Please give us recoil, not cones of fire

[Arkanor]

I'm seeing this in a lot of games lately and it's just tremendously annoying. As much as people like to hate on those games though it's conspicuously absent from the Call of Duty series (and BF3).

I'm referring to cones of fire, I.E. when a weapon appears to be aimed at a target but shots disperse around that target in a random cone. Typically this occurs after some fire has happened, preventing all shots from staying on the target for an easy kill. Fair enough, weapon dispersion is necessary to prevent kills from being too easy (a-la COD/BF3) for such a big game with longer spawn delays, but the cone-of-fire method is annoyingly counter-intuitive.

Weapons recoil, it's generally not all that easy to keep them on target firing full auto. When you're shooting a real gun though there's a pretty obvious indication in this in that your sights aren't pinned precisely over the target the entire time you're shooting (unless you're Iron Man). COD/BF3 got the fact that guns hit where they're aimed mostly right, but weapon recoil is dramatically understated, making full-auto fire fairly effective and kills rather easy. The STALKER series seems to do a better job of this, when you start missing the target you have a good indicator because your sights fly way off it, this provides immediate visual feedback that you need to stop firing and re-align on the target.


Anyway, that's my rant. I much prefer visual recoil over the immense dissatisfaction of feeling like I have no influence where the bullets are going. In game terms (TTK/etc) it should mean the same thing except less firing fruitlessly because you thought your gun was pointed somewhere the game says it actually wasn't. It also opens up the possibility for people to become better at the shooting by compensating for the recoil pattern (to some extent, the pattern should be semi-random and not fixed).

EDIT: Few people have brought this up and I figure I'd add it to the OP instead of let it get lost, just to clarify, hip-fire typically uses a floating reticule and a cone of fire (typically expanding the reticule to signify inaccuracy). This is used in almost every game and is expected, your character doesn't have as good of an idea where the gun is pointed at the hip, and can't compensate nearly as well. It has its place in close quarters/rapid indoor firefights where accurately sighting isn't always an option.

[Tsunami]

or you could have a preset spray pattern specific for each weapon. This encourages the users to learn the weapon and know the pattern to get all the bullets in the spot they want.

Basically rewards players for learning the weapon

[SFJake]

Bleh, I actually hate both. There's something for ya! :P

Nothing more obnoxious than dealing with recoil with a mouse. I'd rather deal with random spread, honestly.

[Stardouser]

A hybrid method is best. A certain amount of spread if you hipfire or are moving, if you crouch and aim down sight it will be reduced to zero, but recoil will be present in either case. However, since it is, in fact, a hybrid method, the recoil need not be excessive.

[Comet]

They're not going to change something like this at this stage of development I'd imagine.

[Forsaken One]

I love tactical shooters but one thing I don't agree with is recoil. Let me list a few reasons why.

#1. It makes the screen move or jerk around. This is not only annoying but can cause some people motion sickness.

#2. recoil can NOT be used as a way to balance something. Adding something that a player may be even able to counter a little with "skill" throws off the balance of said weapon. Balance should be uncounterable by the player, the player should be forced to learn via skill how to best use a balanced weapon instead of turning a balanced weapon into a overpowered weapon.

CoF however does not allow someone to spray and counter their spray by pulling down on the mouse.

Some of my personal rules to gaming.

A game should never impair a user. if a flash bang goes off it should only deafen and blind the char it should NEVER be bright and loud to hurt the user (some games are guilty of this... one game even made me almost deaf and forced me to replace my screen because the flash bangs burned an image into it.... ) this also falls under things like giving a user motion sickness via mechanics. (an example is recoil.)

Something should NEVER be balanced in such a way that a user can counter what makes it balanced. if something has high power yet very slow reload and small clip yet the user can "weapon swap" to avoid these penalty it effectively ruins the balance and makes said thing overpowered. The same falls under things like recoil. It has high power but balanced by high recoil and yet being skilled can make the recoil at least less then what it was? You just destroyed the balance of the weapon and made it overpowered.

Something should be balanced and then it is the users job and skill to make the most of a weapon in a way that does not override what makes the weapon balanced in the first place.

[Talented Maori]

No to random bullet spread, yes to recoil!

[Synapses]

You are going to get it. ^_~

[morf]

Hybrid method is best:

Hipfire = really big CoF, more or less useless beyond 10 yards

Iron sight = reduced mobility, but pinpoint accuracy on the reticule, adjusting for recoil separates the men from the boys.

And of course bullet drop is a consideration in either case.

[WolfAlmighty]

Don't flame me for not knowing this, but is PS2 going to have different classes of weapons (e.g. Aassault rifles, carbines, SMGs, long rifles)? In such a case, you cannot have each gun be pinpoint accurate even while crouched and not moving and ADS. No gun has pinpoint accuracy at all ranges, which is what cone of fire emulates. It shouldn't be quite as extreme as BF2, but it should also not be nonexistent.

Then again, this is the future so maybe you could justify the removal of it canonically.

[OnexBigxHebrew]

I think you're missing a major reason for COF.

CoF is important in game using ADS or zoom because it artificially represents an inability of the shooter to know exactly where a hipfire is pointed - this is why the cone tightens drastically when looking down sights or in a zoomed perspective. This is necessary because IRL there is no 'center' of screen or crosshair for you to nail every time - just a felt out guess at where you're pointing. However, the player can see 'dead center' (a crosshair) and all peripheral vision of the character, the shooter knows where the hipfire will land, unfairly eliminating the need to aim down sights or zoom - thus the inaccuracy of hipfire has to be artificially implemented by using a CoF.

Pretty simple stuff.

[TAA]

From memory Frontlines Fuel of War did an excellent job with recoil. I didnt play it for that long due to the lack of clan support. It certainly had absolutely spectacular sound effects.

How did they do with Homefront? Did that use CoF or recoil?

[Khellendros]

No to recoil, yes to CoF!

[Galzus]

Playing Blacklight Retribution reminded me of how much I hate cone of fire. Your red dot sight is right on a guy's face and it looks like you're going to get a headshot? NOPE! Your bullet just when a couple yards the other way!

CoF also promotes luck-based wins

[goneglockin]

Originally Posted by Forsaken One

Something should be balanced and then it is the users job and skill to make the most of a weapon in a way that does not override what makes the weapon balanced in the first place.

What the hell are you talking about? Skill should not override balance?

I have an idea, let's make a shooter where clicking your mouse on someone challenges them to a realtime mini-game of paper, rock, scissors...

I didn't grow up with FPS games, they grew up with me- and I can't stand what the console kids have done to them these past 6 years. Game mechanics designed to make FPS a pointless, dull, non-competitive, everyone wins circle-jerk have ruined the entire genre.

Playing an FPS game today feels like a cheesy theme park ride; a simulation of the golden era from 1998 to 2006. It's got guns and you shoot people, but any similarities to what FPS games actually were stops there.

You can have it, I'll wait a couple more years for the pendulum to swing back the other way. The brown, modern war, tactical shooter's time is almost up.