UT Movement Mechanics Design

[Thomson]

• Running speed
Direction wise it should stay the same in all directions to enable effective backward movement.
Speed wise it shouldn't surpass the top movement speed of previous iterations, in general
it needs to be fast without getting out of control.

• Acceleration
I personally think thats an important point and that acceleration should be very fast to the point
that it's almost instant. Being able to change directions while walking is what made "walking" viable
as opposed to dodges against any kind of weapon type.

• Air control
Air control should be fairly limited, i think that is part of the risk/reward of jumping or dodging.
Being in the air generally makes you vulnerable to but you gain speed/position.
The one person in the WIP forum had an interesting video where he showed his implementation
of a "quick-fall" button that enables you to accelerate your falling speed.
I think this is a great idea to implement because this could allow higher/further jumps without
the game becoming a flying simulator.

• Jump height
• Gravity
Thats a topic that i think is hard to really talk about without testing it and experiencing it first hand.
In general i liked the jump height in 2k4 because it enabled much more interesting map design but people have been complaining that it feels very floaty.
The best compromise (at least worth testing) could be high jump height + high gravity.

• Dodging
• Double jump
• Wall dodge
I think the 2k4 "moveset" was perfect feature wise. Improvements on height/arc/speed of the jumps are possible though.
In general i think double jumps should be quite high but slow to establish a risk/reward scenario.
Dodges have been great previous iterations, fast and low to make them viable during combat.

• Impact/Rocket jumping
• Team boosting
• Lift jumping
All i can say is "Please don't remove those".

• Ramp boosting
Ramp boosting is great. I think it would be gread if it was very fast depending on the slope. Similar to a dodge. I think it should be less focused on "sliding up a ramp"
and more on "fast sliding along ramps"

• Jumppads
Jump pads are neat, one possible improvement would be if jump pads could alter the jump properties completely including gravity.

[Laokin]

Point #1: I think that the game needs a unique style of movement to not alienate either ut99 or ut2k4 player bases and instead try to get everyone on board.

Point #2: I think the more options and the more elaborate movements are the better. It increases the skill ceiling and adds a whole new dimension to the game and also allows for more diversity in trial maps (bunnytrack in 99)

Point #3: Running should be more of a mix between quake style ***** hopping and ut style where you can reach insane speed if you're really good but while keeping the in-fighting dodge style of movement. I should be treated as a skill to master as hard as shooting. Shootmania and quake are good examples of this where you can spend hours in maps trying to find little ways to improve your game by running better. UT never really had that level of dept to running and it needs to.

With that said :

Running speed : should not be too fast by default but when you use all the modifiers like acceleration and trick jumping and dodge jumping and what not you should be able to move super fast
Acceleration : not too sure what you mean by that but I think quake style ***** hopping acceleration should be mixed with ut style dodging to add a new dimension to running
Air control : not sure about that, has to be balanced with everything else I guess
Jump height : ut3 jump height was weird imo, should be more like ut99 or ut2004
Gravity : I think you should aim for a more realistic ut99 style gravity without hindering the feeling of speed you can attain if you're a really good runner
Dodging : should definetely be there can't be UT without dodge and I also think dodge jumping should be in
Double jump : yes
Wall dodge : yes
Impact/Rocket jumping : absolutely, it adds a new dimension to the game
Team boosting : absolutely in 99 it was really fun to use teamwork to find ways to bypass the ennemy to reach objectives in assault for example
Ramp boosting : yes
Lift jumping : yes
Jumppads : yes

Believe it or not, but, there is a point when the skill ceiling can become too high -- when this happens, you have no community outside of the 1% of people who are comfortable at this really high ceiling. Too many movement options can reduce the game to "Impossible to hit each other" rounds where two people duel for 10 minutes before one kills the other, or at the most extreme levels, to a point where it's out right impossible for them to kill each other. The more movement options you have, the less value weapons like rockets have, because rockets take time to travel, so a certain amount of prediction is REQUIRED in order to land a rocket shot.

High skill ceilings are important, 600 floor skyscraper skill ceilings are just as bad as matchbox 1 inch skill ceilings. If you have too many options for movement, it becomes virtually impossible to hit people using those movement options at peak efficiency.

