next »

[The V Man]

Morning all,

I'm busily working away on The Viking Age, my rather ambitious 1 man 3D RPG set in, as you may have guessed, the Viking age. Currently I'm building out the terrain engine as each world is procedurally generated.

In keeping with that I'm looking to get feedback on loading screens, times, etc. I've posted a topical dev blog over on my site, but here's an exerpt:

What do you like about loading screens? What do you hate? How long would you be willing to (comfortably) wait for a loading screen if you knew it was the only one you’d see while you played?

To me, loading screens need to be reasonably short and present something interesting to look at or to read. I like general gameplay tips or information, and concept art is nice to look at but if the load is taking a bit long I’d want those things to be changed out to keep me interested. Now, over time you’ll undoubtedly see the same art and tips, which are less interesting. Of course if a player has stuck around that long I’d guess they had accepted the load time. Not that I intend to let the load time be terribly long to begin with.

The other side of the coin is to have incredibly minimal load time and ‘pop in’ features when the player first enters the game – such is the way Minecraft does much of it’s work. How does everyone feel about that?

Link: http://www.archaic-studios.com/2012/03/195/

So, if you please, let me know your thoughts. Replies here, comments on the site or e-mail are all welcome.

Also, anyone interested in more information on the game, screenshots, etc. can check out the site here: http://www.archaic-studios.com

[alastair]

Ideally, they should be almost instant. If possible, try and load it while the player is doing something else so the game appears seamless.

[The V Man]

Yes - I probably should have clarified - it's really just the initial load I'm concerned with as there's more world generation that can be done at that point to ease the system load later.

While playing the terrain appears out of view so the player (ideally) never sees it happen and the world appears as one large contiguous mass.

[My Escape]

In my experience the Elder Scrolls load screens have always been interesting.  I think Skyrim had some really lengthy load times on my PS3 – some probably up to two minutes. 

If you plan on having lengthy load screens it could be interesting to add stories from Viking legend.  Perhaps make it a lore unlock; so each time you load the game you get to unlock one more legend to read while waiting?  It wouldn’t have to be anything special, just a background and text. 

Obviously you can really go further with distraction tactics like mini-games, animations or graphic novels.  For me if the load time is beyond 3 minutes you’re going to need something to keep the player involved. 

Good luck! 

[Azure Lazuline]

Well, how long will the load time be? That's the most important thing and you never stated it. If you're going to just have one load time at the start of the game, why not have it load in the background while you're on the main menu, so it's all ready to go by the time you hit "start game"?

[C.A. Sinner]

i usually just browse the web on my smartphone or do whatever else during long load times.

[The V Man]

Ah, good feedback abounds. I agree that progressive/unlockable tool-tips and pieces of lore do make things more interesting and keep things fresh. As I intend the game to feature several cultures and not just Vikings, but Celts, Saxons and the various Scandinavian groups who went a-Viking, the tips could be progressive based on the race of the character you're playing. Regardless, lore of the time is a large portion of the game as it's influencing everything that's being done.

As for how long they currently are - there's about a 2-5 second pause while assets are created/loaded currently, I expect by the time the world gets full populated with trees and ocean and all that it may be around 15 seconds, possibly a touch more. So it's still pretty brief. If I go ahead with world pre-generation during the first load of a new world (my primary concern here) then I'd suspect we might be nearing a minute - I have to do some data point calculation speed tests to confirm what that number is. I certainly don't want to go over a minute - I feel that's an unacceptable amount of time to have anyone wait. I think 30-45s is the magic area that's both fair to the player and to the coder who's trying load resources.

[JDM]

Best loading screen: No More Heroes.  A little spinning star appears in the bottom of the screen that you can press the B button to kick higher, and if it scrolls off the screen it changes color.  Here's something (not that great) I wrote a few years ago about it: http://thesycophant.wordpress.com/2008/11/22/no-more-heroes-even-the-loading-screen/

I wish more games would give me something TO DO while loading happens.  A small, insignificant thing that doesn't distract the hardware much, but just something where I can keep looking at the screen, pushing buttons, and making things happen.

[TaintedFork]

One note, if you want to do "fun facts" or whatever:

I forgot where I read this, but it's obvious enough already. Either give your facts context sensitivity, or don't put any stupid ones in.

Nobody wants to see FUN FACT: "Press A to jump!" when they're just about to face the final boss.

---

An idea I had was that you could put some Viking folklore on the loading screens. Maybe include a tiny animatic below the text for those who would rather not read.

[Ben_Hurr]

One note, if you want to do "fun facts" or whatever:

I forgot where I read this, but it's obvious enough already. Either give your facts context sensitivity, or don't put any stupid ones in.

Nobody wants to see FUN FACT: "Press A to jump!" when they're just about to face the final boss.

---

An idea I had was that you could put some Viking folklore on the loading screens. Maybe include a tiny animatic below the text for those who would rather not read.

That said, FUN FACT: "MAJOR PLOT SPOILER!" isn't good at any point in the game either.

[Lynx]

Having just played Batman: Arkham City, I think they took an interesting approach by having the load screen recap, often in several pictures, the story up to that point, thus reacquainting you with the next big thing you need to tackle.  If you've put the game down for a few days or even longer, and are just taking it up again, you might welcome the refresher.

[Capntastic]

If you're gonna have fun facts, don't make them things like reminding players what their skills do, or something that goes instantly from useful to frustratingly repetitive.  If you're going to give setting info, I'd suggest making it unobtrusive and ignorable, while interesting if you opt into reading it.  Sort of like the flavor text of M:TG cards.  Estimate how many loading screens a player will hit during a given run of the game and try to have more snippets than that.  Bonus if they're context sensitive, of course. 

[DinofarmGames]

I think loading times should be avoided at ALL costs.

Like, if you have loading times of more than a second, then you need to actually re-structure your game for the sake of avoiding them.  Get rid of music.  Do simple 2D art instead of 3D.  Restructure your programming.  Do whatever you have to do to get load screens down to less than a second.

I find long loading screens offensive.

[Ben_Hurr]

That's sort of what I was thinking: The ideal loading screen is none at all.

If it's so long that I need a little minigame to keep from chucking the game out of the window, maybe that needs some re-examination.

[DinofarmGames]

Relevant:  http://asserttrue.blogspot.com/2012/02/splash-screens-sloth.html