ADR- The "After death replay", like in Civilization.

[NormanVauxhall 8]

Idea.

I thought could be interesting to have an “After Death Replay” (from now on ADR) similar to what do you usually see once you have finished a Civilization game.

Here a

of a Civilization 5 replay.

Hypothesis

We are playing and, after four hours of play, we get killed by someone when we were running happily in a crop field. “You are dead” screen. We choose to download (details later) the ADR of our last life.

We load the ADR (in the game? Offline? Suggestion welcome) and we will see a screen similar to the one in the link above. The Chernarus+ map, a text box and a time scrolling bar (from now on TSB) with different colored mark on it, highlighting the event recorded (maybe also a filter option for different kind of events). For every event (more or less) we have done in our last life, we can see:

• On the map where it happened
  
• On the text box what is happened
  
• On the TSB when is happened
  

Your life will scroll in front of your eyes, remembering some details that you have probably forgotten, like the time you were fleeing from a horde of Z in a church with your brother and defend until the last bullet, dropping down the Lee Enfield and piking up an axe and killing the last Z with it.

I think could be interesting for the big chance of storytelling given by this game.

Things I would like to see.

Different levels of event are recorded, from finding a weapon, starving, shooting someone, killing Z, fixing up a car, surgical operation to the lung etc, filtered by color for each kind of action; transfusion, patching, surgical operation and all medical gizmos are in red color; combat activities are in brown etc.

Also, if someone start a “combat” with you it will be interesting to know who he/she was or maybe where he/she was? It could also be a week old fight that you didn't remember to be in it, maybe you didn't notice it and you didn't return fire to him. (hypotetical, let's discuss on it!)

Example:

• Text box: You were shot in the lung with a 1866 winchester used by NormanVauxhall
  
• TSB: 1h 51m 34second of life – Marked in brown on the TSB
  
• Map: The full map with a zoom in on the area of the event with a couple of marks on, the position of the shooter and the victim.
  

What I don't know.

I don't have an idea of what action are recorded and where are recorded. I don't think it will be safe to have some of this data on the client side as a safety precaution. That's why I've said on the top “download the ADR”. I think you can choose to do it and you query the central hive (please correct me if I'm wrong!) all the recorded event for your ID.

Probably not all the action are recorded and I'd like to know what is it possible to do. Not interested in ALL the empty tin can I've picked up, but when I've finally found out a Makarov it will be nice to have a note on that.

This idea come up in my mind after looking on this thread, so I think the developers have a lot of data stockpiled. Don't know precisely what they have, but i think there's a lot of useful stuff/info/data for this ADR idea. Could a simple query recreate a TXT file to create a "log/diary"? Feed this file into a replay program and here we are. No? If anyone have some idea about how could work, comment please!

EDIT

Some note

Cause it's a replay, does not mean it will be a video. Could be a simple TXT file with all the relevant data.

To avoid to use it for ruin the gameplay of your killer (IF the replay show position and name of your killer) the ADR could be dowload after an X amount of time. (1 hour?)

Feedback, suggestion and reaction on this topic will be very welcome.

Thank you for your attention.

Edited December 4, 2012 by NormanVauxhall

[Michaelvoodoo25 3120]

When you die, you don't get to read your obituary!

[Bakst 98]

Interesting idea, especially from a narrative point of view: it's like your life is "flashing before your eyes" when you die!

But I have some serious issues with the idea as well. For one, it's no good to reveal the position of your killer, since that unfairly exposes the other guy's strategy and tactics. What's more, all you'd have to do is download the replay and communicate the other guy's position to your squad, who could then hunt him/her down with ease. Maybe it could be a per-server setting, where rookie servers allow your killer's position to be revealed but veteran/expert servers do not reveal this information and also don't tell you the guy's name. (That would be the kind of server I'd prefer to play on -- I figure if someone takes me out from a concealed position, I'd have no way of knowing whodunnit IRL, so why should the game tell me after I'm dead?)

The other problem is of a technical nature: it might put extra strain on the server and/or client load, increasing lag for everyone -- all for a non-essential feature.

So all in all I'm intrigued, but would like to learn more about the practical implementation of such a system.

* * *

P.S.: You might want to post your topic as a comment in this thread:

http://dayzmod.com/forum/index.php?/topic/38742-suggestions-for-the-dayz-standalone-thinking-outside-of-the-limitations-of-an-arma-2-mod/

It has emerged as the authoritative collection of suggestions for the standalone.

Edited December 4, 2012 by Bakst

[NormanVauxhall 8]

Interesting idea, especially from a narrative point of view: it's like your life is "flashing before your eyes" when you die!

Exactly!

But I have some serious issues with the idea as well. For one, it's no good to reveal the position of your killer, since that unfairly exposes the other guy's strategy and tactics. What's more, all you'd have to do is download the replay and communicate the other guy's position to your squad, who could then hunt him/her down with ease. Maybe it could be a per-server setting, where rookie servers allow your killer's position to be revealed but veteran/expert servers do not reveal this information and also don't tell you the guy's name. (That would be the kind of server I'd prefer to play on -- I figure if someone takes me out from a concealed position, I'd have no way of knowing whodunnit IRL, so why should the game tell me after I'm dead?)

