This will be the best idea ever. Having huge outside arena screens would allow all the heroe's to remain outside while the combantants fight it out at the same time re-ducing the lag of hundreds of people sitting in the arena, whic I assume would be another area that can be affected by load time of numerous heroes. You could even place numerous TV screens throughout the cities.
Oh what about Blimps that fly through the sky brodacasting the next arena fights 
that would be cool. I predict major lag issues when this comes out 
. We need to battle evil lag issues.
If it randomly switches between matches in progress then that might be ideal for encouraging other players to get involved. Naturally one switch when the players inside are in combat, the last thing you want is to just see someone running down a street.
Wow, this is a really good idea. I would definitely enjoy seeing my friends fight, becuase I wouldn't be able to fight with many, because they're lower level.
I hope the devs take this into account, or if they already have an idea like this.
This is one of the best ideas I've heard regarding the arena. I really hope they consider doing this.
Lag will happen though. Everyone will be outside the arena watching. But it is better to have lag there than in a battle.
total kick to the gut
This is like having Ra's Al Ghul show up at your birthday party.
It has a Running Man feel to it.
If there were multiple screens through out the cities then this would help spread out the lag that would occur.
They could involve the civ's too, have em outside the arena selling shirts for the events.
Could we incorporate influence gambling with this, ya know bet on the matches and win influence 
This idea sounds great, and I like the idea of gambling on the contestants too. The video screens could switch around to give the watchers nice dramatic angles of the battle, maybe even have highlights for special events. For that matter, we can even have announcers typing this and that between fights! I know, that last bit isnt so realistic, but might be doable for special events. Heheh, the Madden of CoH arena, pointing out the obvious to us all in case we weren't paying attention
Uh, I'm quite sure that isn't how the arena will work. First of all, when you want to start up a 'fight', the arena will create an instance of a map (which I assume can be anything from a Lab to an outdoor city scene*), and not that the combatants would be 'in the arena'. Secondly, there won't be people sitting in bleachers watching 'the match' because it's not really an 'arena' that you're fighting in, it's an instance of some other map. They did mention the possibility of becoming a (destructable) camera-bot or something similar if that doesn't pan out. So although I agree that having a HUGE TV outside the arena would be cool, the only way I can see it happening at all is if there was a tournament and they displayed the main event for all to see. Even then though, you can gaurantee there would be a ton of lag in the area.
*I say this because if you check in the Screenshots section, there's actually shots of PvP
Anywho...YAY Arena's coming!!!
This technically isn't possible with our engine. It would have to be a huge animated texture refreshing at 20+ frames per second.
We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.
Positron
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What about rooms with glass in them? Like box seats in a stadium? That way you technically can't effect the match but can view it. Have them all around the colleseum.
Portal technology has been around for years, it was possible even back when half-life was was starting to get more heavily modified. The technology was widely used with Half-Life2 as well where a polygon surface essentially behaved like the viewport for a camera and basically rendered things in the world twice. Once for the world itself and once for what the viewport was displaying.
I'm sure given time its something the CoH engine could be adapted to do especially since it would promote a more social aspect to the arena because players physically gather around one another to watch the match.
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We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.
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OK, forget the TV......could we just have a picture of that?
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This technically isn't possible with our engine. It would have to be a huge animated texture refreshing at 20+ frames per second.
We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.
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I just got a new sig
they shuld let you gamble xp or earn xp in the arena also let you bet influance...
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they shuld let you gamble xp or earn xp in the arena also let you bet influance...
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And then we can have Influence sharks! And blackjack! And hookers!
like if u foght a 50 at lev 1. you both gamble the different or the same amount of xp.. and the winner gets it and the loser loses xp. it should b the same with influance. also u should b able to interact with people from city of villans if u wanna make a direct comment to me hit me up at [Email]tpurittfdps@hotmail.com
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they shuld let you gamble xp or earn xp in the arena also let you bet influance...
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And then we can have Influence sharks! And blackjack! And hookers!
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In fact, forget the Influence sharks.
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We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.
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Rockets From My Sockets!!!
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Portal technology has been around for years, it was possible even back when half-life was was starting to get more heavily modified. The technology was widely used with Half-Life2 as well where a polygon surface essentially behaved like the viewport for a camera and basically rendered things in the world twice. Once for the world itself and once for what the viewport was displaying.
I'm sure given time its something the CoH engine could be adapted to do especially since it would promote a more social aspect to the arena because players physically gather around one another to watch the match.
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Only catch with the half life 2 version of the TV screen is that it ups the minimum requirements for a game something awful. My computer ran HL2 fine except in the rooms with TV monitors.
Have an instanced viewing room. When the door is clicked one person and one person only are taken to their own private viewing room. Think "viewing booth" (or Pee-Wee Herman) if that helps.
The only thing in the room is a couch, a fridge*, a plant, a lamp, and a big TV.
I can't imagine that framerates would be a problem in an instanced cubicle with one occupant.
Ariel
*It glows, but doesn't make any noise, and when you click on it, it tells you that you have received a cold beverage, then it goes back to glowing.
Man, you guys aren't thinking futuristic enough.
Gotta have holograms, which shows who's fighting represented by a smaller see-through version of the heroes battling, projected above folks' heads or on a platform or something. Just have the game render small heroes with a toned down stealth effect, mimicking the actions of those in the battle.
Same effect, should be do-able, and such.
-Ink
Inkblaster - 50 - NRG/NRG
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Portal technology has been around for years, it was possible even back when half-life was was starting to get more heavily modified. The technology was widely used with Half-Life2 as well where a polygon surface essentially behaved like the viewport for a camera and basically rendered things in the world twice.
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From what I read on game magazines, and looks like you know this stuff better than I do 
, DOOM III and Half-Life were one of the first engines to support "real-time" video on a screen of something happening in another place.
Framed videos were pre-rendered, and presented that way. I remember that I read opinions on some HL2 demos and several of the comments were about the Source engine being able to show multiple view-cameras from the player... I would have to dig the URL for the demo, but it was one where the player entered a place like a cave, a corridor, with a river on his feet, and there was also some flames in a spot, showcasing shadows and reflections etc...
Realtime "video inside video" might be too hard, like the TV idea, but full-screen isn't.... er... right?
I am just a casual follower of the game development
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This technically isn't possible with our engine. It would have to be a huge animated texture refreshing at 20+ frames per second.
We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.
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Hey, Positron, what about a sort of "giant hologram" rather than a flat image? You'd see a really large version of one of the fights taking place inside, only it would be transparent, have some scan lines in it, etc.
Dagnibbity, Inkblaster beat me to it.
[url="http://tinyurl.com/4ylgy"]The Wanderers[/url] of Virtue
We farm fun!
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The technology was widely used with Half-Life2 as well where a polygon surface essentially behaved like the viewport for a camera and basically rendered things in the world twice. Once for the world itself and once for what the viewport was displaying.
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The problem with that, as far as I can tell, is that the inside of the arena is an instanced zone seperate from the zone the screen would be in. And the arena's are in high traffic zones already, so adding the screens might choke computers that were already suffering lag before the player came into view of them.
Personally, I love the idea of the roaming cameras, as long as you have some way of respawning them if destroyed
"I reject your reality and substitute my own!" Adam Savage from Mythbusters
They should Put a huge Tv outside so ppl can wacth outside the arena ...also they should have the Emote of you Eatting POPCORN ....it would be the Bomb