RTCW AI discussion

Hey dudes.

I just beat RTCW the other day. The last resurrection level with Heinrich was interesting to say the least. After I took him out, I had to go back and re-do the level because it froze after the initial cutscene and didn't auto-save. Cheers to Id for allowing unlimited saves. This game struck me as being SOF light, with an added component of supernatural monsters. That non-human element created a nice factor for gameplay and emliminated the monotony effect IMO. Nice balance there. I also like how they slowly worked in the zombie hoards later on in the game instead of straight out from the start.

One area had me confused however. Heinrich, like the "gorrila" at the earlier level, conjured up flying ghost armies. The initial boss had range limits with these flying terrors, however the Heirich version did not. I did manage to keep moving and hitting long enough in order to keep him busy, but out of the blue he would release a batch of these killers and well...snuff me out, frightnight style. Anyways, I was wondering what convention was used for the AI to trigger these ghosts. It make me think the gameplay did not necessarily have to be so fast and furious at times. Of course there seemed to be a wildcard effect were Heirnrich lauched these ghosts out of random decision...

Oh and the rest of the AI was fairly seemless. I did catch the odd time were one Nazi was just standing around next to his fallen comrad, just goosesteping around sort to speak.

Note: The max textures did slow down on one part with my ti4400.(Have to edit my sig too) It was the final level were your pursued the remaining SS Occult agents through the courtyard with the giant knight statue. Possibly due to multiple lighting effects I'll wager. It became MX like all over again...

So, any notable comments on gameplay?

Oh, and one final comment: Heinrich(sp) wasn't really Heinrich at all, just a manifestation of his likeness. Wonder if Id developers went that deep into gamplay though. ;)

Umm if something was limiting your fps in that area I can assure you it wasnt your vid card (espeically a gf4)Id say more like CPU power.
All these recent highly modified Q3 engine games are very very very CPU dependent.

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Originally posted by Ganja
Umm if something was limiting your fps in that area I can assure you it wasnt your vid card (espeically a gf4)Id say more like CPU power.
All these recent highly modified Q3 engine games are very very very CPU dependent.

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I agree. My 1Ghz P3 will continualy be my system's bottleneck until I upgrade. Also, CPU intensive flight sims I tested out as well with my new card. FS2000 did show a major improvement, but Jane's F/A-18 only slight at max texture. Only thing notable in RTCW was that one scene. Zero movement, no characters moving about, just the lighting effects. Slight choppiness just panning the area at max detail.

Other notes on weapon use I made:


Knife: Used this for simply breaking things open for searches etc. It was somewhat disappointing to find you couldn't throw it(as in SoF), but it would have been useless against most enemies anyways. I did entertain the idea of meeleing with the zombies using a knife/kick combo and to tell you the truth it worked out not bad. Sooner or later I went back to foot shots with the shield carry types though.

Pistols: Did not use these much. The Luger silencer still took several shots usually at long range and the twin .45's were a nice touch, but I found them also useless. Never used the .45 by itself.

Submachine guns: The Sten was all around the best for me. It delivered enough rounds to stop the target from firing back, and possessed some stealth properties with being so quiet. MP-40 usually became a default weapon and lacked firepower. Although the Thompson was better, I rarely had enough ammo for it to carry it long distance.

Rifles: Mauser with scope and the Snoop rifle were quite effective. Especially during covert and when low on smg ammo. Again the diff between this and SoF was the inability to fire while leaning. Just the same, it made you near invincible in SoF to do so. (Sorry about the Raven/id comparison. These are my only FPS I own right now)

Assault Rifle: Paratroop rifle was the best. Semi-automatic, scope and powerful. I used it 90% of the time after it became introduced.

Grenades: The German grenades were useful at times if I managed detonation time down to the last second. The Nazi troops were all experts in avoiding these. I never did see them play "haky sack" and lob them back like soccer stars as advertised, but then again I was usually trying to rush things than to notice, and rarely ever stood in line of fire to find out. The American grenades were useless to me. Less throwing distance, never hit a target. Have to retry those. The dynamite was pure boss weoponry. Especially the first flame soldier.

Rockets: Pure Uber Soldat stuff for me. Never used them otherwise.

Venom: Uber Soldat again. I also used it on the Lopers. It had no use for troops although during the "statue" scene I discussed, I did have to use it on the extra tough elite troops in a desperate run attack.

Flamethrower: Nasty weapon. It was good for corners, I will admit that. Zombies were quickly dispatched with this. Other than that, it has a lag time on it which made it ineffective during major combat against troops. They could still fire away after getting hit for a while.

Telsa: Useless. Most elite troops could fire while being hit with it. Ineffective in every way for me. I think the zombies actually enjoyed it. Also poor aiming capabilities. Reminded me of the SoF microwave gun. Similiar ineptitude, but even worse. Quite fake as well.

I finished RTCW one week after i bought the game :( . Now i'm saving my penny for MOHAA or dungeon Siege ;)

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Originally posted by badass_anthony
I finished RTCW one week after i bought the game :( . Now i'm saving my penny for MOHAA or dungeon Siege ;)

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I picked away at it for about a week and a half. Not, bad. I may go back and try it again soon, but for now, I'm trying to master beating the last level until I find a pattern. I did the same thing with Soldier of Fortune until it became second nature. AFA new games right now, I'm not sure. Probably Max Payne, MOHAA(1 WW2 fps is enough for me though) or SoF2, but I'm not sure yet. Also waiting to see any new flight sims on the horizon.

I figured it out. Outside the ring triggers the flyers. Makes sense.