Yes, I was a little concerned about the position of the other player. I have and idea, but... after your next point.

The other problem is of a technical nature: it might put extra strain on the server and/or client load, increasing lag for everyone -- all for a non-essential feature.

For example: if you are intrested in your replay, after the "You are dead" screen you can choose if you want the replay or not. If yes the "server" will accept your request and slowly start to gahter the info. After, for example, one hour you have can download through a link sent to your email (as i said, an example)

So all in all I'm intrigued, but would like to learn more about the practical implementation of such a system.

Same for me, that's why I'm working on so much different hypothesis hoping to get some interests from other users.

Thanks for the reply.

P.S.

I will follow your suggestion to link this idea to the thread. Thanks.

[enforcer1975 1111]

Nobody will save Yottabytes of video for nothing..If someone wants to review his killstreak and jerk off to that he has do record it himself, the engine doesn't allow that.

[NormanVauxhall 8]

Nobody will save Yottabytes of video for nothing..If someone wants to review his killstreak and jerk off to that he has do record it himself, the engine doesn't allow that.

No video involved in this case. Did you see the link of the Civilization replay? Just a lot of code line... could be a simple TXT file to feed in to a program. I've thought about this looking this thread of the forum. Seems they have a lot of data stockpiled. So, let's query the database to see our "life". Does not seems too bad indeed.

Edited December 4, 2012 by NormanVauxhall

[Bakst 98]

You pretty much have me sold on the idea, Norman. But I think it would be important to have a cool-down period of at least one hour -- maybe even 24 hours -- between the time of death and the moment that you can download the rerun. This is to stop people using it as a strategic combat tool.

[Shadow Man 142]

You pretty much have me sold on the idea, Norman. But I think it would be important to have a cool-down period of at least one hour -- maybe even 24 hours -- between the time of death and the moment that you can download the rerun. This is to stop people using it as a strategic combat tool.

I'm pretty much in agreement. I like the idea but to be honest if you have to wait even one hour the chances are you'll have started a new game and will soon not care about your replay. Unless you had the most amazing lone-wolf-versus-team-of-seven win.

[NormanVauxhall 8]

I'm pretty much in agreement. I like the idea but to be honest if you have to wait even one hour the chances are you'll have started a new game and will soon not care about your replay. Unless you had the most amazing lone-wolf-versus-team-of-seven win.

So probably it's better to avoid any information about other players. Only the people (if any) that he/she has killed.

Do anyone think that the word "replay" is keeping out people to understand what is it really? Maybe "postmortem diary" sound a little more explanatory?

[dallas 5195]

When you die you should enter a room with black and white squares on the floor, surrounded by thick deep red velvet curtain and a greeted by a backwards walking, backwards talking midget.

Edited December 6, 2012 by Dallas

[NormanVauxhall 8]

When you die you should enter a room with black and white squares on the floor, surrounded by thick deep red velvet curtain and a greeted by a backwards walking, backwards talking midget.

Come on man! Be serious... RED velvet? Too obvious... XD

[hatfieldcw 184]

I like the idea, and I have often wished for something a little bit like this, but just a line on the map showing where you went. A little worm crawling across Chernarus, hitting the hot spots and terminating in a big red X would be enough for me, but if it had little icons for significant events, like eating, drinking, bandaging, killing zombies, getting hurt, receiving transfusions, getting in/out of vehicles, that sort of thing, it would be even more entertaining.

No reason for it to include information about other players, but here's my pie-in-the-sky addendum: Let the utility load multiple replay files at once. Assuming they're timestamped and flagged by what server you were on, you could have your whole clan, adversarial teams, or even the server admin submit multiple replay files to the same replay, allowing you to view, in retrospect, everything that was going on the whole session. Aftermath of fights, near misses, ad hoc alliances, all would be revealed by the replay.

Just the other day I had a fight with two bandits. I got the drop on them and killed one. I wounded the other, but someone died way across the map right at that moment, so I thought I had gotten them both. I didn't verify the kills, so for the next hour this guy was crawling along behind me, using his binocs and his wits to keep up with me as I scouted for chopper wrecks, until he finally got me in his sights as I came out of a barn. How epic would those two intersecting lines on the map be if you could watch both stories unfold at once?

[colekern 1364]

I was skeptical, because something similar to this has been discussed before and it was passed off as "having your story told to you". However, I woudn't mind having some sort of recap, or proof of my exploits for friends and stuff.

Like others said, it needs to be blocked from you downloading it for a couple hours or so and doesn't need to reveal the shooters location.

[Bladez 0f Fury 33]

I was iffy... But I like it. With the cooldown it would be very nice to look at tactics of where you tend to die more what to avoid and so on and so forth in a simple "map" view. I would really love to have this for when I don't feel like playing and rather watching "videos" of DayZ. I think would be a lot more helpful for each individual person to learn our own habits that we don't see in game.