[Merged] Planetside 2 & TrackIR

Coreldan · 2011-11-23, 01:23 PM

I've mentioned this a few times in other threads, but thought it could use it's own.

So, if anyone isn't familiar with TrackIR, this video explains it pretty well:
I think it would be really damn awesome if Forgelight could be made to support this. It would work like wonders in a game like PS2 (really amazing in ARMA2, for example) and does a great deal for situational awareness.

Since Forgelight is likely to be in just about every game they will be making from here on, making it generally speaking compatible with Forgelight would probably make it quite easy to make compatible with each game they have coming in the future with little effort.

It's quite a niche thing, though, and I feel that they won't use the resources on something like this, but it sure would be really awesome.

Naturally any kind of dev reply would be cool, but that's just hoping

EDIT: Good to note that it's not really TrackIR that needs to be implemented, but free look which benefits everyone. After free look is in, TrackIR is easypeasy to integrate to the game.

Originally Posted by Justaman

I think you should edit the OP so that it doesn't imply that "TrackIR" is what needs to be implemented. It should say we want a "free look" button, or an extra set of hot-keys that only effect our visual orientation. In the best case, it would be a free-look button that toggles the visual orientation hot-keys from what they are, to your mouse. So that single button Free-look would seamlessly work with either mouse+keyboard standard setups as well as mouse/keyboard+joystick/other peripheral. As the peripherals them selves would handle the use of those inputs.

Which in comparison is next to nothing for development time.

FastAndFree · 2011-11-23, 01:25 PM

This has popped up before, we never got an official answer.

I even went so far as to rig together a Freetrack set

That I have never used since

So fingers crossed that PS2 will support it

Bags · 2011-11-23, 01:25 PM

Waste of development time.

Coreldan · 2011-11-23, 01:39 PM

Aaaand, it would greatly benefit both grunt gameplay as well as flying. For tanks I can't really figure out much of a good use for it, but for infantry and flying it makes a big frigging difference.

Pretty please?

FastAndFree · 2011-11-23, 01:41 PM

Originally Posted by Coreldan

Aaaand, it would greatly benefit both grunt gameplay as well as flying. For tanks I can't really figure out much of a good use for it, but for infantry and flying it makes a big frigging difference.

Pretty please?

It would be useful for the Magrider at least, which won't have a turret for the driver.
Or when you want to look around while still keeping your turret on the precious BEP farm base door

Geist · 2011-11-23, 01:45 PM

Looks great. On the Mechwarrior Online forums, they were also talking about this and one of the Devs implied that they were looking into it. Take note SOE Devs, since MWO is a competitor for PS2, perhaps you guys should look into it so as not to lose your customers(No worries about me, I'll be playing both

)

Khellendros · 2011-11-23, 01:49 PM

That would be awesome to use in PS2. I hope they do work on that at some point, probably not by release, but at some point would be great because I would get that.

Coreldan · 2011-11-23, 02:11 PM

Yeah, I'm just afraid that after release there will still be more to work on that they have the time for and it just gets pushed and pushed and never implemented.

Wonder how much of a job it is to implemented it in the first place. Also I'd figure it would be easier to implement it now while the engine isn't all that finalized than trying to tack it on afterwards. I suppose with an Unreal Engine game that could be as easy to implement as checking a tickbox

but with a brand new engine that is not likely the case.

Dreamcast · 2011-11-23, 02:19 PM

Cool but only like .1 % will use it...How about the other 99.9%

Occupy planetside?

Xyntech · 2011-11-23, 02:21 PM

Originally Posted by Coreldan

Wonder how much of a job it is to implemented it in the first place. Also I'd figure it would be easier to implement it now while the engine isn't all that finalized than trying to tack it on afterwards. I suppose with an Unreal Engine game that could be as easy to implement as checking a tickbox

but with a brand new engine that is not likely the case.

Since SOE is developing Forgelight as a proprietary, in-house game engine, I imagine that they will probably continue to upgrade the engine as a whole, much like Valve upgrades the Source engine.

Of course, SOE is not Valve, but maybe they'll start heading in that direction with Forgelight.

FastAndFree · 2011-11-23, 03:34 PM

Originally Posted by Dreamcast

Cool but only like .1 % will use it...How about the other 99.9%

Occupy planetside?

Actually, if the feature to turn your head around was in anyone could benefit from it, even without IR head tracking

You would just have to bind some keys or your joystick's hat switch to it

Skepsiis · 2011-11-23, 07:17 PM

Wow, this is actually really cool... but not sure if I would use it myself. I think it could be very useful for vehicles especially aircraft. The immersion would be fantastic.

Coreldan · 2011-11-24, 12:29 AM

I was thinking this through further, the implementation would likely be easier than I initially thought. What SoE would have to do is the head turn animations and mechanic and probably a bit more interiors to aircrafts. As someone mentioned, the free look feature even without trackIR is really nice and handy, but then I realized the TrackIR is nothing but input commands for Windows, just like a mouse or joystick would be. So it would just mostly come down to them being able to code in free look so you can look in a different direction than you are aiming, actually harnessing the trackIR input commands shouldnt be a big deal.

krnasaur · 2011-11-24, 01:01 AM

I love what technology can do these days, not for me, but interesting.

Coreldan · 2011-11-25, 01:41 AM

I think Higby needs to stop eating leftover turkey to reply to us