38 replies to this topic

[M1lkshake]

Last night was Hawken's first (to my knowledge) "sportscasted" competitive Hawken game. Kirk and Butt provided commentary and in general tested out the limitations of Hawken's spectator mode, while Axe Attack and Crushinator put together teams that resulted in some very close games. Overall I considered it a success, and I'd like to thank everyone who was involved.

 

If you missed it, you can watch it here: http://www.twitch.tv...wken/v/11631216

 

That being said, this was definitely a test run and not everything was ideal. Obviously Hawken's Spectator mode leaves much to be desired, but there is little we can do about that for the moment. Any other discussion, critique, or suggestions are more than welcome here.

 

In the future, we plan to sportscast actual TPG matches primarily. Once we're sure we've worked out the kinks to the point that the participating teams are not inconvenienced, we'll announce it and begin picking TPG weekly matchups to stream.

 

Let me know what you guys think.

[eth0]

Chase cam is very confusing to watch unless the commentary is directly related to the action. I think a two cam setup will relieve this and overlays for team colors, classes and names, and silo states would really put the cherry on top.

All in all, a little more commentary to cater to the oblivious watcher and I'd show it to my parents.

[JackVandal]

I liked it, i did prefer the free flying cam to chase for the most part, and there were some gaps in commentary, but it was good, especially as a test.

[TheButtSatisfier]

Good feedback so far. Kirk and I agree on all points and are eager to make the next session more enjoyable - and worthwhile - for you guys to watch. Keep the suggestions coming!

[Nept]

Issue: The organizers and shoutcasters were all fat.

 

Solution: Get less fat.

[cbrxx]

First 20 minutes, drop.

[Merl61]

Issue: Nept is a Skrub

 

Solution: Git gud

FTFY

[TheButtSatisfier]

First 20 minutes, drop.

 

 The bass? Does it have to be right at 20?

[Elite_is_salty]

Thanks for doing this. I didn't watch it tho.

 

Edit: Just something I want to add; when I watch counterlogicman's stream or videos on twitch it loads so fast. If you could use his same stream settings then that might make things a little better because we all know twitch already sucks with bandwith.

Edited by Elite, 19 August 2015 - 11:14 PM.

[DerMax]

Chase cam is very confusing to watch unless the commentary is directly related to the action. I think a two cam setup will relieve this and overlays for team colors, classes and names, and silo states would really put the cherry on top.

All in all, a little more commentary to cater to the oblivious watcher and I'd show it to my parents.

This.

 

I would also add that the commentator pressed Tab way too often, which was slightly annoying.

[IareDave]

fuzzy bunny the neg talkers, this was a solid first time casting and I enjoyed watching the short bit I did see and I know you guys will improve the (next?) time.

 

Gj

[Dr_Freeze001]

Last night was Hawken's first (to my knowledge) "sportscasted" competitive Hawken game.

 

*Cought Priority Target Cough*

 

Otherwise, yea, it's pretty much been said. Moments when the commentary and action doesn't match and the current state of the spectator mode. It would be great to have a HUD when spectating, or have the option to turn it on.

 

I gotta say, it's some good comentary. If this a test run then I'll defenitly try and watch the real thing.

 

 

 

One more thing: on the announcing side: please make sure to put in a countdown of some kind, because timezones are a fuzzy bunny. 'So many hours until stream' removes any doubt from non-NA viewers. Cheers.

Edited by (KDR) Dr_Freeze001, 20 August 2015 - 03:45 AM.

[Hyginos]

The easy solution to the scoreboard thing would be to multibox the game, leave one instance looking at the scoreboard in the menu, and overlay that over the bottom of the stream.

[Nept]

Last night was Hawken's first (to my knowledge) "sportscasted" competitive Hawken game.

 

*Cought Priority Target Cough*

 

Actually, there was a shoutcasted tournament back in closed beta.  It's just that everyone involved was terrible.  In every way.

[Amidatelion]

The easy solution to the scoreboard thing would be to multibox the game, leave one instance looking at the scoreboard in the menu, and overlay that over the bottom of the stream.

