Seasons

[yorkie065 78]

This is something that I'd like to see later on down the development line as theres a few things that are coming to the standalone which would be a great factor to this, and also the fact that the seasons could take a while to setup taking time away from valuable development time on features that have higher priority. 

 

So yeh, the 4 seasons would be kick ass to see in the game. Each season having it's own texture and model set, with different characteristics forcing players to adapt to the changes in weather and the like. Below are some of the things that would be cool to see in each season. 

 

Winter: December - February:

Rooftops of buildings (especially flat ones), mountains, highlands, hills and some flat lower traffic areas covered in snow. A lot of the trees to be leafless or with very few leaves on them, bushes included and the evergreen/ fern trees to have snow on them. Reduced viewing distance/ visibility, higher chance of rain or snow and the odd chance of blizzards/ horrendous weather, shorter daylight hours and colder temperatures forcing players to use thick warm winter clothing. Seeking shelter more often, eating and drinking properly/ more often and finding heat sources to keep core temperatures up. Reduced wildlife for some types, but increased chance of seeing other wildlife that thrive in winter conditions. 

 

Spring: March - May:

Very little snow in earlier weeks of the season in the higher places on map. Tree's and bushes re-growing their leaves, so a fair bit of green. Good viewing distance with a decent chance of rain, no snow, odd chance heavy rain and daylight hours getting longer with rising temperatures. Food becoming easier to find and growing on trees or vegetable patches with more wildlife appearing around the map. 

 

Summer: June - August:

No snow, very hot and sunny with nice long view distance/ visibility, odd chance of rain and slightly more increased chances of thunderstorms. All trees and bushes in full bloom looking nice and green and thick. The hotter temperatures requiring thinner clothing, higher chance of dehydration and fevers or sun stroke. Decent amount of wildlife but less than what there was in the spring. 

 

Autumn: September - November:

Basically what chernarus is now. A lot of orange and brown on trees with them loosing leaves, some still green. Moderate but cooling temperatures, ok daylight hours and visibility with mixed weather conditions and odd chance of storms. Food and water like it is in the standalone currently, with wildlife being rarer than Summer, but not too hard to find. 

 

It would be very cool if these seasons were to actually run alongside the real world seasons like the day and night cycle meaning that the updates for the world would come once every 3 months or so once all the seasons are finished. Obviously theres a lot of things that are going to be coming to SA before this, and I don't expect it anytime soon. If im honest I probably don't want to see this until the full game is actually released, and the seasons get put in as patches. They do kind of already have a summer styled map (or section of the chernarus map) in Arma 2 PMC, where it's all green and very vibrant looking. It's a very refreshing look, and seasons will hopefully bring new cool challenges for players with each change, keeping them engaged in the experience. Also theres probably a lot of things I've missed out for each season, so any further thoughts would be great to hear! 

 

 

[Crawflex 3]

I was literally about to post this, but not as in-depth as this. Very good and seeing this actually become a reality would be awesome! If i understood correctly the seasons are real life time dependant? Because thats what I was thinking at first. That would create a little more work for the devs to roll out the season patches, but I think it would be worth it.

 

Take my beans!

Edited January 6, 2014 by Crawflex

[rooniedoo 68]

Good Idea, but what season it is should depend on where the server is located

Ex: an Aussie server would have Summer in December-Feb while an American would have Winter.

[Death_Dealer 3155]

While this would be insanely cool, it seems like it would be pretty hard or even impossible for the devs to do with the current engine + the amount of work like retexturing (even small things like shrubbery and grass would have to be retextured/removed)

[Korsbaek 1778]

This would crave huuuge amounts of work. It could be awesome with seasons, but I just think it's too much work.

[weparo 613]

This would crave huuuge amounts of work. It could be awesome with seasons, but I just think it's too much work.

[kovie20@gmail.com 125]

Would definitely be a lot of work for the devs when they have more important things to work on. I would like to see though a better weather cycle w/ the addition of temperature effects on the player. Increased food and water need when cold, shaky aim if the player doesn't have warm clothing etc. etc.

[Hakiki 10]

Cool idea, probably loads of work to implement though. Re-texturing just about everything for at least 4 different seasons, plus the added fact that it should preferably happen gradually.  It would be extremely weird if you went from a full on winter-blizzard one day, and logging in the next day you would find green leaves on all the trees, flowers in bloom, and all the birds that had migrated for winter would all suddenly be back the same day, just because it was suddenly spring overnight?