This is the exact reason why UT2K4 survives with it's most popular game modes being Onslaught and Invasion.

Onslaught invalidates your movement options by adding vehicles and tremendous map sizes, Invasion puts you against A.I. enemies in a COOP environment with the other players that have the same move set as you, so you are not even competing against other players with these move sets in either of these modes -- all the other modes are barren wastelands devoid of activity because the movement was WAAAAAAAAY too unpredictable in the actual arenas, the life blood of the Unreal franchise.

In contrast UT '99 survives on Instagib/DM/CTF servers -- because the movesets retained enough predictability for the combat to be fair and satisfying, but still retained enough required skill and precision to foster an earnest competitive game.

The higher your skill ceiling, the less people who play it will be good at it... The lower your skill ceiling the more people will be good at it.

100% of the player base being god like is just as bad as 99% of the player base being terrible.

You need to bring that to the middle, extremes are always bad.

[adobbs]

Steven, glad Epic is tackling this topic first--couldn't be more excited about this project. Arena FPS will always be the greatest genre, and I hope this game revives the community and introduces a new generation of gamers to the experience.

Although I primarily played Quake (Quake 3 in particular), I also played quite a bit of the various UT games, particularly UT99. I'm far from an expert at the series, but I did somehow manage to place 2nd at a small tournament behind r3v3lation.

My two cents...

General Movement:
• Running speed (in the past has been the same forward/back/strafing)

Keeping the same for forward/back/strafing is good. It's hard to comment on the speed itself without actually playing and feeling it. As you mentioned--speed and a combination of other mechanics can really bias the game toward hitscan weapons. It would be a problem if it felt like I was trying to hit a TF2 Scout with a rocket.

• Acceleration (how fast you change direction when moving)

Instant, or very, very close to instant. Anything else makes a first person game feel sluggish. When I'm viewing my character with a third person camera, the animations help make momentum feel more natural. In first person view, it feels like the game isn't responding to my inputs.

• Air control (how much you can affect the direction of your movement while in the air)

I'm more familiar with the difference in air control between Q1 and Q3 than UT series (sorry!). Somewhere in-between those would be great. In other words, if changing direction on the ground is instant, then in the air it should feel half a step less responsive.

• Jump height

Would have to test it out, but somewhere between half the height of the player and 3/4 height would be my guess.

• Gravity (affects how floaty the game feels. With higher gravity, even if the jump impulse is modified to result in the same jump height, you’ll spend less time in the air)

Definitely should feel some weight. This is more of a personal opinion, but I enjoy fast, fluid but solid-feeling movement.

• Dodging (fast low jump in any of the 4 cardinal movement directions, with a sudden deceleration on landing)

Yes. Also, thought I love bunn*y-hopping in quake, UT should not have it in the core game.

• Double jump (past titles only allowed the double jump to occur at the apex of the jump. UT2004 allowed double jump during dodge, UT3 did not/)

No. I would rather see people gain extra height through mechanics like impact or rocket jumping.

• Wall dodge (ability to perform a dodge while in the air away from a nearby vertical surface)

Sounds good.

• Impact/Rocket jumping (ability to jump extra high by jumping while point impact hammer down or using other splash/impulse providing weapon at cost of some health).

Yes, yes, yes. This mechanic is super fun and has a nice trade-off built into it. You have to sacrifice health for quicker movement or better positioning.

• Team boosting (ability to provide impact/rocket jumping benefits to teammates, who take no damage in normal teamgames)

My gut says this may open up to many opportunities to break level designs in unexpected or hard to test ways, but this could be a nice little mechanic to play with as well.

Level Designer constrained movement features:
• Ramp boosting (ability to scale a near vertical surface by dodging into it, possible on any near vertical surface in UT2003, and only on LD permitted surfaces in UT2004)

Unsure on this one.

• Lift jumping (taking advantage of lift momentum to get a boost to your jump at the top of the lift’s path)

The mechanic seems a bit superfluous and, for me, oddly unnatural feeling.

• Jumppads (provide a long distance jump to a specific destination)

Yes. It's not great when levels overuse them, but I think a jumppad is a useful, flexible tool that gives more options for level designers to play with.

