Wouldn‘t it be a lot more scary to have a animation when you get grabbed by an barnacle?

[Tabby]

As I saw the first minutes of Black Mesa - Xen something bothered me, when gorden tries to long jump from the point and a barnacle grabs him and pulls him upwards, good idea for a little shock moment. But when the barnacle grabs him, he just gets pulled up very slow and you can’t feel how the barnacle is trying to get you, i think it would be a lot more realistic and smoother if the camera gets shaked and the player moves a bit because he just jumped very fast and got hit by a barnacle. Right now when you get grabbed by a barnacle during a jump it feels like hitting a wall, when you walk or crouch it’s fine that you don’t really move a lot but I don’t think that the tongue of a barnacle is made out of steel. It would give the game a wonderful touch and a little shiny detail that maybe slows the gameplay and bothers people like me.
Greetings, Timon

[marcel]

I also dont like how the npcs react to getting grabbed by a barnacle, they just ragdoll and it looks ridiculous. halflife was so much better on that front.

[Rushi]

Originally posted by WashingMachineHunter:

I also dont like how the npcs react to getting grabbed by a barnacle, they just ragdoll and it looks ridiculous. halflife was so much better on that front.

It isn't black media's fault. It uses hl2's barnacles which used the ragdoll kills.

Still though, it does look ridiculous. I saw a guard get tossed about and do a 360 front flip once.

[V I D A L]

Originally posted by Terra-BITE:

Originally posted by WashingMachineHunter:

I also dont like how the npcs react to getting grabbed by a barnacle, they just ragdoll and it looks ridiculous. halflife was so much better on that front.

It isn't black media's fault. It uses hl2's barnacles which used the ragdoll kills.

Still though, it does look ridiculous. I saw a guard get tossed about and do a 360 front flip once.

It is, but there is nothing stopping the developers to actually make struggling animations for the npcs and having them switching to ragdoll only after they get to the top and begin being devoured. Right now they go into ragdoll mode immediately as if they were dead the second they touched the tentacle.

[9seed]

It might be kind of cool if getting caught by a barnacle tounge didn't stop you dead in your tracks, center you underneath the barnacle, then slowly realed you up, but instead just used physics somehow, just letting the player swing around as you got dragged up. It'd make getting grabbed a lot more panicky, as you try and line up a shot on a seemingly moving target.
Also, it'd make that long jump grab a lot more interesting, as you jump across the gap, pass over the landing platform, then swing upward and smash into the ceiling.

I kinda doubt the engine would be capable of handling such things, but it'd certainly make barnacles more dramatic.

[Tabby]

Exactly what I thought 9seed, I don’t really know much about the source engine but I do believe It would work, when you get hit by a crowbar or a zombie your cam moves a bit in hl2 and it just needs something like that and a movement, when you’re trying it I’m sure it will work. Btw. Thanks a lot for the replies I think this topic is really interesting.

[ronster]

This is a fantastic Idea! You can stipulate a camera shake fairly easily.

You could also probably re-code it as a Physics constraint type also on !Player or npc

There is also the case for the actual Barnacle Making a Strike sound i.e. similar to the Barnacle weapon in opposing force before the Bark where it Drags pulls and is supposed to Pant also.

There is a weird delay when a Barnacle grabs a prop physics to the sound though it is delayed for some reason....

I would also say if you end up in it's jaws it should be game over at that point if you can't shoot it. It would be something also to see inside it's mouth briefly (animation) just before the screen goes red

It would be nice to trigger a throttle animation on npc's also similar to the Marine in Uplink or Vort animation.

[DOOT]

To go about solving the issues with NPCs when grabbed by Barnacles, there's a solution that could possibly fix multiple bugs at once. In Blast Pit, when the dying scientist that tells you to go kill the tentacle dies, he flails out for a second. Same with that dying guard with the wall-mounted medkit in Unforseen Consequences. I think that tweaking the ragdoll physics a bit would fix these issues. And I have a suggestion for an easter egg: Make one of the barnacles on the area with the 2nd broken catwalk in unforseen consequences have a slightly more rope-like tongue (add a skin setting to the npc), referencing Freeman's Mind.

[Venom415]

tbh this remember the rope mechanic from opposing force, if they use something like that for the barnacle tongue and then release the player upon death, that could work really well. Omg imagine having to kill a barnacle and swing off its tongue to cross something lol.

[Tabby]

Originally posted by Venom415:

tbh this remember the rope mechanic from opposing force, if they use something like that for the barnacle tongue and then release the player upon death, that could work really well. Omg imagine having to kill a barnacle and swing off its tongue to cross something lol.

that would be astonishing, the rope animations from opposing force were very good and if vavle did that 1999 on goldsrc who stops them from a good animation in source huh

[ronster]

I think that having the Player swinging about on the tongue is a lot of extra work for a small pay off... I will explain in a sort of Hammer Flow chart (I/O) how I think it could be improved but with less work.

On Touch Barnacle Tongue >>> Barnacle Strike

On Barnacle Strike >>> Trigger !Player Random Camera Movement (Disorientation) 1.5 seconds
On Barnacle Strike >>> Play Sound (Barnacle Strike)

On Barnacle Pull >>> Trigger Hurt (Throttle Damage)
On Barnacle Pull >>> Start Camera Shake 1 second
On Barnacle Pull >>> Play sound Bark (And Pull and Pant)

On Barnacle Bite >>> fade to Black Screen
On Black Screen >>> Overlay screen (Squigy Flesh interior mouth) 1 second
On Finish Overlay >>> !Player Death

What I think this would do is weather you walked in to the tongue or jumped into it, once you touch it a random camera movement to disorientate would suffice to soften the lack of physics and simulate physics with the camera and be accented by a strike sound. A slight camera zoom to be triggered could also work in conjuction with camera movement on strike.

