Bad Scuba Form and other relevant topics for diving realism
Stiggandr
Between here and there. Join Date: 2015-03-17 Member: 202259Members
Between here and there. Join Date: 2015-03-17 Member: 202259Members
Sorry this has been driving me crazy for a while. If you have fins, you don't use your hands when scuba diving. That's terrible form. It's much less efficient for oxygen conservation. All you use are your fins for propulsion and direction. You only use your hands and arms to very subtle guide yourself around certain areas or make tight changes in direction.
Also if you have a correctly filled neutrally buoyant BC, (which I'm assuming is automatic due to high tech magi-science.) then you don't tread water when you are at rest underwater. In fact, you never tread water when you have a BC. You're either neutral, sinking, or buoyant, and all of that is handled by the BC, no treading necessary.
Those two annoyed me, but these are just side points that could be cool effects for realism.
When you're actually diving, you start to loose colors at depth. A flashlight or bioluminesecense can bring those colors back out.
Red - 15ft
orange - 25ft
Yellow - 35-45ft
Green - 70-75ft
When you're at depth the pressure means that you're taking more air into your lungs with each breath. As a result when you ascend you always want to be breathing out or else risk lung over expansion. When the character ascends it would be a cool effect for them to be breathing out and letting bubbles build up around them.
One thing that I see very experienced divers do, and something that I try to do myself, is to breath out extremely slowly, then to let out the last bit of your air quickly when you're ready for the next breath. For the same reason mentioned above, you never hold your breath underwater, but you still want to prolong your air when underwater and this is one way to do that.
At depth, because of the increased pressure, you take shallower breaths and the air sounds out at a slightly higher pitch.
Sorry if this has been discussed before, I didn't see it during a forum search. If there are any other divers out there with thoughts or suggestions I'd like to hear from them as well!
Also if you have a correctly filled neutrally buoyant BC, (which I'm assuming is automatic due to high tech magi-science.) then you don't tread water when you are at rest underwater. In fact, you never tread water when you have a BC. You're either neutral, sinking, or buoyant, and all of that is handled by the BC, no treading necessary.
Those two annoyed me, but these are just side points that could be cool effects for realism.
When you're actually diving, you start to loose colors at depth. A flashlight or bioluminesecense can bring those colors back out.
Red - 15ft
orange - 25ft
Yellow - 35-45ft
Green - 70-75ft
When you're at depth the pressure means that you're taking more air into your lungs with each breath. As a result when you ascend you always want to be breathing out or else risk lung over expansion. When the character ascends it would be a cool effect for them to be breathing out and letting bubbles build up around them.
One thing that I see very experienced divers do, and something that I try to do myself, is to breath out extremely slowly, then to let out the last bit of your air quickly when you're ready for the next breath. For the same reason mentioned above, you never hold your breath underwater, but you still want to prolong your air when underwater and this is one way to do that.
At depth, because of the increased pressure, you take shallower breaths and the air sounds out at a slightly higher pitch.
Sorry if this has been discussed before, I didn't see it during a forum search. If there are any other divers out there with thoughts or suggestions I'd like to hear from them as well!
Comments
I have an aversion of asking for realism in games, mainly because it's like asking for realism in an impressionist painting-- it just won't happen a lot of the time, and it's like asking the developer(s) to change their mindset
There are plenty of games out there that I don't really find interesting because I"m an expert in what the subject matter is, and it is just a sad imitation of said subject matter (talking about music, you think hating seeing bad diving mechanics are bad, then you are lucky my friend :P ) but I still don't ask for "realism" because it's not really possible to ask people to have the skills required of the subject matter to do it "properly"
now I"ve read a fair number of books on diving, but don't know that much about it anyways:
All I'm going to say for this first reply is: I think talking at all about realism in this game (with its sci-fi elements so strongly established) is kinda weird. I'm probably going to get a lot of angry replies since I know there are a lot of people on the forums that adore diving, and want it properly represented, and that's totally fine-- but this is a forum, and I will post my extreme opinion no matter what :P
Also, color really needs to be in this game, no matter how deep the player goes, unless all the creatures in deep regions are transparent and have no color (which I doubt is the case)
Anyways angry rant over
ALL THAT SAID:
your points are very nice, because they compromise: they don't try and change game mechanics to an absurd degree, quite the opposite- it's just a matter of aesthetics really, which I agree with except the color part (everything else I think would be cool if the devs implemented)
Cheers
is this also valid for Free-Diving (apnea)?
The air tanks giving you only 30 seconds is not really comparable to Scuba Diving IMO... despite of the breathing sound [:-)
No, not free diving. You enter into the water with the same amount of air that you leave the water with. It's only relevant when you're taking in air underwater. Every 30 to 33 feet or so (depending on salinity) the pressure increases by the equivalent of one measure of atmospheric pressure, 14.7 psi. If I breath a full breath at 30 feet and ascend, then my lungs would have 30 psi pushing out and only 15 pushing in, and It would damage my lungs.