[Holi]

Only thing I immediately think isn't something that should be in the game is double jump since it just seems rather redundant but then again.. Probably a lot of people who love to press twice on buttons here for some reason or other

Would be nice if you could trigger settings for these movement mechanics with easily changeable mutators that's a breeze to switch between rather quickly on the server for less cognitive memory bias as we feel it out

[Laokin]

I would not agree with that. As long as they make it like quake where you have to stop your running to engage in battle it will be fine.

It's not an opinion that skill ceilings can be too high, just like it's not an opinion that skill ceilings can be too low.

It's also not an opinion that the more complex and difficult game you have, the smaller number of people are going to be great at it.

It's also not an opinion that UT '99 survives with Instagib/CTF/DM while UT2K4 survives in Onslaught and Invasion.

These are all FACTUAL statements, not opinions, or intuition, or "what I feel." They are independently verifiable to every single person on this forum if they wished to test any of those statements.

You know why players have to "Stop" in quake to fight? Because of conservation of momentum [no air control or double jump direction changes] and because Quake's free base movement options are extremely limited.

Forward/Reverse
Strafe
Jump
Crouch

They don't have double jumps, dodges, dodge jumps, wall dodges, jump boot dodge jumps. They don't have the ability to change direction completely in the air, like in UT2K series... in Quake, if you're in the air, you're a sitting duck because they have a system built off momentum, the more you move this way, the faster you go -- slowly accelerating each jump, in order to turn, you have to stop. Quake is a masterpiece in the same vein that UT '99 is, and that's because they DON'T have arbitrary movement options, they have a very BASIC movement skill set that is PREDICTABLE. This is why the games both feature HEAVILY -- guns that are "PREDICTION" based, like the rocket launcher.

Quake has more trick jumps, but they all cost life at significant values putting hard limits on what you can and can't do and when it's wise and when it's unwise to do those things.

Adding MORE movement options wrecks this entirely -- essentially it would remove their need to "stop" to fight, and makes the movement UNPREDICTABLE, and so the rise of hitscan dominance, you might as well just delete every prediction based weapon in the game.

LG/Sniper/Shock/Minigun ONLY.

Does that sound like a fun game to you? Because if it does, UT isn't that game.

[myxomatosis]

what about 2x wall dogdge or more? like climbing between two close walls? be able to dodge on the enemy or teammate would be cool too "enemy dodge" hehe

[jayoplus]

Playing the previous unreal titles, it may be prudent to keep the run speed at maximum as fast as the fastest game? I played the 2K series and I enjoyed the movements, but I certainly see how the design decisions there made that game biased to hitscan weapons. I also enjoyed UT3's movement speed (as some have mentioned above).

In UT3, the gravity, IMO, seemed very heavy, but I understand this was closer to the original. I adapted quickly so again, this may just come down to finding some sweet spot between gravity, air control and the jump height. I have read some other players sentiments on removing the double jump in favor of a possibly higher jump height which may be a good idea as well. I see a post above suggesting the jump height be the same as the character height which is another possible good idea. The thing is for the most part, the players I played with and against used the dodge a lot instead of jumping and only jumped over obstacles or barriers, etc.

Impulse jumping seems to me like it should still be possible so I think that will be a plus from everyone. I'm on the fence on team boosting - especially with no damage. Well, in all the previous UTs I mostly played CTF and TDM and while I didn't observe this happen a lot, I would imagine this may break those game types? Not quite sure.

[firstplayer]

Hello Community,

I wanted to introduce myself first and foremost and say that I am excited about what EPIC is doing with the new Unreal Tournament. As most of you guys know this is a big deal to see how a game of this caliber is developed from the beginning.

Having said that, the direction that I believe Unreal should go in is to be bold in its design. Unreal Tournament is the biggest name in arena shooters and with it being gone for so long its return must be triumphant. Its design must be bold and forward thinking. Influencing a generation of games for the moment it is released not just in its genre but in other genres as well.

Give this opportunity I am happy to present some game design ideas for the Movement Mechanics. Steven Polge definitely hit the nail on the head when he said that this is the first area that needs to be worked on. How a player interfaces with an experience the game is key to any game's success.

