Weekly Poll 10/8/18 - The Melee!

[Sardukhar]

Yep, after the Gunplay Poll - the melee poll.

What kind of melee combat would you like to see - includes weapons and hand to hand.

I'll try to be clearer this time, and may adjust as we go.

Yes, it's in First Person, we all know that.

I think I'll do multiple choice this time - lots of options here.

List of Polls to date: https://forums.cdprojektred.com/index.php?threads/collected-weekly-polls-thread.10984601/

 

[GW84]

Went with option 6, but to be fair, mostly chose it because it comes with a pause function.

Knowing my 'skills' at reflex based games I would need such a function to consider anything other than the 'push button to stab'-approach.

 

[Snowflakez]

I chose a mixture of 2 and 4. I want timing to be important, but not so much weapon angle. I think that's probably asking for a bit too much. I didn't love Dishonored's melee system, but I definitely would like to see various abilities woven into the system itself - for instance, maybe a high sword/knife skill (whatever it's called in 2020) lets you "perfect parry" (a la KCD) an opponent's melee strike.

I DEFINITELY want some awesome hand-to-hand, though. Don't care for over-the-top martial arts, but simple, straightforward and effective fisticuffs is right up my alley. I don't necessarily need or want to be leaping over my opponents, doing flying spin kicks or anything like that, of course.

Thing is, not so sure how RPG impact would work here. It's much more "clear" with guns, and easier to make sense of for action-oriented players if they miss -- their weapon skill was low, thus their weapon swayed and they missed. In melee, how do you handle it? If you're literally in someone's face, it'd be a bit silly for a strike that clearly hit them to miss because RNG. Dunno. We really didn't see much of the melee in the demo, but apparently the gamescom version got some sick katana action.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

A mixture of 6, 7 and 1, with 6 being taking the lead. I don't care about combo hassle, fancy as they might be, nor frantic RMB abuse. But I would like there to be determination and tactics involved.

It's very hard to perform and witness fancy and fluid taekwondo or capoeira moves in FPP, but if you are able to learn different martial arts, you might be able to take advantage of different strikes and forms if you could use a pause function and choose what to pull off and whether to fight defensively (buff to defenses, debuff to offenses and hit chance) or offensively (buff to offences and hit chance, debuff to defences).

And if you choose to not use the function (if there's no need), a straightforward system suffices.

 

[Snowflakez]

A mixture of 6, 7 and 1, with 6 being taking the lead. I don't care about combo hassle, fancy as they might be, nor frantic RMB abuse. But I would like there to be determination and tactics involved.

It's very hard to perform and witness fancy and fluid taekwondo or capoeira moves in FPP, but if you are able to learn different martial arts, you might be able to take advantage of different strikes and forms if you could use a pause function and choose what to pull off and whether to fight defensively (buff to defenses, debuff to offenses and hit chance) or offensively (buff to offences and hit chance, debuff to defences).

And if you choose to not use the function (if there's no need), a straightforward system suffices.

I'm actually gonna change my vote slightly. I'll swap KCD with 1, because I agree with this. I want abilities that can be used tactically (a less drastic and more realistic version of what Dishonored offers - the combat itself is simple, but you can use various abilities to augment your combat style), but the systems themselves do not need to be super complicated.

Swing, block, parry, perhaps a sidestep/dodge button. I think Skyrim could have done with adding a bit more weight to attacks, but beyond that, the system worked well enough. Oblivion was OK too. Morrowind was obviously hardcore in the RPG direction, and I enjoyed that too.

Agreed about combos, couldn't care less. I see the appeal for fighting games, not so sure it's necessary for RPGs, much less first person ones where that sort of stuff would probably make me want to vomit. But the tactical use of abilities in combat would be quite nice.

 

[Nikola_Nesic]

I vote for 6 and 7, but really none of this option look so great, i mean 6 is probably best you can do for FPP melee combat, i still want to see really good FPP melee combat, sadly most FPP do it wrong often melee is tie heavy to stealth mechanic or is just swing left and then swing right.

There was interview with CDPR where they say how they learn great stuff from witcher about melee combat and how they will have great melee system in Cyberpunk for people who want to do melee playthrough.

Here are links https://gamerant.com/cyberpunk-2077-combat-weapons-details/

In demo they just show one attack for melee, but i fear that FPS will push melee combat out.

