Director Mode

[MR_BRONSON]

Director Mode (Recording/Editing module)

 

If you played Grand Theft Auto V on PC (2015) then you will be familiar with the Rockstar Editor - that's what I'm suggesting here, for Naval Action.

 

Showcase screenshot of the Rockstar Editor in Grand Theft Auto V - source: Gamespot

 

For those of you that don't know about Rockstar Editor, basically it allowed you to record gameplay without having to worry about camera angles or camera movement. That means you can press record, and play like you normally would, focusing entirely on the action, not the camera. Then, after the fact, you could use the editor to completely change the camera set-up, its movements, composition etc. You are able to move the camera around the scene, as you pause and scrub through the footage.

 

How does it work? In laymen's terms, as I understand it, when you press record, it doesn't actually capture the video and audio - instead, it records the events that occur in your vicinity, and their status, and their status changes, as you are recording, and later, in the editor, the game engine reconstructs the scene, using the recorded physics events and character statuses, and stringing them together as a stream you can pause and play through (as well as reverse and fast-forward) like a timeline on a video editor. Because the engine is rendering everything that happened, (instead of a video file displaying what you captured) you are able to move the camera around, and set up movements and angles, as you please, throughout this recorded timeline. When everything's done, that's when you finally render it as an actual video file.

 

 

 

Why I suggest Naval Action should have an editor like Rockstar's

 

Ask yourself how many times, during gameplay, you've stopped and thought about how epic the current situation looks and feels. Like a scene out of a movie! This game looks absolutely gorgeous and stunning for a Unity Engine game - with its huge scale and detailed models (and sub-surface scattering on the water), there have been many moments during battle that I've wanted to record the blazing armageddon of cannon fire, smoke and ship parts - with proper cinematic angles - slap on some Pirates of the Caribbean music on, and enjoy re-watching my battle in cinematic glory!

 

However, it's hardly easy to get good cinematography (even if you Ctrl+H to remove HUD) by default, and concentrate on the battle at hand at the same time. Using the Home button to go into free-camera mode is great for screenshots, but impractical for videos as you are unable to control your ship.

 

If the system that Rockstar uses for GTA V could be replicated, i.e. ability to reconstruct a "demo" by recording gameplay events, so that you can set up camera angles after the fact, for Naval Action, I would be very impressed, and you can be sure many people who enjoy recording and editing gameplay footage would love it, and there would be many Youtube videos of Naval Action that would start to look like something out of Master and Commander.

 

Ship battle scene from Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003) - source: Neogaf 

 

 

 

Some extra notes

I do not think this should be a priority for the game developers, at all. Suggestions, as I see them, are literally that, "suggestions". Ideas that could inspire the developers at Game Labs to add to their game, at any point during development. I fully appreciate their right to disregard the idea completely, and I don't believe this is even an important feature - simply an idea that I, personally, think would be cool for them to think about or entertain. I do not claim credit for the idea, either.

Edited January 29, 2016 by MR_BRONSON

[OlavDeng2]

1. what you are proposing would be too much for the devs i think if they were to do this while doing everything else they need to do

 

2. replay system would be good though, replay system but no video editor or screen recorder as they take valuable time from the devs where as they probably would not be able to match tools such as adobe premiere(and maybe even windows movie maker)) and OBS

[MR_BRONSON]

1. what you are proposing would be too much for the devs i think if they were to do this while doing everything else they need to do

 

2. replay system would be good though, replay system but no video editor or screen recorder as they take valuable time from the devs where as they probably would not be able to match tools such as adobe premiere(and maybe even windows movie maker)) and OBS

 

At the time of making the post, I did not feel like I'd have to, but something told me someone would leave a comment like yours, regarding development priority, and so I did end up leaving "Final Notes" as follows (in the original post):

 

Some extra notes

I do not think this should be a priority for the game developers, at all. Suggestions, as I see them, are literally that, "suggestions". Ideas that could inspire the developers at Game Labs to add to their game, at any point during development. I fully appreciate their right to disregard the idea completely, and I don't believe this is even an important feature - simply an idea that I, personally, think would be cool for them to think about or entertain. I do not claim credit for the idea, either.

 

In general I find your point to be moot, even if I hadn't addressed it in my original post - the suggestion forum are for suggesting ideas, not for demanding things to be added straight away. It doesn't take a genius to realise there are many other things that are a lot more important and I even mentioned that my idea isn't even necessarily important. Making suggestions are for both, the developers to take inspiration from, if they want, and for the rest of the community to pitch in to see what general opinion is. Saying "they take valuable time from the devs" is not really helpful considering that the developers themselves would be able to judge how worthwhile it is. 

 

To respond to your comments further:

 they probably would not be able to match tools such as adobe premiere(and maybe even windows movie maker)) and OBS

 

Another invalid comment, really - if you read the post again, you'll understand that what I'm proposing is not an editor like Sony Vegas or Premiere or Windows Movie Maker ... And it's not a recorder like Fraps or Bandicam or a streaming/capture service like OBS.

 

It's akin to Rockstar Editor, which has nothing to do with editing video, and everything to do with capturing game events so the engine can re-render them (like a demo in other games such as CS:GO) and the camera can be re-positioned at will, and the event stream paused/played etc.

 

I recommend re-reading the post if you are really interested in leaving feedback. Regardless, thank you for your input.

[Ned Loe]

Too much for now, but definitely can be developed in later stages if devs have time. 

[Soler]

I like it

[HappilyyInsane]

I also

 

I like it