Mirrors

W4E

W4E

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In HL2, why cant you see yourself in mirrors? (if there are any)
People say that the reason is "YOU are gordon freeman" but i can see myself in mirrors. On the in game cameras can you see yourself?
 
I did think it was funny in Doom3 jumping in front of mirrors and changing guns. They did a nice job on that in Doom3 but its not really necessary. If it isnt in hl2 i dont mind.
 
No you guys, Gordon can't be seen in a mirror because he is a Vampire! :eek:
 
But i think it'll look weird if you can see object being moved by an invisible player.
 
I don't think the mirrors will be real mirrors, you'll likely see the environment reflected but perhaps not characters. Which will be a shame as it looks so nice in D3
 
If you would be able to see yourself in the mirrors, it would be the end to the world as we know it.

end.
 
It is probably done for the whole "you are Gordon" concept, but in a different way than you think.
It's extremely hard to make the character in the mirror look as believable as the first person character. It would detract from the believabily of "you are Gordon" when you see some relatively poor animated character behaving differently than you do. Imagine if Gordon picks up a box with his hands, in first person you wouldn't see his hands around the box, but you'll see a part of a floating box, which is acceptable, but that would look stupid in the mirror. Or even worse, weapon switching! What would you see? Gordon getting a rocket launcher out of nowhere? Gordon packing the firepower of a small nation in his backpocket?

It sounds easy enough to do, mirroring you actions in the mirror, but it's really harder than it looks, just like that most FPS don't have the legs of the character, it's really hard to do.

How can you feel that you are Gordon when the guy in the mirror is clearly not?
 
The Dark Elf said:
I don't think the mirrors will be real mirrors, you'll likely see the environment reflected but perhaps not characters. Which will be a shame as it looks so nice in D3
Click to expand...

Of course you'll see the models reflected, NPCs that is. I do recall seeing the reflection of the zombie in the docks. Even objects like buggy and physically stimulated items would have reflections - except I suppose, Gordon himself.
 
It would be easy to make a game without mirrors. Or just to have all mirrors broken. You probably wouldn't notice at first.

Mirrors have always bothered me in game, you never look realistic when you move in front of them.
 
if VALVe wanted you to "feel" as though you are the main characters they should have never gave the main character a name, or a facial appearence. *Yawn* at excuses....
 
Pitbul said:
if VALVe wanted you to "feel" as though you are the main characters they should have never gave the main character a name, or a facial appearence. *Yawn* at excuses....
Click to expand...

It's good to know you know much about storytelling. But kudos for totally missing the point, but whatever.

And what was your bright idea then on how NPC's react to you then if you don't have a name or anything?
How would that have been in HL? "Hi [computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice], looks like you're running late, they are expecting you in the test chamber [computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice]"

Or in HL2 "[computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice] you're staring at me again."

Ugh... :hmph:
 
I think there was an Eek the cat cartoon about that once...they blurred out the character's mouth whenever he did it too.

"Welcome...EEK THE CST. How are you today...EEK THE CST."

Oh yeah, he made a typo on his name too :D
 
You can't see yourself in mirrors because on the outside you are just a model walking around with a gun straight out (like in HL1)
 
PvtRyan said:
It is probably done for the whole "you are Gordon" concept, but in a different way than you think.
It's extremely hard to make the character in the mirror look as believable as the first person character. It would detract from the believabily of "you are Gordon" when you see some relatively poor animated character behaving differently than you do. Imagine if Gordon picks up a box with his hands, in first person you wouldn't see his hands around the box, but you'll see a part of a floating box, which is acceptable, but that would look stupid in the mirror. Or even worse, weapon switching! What would you see? Gordon getting a rocket launcher out of nowhere? Gordon packing the firepower of a small nation in his backpocket?

It sounds easy enough to do, mirroring you actions in the mirror, but it's really harder than it looks, just like that most FPS don't have the legs of the character, it's really hard to do.

How can you feel that you are Gordon when the guy in the mirror is clearly not?
Click to expand...

That sums it up just about perfectly. :)

I'm certain Valve's policy on Gordon is to leave him as a blank slate character-wise, for those exact reasons. So, the only part of him you'll ever see are his hands (which they probably made visible because floating guns are dumb).

Everything else requires you to fill in the blanks with the power of imagination.
 
I just bet that Half-Life won't have mirrors at all. They can obviously do it though. Remember the video with the camera that was looking at the G-man, and displaying it on the screen? A mirror is no different. Do you remember any mirrors in the original Half-Life? I don't, unless you count broken ones. I'm sure they will do the same here, conveniently make it so no mirrors are available to the player. Or, as soon as you look at them, they will shatter :)
 
That would be cool if you looked into the watter you could see you're reflection.
 
since gordon isn't rendered, i'd say it's impossible to see him in mirrors.
 
muka3d said:
I just bet that Half-Life won't have mirrors at all. They can obviously do it though. Remember the video with the camera that was looking at the G-man, and displaying it on the screen? A mirror is no different. Do you remember any mirrors in the original Half-Life? I don't, unless you count broken ones. I'm sure they will do the same here, conveniently make it so no mirrors are available to the player. Or, as soon as you look at them, they will shatter :)
Click to expand...
there were mirrors in HL,BS and probably Op4, they were just static glass textures thoug.
 
Your not supposed to feel like yourself, your supposed to feel as if you are gordon.
 
PvtRyan said:
It's good to know you know much about storytelling. But kudos for totally missing the point, but whatever.

And what was your bright idea then on how NPC's react to you then if you don't have a name or anything?
How would that have been in HL? "Hi [computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice], looks like you're running late, they are expecting you in the test chamber [computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice]"

Or in HL2 "[computer generated voice]BOB[/computer generated voice] you're staring at me again."

Ugh... :hmph:
Click to expand...

Text to Voice is pretty good actually (as seen in UT 2004). It's by no means perfect, but give it a couple of years and I bet you'll hear you're name in RPG's spoken quite fluidly :)
 
I thought FFX did a good job of not having to use text-to-voice. I don't remember any character saying Tidus's name once, but I didn't notice until someone pointed it out.

Don't know if that'd work for HL2, but I'm just saying it has been done.
 
Valve should ship the game with an 8 megapixel digital camera and software to convert several images of your face from different angles into a head model that replaces Gordon's head... like a more advanced version of that HeadCasting crap that comes with Matrox video cards.
 
chimpmunk said:
there were mirrors in HL,BS and probably Op4, they were just static glass textures thoug.
Click to expand...
Ah yes, the bathrooms. I remember now. They look more like the dull side of aluminum foil, except even duller and not reflective... Well, we shall find out. Someone e-mail Gabe.
 
Lol. It's in the "Official Valve Answers" or whatever thread.

And as for the model looking like he did in HL1: Well, think about this. When HL1 shipped, that was a pretty damned good model. Now look at the models in CS or DOD: They're pretty damed good too, especially on an old-ass engine.

I have no doubt Gordon's fully rendered. They just don't want you to feel like an aging white dude if you're 17 ,black, and female. Hence, you never see nor hear him, you just know that you assume the role of Gordon. That's the whole point, to make you feel more in the game. That's exactly what Doom 3 did with our favorite, nameless Marine :D
 
The mirrors in D3 were fantastic.. what about reflective glass?..
 
I was thinkin a ideato the mirrors
(if very stupid sorry)
in my opinion will be not bad is the reflections will look very blurry to no show the player model
for example if we see a mirror we look a very blurry shape, cuz can be cuz the mirror is dirt or just bad quality glass
 
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