First Player's Movement Mechanics:
• Running speed (in the past has been the same forward/back/strafing)
Running Forward, and Strafing should be the same speed relative to each other. The overall speed I would say should increase around 30% from UT2K4. The rationale is that UT is a fast paced game, in this era one of the crowns it should have is "fast gameplay". Simply moving backward however should be reduced by 25% to 10%. The rationale for this is strategy and to create more intense battles by keeping players in "each others faces." To make up for the lack of the retreat ability, players should be allowed to dodge in 6 directions and not just 4. More on this in the Dodging section.

The running speed should be the first movement system designed and run through the ringer. This will require iteration after iteration to get the feel right.

• Acceleration (how fast you change direction when moving)
There should be some slight acceleration, 0 to full speed in less than 200ms. ONLY from dead starts however. I think this will create a greater sense of speed and movement for the player. However this is a cinematic change. For a competition level FPS, near instant acceleration would work for NOT having to factor that into your attack strategy and would also have the added benefit of making the gameplay more accessible to new players.

• Air control (how much you can affect the direction of your movement while in the air)
This should be more of a physics based ability as you want it to "feel right" What makes competition level gameplay mechanics is predictability. If a player can predict how he or she is going to fall and that fall closely matches the other movement mechanics then this is good design. Air Control maybe on of the movement controls we work on last as getting everything else is place is what will play a large part in getting this feel right.

In this arena I would suggest allowing the Jet-pack to give a player more control over what they can do in air, Dodging, Extended Jumps, etc.

• Jump Height
Jump height should be one of the first mechanics worked on and made to feel right. If jumping is a combat mechanic the, The height of the jump should allow a player to leap over rockets fired by other players at the same elevation. If jumping is a tactical mechanic or movement mechanic then it should be only as high as allowing the player to traverse the environment better. In a game like unreal i would stick with the jump as a combat mechanic.

• Gravity (affects how floaty the game feels. With higher gravity, even if the jump impulse is modified to result in the same jump height, you’ll spend less time in the air)
This is the fun area and should be designed as such. With lots of iterations. Gravity should be one of the core combat mechanics. Manipulating and Mastering gravity should be part of the way players gain more skill. The gravity should be tight and not floaty but it doesn't and should not be realistic. There should also be maps, weapons, pick-ups that can manipulate the gravity in a certain area, raise or lower the gravity, create vacuums, etc.

• Dodging (fast low jump in any of the 4 cardinal movement directions, with a sudden deceleration on landing)
Dodging is one of my favorite things to do in games. This Muhammad Ali and not Mike Tyson when it comes to dodging. dodging should be a skill that is honed and when mastered should grant the player numerous offensive, defensive and traversal advantages. A dodge should be very quick and tight while allowing the player to get right back in the action after executing it. Kind of like a counter-punch. I think by adding a delay at the start but allowing the player to attack a few frames before the end of the animation that would create a dodge that requires skill to execute and is also fun to "slide around" projectiles.

• Double jump (past titles only allowed the double jump to occur at the apex of the jump. UT2004 allowed double jump during dodge, UT3 did not/)
The double jump should be the third component designed along with the Jump height. I personally believe that a Double Jump is a mandatory mechanic in this era of FPS and gaming. The Double jump should produce the same height as the single jump and the player should be allowed to trigger it at anytime during a jump and not simply at the apex. The rationale for this is to allow unpredictability during aerial combat. However, the Double Jump has its limits in that you don't have as much control over the second jump as you do over the first. Basically when you double jump and pick a direction, you are pretty much limited to landing at the end of that arch. This benefits both the jumper and the attacker as the attacker could fire a rocket at the jumpers first landing arch location forcing death or a double jump and then unleash another as now he knows exactly where the player will land.

The Double jump should serves a few purposes not just mobility but of strategy and allowing the player to move around the map more quickly and avoid projectiles as well as accomplish task during various game modes. In short it give the players more options. The double jump is also essential in tying into the newer features that I think should be added like Wall Running.