Seldkam
Yes, the reason I mention realism here is because it doesn't affect gameplay.
It's not like I'm petitioning for including thermoclines, decompression sickness, nitrogen narcosis, or internal ear equalizing difficulties.
The first two are purely aesthetic changes that affect realism and practicality. Imagine if a mecha shooter had shells eject towards the player, or if a space fighter game had ships that used flaps, elevators, and stabilators. Sure, you don't really have to strive for realism since they're scifi games, but it's a pointless aesthetic factor that detracts from immersion without adding anything. Besides, I'd definitely put this in the survival genre of games, which should place a higher priority on realism.
EDIT: not in direct response to you, just a general plea for realism where it doesn't affect gameplay.
Imagine your favourite sci-fi movie, and you hear that some director is making a sequel. Would you bombard him with facts and requests for making things "realistic"? Or would you let him get on with his movie in his own artistic style knowing that some things aren't going to make sense sure, but the overall experience will be really damn epic?
Yes of course, the 2nd one. It's a well-known concept called "suspending disbelief" and we all do it when we watch movies as not everything will make sense or be 100% accurate.
As I wrote clearly in another thread around this topic, only yesterday:
At the end of the day this is a video game forum, not a scuba diving forum. If it adds nothing to the game, apart from bringing it closer to "diving simulator" territory, then perhaps rethink the idea before posting it :P
Do you think it's "realistic" that we can jump out of our sub at 3000m depth and swim around like normal? No. But is it fun to do that, exploring new dangerous areas, finding new items to craft stuff... yes, so let's keep being able to do it!
No offence intended to OP, just my observations over the last few days with this sort of thread popping up.
I'm going to say something all new forum members should know: if you're going to write wall of text countering someone else's post, at least read the whole thing
All you had to do was read the paragraph I wrote after "all that said:"
you're fighting someone who's on your side, bud
This is NOT a survival game, please don't spread that around... Just because the majority of mechanics implemented SO far have to do with surviving doesn't mean the game is in the survival genre
That's fine, no problem, I really like your ideas especially the no arm animation with fins on, seems small but the detail of your suggestion is rare among suggestions other people give on the forums
My problem is that it doesn't matter a blind bit to 99% of gamers whether their arms move or not at the same time they are using fins. It's just 'familiar' animation work to bring the game more to life. This happens in ALL video games if you hadn't noticed. When not holding an item in hands, hands do 'something' to give impression of movement. This is a video game, and there are certain things you have to suspend disbelief to accept. Just like when you watch a movie. Personally I think it's a bit pedantic to be arguing that stuff should be in this game "because it's like that in real life". I don't want a diving simulator 2015. I want a fresh, innovative, exciting new twist on diving/survival/exploration on an alien world.
Are we gonna start getting bothered by the fact that NO video game character ever has to use the toilet? No. (because it's boring)
Are we gonna start getting bothered by the fact that our protagonist survives entirely without any sleep? No. (because it's also boring)
Are we gonna start getting bothered by the fact that we can get out of our sub at 3000m and swim around the same as at 10m? No. (because it is fun to explore and find stuff at any depth in the game)
None of this stuff affects gameplay, and is unimportant to the average Joe-gamer. The devs need to focus on important gameplay-changing experiences, to mold the game into what it should be. Not get bogged down on pedantic facts like getting the bends if you surface too quickly, or having different rates of breathing for different depths, or seeing colours at a slight difference.
There has been a lot of great discussion on here about gameplay mechanics, being bogged down by pedantic "realism" factoids being chucked about by people who clearly have never been involved with making a video game :P
Please don't take offence, it's not aimed at you in particular. I'm just putting my standpoint and opinion out there on this topic in general. Sorry to hijack your thread a bit for it though.
lol you managed to put my thoughts down into one sentence, but I rambled on for ages. Thank you haha
I just disagree. I mean no hard feelings or anything, but I can suspend my disbelief when we enter the realm of magi-science. I write for some independent publishers and one of the rules that was shared with me early on was to establish the boundaries of your world (or lack there of) early on, and everything that happens within that world won't break disbelief. But, when it comes to a simple aesthetic factors that adds nothing to the game by existing, but can add realism for it to be changed, I see no reason not to default to realism.
In terms of what the arms can do, they could shift back and forth between being crossed, or relaxed and drifting out in front of the player. They could have a wrist watch / dive computer that they could check that could display a miniature replica of the UI. There are a lot of things that could be done to add to the immersion without broken realism that otherwise compromise immersion for people who are familiar with diving. I certainly understand that this would have to be animated in the game, and that takes time, but I also see no reason not to make the suggestion when I believe it can add to the overall experience.
