Attn Modders: Can We Build a Game Within Pavlov?

[nova]

How far away are we from this being possible? I have taken a break from VR because of the absolute lack of popular new titles but really wish that there was something to play. Pavlov has always been my favorite go-to VR title and after putting in a lot of time playing Scum and now the Division 2, it made me realize that VR would make basically any shooter better. Imagine being able to check the workshop and download entire full gameplay conversions of Pavlov each with their own characters and story.

There are already people making content like this for Half-Life Alyx, an entire game based around Goldeneye 64 is in development. We already have the ability to have custom player models, AI, maps, weapons, items, objectives. Is it possible that we may someday be able to queue up level 1 of a coop campaign and play it with friends and then switch to the next level when we are done, maybe even string together levels and save progress? Could we get recreations of old games in Pavlov with functional enemies and animations? This is something that has been done with Sven Coop, where they managed to recreate Doom in the Half-Life engine for coop play complete with all the weapons and enemies.

What makes Pavlov great is that it is less of a game and more of a platform for first person shooter experiences. The greater it expands its capabilities the more fun we can have with it. I see Pavlov and VRChat as basically the only thing keeping the VR multiplayer community alive and just like how VRChat is a hub that connects you to thousands of usermade experiences, I would like to Pavlov reach a similar level.

While I love Pavlov I have to say that it lacks the incentive to come back, the addictive factor that is present in modern gaming. Pavlov needs some form of progression system, cosmetics, unlocks, loot boxes, achievements, leaderboards, etc.

Imagine, as an example, a game mode that turned every level into a looter shooter. Pavlov would need a massive AI refinement for something like this to be viable but imagine a game mode that took any level and filled it with enemies and once the enemies were defeated they dropped weapons of varying qualities, cosmetics, etc. These cosmetics could be kept after the match was over. The weapons could be weapons that are already in the game but with random stats and gun skins. Something like this could give Pavlov a lot of replayability but also an incentive to come back and there could be a competition within the community to create longer more extensive levels for a game mode like this, or full-conversion games in general.

How far away are we from something like this being possible? I know that looter shooter mechanics might not sound appealing but I am trying to give an example of where the game could potentially go if the engine or the toolsets are expanded to allow for it. Is a full conversion of Pavlov even possible? All I see are people replacing textures of player models and adding custom weapons and levels, but how deep and complex could someone make a game using the existing tools and how far are we from being able to make a game within a game?

[Emperor Void]

There are never enough posts like this dealing with potentials and vision. I too would like to see expansions from this much like what we saw with Counter Strike, and all the others. The core mechanics are great and are a great basis to work from. I would have put ATTN: Modders in your title btw. They have likely an answer for you.

[nova]

Originally posted by Emperor Void:

There are never enough posts like this dealing with potentials and vision. I too would like to see expansions from this much like what we saw with Counter Strike, and all the others. The core mechanics are great and are a great basis to work from. I would have put ATTN: Modders in your title btw. They have likely an answer for you.

Thanks for the response. Now that we have World War II models I think the next logical step would be to start adding science fiction and future weapons with different skins for humans and aliens. I would personally like a workshop for guns where people could recreate all the weapons from Halo, Unreal, Wolfenstein, Doom, Goldeneye, Perfect Dark, etc.

The main problem that I see for any of this being possible is that the current AI for bots is incredibly bad and meant to act as stand-ins for VR players. Pavlov needs proper AI bots that can dodge and strategize if we are going to ever get any campaign missions. And if we do get functional AI bots we could add commands to control them like a commander or squad leader and even voice commands.

It would bring an entirely new feel to the game if bots could duck behind over and try to flank you instead of walking blindly at you. I don't know what the future plans for Pavlov are but I am always excited by what the community and devs create and I hope that within the next year or two we start seeing games within the game itself, self-contained story missions with quality AI opponents, puzzles, music, voice overs and custom models. It might be more productive for a developer to make something like that a standalone game instead of a mod for Pavlov but looking at the player population levels for VR, anything released on Pavlov would get more attention and plays than a random nameless game.

