No loading screen during fast travel, please

[Mybrokenenglish]

God of War won the game of the year award at TGA. I still have mixed feelings about that (maybe RDR2 deserved it more), but we must recognise it as a very innovative game: camera long shot, side quests are coherent with narrative (cheaply justified, but still) and last but not least fast travel. Fast travel has no loading screen, it's the first time I see it in videogames (forgive my ignorance if I'm wrong). When you fast travel, Kratos opens a portal and you walk untill you "find" the exit. In the meantime you hear stories about the lore. I know it's just a way to hide map's loading (new adaptation of dynamic loading?), but it's freaking immersive!

Wouldn't it be nice to have something similar in CP2077? I don't know how fast travel will work, but I imagine that V will need to use public transport (e.g. trains/subway as shown at the beginning of the E3 trailer) and that would work perfectly to hide loading screens. A "skip button" could also be added for people using SSD and/or an expensive CPU, so everybody is happy

I don't know if it's too late to add something like this (even though I don't believe anymore in 2019 as a release year) or if red engine could do that, but that would be glorious and definetely better than a loading screen.

What do you guys think?

EDIT: I changed video with a better one, even if in this case no lore is told so it's not that representative.

 

[sv3672]

"No loading screens after the initial load into the game . " Maybe fast travel will be replaced by the car and public transport.

 

[Dreadpoet]

I like public transport being the only means of true fast travel. Clicking the menu button, pointing on a map, and instantaneously being there just does not seem real. It plays to one of the criticisms about modern gaming. The criticism being that, though we have the ability for an immersive experience, we inivetibly turn modern gaming into a shoot, kill, gain levels, eat the kibble.

 

[animalfather]

My solution was the city was connected using tunnels and going through the tunnel was basically the loading screen loading the next area. and u had full control of the vehicle going through the tunnel.

 

[Snowflakez]

I would much rather take a break and relax while I wait for a loading screen than be forced to interact with the game 100% of the time just in the name of "immersion."

 

[Mybrokenenglish]

I would much rather take a break and relax while I wait for a loading screen than be forced to interact with the game 100% of the time just in the name of "immersion."

In my vision you don't need to interact, you can also relax while it's loading, but instead of watching a loading screen, you watch the subway full of NPCs doing their things. Thank god it won't be a soulslike game and you can also pause it as much as you want

 

[animalfather]

so many ways to mask loading, im sure CDPR are on top of it. but i agree a loading screen is not what we want.

 

[Tree_Fox]

How about no fast travel?

People always want these massive worlds... and then want to skip most of it.

What's the fucking point of a massive world, then?

 

[Draymar23]

When I was studying abroad in New York, I had to catch so many trains at night. You tended to get a lot of drug dealers, gang members and prostitutes on board. The atmosphere was very seedy and dangerous. Basically in the end I believe catching public transport as a means of fast travel would be an awesome immersive experience.

 

[BaalNergal]

God of War won the game of the year award at TGA. I still have mixed feelings about that (maybe RDR2 deserved it more), but we must recognise it as a very innovative game: camera long shot, side quests are coherent with narrative (cheaply justified, but still) and last but not least fast travel. Fast travel has no loading screen, it's the first time I see it in videogames (forgive my ignorance if I'm wrong). When you fast travel, Kratos opens a portal and you walk untill you "find" the exit. In the meanwhile you hear stories abotu the lore. I know it's just a way to hide map's loading, but it's freaking immersive!

Wouldn't it be nice to have something similar in CP2077? I don't know how fast travel will work, but I imagine that V will need to use public transport (e.g. trains/subway as shown at the beginning of the E3 trailer) and that would work perfectly to hide loading screens. A "skip button" could also be added for people using SSD and/or an expensive CPU, so everybody is happy

I don't know if it's too late to add something like this (even though I don't believe anymore in 2019 as a release year) or if red engine could do that, but that would be glorious and definetely better than a loading screen.

What do you guys think?

I think it would be interesting, and a nice way around the issue.

How about no fast travel?

People always want these massive worlds... and then want to skip most of it.

What's the fucking point of a massive world, then?

Honestly? Having played massive worlds without fast travel, I can honestly say "it's there to explore when you want to." Having fast travel of some sort isn't necessarily immersive, but it does save a lot of headaches and solves some issues.