 

[kolosmenus]

I loved how Mirror's Edge combat looked, definitely the best looking out of all the options and most fitting for CP. You could change the animations/damage depending on which martial art are you trained in. Unfortunately it's too simple to work in such a huge rpg.

 

[fT3g0]

Didn't know where to cast my vote. I like melee combat fast, deep, and realistic.

 

[Nikola_Nesic]

Nice if someone like this combat, for me this combat is pure mess.

 

[kofeiiniturpa]

Looks awful.

”Realistic” perhaps, but messy and... not very fun.

 

[Poison19]

Wow Mirror's Edge combat looks sick, i vote for it for sure.
Other variants are too slow for Cyberpunk imo. But variant 2 is good too.

 

[Rawls]

Of the options above, I voted 3 because it best mimics the chaos of a fight. I love tactics in games as far as planning how to execute a plan. But once everything goes to hell and your stuck in a room with 5 boosters (which is rarely the plan), it should feel dangerous and fast. Of the options above, Mirror's Edge best represents that.

I will mention that timing does appear to be important there, so I'm incorporating a bit of option 4 into this too. If CDPR could work in angle of attack too, I'd be ecstatic theoretically ... but I'm not sure that would be feasible design wise.

 

[metalmaniac21]

The CP2020 way is pretty good - a limited set of moves forms an endless list of martial arts styles.

 

[Lucian06]

I don't know what to choose:unsure:
Nioh (Dark Souls, Bloodborne, Dragons Dogma) has the perfect Action Rpg combat System. (But it's third Perspective)

 

[Draconifors]

2 and 4 for me.
Dishonored's melee is fun enough from what I remember. While I haven't played Kingdom Come, I've seen what its melee is like.

Skyrim-style melee I definitely don't want in Cyberpunk 2077; I'll just play Skyrim for that.

 

[EngryEngineer]

2 & 3, I really hope that different weapon types feel different from each other. I want my cyberpunk lazer/mono-whip and it not just be another sword with a different animation/skin.

 

[Restlessdingo32]

A combination of 1 and 4, with a touch of 3. I think getting overly complex with combat mechanics often turns them into a complete mess. So keep it simple. A few offensive and defensive options with the different forms of melee combat. The rest of the complexity and variation can come from the timing, positioning and angles. I'd prefer it if the pacing was relatively quick and brutal. Particularly at the point of contact and when gaining the upper hand. In other words, melee tends to snowball when you get an edge and isn't excessively drawn out (aka, realistic).

 

[Poison19]

What is monowhip everyone talking about?

 

[EngryEngineer]

What is monowhip everyone talking about?

It is a fan favorite melee weapon from CP2020, and has become a classic in most other cyberpunk genre RPGs.

It is an insanely sharp whip because it is a strong wire that is only 1 molecule thin (mono-molecular whip or monowhip for short). They tend to be a high risk/high reward type weapon because it might slice right through your enemy's armor but it could also slice through your own if you flick your wrist incorrectly. This is why it is just way "cooler" than a really sharp sword, it is floppy, super light, long, it is a light highly mobile whip that also shreds things and is difficult and dangerous to use.

It doesn't often get depicted in movies and video games which is why I really want it here, one of the only depictions I can think of right now is Johnny Mnemonic though it isn't a great depiction and that one may technically be a laser, it is functionally the same thing.

 

[gogmeister777]

I like these polls, thanks.

Well, I couldn't help but answer this while taking into account what we know of the gunplay so far. So I had to go for the faster choices since I have a hard time imagining fairly fast gunplay suddenly using methods 1, 4 or 6.

Based on this I chose 2 and 3. I thought Mirror's Edge did a good job of FPP melee but I'd also like abilities and combos interwoven as in Dishonored.

5 is also fine since, although the game often technically stops briefly, things are still flowing from a movement/combat perspective. Though I always wonder how they work out damage. Some games give invincibility frames which always seems like cheating, especially if the animations take awhile and you've got health bar regeneration happening simultaneously, heh.

I couldn't pick 1 since I've always thought it was a bit poor and clumsy which, again imho, wouldn't meld with the bullets flying everywhere, dashing, sliding gunplay we seem on course for. 4 is also very careful, fairly slow and deliberate. It worked great for KCD though. 6 I didn't even consider because if they can do that then I'd imagine we'd already have that for guns too.

I'm very curious to know how viable a melee specialist playthrough will be, even though I do plan on sticking to guns with added stealth takedowns.