This would work possibly even better with maps that had wide swaths of an even colour, like frontline. Place the scoreboard there, green screen the white out.

[Hyginos]

Enclosed is my highly thought out and professionally rendered concept of what a stream format could feasibly be with the spectator we have currently.

 

Spoiler

[Dr_Freeze001]

Time to download XSplit and do some experimenting. yay

[_incitatus]

I thought you guys did a great job.  I would like to see less chase cam and more flying cam shots above contested points so that we can see how the teams are interacting as a whole.

[Amidatelion]

Enclosed is my highly thought out and professionally rendered concept of what a stream format could feasibly be with the spectator we have currently.

Spoiler

Wait how are you pulling the map?

[CraftyDus]

The easy solution to the scoreboard thing would be to multibox the game, leave one instance looking at the scoreboard in the menu, and overlay that over the bottom of the stream.

 

You can hotkey w/ obs to switch scenes of different instances, or even scnes of other streams (actual players' first person views).

[M1lkshake]

*Cought Priority Target Cough*

 

Otherwise, yea, it's pretty much been said. Moments when the commentary and action doesn't match and the current state of the spectator mode. It would be great to have a HUD when spectating, or have the option to turn it on.

 

I gotta say, it's some good comentary. If this a test run then I'll defenitly try and watch the real thing.

 

 

 

One more thing: on the announcing side: please make sure to put in a countdown of some kind, because timezones are a fuzzy bunny. 'So many hours until stream' removes any doubt from non-NA viewers. Cheers.

 

Is that so? If you could link the recording here it would be nice to have for comparison.

 

As far as announcing, I was waiting until I was positive we'd be able to follow through with the event before posting on the forums. I wasn't positive everything was set until the day of, unfortunately, so the announcement was later than I would have liked. In the future I'll make the announcement in advance and provide a countdown as well.

[Hyginos]

Wait how are you pulling the map?

 

I was just thinking of a static image with the silos labeled. This would make it easier for both the casters and viewers, as the silos can be hard to identify without the HUD.

[ticklemyiguana]

This is a comment that is primarily in reference to TPG matches. The match that occurred was just a scrim, but for future reference, this is what I'd like to see:

Prep:
1. Know what players' mechs look like ahead of time so you can actually use names as opposed to just speculating on who's shooting who.

2. Know the teams and players. Know of any roster changes, relative lengths of time that the players have been on that team, and what they're known for.

3. Try and find out what maps the teams will be choosing and do some research on common strategies, choke points, advantageous positions and all, eventually learning every map.

4. Potentially find players to interview for build up, asking if they can share any general strategies, their experience in scrims against the other team, what they're looking to get out of the match up, etc.

5. Be experts at the game. Know that a TOW can only fire every 2.25 seconds and deals 125 damage on direct hit. Know that the uncharged heat cannon, while flying slightly faster than the TOW, has only 2/3 the area of splash, while the charged variant has almost double. While you won't get the opportunity to comment on everything you know every game, it will encourage newer players to watch, because not only will you be entertaining to watch, but they will likely learn something about the mechanics of individual fights that you are casting.

Build up:
1. For fifteen to thirty minutes prior to the stream, show some gameplay of previous match ups for those teams, or just general gameplay, whle talking over it regarding the stuff mentioned in prep, as well as a brief overview of TPG rules and if contextually appropriate, information about TPG itself.

The game:
1. My very first suggestion in the stream stands, which after making it you did seem to abide by - no hitting tab, unless the discussion is going that way, or the flying cam is travelling through a zone with no action.

2. Use flying cam whenever possible. In combination with knowing who is who, the top down view experience is unique and captures more of what is going on. It will also "slow down" the action from your perspective, giving you greater ability to comment on it - pending the ability to easily distinguish teams and players.

3. I didn't watch the last game, but for a fair amount of what I did see, you called the teams "Sentium" and "Prosk". Know who's who and use the team names.

4. No super long pauses in commentary. It can be a bit of a strain, but that's what it is. I don't know which pauses were "natural" and which were caused by some of the issues with Butt's connection/mic, but there were some moments where you'd go for two full engagements without saying a word.

