Since the subject came up recently, what's everybodies stance on intros and extros ?
First, let me explain what I see as an intro: Intros/Extros are usually cutscenes, mostly from a third person perspective with or without the players visible. What I don't mean with that is things like actual insertion happening, or radio chatter during insertion... that's what I would call "exposition". Also, if you remember the beginning of the East Wind campaign, the scene where you enter the helicopter and fly over to the other camp, with nothing really happening but credits, that's exposition in my view as well (difference would basically be that during an intro, you don't have control over the camera).
Personally, I never really put them intros into my missions.
First of all, they are not easy to make, and require a certain grade of "creativeness" that I don't posses.
Secondly, I personally don't even like intros since I think it detaches you from the actual happening. I rather would have exposition.
I think slightly different about extros... I don't really like too much extro, but I remember in Operation Flashpoint, almost all missions ended with the "end mission" text displayed over a simple camera sweep over the battlefield you just left...
So, what is your opinion on this subject ?
I'm indifferent about them.
Intro/outro is just additional visual tool for the mission maker. It is coating, fluff. A well made intro is a nice mission detail, but that's it. While I do appreciate mission makers effort I much rather play good mission with no intro rather than flashy stuff in start but no other content.
It should serve some kind of purpose and fit the mission context and style. Increase immersion/mission mood, provide additional information of mission/storyline, etc. If it is just rolling camera over desert with authors name and logo and ripped music of local underground black metal band for several minutes it is just annoying. I liked ALIAS intros in Hello Tanoas. A bit of storytelling with cartoon theme worked well in mercenary style missions.
If intro is long, there should be option to disable it, or bypass it while running. Watching even good intro over and over again if retrying mission is tiresome. It might also be a good idea to disable it for JIPpers.
I don't usually do them simply because I don't know how to. Making them dedicated server compatible is another pain. I have so far made one start cutscene to MP mission, and one to my unreleased SP mission and that's it. I'm likely more inclined to attempt them in a single player missions.
In most case scenarios, I don't think an intro/extro is necessary, plus it also is a lot more work for the mission maker. It might be better to focus on the mission itself rather than the cutscenes.
Depending on the type of mission or storyline or how it is told, I think a cutscene can fit, but I see it as more of a situational or optional thing.
In- and Outros are always a nice feature to give your missions a special touch. And when its made good as well you will never forget it
there are a lot of possibilities for which it is good:
- tell story
- show inception/targets what ever
- amusing
- warm up the players
- cool down the players when mission is done
- and and and...
When i create Intros, they always executed just one time (JIP friendly). Its also easy to add "turn off function" in parameters. Long intros over 30sec should have that.
If you're not good in this, its ok. You don't need to do it, but its nice to see and a good representation of the mission as well.
Btw. after the hundredth time i dont like to see the always same looking "Mission End" splash screen any more... just a short outro is a nice welcome change then! (mission makers create this in 15min)
greets
I think I only made an intro once for a mission, which was the first mission of a campaign. For narrative missions like this I can see them having a place, for the rest, I generally consider them too much effort.
Effort question aside, since I never made an intro myself, I love intros. There are quite a few missions I remember thanks to their intro and those are from OFP. Of course it's not enough and the mission itself has to be good too, but it helps to make the mission memorable.
It shouldn't have to be a highly complex intro that require creative thought, a nice tune and a zoom in into the player starting point is a good enough intro. One of Blake's OFP missions had an intro that simply had the camera zoom into the "Soviet" LST while the Russian anthem was playing. It was wonderful, and did great work in setting the mood for the mission.
(09-13-2016, 12:16 AM)Variable Wrote: [ -> ]It shouldn't have to be a highly complex intro that require creative thought, a nice tune and a zoom in into the player starting point is a good enough intro.
That's already problematic, I have trouble not making things too complex if I do that. The only into I ever made took me two days to complete, and included a car driving past road signs that contained the credits and stuff.. I liked it, but daium it was work... and when we finally played it on the server, people that were supposed to be sitting down were all standing up
Ah yes, I remember that. Well, if making complex intros can't be avoided and days of work are the typical workload to make them work, then sure, better avoid that, and let RueLight keep doing the cool intros he's making
. RueLight, Pirate Lane's intro was just jaw dropping. Awesome job man!
However, if someone is able to limit his intros scope to something simple, by all means, do it. It adds a lot.