Game Mechanics looking for opinions on how to implement cover in stealth top down shooter

S

Seknight

Guest
I'm making a stealth top down shooter loosely inspired by metal gear solid. The idea is that all missions can be played both in stealth and loud, but making combat very difficult so that stealth actually becomes necessary.

One crucial aspect is partial is cover like sandbags. I have come up with two ways to implement cover in firefights.
1: shooters close to the sandbags can shoot over the cover, shooters far away cannot shoot over the cover and so have to run towards the defenders to damage them
2: standing near cover blocks half the bullet, to be invulnerable you have to crouch, but crouching disables you from shooting over the cover at all.

which one do you guys think i should implement?
 

Yal

šŸ§ *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
shooters far away cannot shoot over the cover and so have to run towards the defenders to damage them
This is what grenades are for :p

I personally feel like a third system would make the most sense: characters can stand or crouch/crawl, bullets are fired at either "stand height" (can pass over sandbags and other low cover, will miss crawling characters) or "crawl height" (cannot pass through cover, will hit crawling characters), crawling slows you down but also makes you harder to detect. Now you have dodging behind cover implemented "for free" and a lot of cool emergent mechanics like ducking under a bullet so enemies will shoot each other when they've surrounded you.
 

NeoShade

Member
I think that both systems have merit, and you could take things from each. Consider the following psudocode:

Code:
accuracy = 100;

if (sandbag between shooter and target){
    if (target close to sandbag){
        if (shooter close to sandbag){
            accuracy *= 1; //shooter can simply shoot over sandbag
        }
        if (target is not moving){
            accuracy *= 0.5; //a stationary target near a sandbag automatically crouches. maybe this factor changes with distance from target
        }
    }
}
 
S

Seknight

Guest
ducking under a bullet so enemies will shoot each other when they've surrounded you.
i was actually looking to make my game feel 'real' so missing the target entirely because they're crouching doesn't appeal to me. I like the rest though! It's somewhat similar to what i had in mind for the second system. thanks.

I think that both systems have merit, and you could take things from each. Consider the following psudocode:

Code:
accuracy = 100;

if (sandbag between shooter and target){
    if (target close to sandbag){
        if (shooter close to sandbag){
            accuracy *= 1; //shooter can simply shoot over sandbag
        }
        if (target is not moving){
            accuracy *= 0.5; //a stationary target near a sandbag automatically crouches. maybe this factor changes with distance from target
        }
    }
}
So a shooter targeting someone behind cover is less accurate but can still hit the target?
 

NeoShade

Member
Maybe think of it more as "chance to hit" rather than accuracy. You could tweak the numbers as you see fit of course. Maybe some types of cover offer 100% protection while other types of cover only offer 70% or 80%.
 

Rob

Member
I know this is a top down game but I'd like to relate my experience playing Kill Switch.

I had a playable demo of it from a magazine and ended up really enjoying it and buying the full game. It's a 3rd Person cover shooter and I rarely if ever played FPS/3PS games.
You basically move from cover to cover. Some cover is tougher than others but they're all mostly destructible.
You can stand up or lean out from cover in order to aim but you're also at risk of being shot when you do that.
You also have the option of "spray and pray" where you lift your weapon over the top or to the side of cover and blast randomly in that direction. Low accuracy but you won't get shot.

So in summary - cover of different heights (half/full cover), option to aim out from cover but be susceptible to being shot yourself, and low-accuracy spray and pray.

I think a system where your vision becomes limited when you're hunkering down combined with the ability to pop up/ out and shoot would be great. A risk vs reward scenario.
 
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