For Reloaded:
1. Keep the "walk" speed of the flying cam, and increase the boost speed by a fair clip so that the camera can keep up with the action. If this is an easy numbers tweak, it'd be great to see really soon.

2. Look into allowing the spectator to see which silos are capped by who. Not being able to see this is pretty frustrating.

3. Allow the flying cam to break off from the person you're spectating, as opposed to the location being saved in the map. Currently when the spectator switches between free fly and third person, the free flying camera is completely stationary, and when switching back, to the free flying mode, the spectator ends up far away from the fight. This is not exactly ideal.

4. Space allows the spectator to go up. Give it a button to go down.

5. Make. It. Smaller.

Final thoughts:
1. Despite the above, I thought this went very well - for the first time attempting it. I really do want to see a little more coherence in the commentary and overall smoothness - less confusion as to what's going on. I know this is partially the fault of how spectator mode works, but anything you, as the casters, can do to alleviate this is to the benefit of this concept.

2. Don't be afraid to experiment. Try out new styles of commentary, varying levels of engaging with the viewers, different paces and overlays. (I'd love to see the ability to pull up a full screen map that you can draw on to illustrate strategies and go over recent plays.)

3. Good job. Keep it up.

Edited by ticklemyiguana, 20 August 2015 - 08:09 AM.

[Badtings]

Willing to help with "dope GFX"

[Dr_Freeze001]

Spoiler

Alright: I'm gonna ask a risky question here: How about the possibility of using hacking tools, as in wallhax, seeing enemy names and health regardless of position or state, for use as a spectator and commentator.

 

See, currently I'm trying to figure out a way to get info out of the game and into a program, so that we'd have a minimap for use in the overlay. Then it occured to me that people have been doing this already, namely through hacking the game via 3rd party tools.

 

Now, I'm not gonna try this out without express permission, but hey... any opinions?

Edited by (KDR) Dr_Freeze001, 20 August 2015 - 12:32 PM.

[Hyginos]

Spoiler

Alright: I'm gonna ask a risky question here: How about the possibility of using hacking tools, as in wallhax, seeing enemy names and health regardless of position or state, for use as a spectator and commentator.

 

See, currently I'm trying to figure out a way to get info out of the game and into a program, so that we'd have a minimap for use in the overlay. Then it occured to me that people have been doing this already, namely through hacking the game via 3rd party tools.

 

Now, I'm not gonna try this out without express permission, but hey... any opinions?

 

You'll never guess what just came up in IRC. 

 

It could certainly work, and I think if you clear it first and practice full disclosure it should be fine at least morally. It will come down to policy and liability whether it ends up being allowed

 

EDIT:

By far and away the largest problem with spectator mode IMO is that it can make a server un-joinable. That particular bug should be at the top of the list to squash.

Edited by Hyginos, 20 August 2015 - 01:11 PM.

[Merl61]

Spoiler

Alright: I'm gonna ask a risky question here: How about the possibility of using hacking tools, as in wallhax, seeing enemy names and health regardless of position or state, for use as a spectator and commentator.

See, currently I'm trying to figure out a way to get info out of the game and into a program, so that we'd have a minimap for use in the overlay. Then it occured to me that people have been doing this already, namely through hacking the game via 3rd party tools.

Now, I'm not gonna try this out without express permission, but hey... any opinions?

As someone who has used said tools, the information provided wouldn't be very useful, unless there is a better one than what I am aware of.

[CounterlogicMan]

I'll highlight the video to make it more succinct. 

 

Also, currently working on getting the youtube channel going. So the videos will be automatically exported to a format other than twitch. Know of some viewers that have difficulties with the twitch player.

Edited by CounterlogicMan, 20 August 2015 - 04:07 PM.

[Dr_Freeze001]

As someone who has used said tools, the information provided wouldn't be very useful, unless there is a better one than what I am aware of.

 

Well, fair enough. Doesn't seem worth the trouble if what you say is true.

 

On another note: did some experimenting for an overlay, this is what I got:

http://www.twitch.tv...e001/v/11954061

[CounterlogicMan]

If only there was a much more attractive, less obtrusive scoreboard. That could be brought up during a match by a spectator without giving the audience eye cancer.