 

Absolutely an entertaining concept, and definitely something that I could see bringing a little (or a lot) variation to the game. However I expect it will be probably YEARS down the line to even start working on this, and would take a LOT of development resources to ... well, develop. :D

[Twixxer 159]

200+ square km map having 4 different seasons? Well you can always dream..

[Migwel 3]

Sounds like a great idea

[dallas 5195]

I think we really only need a winter version, but rather than just a white reskin, I'd love elaborate snow and ice mechanics and cold ambient sounds to go with it. I'd love roads being hidden and snow banks in various heights. Or few parts of roads, streets, docks exposed and covered by black ice. The height of the snow effecting your movement speed. Slows you down at knee height, becomes a struggle at waste height and sometime gets so high, you have to backtrack and find another route.

I like to see different thickness in ice, the sound of squeaking and cracking. Think ice you can break to retrieve water or fish, thin ice, you can fall through, which requires you to know what exactly to do to survive, when drenched in ice water(think dry clothes and running to keep your temperature up and blood circulating).

Ability to build fires inside house and operating stoves, however with the risk of fainting/dying, if you haven't opened/cleared the stove pipes.

Edited January 6, 2014 by Dallas

[yorkie065 78]

I can fully appreciate the amount of work re-texturing everything would take as I've worked as a junior level designer in the industry and also created many 3D models for my uni course. Hence why I said I don't expect it to happen until the game has been fully released. Even if it was on a minimal level with say just the ground being textured with a frosty effect and not worry about the trees and just implement features that would represent winter time would be cool. The game looks like it's basically in winter, and it's current condition, even in the mod, cold wasn't overly too present unless it was raining and at night. So something a bit more extreme forcing players to adapt their clothing, sacrificing the military gear just to stay alive and the scarsity of wildlife when it gets put in would a fantastic and refreshing challenge. 

 

I think we really only need a winter version, but rather than just a white reskin, I'd love elaborate snow and ice mechanics and cold ambient sounds to go with it. I'd love roads being hidden and snow banks in various heights. Or few parts of roads, streets, docks exposed and covered by black ice. The height of the snow effecting your movement speed. Slows you down at knee height, becomes a struggle at waste height and sometime gets so high, you have to backtrack and find another route.

I like to see different thickness in ice, the sound of squeaking and cracking. Think ice you can break to retrieve water or fish, thin ice, you can fall through, which requires you to know what exactly to do to survive, when drenched in ice water(think dry clothes and running to keep your temperature up and blood circulating).

Ability to build fires inside house and operating stoves, however with the risk of fainting/dying, if you haven't opened/cleared the stove pipes.

 

That would be amazing and would make journeys and firefights just that more interesting and difficult. BF4 has the slower run in deeper water which is cool and raises the weapon infront of your face to avoid getting it wet. Would love to see this kind of thing but as many say, we can only dream! I just hope Rocket has the same dream! ;) 

[doublebrain 255]

Im pretty sure a remake of the whole map for all 4 seasons wont happen. Only thing that seems possible to me is something like more rain in autumn, very cold in winter, warm but also rainy in spring, warm and dry in summer. Maybe some change in screencolour and light could also create some ambiance. Low satiation and a blue touch in winter, bright colours and a orange touch in summer, stuff like that.

[TEST_SUBJECT_83 465]

I think we really only need a winter version, but rather than just a white reskin, I'd love elaborate snow and ice mechanics and cold ambient sounds to go with it. I'd love roads being hidden and snow banks in various heights. Or few parts of roads, streets, docks exposed and covered by black ice. The height of the snow effecting your movement speed. Slows you down at knee height, becomes a struggle at waste height and sometime gets so high, you have to backtrack and find another route.

I like to see different thickness in ice, the sound of squeaking and cracking. Think ice you can break to retrieve water or fish, thin ice, you can fall through, which requires you to know what exactly to do to survive, when drenched in ice water(think dry clothes and running to keep your temperature up and blood circulating).

Ability to build fires inside house and operating stoves, however with the risk of fainting/dying, if you haven't opened/cleared the stove pipes.

This^

Snow is a must, even if its just an area of the map that always has snow, but if it could change all over the map, that would be amazing...but unfortunately unlikely.

[JuX 72]

This has been suggested already, but nice to see it brought up.

 

The seasons will be lot of work, but i do not believe its difficult as many here believe it is. Simply by replacing textures you could make

winter on Chenarus, thats good enough for ALPHA and BETA versions.