Dev Question // Co-op Gameplay

[Darius_ITR]

Hello explorers!
Big thank you to everybody who replied to our previous post. Now that we’ve shared some co-op details with our explorers, time to know what are your thoughts on…

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Co-op Gameplay

• How do you imagine it going? What experiences would you like to share with your fellow explorers? Anything in particular you’re hoping for?
  
  Please keep in mind these questions are to generate discussions and ideas. They aren’t a guarantee of anything to come or go, change or remain as is.

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Try to describe in detail your thoughts on this subject. Thank you, and have a beautiful day in the Radius :)

[DevilsWings]

Atleast a 4 player coop mode and a whole world where everything is shared.
Friendly fire is a must and a menu to modifiy difficulty and loot in the open world.
That way you can make the world harder or easier depending on your liking.
The rest make it fun, aslong the gameplay is as good as Ghost of Tabor or better i will love it.

[Nate Mc Bow]

2-player coop seems to the most technically viable. ITR was excellent on it´s own as the gunfights were mostly contained, adding too many players into it would either cause chaos or result in deviant enemy AI I bet.

[Eagle Black]

Friendly fire.
If one player dies, the teammate can resurrect him/her within 30 seconds.
If one player fully dies, the whole team loses and gets teleported back to base (to avoid team griefing).
Items in chest and artefacts should be 1 per player. If one player does not want the loot, he/she can grab it from the chest and throw it on the ground so the other player can have that loot too.
More enemies per player and more loot.
It should be possible to exchange weapons, but if one player report the other the team loses and get back to base restoring the inventory.
There should be "Recent player you played with" and "add as friend" in the game itself.
The queue for finding players to play with should be based of the rank all players are in.
A player should be able to start a game alone with normal quantity of enemies and as soon as another player joins, there should be a pause, the new player being added and the enemies should increase in quantity. The same if a player leaves the session.
When returning to base, players can still talk to each other via walkietalkie while being in different bases.
Players should be able to heal each other with regen artifact of some sort(by being close) or injecting each other.
Multiple players can use tactics and enter from different doors in buildings. By being both in the middle of nothingness makes it less useful playing with somebody.

[seriouskyle]

Originally posted by Queue:

Coop done simply is just two people in the world at the same time. Coop done well supplies a point of coordination. What you don't want is things that are only accessible via coop - a door that requires two separate buttons pressed at the same time, for example. But there should be a means of helping besides being an extra gun or a pack mule.

Say there's a cache with a weighted lid on top. By yourself, imagine the lid takes six seconds to lift, simulating struggling with the weight. But add a second person, and the time halves - meaning a situation under pressure becomes easier with help.

Another example would be allowing players to put their hands out, the way you do when you're going to have them place their foot in your hands so you can 'boost' them up, thus allowing the second player to help you climb onto or access places that, if you were alone, would require finding a ladder or other route.

Of course, I'd like a rarer artefact used solely for a player to revive their fallen friend - making coop a less frustrating journey if you're deep into a mission and would lose time waiting for a respawning player to walk all the way back.

Finally, if you're feeling nuts, some kind of binding artefact which, when a copy is shared or held by two players, creates some kind of shared risk/benefit, like halving your damage taken while magically transmitting the other half to the holder of the other half of the artefact.

I agree to this. Coop should ADD a dynamic to the gameplay instead of just kind of being thrown in. I like the aspect of realistic advantages to having a "battle buddy". Helping each other over obstacles, or carrying a heavy object together in one hand to speed up movement, having someone to provide overwatch as you enter into a mimic infested neighborhood while providing instructions over a walkie talkie, sharing food and ammo (tossing a mag to your buddy), being able to open up some kind of med kit to render first aid and revive your downed buddy (or buddy dragging them off the X so that you can render aid), all of these things would make coop a worthwhile added experience to the already awesome singleplayer.

[Floor dog with a RTX 3060]

Originally posted by mirauch:

"What you don't want is things that are only accessible via coop - a door that requires two separate buttons pressed at the same time, for example"

i disagree. Giving someone a leg-up could make it possible to reach certain areas that are unaccessible when you are just out on your own. You can debate if this is a requirement to finish the storyline in coop, but at least it could be a requirement to access certain goodies.

Giving not only the usual items, but MONEY to other players would be nice, and prices in store should be higher when playing with more people. So.. in order to tackle the enemies of the radius, several people help gather the money to equip ONE player with a good gun, so he can help bring them all further down the road.
The giving money thing is simpler and more direct than "giving stuff to sell".

Some additional ideas for coop teamplay :
- one player opens (swinging) door between 2 rooms with his hand, other player has his rifle in 2 hands already aiming, another player flashbangs room with grenade when 1st player swung door open.... ( like the teamplay was in Ubisofts RAINBOW6 series. )
- leg-ups ( like mentioned before )
- coop moves to navigate through anomaly fields : one player can make the "safe corridor" in anomaly fields visible to the one who is venturing in it ( add some plausible explanation - variation of detector tool ? Call of Pripyat had 4 detectors, we are still only having ONE !!! )
- Create some means to accelerate movement. When walking bigger distances, movement speed/stamina could be affected positively by players being close to each other ( add some plausible explanation or mechanic - all players carrying a special artefact that amplifies by proximity of similar artifacts ? )
- That idea carried forward : All kinds of artifacts that give bonuses when carried by players in close proximity as well.
- Tools that "highlight" and find enemies - as mentioned with the Spotter-Sniper-gameplay.
.....

A good way to provide a plausible explanation for players moving faster together is that they could like, break into cadence, or just a morale boost if together.

[P - 13]

May seem a little silly but haven't seen anyone mention a way to securely connect with your friends online. I'm not super big on co-oping with randos but adore co-op when it's with my friends. Implementing a password system would be greatly appreciated.

It's kinda been mentioned as well, but a good way to scale the difficulty for multiplayer. If the game is playable solo, I would hope that the Co-op experience has a way to compensate for the extra pair of hands. Preferably not bullet sponges mind you, but maybe see some challenging enemies earlier (Like armored units or mimics) or increase spawns on more minor enemies (The ITR1 Spawns come to mind).

And of course many of the other great ideas already listed. Call outs, interacting with the other player in the world, mechanics incentivizing co op (Like leg-ups or buffing relics).

[thicc rocc derg]

I do kinda wish 4 player co-op could be an option in the future as it's own separate category.

[The Fat Vegetarian]

So far so good! Loving it so far, and Co-op is a blast. We ran into a few issues where if the non-host player was holding something in their hand, their game would crash when entering an area via the warp map. Haven't tested it with the warp door/portal things yet. We also cannot hear each other in game, have to use Discord or something similar for voice com.

Good so far though!