[XPloyt]

If only there was a much more attractive, less obtrusive scoreboard. That could be brought up during a match by a spectator without giving the audience eye cancer.

 

Maybe one could talk to Shadeness (and/or associates) about adding a more elaborate overlay in the Hawken Heroku app. At the moment, for each server you view in Heroku, you can pull up an overlay which consists of the server's list of players with their mmr rating (if made public), and a game progress % bar - and the updates happen in real-time. I've considered adding this overlay while streaming. But I would only do it in something like Wirecast, where images' perspectives can be rotated in 3d, which would allow the overlay to be comprehensible without taking up too much estate.

 

Here's a link to an overlay : http://hawken.heroku...1d4f636/overlay

 

I forgot to add a suggestion:

 

Turn the game volume down a bit so it doesn't distort during chaotic moments.

Edited by XPloyt, 20 August 2015 - 05:20 PM.

[Hyginos]

If only there was a much more attractive, less obtrusive scoreboard. That could be brought up during a match by a spectator without giving the audience eye cancer.

 

I don't think it looks that bad.

 

Spoiler

 

The TPG log is out of place color wise but I think it works OK.

[DM30]

I don't think it looks that bad.

 

Spoiler

 

The TPG log is out of place color wise but I think it works OK.

 

This looks like a great format, but the one part of it that's bugging me personally is that since the map is so much bigger than the TPG logo the whole thing looks unbalanced. Some more tinkering and I think it would be perfect.

[Silverfire]

I don't think the TPG logo needs to be so big, maybe a smaller "watermark" type thing in a corner where it's visible but not intrusive and unbalanced. I don't know what to replace the large logo with, map is square and scoreboard is longer rectangle. It's just a bit odd.

[Dr_Freeze001]

I've made a small map viewing program for use in OBS:

 

(Download link)

 

Any features you might want to see added?

Edited by (KDR) Dr_Freeze001, 21 August 2015 - 06:51 AM.

[Nept]

Blackjack and hookers.

[DM30]

Question that I just thought of about the stream setup, regarding the complaints about not being able to easily tell who owns which points: Would it be possible/desirable to have a second instance of Hawken running with a random account that joins into a team as an actual player, not a spectator, and use the silo indicators and base health bars from that instance overlaid onto the top of the main stream? The issues with this of course being that it prevents the use of a dual-spectator setup and having to avoid being idle-kicked if the player is sitting in one of the bases.

 

In addition to being able to show the status of each of the silos in real time instead of having to guess, it might also make it easier to tell which team is ahead, because I noticed while watching the stream again that when following individual players, when switching from a player on one team to a player on the other the base health indicators would swap so keeping track of which was which could get a bit challenging. If that was static the whole time from one team's fixed perspective that might be nice.

[Amidatelion]

Question that I just thought of about the stream setup, regarding the complaints about not being able to easily tell who owns which points: Would it be possible/desirable to have a second instance of Hawken running with a random account that joins into a team as an actual player, not a spectator, and use the silo indicators and base health bars from that instance overlaid onto the top of the main stream? The issues with this of course being that it prevents the use of a dual-spectator setup and having to avoid being idle-kicked if the player is sitting in one of the bases.

 

In addition to being able to show the status of each of the silos in real time instead of having to guess, it might also make it easier to tell which team is ahead, because I noticed while watching the stream again that when following individual players, when switching from a player on one team to a player on the other the base health indicators would swap so keeping track of which was which could get a bit challenging. If that was static the whole time from one team's fixed perspective that might be nice.

 

Just like proper sitting in game, you'd have to keep the mech pointed into a corner to prevent radar returns and find a decent stash point so that a player doesn't get distracted by the hitbox. I don't personally think it's advisable but it's doable.

[Hyginos]

Just like proper sitting in game, you'd have to keep the mech pointed into a corner to prevent radar returns and find a decent stash point so that a player doesn't get distracted by the hitbox. I don't personally think it's advisable but it's doable.

 

You would also have to find a way to keep the mech active without having the window selected, assuming you were multi boxing.