Two of my current favorite games are this one and long dark because they recreate environments that I love being in in real life. However, Every time I see that hand swing out in front of the player to swim it nags at me, and breaks the experience.
It's fine that we disagree, but I'm struggling to see how your suggestion would add to the overall experience apart from adding "realism" just for the sake of it. The only time your hands do anything at the moment anyway is when you're not holding onto another item of some kind, which is pretty much all the time
Well, like I said, operating inside the rules of a scifi world isn't in contradiction to realism. The reason I petition for aesthetic realism when it doesn't otherwise detract from the game is because a needless lack of authenticity can appear to be low quality.
Maybe it's the author mindset, but even when I'm writing a diesel punk fiction, I want to be sure that the command structure of the military is right, and that I use the proper names for all of the WWII generals. etc. It adds depth, and depth adds quality. I would want a historian to come out and talk about how much more immersive the story was for the correct operations, jargon, and command structure even though I literally have allied soldiers in diesel punk power armor fighting Mary Shelly-esk uber soldat during Operation Market Garden.
But I think there is a fine line between calling out "real-life familiarity" mistakes, and just calling something out because it personally bothers you
Sorry if I seem a bit over-zealous on this topic, "realism" in video games is just one of those concepts that gets misused and misquoted all the time!
If we go with OP's idea I can ask you, what makes you think the pressure in the water on that planet is exactly the same as the water on earth?
Is an alien planet so the composition of the water might not be the same as our oceans hence making it more or less dense than hours, so, earth like physix dont "realistcly" apply
Having player characters exhale out while ascending would be a cool touch. Its something that anyone with SCUBA experience would appreciate, but i think that its something that may be missed by most player.
You also have a good point about swimming with your arms while wearing fins, but i can see why the devs chose to animate swimming this way. There needs to be an obvious way to convey that the player swims a little faster without an item equipped. Swimming with arms seems like something that most lay people can understand. I think its important that basic game mechanics can be easily identifiable.
I dont think that following the strict laws of color diffusion would add much to the game. It seems like they may be drawing inspiration from this principle as the bright colors of the shallows fade into ever darkening waters. Hopefully we will see more bio-luminescence as the deep is fleshed out more. If anything i think loosing the majority of the color spectrum below 50 ft would make for a pretty bland experience. I cant see much upside not allowing the art team some creative freedom on this. This game can be surreality beautiful, I'd hate to see that change.
Some realistic elements are good, like increased air consumption at depth to add challenge to the experience. But being overly realistic, adding something like requiring safety stops every 30 meters to avoid getting the bends would be tedious and conterintuitive to most folks who are just trying to get to the surface before they drown.
It can seem like a delicate balancing act sometimes and regardless of what they decide to be wholly realistic or surrealistic, there will always be someone who will be unhappy with how it was done.
Nanites are always the answer.
This has been brought up before, but we really feel it's important to show the view model arms moving. It is important for gameplay, because it makes it very clear when you are moving, the direction you are moving, the speed you are moving, etc. If we were using a 3rd person view, then it is likely we would have done less arm motion, because the legs would likely be in view all the time, and do the job that the arms are doing in first person. This is another topic that has been brought up a lot, and we've given some pretty extensive answers as to why we have decided against eliminating colors in a realistic fashion. But the short version is, it would just detract far too much from the lush, vibrant world we want to create. It would remove a lot of the variety and clear distinction between biomes and creatures, and create a playing experience that feels much more monotonous over an extended period of time.
That said, some of your other suggestions actually do sound like something we could do that would add to the realism, but without sacrificing any gameplay or visual interest. I think these 2 would be pretty interesting:
I respect your choice, and it's your game to create, but that doesn't make it any more sensible to me.
If anything, any differences between real diving and this game's mechanics I chalk up to Sci-Fi. How awesome it would be to be able to compress air with some kind of personal air compressor device whenever you surface. It'd be cool to not care about narcosis as much, or the bends and such.
Aesthetic stuff like hearing him breathe out as he ascends or take shallower breaths at depth would be cool! Nice to know there are diver gamers around like me!
As an additional point to the breathing out factor, it's actually pretty incredible. Since you're ascending the pressure is decreasing, so even though you're breathing out your lungs never really run out of air if you breath out slowly enough. It's a surreal experience to keep breathing out, and breathing out, and breathing out, and never really run out of air until you ascend.
For bends reasons, you want to have a safety stop before you surface, but if you're monkey diving with a small tank, then you can go to great depth and surface again quickly without worry. That's when you experience this the most, and that's very applicable to this game and the small amounts of oxygen in your tank.
Also I don't mention safety points for application to this game, I just have a bit of a tick about never mentioning diving without the associated dangers.