• Wall Dodge/Air Dodge (ability to perform a dodge while in the air away from a nearby vertical surface)
The Wall Dodge should feel about weighty and skillful and have about the same speed as a ground dodge albeit covering a slightly greater distance as the player will use the wall to generate force. The wall dodge is another high skill maneuver that is primary used to dodge in coming projectiles and keep opponents off balance. Also to add a bit of flavor to the wall dodge it might be fun to see how we can use direction based dodging to allow the player to dodge straight off the wall or up or down at a 45 degree angle. This would create even more unpredictability for the shooter but more options for the player to transverse the environment.

Air Dodge is an extension of wall dodge meaning that you don't need a wall to bounce off of however you would need a jet-pack. You have the same options however with noticeable reduced distance. The Air dodge is more of a last ditch maneuver to that when you see that rocket out the corner of your eye you can react. This one will take some iterating to get the feel and the distance right.

• Impact/Rocket Jumping (ability to jump extra high by jumping while point impact hammer down or using other splash/impulse providing weapon at cost of some health).
&
• Team boosting (ability to provide impact/rocket jumping benefits to teammates, who take no damage in normal teamgames)

An excellent feature that should remain in the game. It promotes teamwork and provide a way to boot a character to heights unobtainable by simple jumping or double jumping. There should be a limit to this however as if a player uses impact jumping they cannot double jump. The rationale is to cause the player to think creatively about using double jump or impact jump and it will foster creativity.

• Wall Running (ability to run on walls for a limited time)
In a game focused on twitch combat and speed, wall running is essential to the experience. Wall Running allows the players to get places fast and smoothly and it will open up a whole host of offensive defensive and traversal options. Players should be allowed to Dodge off the wall with increased range due to the increased speed that is generated from a wall run. The cool thing about a wall run and how it ties into the physics of the game is that after a player executes a wall that speed boost they gain from it remains as long as they keep sprinting. This in turn will allow them to jump further on a single or double jump. This momentum also persists through the jumps allowing the player to get around a map fast. This is an excellent feature and will be highly utilized in game-modes like Capture The Flag(CTF).

• Sliding (an extension of dodging in the forward direction while on ground)
Sliding would be a great feature to add as it would allow the player to dodge an incoming attack at relatively the same speed in which they were running and like the dodge proposed earlier, allow the player to attack just a few frames before the end of the animation. Tight and controlled and to be using like a boxer's counter punch. Also CTF levels would definitely benefit from this mechanic as it will allow the player to keep their momentum while moving through a dangerous battlefield.

Remember that all of these mechanics are paper design now and will need iteration to get right and maybe even some features will be scrapped due to just not being fun or unbalanced. If anyone in the community has any questions or would like me to further explain my rationale for my design decisions just hit me and we can discuss.

Like I said I am very excited for this opportunity and I will be contributing much more in the future.

firstplayer

[Wail]

I honestly thought UT3 hit a pretty good point in terms of striking the balance between UT2004 movement and UT movement. I'm probably an outlier in that I enjoyed all 3 UT games quite a bit, although for different reasons.

UT being the original was my first love and I think, quite honestly, that I'd be happy with just UT99 HD. Back in UT days I loved almost everything: Deathmatch, TDM, CTF, even occasionally Domination. Assault was kind of fun too, but as soon as it became about learning very specific jump tricks I lost interest.

That being said, I probably played more UT2004 total, and have worked with and modded for the UT2004/UE2.5 platform much more than the original game. UT2004's gameplay was well suited to Onslaught, where giving players dodge jump made footsoldier vs. vehicle battles pretty interesting. Onslaught did a really good job of making a skilled footsoldier relevant against vehicles, something I haven't seen most games do. The core gameplay of UT2004 was not rewarding to me in DM / CTF though. UT2004's Assault was an improvement over UT99's, and the TAM/Freon gametype worked with UT2004's gameplay much better than DM/CTF did.

