You know dogs and cats can see at night, why not the aliens from natural selection?
Maybe the aliens automatic see like "nightvision" in darkrooms

I don't want a green screen like the retarted NVG built into the AvA plugin. Maybe something that'd ramp up brightness instead?

What wrong with the current alien "flashlight"? I kind of like it and it's quite useful indeed for seeing marines in the dark.

I think he means a flashlight that also includes seeing all those dark corners and objects. But it sounds like a good idea, I've always found that the aliens had a harder time getting through the dark (no way to see where they are going because there is no light), but more effective in killing in the dark (current flashlight for aliens). I find that kinda strange and a little annoying too.

Ok, we could go about making everything go gray except for player models and all shadow removed. But that also destroys the visual pleasure of enjoying a well designed enviroment doesn't it? Well at least you can toggle it on and off.

That might get people to stop rushing blindly into marines.

Nothing will ever get people to stop rushing blindly into marines, that's like saying magazines without covers will sell less issues merely because you can't see the gossip that's contained within. Scientific fact, gossip magazines have an aura.

Ya thats right, i see many animals with a flashlight in the hand

Nightvisin is only a word!
I mean, that the aliens can see in dark rooms, the view going to grey/less color ONLY in dark rooms.

What I mean is that highlighting the enemy will automatically increase their intensity level through contrast, which might make new players more likely to notice how bad a situation they'll be putting themselves in when they rush down a corridor into a waiting lmg.

Here's an idea, why not come up with something more alien than "low light" or "dark" vision? Right now, the Kharaa turns on a hyper sensitivity to objects, such as Kharaa structures and Marines, which represents an ability like "seeing" with their nose and the heat given off. In a perfectly dark room, this is a huge advantage to the Kharaa and is not limited to a cone as in the case of a Marine. Where it turns into frustration is that you have no chance of seeing the shape of the walls and such in the same perfectly dark room - so running into and getting stuck in odd spots is way too common.

What I would like to suggest comes from nature, lets give Kharaa "feelers", which in game terms translates to highlighting the imediate adjacent surfaces surrounding the player is lit up in way only they can see.

Alternatively, perhaps they could also "borrow" from nature and leave trails of scent on all the surfaces that they and other Kharaa can see highlighted, thus exploring and "mapping" out their territory in pitch black.

there used to be a sensory chamber ability that left scent trails, but it was pretty crappy, not very useful in pub servers, and they got rid of it pretty quickly

aka. Pheromones. (v2.01) Yes, I've been here awhile. If I recall when we tried to get focus to replace it we got a hell of a lot of vocal resistance. Now people love focus. There are so many good ideas in this game that are like that: hate it before trying --> love it after in the game.

I think ive got a great idea...
what about, when every kind of alien has a different sight/sense.
I thought about a -(visible)- sense of smell? there u can see where the enemy/friend has toucht the flow/wall, and the older it is, the less visible would it be.
Also u can make it with the hearing... im not sure how it works with the hl2 engine but it would be cool to have an increased hearing-range in lets say 30 degrees angle in front of u.
also a quake?!-sense, where u can see in which direction (also through wall) are marines/machines/other aliens.
What about an infraredvision, which lets u easy see enemys, aliens, droppt weapons, machines etc.
Or a single sense, like smelling blood of a badly injured marine/aliens, for sure be able to see the difference between alien-marine.

All these advantages should have for sure some disadvantage!
+smellsense - bit (not completely) visionsense
+hearingsense - tiny bit visionsense
+quakesense - bit hearing sense
+infraredvis. - bit visionsense

or all mixed together, and well balanced.

Now... thats my part here so far.
And because i play mostly aliens, some other ppl should have kind of similar ideas for marines.

cheers Moe

Just make it so that the current alien flash light picks out the outlines of structures and walls and what not, maybe it could be more multi coloured, with walls and objects becoming the current yellowy white and then marines and other moving objects becoming darker yellow, the faster they move or the closer they are, until they become red. Make it more like some of those funky effects they use on wild life shows, that show how an animal sees the world.

Look at the effects they use on some of the maps in this video to get a better idea of what I mean.

Off topic, but i think itd be cool if one of the aliens only saw in black and white, and marines kinda glowed a bright white.

thatd look so freakin hot.


Id also like to see some level of motion blurr for ALL players. (really low)
its really easy do, just toy around iwth the motion blurr function on garrys mod to see what i mean.

it just makes the game look SO much smoother, and more realistic.

what about the current glowing marines/aliens + the vision mode would also display the poly's lines/outlines (EDIT) wirefame in close proximity overlayed onto the normal view

that way you can easily navigate and see marines without changing anything to do with lighting

it would like an virtual reality overlayed onto a normal vision, sorta like the alien was using sonar or something.

That's perfect, since it forces you to become like an alien, trusting onlky their senses in battle.

Not a horrable idea but like... On cs if crap is too dark i just turn up my gamma lol.

NS2 should do its best from stopping players from doing this.

Come to think of it, the source engine does have a lot of neat visual filters that can be applied... like when the G-Man talks to Gordon Freeman in HL2 at the beginning and end.

Ive been thinking about this also. I like the idea of aliens using different senses to see in the dark, and the old one needs some obvious upgrades. Lets not focus on too many senses though, we dont need something that gives aliens an obvious advantage over marines. I mentioned this also on another discussion.

Simply having aliens and marines glow doesnt really make sense to me. But I also dont want to drift too far away from it. Alien night vision still needs to be different from marine night vision/flashlight/whatever they decide to use.

Theres got to be a way to make it look more realistic. Just a suggestion. Maybe in the dark you could have all the models outlines in white or something, nothing to much, and have lines pulsing from them in the direction that they are moving, kind of like sonar vision or something, if you get what im trying to say. I always wondered how bats see in the dark, and incorperating that into the game may give it a bit of an original edge. We could have the borders of things that arent moving ligned in white, or we dont have to. Aliens originally couldnt see things that werent moving to begin with, but this could pose issues also. Being in a dark room alone for example. Maybe things that arent moving could be ligned in white only with the alien itself is moving, the sound of its own movement echoing off the walls so it can see where its going. This would however pose a problem when it came to upgrading to silence, but it would be interesting, and original.

Perhaps it could be something that may attact people to the game just so they can see how its done, and while seeing, realize "Hey, this is a pretty cool game!"

lol

Just a suggestion, it would probably take a lot of work to pull off, i dont know. It would be cool though.

Maybe keep the current flashlight for the aliens but make an automatic thing for like HL2 lighting instead of when you go outside it gets brighter when you go into dark rooms it gets brigher if your an alien.