You get hurt whilst being pulled up and the camera shakes making it a bit harder to shoot the Barnacle.

Once you get to it's mouth it always seemed to me that you still feel a long way away from it.... So instead and following the same rules that it has for npc's also once bitten you are dead but again we are playing with the camera to improve perception by first going dark then a brief glimpse of an screen of Alien Flesh for a moments glance and then screen goes red you are dead.

Example of the sort of Overlay to display for interior mouth

https://cdnb.artstation.com/p/assets/images/images/013/337/071/large/chris-hodgson-alien-growth-flesh-rhizome-render-01.jpg?1539141450

Also of note is that Zombies when caught by the Barnacle.... The Zombie should have a helpless state whilst being pulled up (Not Throttled) and is spat out and the Barnacle only eats the head crab which is the correct way this should act .

Security Guards, HECU, and Scientist and Vorts should all be Throttle animations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svy1Y5r8Ux4

As for the Barnacle tongue in Half life it is animated with a Dangle but upon Grabbing something Visually it would be nice to make it animate more like the rope in Opposing force upon pulling up something.... But the Rope in Opposing force looks like it uses Sections linked together, where as the Barnacle tongue is one Dangling object by the looks of it. The Tongue Grab animation just looks like it needs looping to be honest but a better Idle dangle animation would benefit the Tongue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJj073iu-N4

Tongue Rotation might also be a cool effect on both !player and npc's to make feel more organic on the way up. Spiral upwards.

Dropping a Headless Ragdoll Corpse of of Scientist, Security Guard, HECU and Vorts would make a lot more sense than Levitating the whole Npc through the ceiling. The Zombie mechanics are taken care of by only eating the Head crab so it shows us how it was supposed to work. In Half Life 1 we are treated to the npc arching their back then Gibbed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kARXsPyecpw

Upon eating a Flare a Barnacle should ignite.

[Tabby]

Originally posted by ronster:

I think that having the Player swinging about on the tongue is a lot of extra work for a small pay off... I will explain in a sort of Hammer Flow chart (I/O) how I think it could be improved but with less work.

On Touch Barnacle Tongue >>> Barnacle Strike

On Barnacle Strike >>> Trigger !Player Random Camera Movement (Disorientation) 1.5 seconds
On Barnacle Strike >>> Play Sound (Barnacle Strike)

On Barnacle Pull >>> Trigger Hurt (Throttle Damage)
On Barnacle Pull >>> Start Camera Shake 1 second
On Barnacle Pull >>> Play sound Bark (And Pull and Pant)

On Barnacle Bite >>> fade to Black Screen
On Black Screen >>> Overlay screen (Squigy Flesh interior mouth) 1 second
On Finish Overlay >>> !Player Death

What I think this would do is weather you walked in to the tongue or jumped into it, once you touch it a random camera movement to disorientate would suffice to soften the lack of physics and simulate physics with the camera and be accented by a strike sound. A slight camera zoom to be triggered could also work in conjuction with camera movement on strike.

You get hurt whilst being pulled up and the camera shakes making it a bit harder to shoot the Barnacle.

Once you get to it's mouth it always seemed to me that you still feel a long way away from it.... So instead and following the same rules that it has for npc's also once bitten you are dead but again we are playing with the camera to improve perception by first going dark then a brief glimpse of an screen of Alien Flesh for a moments glance and then screen goes red you are dead.

Example of the sort of Overlay to display for interior mouth

https://cdnb.artstation.com/p/assets/images/images/013/337/071/large/chris-hodgson-alien-growth-flesh-rhizome-render-01.jpg?1539141450

Also of note is that Zombies when caught by the Barnacle.... The Zombie should have a helpless state whilst being pulled up (Not Throttled) and is spat out and the Barnacle only eats the head crab which is the correct way this should act .

Security Guards, HECU, and Scientist and Vorts should all be Throttle animations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svy1Y5r8Ux4

As for the Barnacle tongue in Half life it is animated with a Dangle but upon Grabbing something Visually it would be nice to make it animate more like the rope in Opposing force upon pulling up something.... But the Rope in Opposing force looks like it uses Sections linked together, where as the Barnacle tongue is one Dangling object by the looks of it. The Tongue Grab animation just looks like it needs looping to be honest but a better Idle dangle animation would benefit the Tongue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJj073iu-N4

Tongue Rotation might also be a cool effect on both !player and npc's to make feel more organic on the way up. Spiral upwards.

Dropping a Headless Ragdoll Corpse of of Scientist, Security Guard, HECU and Vorts would make a lot more sense than Levitating the whole Npc through the ceiling. The Zombie mechanics are taken care of by only eating the Head crab so it shows us how it was supposed to work. In Half Life 1 we are treated to the npc arching their back then Gibbed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kARXsPyecpw

Upon eating a Flare a Barnacle should ignite.

thanks for your Ovelwhelming feedback and ideas, it looks like you put a lot of effort in this. I think your thought about this discussion are very good and should be analyzed by someone really working with Animation or Programming. Greetings Timon

[ronster]

Thanks,

There is a slight problem of spitting out a headless ragdoll, assumming that you can transform on the fly any security guard, HECU, Scientist or Vort to a headless version....

What you don't want is for the Barnacle or Barnacles to continually pick them up so they must be told to Ignore anything they have either bitten or tasted once.... There is a string in the code that tells it not to pick up something it has already spat out so inferring that the npc transformation should be the end result and the Barnacle thinks it has spat that npc out and won't grab it again

[Maksman]

Remember when Barnacles grabbed npcs and they didn't die on contact of the tounges? Pepridge farm remebers.