UT3, to me, was a good in-between step gameplay wise that was dragged down by a number of surrounding factors. UT3 was actually fun in DM / CTF, so it was pretty successful there for me. The areas where it fell down in these gametypes were almost all aesthetic -- By which I mean that the gameplay didn't feel crisp, the visuals were muddied by excessive level detail / unclear character silhouettes, and innumerable other UI annoyances. What UT3 did most poorly, in my opinion, was Warfare, which is a shame since it was touted constantly as the big 'new' thing of UT3. Throughout the course of UT2004's life I modified a number of ONS maps to improve playability from years of experience playing the gametype and learning what was fun and what wasn't. Warfare seemed to disregard all of the lessons learned from UT2k4 (or maybe no one at Epic liked ONS enough to care) and ended up making a gametype that was superficially similar to Onslaught, but lost the subtle balance between footsoldiers and vehicles, and the nuances of vehicle use that made ONS interesting for years. I'm under no illusion that ONS was perfect, and I introduced a lot of mods for ONS in UT2004 to improve the gameplay, but Warfare was satisfying neither to existing UT2004/ONS players nor to people new to the UT series.

When it comes to core movement I would be content with any, but I do feel like UT99/UT3 have better movement for DM/CTF than UT2004. The dodge jump just became to necessary as a movement mechanic in UT2004, with side effects rippling through the rest of the game. One thing that did disappoint me in UT3 was that ramp-dodging was effectively removed. There weren't many areas with angled walls in the UT3 stock levels, but I remember trying it in a few places and sliding down ineffectually. Ramp sliding and rampdodging isn't strictly core to UT, but it's one of those movements that is fun and has been in for long enough that it's expected. Same thing with lift jumps, piston/shield jumps, etc.
One thing that UT2004 had over UT3 in the movement arena was that UT2004's wall-dodge movement reset the player's Z velocity. UT3's walldodges were not as satisfying because the Z component of velocity was maintained. While resetting the Z has consequences for designing vertical spaces and the risk/reward of elevation, I think the upside outweighs the downside. Resetting Z keeps the wall dodge a consistent mechanic, whereas if Z velocity is maintained, the dodge often feels like it does nothing. As a general game design principle if I execute a button press expecting a certain behavior I think it's better if that behavior is consistent (and fun/noticeable) rather than strictly realistic.

[KillTrain]

My short two cents

• Running speed (in the past has been the same forward/back/strafing)
- I would like to see characters running slightly slower backward than forward, OR, make aiming harder while moving backwards. This promotes an agressive forward-moving playstyle.

• Acceleration (how fast you change direction when moving)
- I would like to see this based on character size and mass as well as current speed and angle of direction change. Smaller, lighter characters turn faster and making a right turn is faster than a u-turn.

• Air control (how much you can affect the direction of your movement while in the air)
- you should not be able to move - aside from turning - while in midair. If you can, it should be very little.

• Jump height
- Having a slightly higher jump height than realistically possible would give the player a sense of strength, but too much seems comical

• Gravity (affects how floaty the game feels. With higher gravity, even if the jump impulse is modified to result in the same jump height, you’ll spend less time in the air)
- based on the map. I loved the outer space levels and gravity should be moon-like in space maps so the player has a reference and feeling of "this is what it would really be like". Maps on a planet with gravity should allow for 1-2s of air-time while jumping to keep it somewhat realistic. It would be neat to play on a space map and be able to jump 3 meters, playing another map on a jupiter-like planet and barely being able to jump, then playing on earth with normal jump height. Controlled by gravity not player jump height capability.


• Double jump (past titles only allowed the double jump to occur at the apex of the jump. UT2004 allowed double jump during dodge, UT3 did not/)
- I would like to see double jump REMOVED with the exception of gun or device-assisted double jumps.(ie rocket jumping). You should be able to double jump, but only with enough skill and knowledge of the game to do so.

• Wall dodge (ability to perform a dodge while in the air away from a nearby vertical surface)
- keep, fun tactic

• Impact/Rocket jumping (ability to jump extra high by jumping while point impact hammer down or using other splash/impulse providing weapon at cost of some health).
- KEEP, see above note in double jumping.

• Team boosting (ability to provide impact/rocket jumping benefits to teammates, who take no damage in normal teamgames)
- KEEP, promotes teamwork and skill while making things entertaining and fun. Who doesn't like to shoot their friends with rockets with no consequences?

Level Designer constrained movement features:
• Ramp boosting (ability to scale a near vertical surface by dodging into it, possible on any near vertical surface in UT2003, and only on LD permitted surfaces in UT2004)
- If kept, limit it. You should not be able to reach areas of maps you weren't intended to on foot, that is what jump pads are for. That said, it can add some very fun gameplay if kept in mind during level design.

