The x-ray goggles or some similar gear aren't such a bad idea, as long as they'd take a lot of energy to activate, and the duration would be tremendously short, like 5 seconds. It would act as a detection skill, to support your party in avoiding unexpected attacks. Still, the cameras thing is already quite awesome, and anyways having a foreground is a must!
I don't think that there should be an actual foreground layer of blocks. If there is going to be a kind of foreground layer, it should just be the background being superimposed onto the foreground when you don't have line of sight on that specific background tile. The reason for the use of line of sight: Having just a foreground layer invites all sorts of just frustrating attacks by stuff you as a player cannot see but your character would be able to see. Consider you have a well lit cave with a foreground layer on it. If you use a circle mask to effect the transparency of the foreground layer then you as the player would not be able to see far down the cave, but ostensibly your character would be able to see much farther. If you make the foreground transparent when you occupy the same space as a connected foreground tile, then when you would look into the cave from outside of it you wouldn't be able to see inside of it as the player but your character would. Using a LoS method would mean that you would be able to see what your character sees. Superimposing the background onto the foreground has a number of advantages: it doesn't mess up the two mouse button system of placing blocks in the player layer and placing blocks in the background layer. It requires less data to stream for a server, as it only has to send the background tile data. There are rarely any situations where you'd want to have a foreground layer of blocks and not a background layer of blocks. This combines the pros of having a foreground layer ( not being able to see into buildings your character wouldn't and making buildings/other stuff in the world look nicer. ) whilst eliminating some of the cons ( being surprised by a monster that your character would be able to see but you wouldn't, having to stream additional data with a server, making the block placing system more complicated )
Your idea has its good points, but it would still be possible to make annoying attacks. Also, you are looking at it from the wrong angle. Your character would not be able to see everything simply because there are no obstacles on the 2d line of sight. Take into account that if you emulate 3d by using foreground, you're actually assuming that the character sees in 3d and therefore there are bushes (or whatever) in which others might hide. In a cave, you might not be able to see everything in front of you, as there are rocks that might hide something behind them. This is emulated by the foreground. So yeah, some attacks might be annoying and exploited, but hey, ambushes are annoying too in real life. Plus, if you supply the player with various means to see through the foreground, like cameras, X-ray goggles or whatever, even if only during a short time, getting ambushed or not becomes a matter of strategy rather than one of exploitation of the foreground. Surprised because you don't want to give up your head slot to wear X-ray goggles? Well, then maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to sacrifice the slot after all.
I think the blocks should become transparent when the player walks behind them. That way: 1. foreground will be ok 2. the player will be able to see what's going on inside EDIT:ninja'd
Brilliant idea!!! Maybe even a door that is placed on the background and you can walk in it and even go into a whole nother room.
Some degree of foreground its apparently implemented already "Left clicking will place blocks it in the foreground (the collision layer in which the player walks), and right clicking will place it in the background." Sauce: Under building and mining.
To my knowledge, the "foreground" being referred too is the layer on which the player resides. So this placement is on the collision layer. if anything this would indicate that they are NOT implementing foreground. However Rho said, in IRC, that the idea was still up in the air, so no solid decision yet.
Indeed it is, I had my eyes PEELED watching that lighting video, or any indication for foreground. I could find none. Yet I shall not abandon hope yet. They haven't said no, and until they do, I will keep wishing.
Well the torches being placed on background walls does indicate that they are willing to change. Hopefully they consider this.
Thats just a little bonus to add more interactivity with backgrounds (Im surprised terraria never did it, since you could place plataforms in background only). I really hope the add some real foreground (not on the collision layer), i always get peeved when i can see the light from torches when im not supossed to :/, I want Secret Bases QQ.
Fenix, I am with you there. However, This game will be fantastic even if foreground doesn't make the cut. The dream of it is fantastic, but the game will be fantastic with it in or out.
I'm just going to say it. You all care more about this idea then I do. I didn't expect that to happen.
Been wondering whether something like this should be added to the game and I must say, the points people have brought make me support this idea.
Let's say they were to implement a system like that, of course you need to see where you are going when you are actually there, so some kind of sphere of vision needs to be there, like we have seen in platformers before. Otherwise, it would just be blindly going around, and if a place has a staircase, you wouldn't be able to see it except maybe through a window. I do like the camera idea for viewing the area before you go there and hacking enemy facility cameras and such. Maybe, you could even launch cameras to planets before going there to know a little about what you are about to get yourself into.
There has been talk of line of sight viewing around foreground. Considering this is the AI of enemies, implementing an even more simple version of this would not be a problem.
Forgrounds could also add a large sense of isolation witha magnification change. Just like the background forest and mountains in Terraria, there are trees in front of you. Or if you are in a desert, the camera pans out and your character is really small with a desert in front of him.
