[Sushi]

I'm sorry if this has been talked about before, but I couldn't find it. Is anyone else interested in the ability to pause the game, but leaving full camera control? Think screenshots. You find an epic moment, hit pause, then have all the time you want to reposition the camera and take the perfect shot. I'm sure you've all had the experience of seeing something cool for a a second before the moment passes, then thinking, "Blast! If only I'd had an external camera with the HUD off!"

My thought for how to implement this:
1. Enabled via command-line option
2. When option is set, hitting "pause" doesn't bring up the normal pause screen. Instead, the game pauses as normal, with the words "Pause" written on the HUD somewhere.
3. During Pause, the normal camera controls all work. Also, show/hide HUD still works (and any other screenshot-relevant controls).

"But Sushi," you're all saying, "what could possibly be the downside?" Well, it would also allow people the opportunity to cheat a bit. Imagine pausing your dogfight, looking around to see where everyone is, then resuming. Basically, you'd be able to have universal situational awareness if you wanted to. But is that really worse than any of the cheats that already exist? And does anyone care how other people choose to spoil their game?

Thoughts? I might get around to implementing it myself eventually if people are interested, but if someone else wants to tackle it first they're welcome to.

[Black Wolf]

This would be awesome I've been in that situation so many times. Rather than a command line, perhaps it could just be an upgrade to Alt-Pause?

[Genghis]

Does FSO have replays?  It would be cool to record a mission and only allow the UniversalCam(tm) in the replay. 

That way, not only do you avoid the cheating problem, but you can also jog the timeline forward and backward to your heart's content until you cue-up the perfect shot at the perfect moment.

[The E]

Nope, no replays. And yeah, this feature would be totally awesome.

However, I don't much like the idea of adding another commandline option, better to just add a new control config defaulting to Alt-Pause or Ctrl-Pause or something.

[Sushi]

Nope, no replays. And yeah, this feature would be totally awesome.

However, I don't much like the idea of adding another commandline option, better to just add a new control config defaulting to Alt-Pause or Ctrl-Pause or something.

I thought adding new controls was a no-no until the New Pilot Code got committed...

[karajorma]

Don't we already have this feature?

I forget the key-press for FSO bullet time but I know we had it in the past.

[The E]

I don't know about that. The last time I saw that was in Vidmaster's Shadows campaign for TBP, where he sort of weaponized the set-time-compression sexp. Anyway, I think that something where you could just turn off the "simulation" part of the engine to steer a floating camera through the paused mission is probably the way to go. IIRC, scripting already has something like that (If you start a mission via scripting, you need to call mn.simulateFrame() before mn.renderFrame() to make the mission actually run).

[Aardwolf]

Someone tried to make a scripted replay feature, but I have no idea what became of it.

[headdie]

i was thinking about replays myself and was thinking about suggesting it, it would save hassle with 3rd party software

[FUBAR-BDHR]

If it is implemented it should be disabled in TvT and dogfights in Multi. 

[Colonol Dekker]

This is a definite no brainer. I vote new keypress, then (code master people allow me the embelishment) keeping fighter in situ, use a dummy fighter created in place of your fighter with no clipping.
 
You work out how.

[Genghis]

If it is implemented it should be disabled in TvT and dogfights in Multi. 

"it" - being the advanced pause, or an entire replay system?

[Solatar]

Alt-Pause to enable, then hit Enter to assume control of camera.  Controls work like FRED, centered on your ship (or possibly your target).

Already exists; is this what you wanted?

[The E]

If it is implemented it should be disabled in TvT and dogfights in Multi. 

"it" - being the advanced pause, or an entire replay system?

Advanced pause. A replay function for multi would be awesome; Uncharted 2 has a similar function and it's pretty cool.

Alt-Pause to enable, then hit Enter to assume control of camera.  Controls work like FRED, centered on your ship (or possibly your target).

Already exists; is this what you wanted?

Already exists? Gotta try it. However, what we're talking about here is a completely free camera that you can move at will through the mission space.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

Yea the alt-pause feature.  Replay would not be an issue unless it caused unnecessary lag.  Host control over it might be a good idea as some peoples computers might not be able to handle it while others might. 

Wonder if something like the multi limbo code would work for this but with the game paused.  The ability to fly around as a "ghost" ship is already there. 

[Rodo]

YES PLEASE!, don't know about the replay but the pause is a very good idea.

[Thaeris]

What sort of systems did X-Wing and old sims like Hornet use for the mission recorder? You could go back through the entire mission from any perspective with either of these sims, and then save the recording if you wanted to. X-Plane is kind of like this, too, and will let you output movies in Quicktime format...

[Mongoose]

The Descent series saved its recorded demos to relatively-small external files, which I'm assuming contained location/state information for all of the objects and projectiles in each level at any given moment.  I don't know how much practical use it'd be, but taking a peek at how it was implemented in the D2 source code might generate some ideas for pulling the same thing off in FS2.

[Iss Mneur]

The Descent series saved its recorded demos to relatively-small external files, which I'm assuming contained location/state information for all of the objects and projectiles in each level at any given moment.  I don't know how much practical use it'd be, but taking a peek at how it was implemented in the D2 source code might generate some ideas for pulling the same thing off in FS2.

Well the most obvious way and least elegant way to do the replay feature, would be to have the physics engine dump the location data (x,y,z,facing, type of object) of all objects in the game at a set interval.  The challenge would then be to get this data back into the engine in a fashion that would allow for the user to control the playback the replay.

[headdie]

The Descent series saved its recorded demos to relatively-small external files, which I'm assuming contained location/state information for all of the objects and projectiles in each level at any given moment.  I don't know how much practical use it'd be, but taking a peek at how it was implemented in the D2 source code might generate some ideas for pulling the same thing off in FS2.

Well the most obvious way and least elegant way to do the replay feature, would be to have the physics engine dump the location data (x,y,z,facing, type of object) of all objects in the game at a set interval.  The challenge would then be to get this data back into the engine in a fashion that would allow for the user to control the playback the replay.

if you are going to do that how about writing to a variation on a mission file? then it would be viewable in the techroom.

the other option would be to record the display and audio output to a file then run a convertor into a popular video file