• Lift jumping (taking advantage of lift momentum to get a boost to your jump at the top of the lift’s path)
- keep

• Jumppads (provide a long distance jump to a specific destination)
- Take it or leave it with me. If using them, use them sparely and only for strategically meaningful reasons. (In order to provide a way of getting somewhere on foot quickly when no vehicles available, or to high-up otherwise unreachable areas of maps etc.)

[MrFinalz]

so much this.

Steven

There's another alpha testing solution which can be easily implimented for movement testing, without the use of weapons

Bunnytrack, in a cut down form this UT99 mod is only about movement

There are thousands of simple and complicated BT maps which can be taken from for testing, the inclusion of a single trace hit weapon such as primary shock also allows people to test hitting targets whilst moving, which is basically just testing mouse and keyboard co-ordination

With this we can effectively test;

All forms of dodging and jumping
Ramp dodging
Air control(a massively important factor in getting the feel of the movement right)
Bounce pads
Lift jumping

Whilst bunnytrack uses flags there's no need for this, all we need are the obstacles

Here's an example of some BT maps

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbr1KE-uLn8

This way movement can be tested for longer and perfected easily, as there are many skilled UT players who focus on their movement

[Megistos]

IMO:

Running speed: Some happy medium between the previous games, but will depend on other factors.
Acceleration: Instant, like I believe it has always been.
Air control: Some happy medium between the previous games.
Jump height: Single jump a little higher than it was. No double jump.
Gravity: Some happy medium between the previous games.
Dodging: No dodge jump. UT3 had a good dodge distance, but it should be faster and the arc should be lower.
Double jump: No double jump, no dodge-jump.
Wall dodge: Yes, in some form. I don't really have an opinion on the details, but it's a cool mechanic.
Impact/Rocket jumping: Definitely keep this in.
Team boosting: Yes. It shouldn't have a huge impact on TDM, but it adds an element to gametypes like Assault.
Ramp boosting: UT2004 system seems good.
Lift jumping: I would definitely miss this if it was removed.
Jumppads: Up to the LD.

[WHIPperSNAPper]

Preferred Game Play / Movement: UT99 style

Running speed: 115% default UT99 speed. Just make the default a little faster and give server admins the option of increasing or decreasing the speed.

Acceleration: It never seemed to be an issue in UT99, so keep the UT99 settings.

Air control: Enough so that if you are jumping over a low gravity area (Lucius's Pit) or using a jump pad that you can curve your trajectory to land several meters to the left or right of a straight line, but not much more than that. This could probably be expressed in terms of "how far should a player be able to move in a direction perpendicular to the axis of the direction of the jump".

Jump height: Being able to lift your player cylinder off the ground by 60% of the player cylinder's height seems like a good ratio.

Gravity: I thought that UT99 felt pretty good and that UT3 just a little heavy.

Dodging: The simple 4 cardinal movement dodges of UT99 worked out well, but the UT 2004 dodge jump seemed overpowered, so I'd axe the dodge jump.

Double Jump: The only value a double jump has is to activate a pair of jump boots on the second tap. What was frustrating in UT99 was that if you had the jump boots and wanted to make a small jump, you were forced to activate the jump boots, so I wouldn't mind seeing a double jump mechanic but only for the jump boots. Without the jump boots it didn't seem to add anything of value to the game..

Wall Dodge: Get rid of it.

Impact/Rocket jumping: This mechanic works out well because it has a significant negative cost and can be disastrous if not executed properly.

Team Boosting: Off by default, but available as a Mutator.

Ramp Boosting: This worked out pretty well in the UT99 map CTF-Bleak, so I don't see the harm in including it in the game.

Lift Jumping: It doesn't have much of an effect on combat, so it should remain in the game.

Jump Pads: These are useful additions in certain maps. One of the most popular UT99 maps, CTF-w00tabulous, used these to great effect.

It's not an opinion that skill ceilings can be too high, just like it's not an opinion that skill ceilings can be too low. It's also not an opinion that the more complex and difficult game you have, the smaller number of people are going to be great at it. It's also not an opinion that UT '99 survives with Instagib/CTF/DM while UT2K4 survives in Onslaught and Invasion.