Most massive open-world games tend to only load a small area around you (effectively, walking around is an ongoing interactive loading screen), which also tends to be kinda glitchy (Bethesda is the worst offender by far, but also extremely far from the only one); fast travel can effectively "reset" the loading mechanism and make it work properly.

 

[MrQwerty227]

yeah no thanks. The fast traveling in God of War was tedious and got old after a while waiting for each animation to finish. At the end of the day, these are just video games, and unnecessary fluff just get in the way of fun. The whole point of fast travel is to get you closer to the fun faster. Making fast travel take longer would defeat the whole purpose.

 

[Draconifors]

I plan to use as little fast travel as possible, but for when I do use it I would prefer the usual "loading screen and poof, you're there" implementation.
Fast travel is, IMO, supposed to be fast and convenient, not a chore like what that God of War video shows.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

Yeah, it'd be really neat if the traditional teleport fast travel never made its way to the game at all. And traveling was only doable by foot or vehicle or public transportation (wherein the player could "take a nap" to bypass the realtime trip, but in so doing he would also miss what ever content the trip might have to offer -- random encounters (outside or inside the vehicle), talking to the other passengers for what ever unique it might produce, seeing the scenery...).

 

[atomowyturysta]

You'll get cars, bikes and shit. Also, probably, public transportation (Ok.. Public transportation in anarcho-corporatist utopia for ultra rich... why not... )
So why would anyone need fast travel. GTA, SR series lacked FT because they had cars and shit. No fast travel ( although I like FT in huge OW games, CP seems to be an exception)

 

[Suhiira]

Ummmm ...
Boys and girls, there a technical reasons you need a loading screen during fast travel. You have to replace EVERYTHING on your screen and that takes time and CPU/GPU horsepower. Consoles and computers are fast, but not that fast.

 

[Mybrokenenglish]

Ummmm ...
Boys and girls, there a technical reasons you need a loading screen during fast travel. You have to replace EVERYTHING on your screen and that takes time and CPU/GPU horsepower. Consoles and computers are fast, but not that fast.

As shown in god of war, when fast travelling the game loads a small blue area (tree of life) while in background it loads the arrival area. Once it's done, the exit door appears, you walk through it and you get to destination (in theory you walk around the tree, but once you understand that it's loading you can stand still waitning for the door to appear in front of you).

My idea is pretty similar: you get on the train/subway, it starts going through the tunnel (the game has only the train's wagon in memory and textures moving out of the windows to pretend the train is actually moving) while it loads the arrival area, which is another subway station. Once you get there, train stops, you get off, trains gets cancelled from the memory and you walk out of the station (arrival station is small as well so the game has few seconds more to load further). Open world again. It has been done already, so in theory (given the engine's ability to do that and devs' ability/will) it can be done in other games as well. You have a super fast PC which loads areas in 2 seconds and/or you don't care about subway's random encounters? Skip button and you are immediately there.

I'm pretty sure next gen games will use similar techniques to avoid loading screens (a lot of linear games already do that, for exemple when you pass through a very narrow path between 2 areas, usually a crack in a mountain) when fast traveling, it's just a bigger application of what I think it's called "dynamic loading" (correct me if I'm wrong). Very few people like loading screen, you want to play, not looking your CPU/GPU loading (unless you are some kind of fetishist ) and that could be an excellent way to make waiting fun.

P.S. the video I used is terrible, but is the first I found. Lazy me.

 

[Suhiira]

My idea is pretty similar: you get on the train/subway, it starts going through the tunnel (the game has only the train's wagon in memory and textures moving out of the windows to pretend the train is actually moving) while it loads the arrival area, which is another subway station.

Something like this could be done, pretty easily if the subway is in a tunnel, not quite so easily if it's outside one, but still doable (if the background scene is fairly simple; i.e. no moving vehicles, pedestrians, etc.).

It's mostly a matter of K.I.S.S., we all know loading is necessary (well, most of us do; there's always the clueless minority that want what they want simply because they want it), it's just a matter of how much and how often we're willing to put up with it. Some folks take advantage to get up and hit the restroom, grab a drink, stretch their muscles, others are impatient for the action to continue.