What's the story behind dbc14/17 ashes fast bowling animation?

[blockerdave]

"Classic", "Standard", "Retro". I have no clue which setups anyone is speaking about.

Standard is your button press and classic is dbc style.

My 2 cents: I find the fielding radar not very helpful perhaps due to having got used to the end way.

 

[cricfreak12]

My 2 cents: I find the fielding radar not very helpful perhaps due to having got used to the end way.

I agree never liked the idea of having the fielding radar back since used to looking around the field and also was a little joy in itself getting to view all around the ground and stands especially after they took out the timer.

One question though can we get rid of pitch markers and field radars? Basically going back to the set up of dbc14/17. I know about controls but not sure about those two and IMHO never liked the pitch marker as it takes the whole fun away.

 

[TemPSaad]

I think the discussion of this thread has been diverted , what about the story of mocapped fast bowler? can some one from BAS clarify on this , (again notice I am not demanding new actions or criticizing the old one just a little banter and chit chat thread it is so kindly don't bang on me)

 

[wasteyouryouth]

If you're not happy with the bowling actions from the videos that Big Ant and the Beta testers have released, and if bowling actions are a deal breaker for you, then buy another cricket game.

 

[fanirama]

I've been saying this from the beginning. Pay someone unknown a small sum of money or heck, get someone who plays in the office to bowl and bat and mocap those for even lesser cost. You really need like ~20 animations PER shot for bowling and batting. Yes it is a LOT of animations but that is really what makes a game entertaining. I mean, everyone bats the same, bowls the same, fields the same. it's just annoying after the Xth iteration of the game tbh.

It should also do things like assign random subset of animations to a player and flip through those. But hitbox detection and other things play a part so it is not easy. But once you nail it once, iterations down the road become easier and easier.

 

[EnigmaticZee]

I've been saying this from the beginning. Pay someone unknown a small sum of money or heck, get someone who plays in the office to bowl and bat and mocap those for even lesser cost. You really need like ~20 animations PER shot for bowling and batting. Yes it is a LOT of animations but that is really what makes a game entertaining. I mean, everyone bats the same, bowls the same, fields the same. it's just annoying after the Xth iteration of the game tbh.

It should also do things like assign random subset of animations to a player and flip through those. But hitbox detection and other things play a part so it is not easy. But once you nail it once, iterations down the road become easier and easier.

I wish that was the case. I would have done mo-cap for free. I do bowl Brett Lee, James Anderson McGrath and Clarke's spin style.

 

[blockerdave]

I've been saying this from the beginning. Pay someone unknown a small sum of money or heck, get someone who plays in the office to bowl and bat and mocap those for even lesser cost. You really need like ~20 animations PER shot for bowling and batting. Yes it is a LOT of animations but that is really what makes a game entertaining. I mean, everyone bats the same, bowls the same, fields the same. it's just annoying after the Xth iteration of the game tbh.

It should also do things like assign random subset of animations to a player and flip through those. But hitbox detection and other things play a part so it is not easy. But once you nail it once, iterations down the road become easier and easier.

You really don't need that many animations per shot.

 

[wasteyouryouth]

You really don't need that many animations per shot.

But that's what makes the game entertaining. I'd rather have 20 animations for each shot and poor gameplay instead of one animation for each shot and perfect gameplay. You must be crazy.

 

[fanirama]

You really don't need that many animations per shot.

Why not? I mean I threw some large enough number in there but tbh the more animations per shot, fielding, bowling, wk, the better imo.
Even if they did say 6 per, it is still better than the current 1 per. I think having 20 per would be awesome!!

After a while, it is just boring and irritating watching the 11th guy from Pakistan play the cover drive, hook, square cut, on drive, pull, whatever the exact same way as the best opener from Australia. How does that make sense in immersion?
I mean, then what's the point of having diff faces as well? There's a reason people do the myriad faces. And you don't even see it while batting most of the time.

I think it is doable. It just needs work, budget and time. The game is already very good (I supported them by buying it on PC, console and all cricket games they've put out). This will elevate it further.

 

[wasteyouryouth]

It just needs work, budget and time.

This probably answers the question as to why there aren't 20 animations per shot.

 

[Dutch]

It just needs work, budget and time

Yeah apart from the roads, hygiene, security, education, entertainment, peace....what 'ave the Romans ever done for us?

 

[fanirama]

This probably answers the question as to why there aren't 20 animations per shot.

Absolutely. But I feel they could potentially do it. Sure, 20 animations per shot is a lot but at least 2-3 per shot might be possible. Something they need to consider as another ToDo.
I mean, they don't have budgets of Madden NFL, sure, but I'd love to see this happen even with a smaller budget.
I'm not sure how many they sell (given India is the largest market for this but there's also Indian disregard for any IP and blatant piracy) but hopefully they've made enough to make this happen at least for the next DBC.

 

[wasteyouryouth]

Absolutely. But I feel they could potentially do it. Sure, 20 animations per shot is a lot but at least 2-3 per shot might be possible. Something they need to consider as another ToDo.
I mean, they don't have budgets of Madden NFL, sure, but I'd love to see this happen even with a smaller budget.
I'm not sure how many they sell (given India is the largest market for this but there's also Indian disregard for any IP and blatant piracy) but hopefully they've made enough to make this happen at least for the next DBC.

As far I know they've motion captured Smith and Maxwell which would suggest they have at least 2 animations per shot.

 

[blockerdave]

As far I know they've motion captured Smith and Maxwell which would suggest they have at least 2 animations per shot.

Think there are 5 batting styles. Whether each style has an entirely unique animation for each shot I don't know.

 

[motime6]

I posted a thread over a year back about the absurdly terrible animations in Big Ant games. Caught some flack from fanboys here but I must admit looking at the new footage they definitely have focused on the batting animations and they look a lot better than before. So here is hoping they will continue to focus on animations and implement more individual styles in the next few iterations. Animations are incredibly crucial in how a sports game feels.

The bowling action is still terrible though. I mean how hard is it to get a bunch of local club cricketers to mo-cap their actions? Hell I would have paid a visit to the studios as I can mimic professional actions of at least 10 famous fast bowlers pretty well.

It is just sad that something which is so repetitive as a bowling action isn't truly addressed. I remember cricket games from almost 2 decades ago having better and more smoother bowling actions.

I realize some fans here just dismiss any criticism of Big Ant studios, but here is hoping more criticism will lead to better bowling animations in the future.