the points in this video gave me an idea to address the issue. That would be the part about understanding what you're watching. I agree, for a new player who has never seen NS2; it's probably confusing as hell. Heck, during my last Twitch front page cast, someone asked if it was a MOBA lol. To help with this, I've contact ItsSuperEffective to help create a 60 second basic gameplay/overview video for my casts and any other caster that wants to use it. My plan for this video was to use it for my big front page shows; when I have thousands of people in there. I can play this video before and after each round to ensure everyone watching has a basic understanding of the game. They don't need to understand deep gameplay, just what's going on. Hopefully this will help.
Anyway, I've said more than I wanted to here lol. Just my 2 cents. Good discussion so far.
Agreed have designated "camera men" and a producer calling the shots for what to switch to. Reacting to the hosts of course. Obviously this wouldn't be practical for the many, many games that go on throughout the year, but putting in that kind of effort for the finals would be kind of cool.
As far as the tech side of things, I would imagine a bigger game like LoL or SCII would more likely be the kind of place that would develop. But an NS2 fan can dream can't he lol.
I'm not saying it'll never catch on because if a guy like Pewdiepie on youtube can have the most subscribers then maybe enough people will be interested at some point. But then again I equate him to that Fred guy which was just some dork with a voice modulator that kids liked. So maybe those kids will grow up wanting to be famous for playing games, but as of right now the driving force behind wanting to be a professional anything is fortune and fame, and there is really none of that available in the gaming world.
I think there is: http://www.dota2.com/international/home/overview/
I'd take a cool $1,437,190 for playing games professionally....
basically just copy everything DOTA 2 does related to spectating, as it's pretty much perfect.
I don't think anybody's comparing ns2 to counterstrike. And whilst I think the overhead gives a better view of team movements, a lot of which might be lost in first person, I still think that you still get to see a decent amount of whats going on beyond just how the person is aiming or whatever - less is lost than you'd think. It's not like I need an overhead to tell me that somebody's rushing a hive if I'm watching it happening from somebody's POV, but then sure, you run into problems where you may miss a counterrush or whatever.
"I would rather be able to catch a play that changes the entire game and momentum around than catch a marine killing a skulk with a shotgun in FPV"
It's not really about catching a random twitch shot, but getting a closer glimpse into those gamechanging plays when they happen. I can enjoy watching competitive ns2 purely on it's strategic elements alone without necessarily needing the action to keep me interested, but there's a certain amount of frustration that occurs when you see a group of alien blips mash into a group of marine blips, and a bunch of blips disappear and I'm just thinking WTF JUST HAPPENED. I know the outcome of the engagement, but not much about how it all went down.
You're right reddog about how unfeasable it is at the moment to incorporate FPS anymore than it already is, so i'd take everything I say with a grain of salt - I understand that not much can be done, and I'd rather you and all the other casters just keep on doing what they're doing instead of forcing more of something that doesn't really work. In my ideal stream overhead would be on most of the time anyway, even if i'd prefer just a little bit more FPS.
I think an interesting thing to experiment with for live casting might be multiple cameramen. One focusing on the primary overhead feed, and one only rarely used, searching the first person mode for good moments to highlight occasional engagements in FPS mode for the feed to cut into every now and then. Would solve a lot of problems with not getting the first person spec in the right place at the right time if there's somebody dedicated just to finding footage and giving you the greenlight to feature it at your discretion. A replay system would be amazing (that way if anything particularly interesting happened in an engagement that was missed it can always be referred back to) but that's only a pipe dream.
Anyway, apologies if anything came across as completely unintelligible - it's early in the morning and I haven't slept.
I have only watched DOTA 2 Streamed, I have never "attended" a competitive match through the game (is that really a thing?) in which case, yes that.
I think the NS2 spectating experience is actually pretty great as is, the problem is the streaming experience. If someone could provide the same spectating interface and experience when you are connected to the server while also adding casters and a "Primary Camera" that the spectators have the option of giving over control to, it would be really awesome. Also adding an instant replay function would be awesome too... although again, all that would be INCREADIBLY technically challenging. The other caveat would have to be accessibility, twitch.tv provides a forum to view these games without owning them, so either an entire new service or a version of the game that is free just for spectating competitive matches.
This suggests there be multiple people to act as a unit to do the broadcasting...
Something like...2 camera men going for close action who divide up the map, and 1 dedicated to top-down view.
and one guy to control the feed from the other 3...
Perhaps, the default view is in top-down view, when say a battle happens, this view is used for the whole event. Meanwhile the close up camera men is recording a mix of floating or first person view. When the action ends, the feed switches to the camera with the best shot. This is seen often in many sports games like Soccer cups, etc.
Of course this would require a broadcasting control room :P
What I'm saying is, if there was a way to have multiple people (spectators) cameras to stream their feed (not publicly visible) to 1 guy (producer) he can then choose the flow of what gets shown, what camera gets swapped to, etc.
I don't have the technical terms or in-depth knowledge on this topic, but I hope you all know what I mean.
I think Youtube can actually do this when I was experimenting with it.
The other alternative is to create something like HLTV. It's a bot that sits in spectator, that streams the game's telemetry to an external load balanced service. People would then tune into that and have all the control at their fingertips. This obviously would require programming be done, so the top option may be more likely...
How, from two different casters, can we get this to work? I don't know that's not my technical knowledge, but if Skype can do it, there must be a way. A small delay on the 1st person cam is not a big deal, as long as the top-down view comes first so as to not spoil the action.