Maybe Pavlov could serve as a platform for the creation of community content, allowing other full conversion mods to be DLC, free or otherwise and advertise it on the title screen. Pavlov is a great interface for VR shooters and if you look at recent videos of VR military training videos you can see that they are using a system that steals much of the mechanics from Pavlov's weapon interface. Now with the WWII mod what Pavlov is is starting to get a little confused. It is clearly not a Counter-Strike ripoff anymore and its starting to just look like a sandbox for others to create content for. Here is hoping that the community ends up getting tools to turn Pavlov into virtually anything, seeing as how most of the video game market refuses to put their IP in VR, maybe we will have to do it ourselves.

[Emperor Void]

Originally posted by Nova:

Originally posted by Emperor Void:

There are never enough posts like this dealing with potentials and vision. I too would like to see expansions from this much like what we saw with Counter Strike, and all the others. The core mechanics are great and are a great basis to work from. I would have put ATTN: Modders in your title btw. They have likely an answer for you.

Thanks for the response. Now that we have World War II models I think the next logical step would be to start adding science fiction and future weapons with different skins for humans and aliens. I would personally like a workshop for guns where people could recreate all the weapons from Halo, Unreal, Wolfenstein, Doom, Goldeneye, Perfect Dark, etc.

The main problem that I see for any of this being possible is that the current AI for bots is incredibly bad and meant to act as stand-ins for VR players. Pavlov needs proper AI bots that can dodge and strategize if we are going to ever get any campaign missions. And if we do get functional AI bots we could add commands to control them like a commander or squad leader and even voice commands.

It would bring an entirely new feel to the game if bots could duck behind over and try to flank you instead of walking blindly at you. I don't know what the future plans for Pavlov are but I am always excited by what the community and devs create and I hope that within the next year or two we start seeing games within the game itself, self-contained story missions with quality AI opponents, puzzles, music, voice overs and custom models. It might be more productive for a developer to make something like that a standalone game instead of a mod for Pavlov but looking at the player population levels for VR, anything released on Pavlov would get more attention and plays than a random nameless game.

Maybe Pavlov could serve as a platform for the creation of community content, allowing other full conversion mods to be DLC, free or otherwise and advertise it on the title screen. Pavlov is a great interface for VR shooters and if you look at recent videos of VR military training videos you can see that they are using a system that steals much of the mechanics from Pavlov's weapon interface. Now with the WWII mod what Pavlov is is starting to get a little confused. It is clearly not a Counter-Strike ripoff anymore and its starting to just look like a sandbox for others to create content for. Here is hoping that the community ends up getting tools to turn Pavlov into virtually anything, seeing as how most of the video game market refuses to put their IP in VR, maybe we will have to do it ourselves.

VR is not going anywhere, but it also hasn't hit mainstream yet. Its edging to it. The Quest 2 has done a giant leap for that, but as mostly a standalone. Cost of a gaming PC does restrict the acceleration of growth. Current issues with GPU's being available on the market doesn't help either. Q2 is amazing for what it is, but it is still not yet the THING. Qualcomm is also getting some major competition with another 5 nanometer cell gpu that can do ray tracing. I wouldn't say graphics are the biggest issue for mass adoption. Quest certainly is keeping an amazing price point, but most people have no experience to base a $300-$400 purchase from and even if they do, too many base it off bad phone vr experiences that are 3dof and terrible. I know there are a lot of us who act as ambassadors to pancake gamers and even non gamers to try and sell the awesomeness of the vr experience to. There is just not as much mainstream knowledge about VR. It is still fringe, and because of that it doesn't have nearly the cast of Dev's to make games and content. That is just how it is now, but we are in no way stuck in this.

Pavlov has already carved its place, and it won't go anywhere. Nothing else is going to take its place. I can't say if its full potential will be met, perhaps maybe when Pavlov 2 comes out sometime we will see more of its potential fleshed out. However, it will get there at some point.

It isn't about where you started, or even where you are now, it is where you are going to be. Pavlov will reap the benefits of an exploding vr market. VR already accounts for slightly over 2% of gamers on Steam this year. Quest 2 also happens to be the most used HMD on Steam btw. Hand in hand, tech improves, gets more available as it gets cheaper, is introduced to more people, and hangups end up fading bit by bit... The best is yet to come. Hell, I have been here since damn near the beginning of Pavlov. It is remarkable how it has grown since those early days. It isn't done by a longshot.