Steve, I hope that you guys will invest deep thought in contemplating the following argument:

"If it's not broken, why 'fix' it?"

The most objective, factual argument I can make in favor of UT99 movement style is, very simply, that UT99 was a huge success and UT 2003/4 did not fare as well. UT 2004 seemed to succeed primarily in the area of the vehicular game Onslaught and the non-competitive game Invasion. It didn't do so well for traditional on-foot games, including CTF which was the flagship game of UT99. If you take a "the player counts don't lie" approach and compare the online player counts for UT99 and UT 2004 at any given amount of time after the release of each game, (say UT99's player counts in 2002 v. UT 2004's player counts in 2007) you'll find that UT99 trounced UT 2004. UT99 also had far, far more clan match activity. (This analysis does not work with UT3 because it had a great many non-game play/movement problems that affected player counts.)

Furthermore, we should consider which player base is most important to please with the default game type: Experienced UT players who are already sold on the UT franchise or brand new people who had never heard of or ever played a UT game prior to UT4? Which movement style will make the game most accessible to the new players? (Those who prefer UT 2004 movement can always invest the small amount of effort needed to use a mod.) UT99 style is the tried and proven winner; it seems like UT99 style offers less risk of failure.

Whether your team settles on UT99 or UT 2004 movement style, a great many devoted and passionate fans of either UT99/3 or UT 2004 are going to be severely disappointed. It's an intractable problem. Perhaps you could reach a compromise by offering to include the other style as a mutator option for server admins. If that is done, there should be a good way to differentiate/filter servers in the browser based on movement style.

[MuscleShock]

Impact hammer jumping and jump boots must remain in the game, a crucial component for CTF, vCTF and assault

[L4NZ10]

My thoughts:

• Running speed (in the past has been the same forward/back/strafing)
It should be like the 2K series, I thought it was the perfect speed.
Maybe, running backward should be 20%-30% slower, promoting aggressive play, but really it should be tested out to see if it's good.

• Acceleration (how fast you change direction when moving)
Instant, or almost. Having too much accelleration would result in a laggy feeling.

• Air control (how much you can affect the direction of your movement while in the air)
None. I think in a shooter game if you make a bad jump you should take the consequences it brings, without the ability to adjust your trajectory in mid-air.
Also, it could be a valid compromise in order to keep the double jump.

• Jump height
UT2K edition. I feel it was the best in any UT game I played.

• Gravity (affects how floaty the game feels. With higher gravity, even if the jump impulse is modified to result in the same jump height, you’ll spend less time in the air)
In UT3 the feeling was like being crushed to the ground, so I would make gravity certainly less heavy than that. At the same time I can see the point of the ones that describe UT2K "floaty" (although I was just fine playing there), so it could be tested out a gravity value between UT2004 and UT3.

• Dodging (fast low jump in any of the 4 cardinal movement directions, with a sudden deceleration on landing)
Always been a staple in the UT games, keep it.

• Double jump (past titles only allowed the double jump to occur at the apex of the jump. UT2004 allowed double jump during dodge, UT3 did not/)
Keep double jump. For me is one of the things that make UT unique. I would love something similar to UT2003/2004, but I'm open to some tweaks on it.

• Wall dodge (ability to perform a dodge while in the air away from a nearby vertical surface)
I'm fine with it, keep.

• Impact/Rocket jumping (ability to jump extra high by jumping while point impact hammer down or using other splash/impulse providing weapon at cost of some health).
• Team boosting (ability to provide impact/rocket jumping benefits to teammates, who take no damage in normal teamgames)
Keep 'em. All the mechanincs that add variety are welcomed.

• Ramp boosting (ability to scale a near vertical surface by dodging into it, possible on any near vertical surface in UT2003, and only on LD permitted surfaces in UT2004)
Keep.

• Lift jumping (taking advantage of lift momentum to get a boost to your jump at the top of the lift’s path)
Absolutely keep. They are no way gamebreaking and surely are a lot of fun.

• Jumppads (provide a long distance jump to a specific destination)
Absolutely keep. I found them very useful to reach some areas of a map, or quickly return to the battlefield after a death.