Weapon recoil?

[Skelegant]

Gun recoil is something I've been messing around with for ages, but still haven't decided whether or not I like it While it can help the weapon feel more powerful, it can make the player feel weaker (and sometimes seasick). I think if recoil is added to the more powerful weapons (rocket launcher, SSG etc) but left out of the weaker ones, it works ok.

[Nevander]

I didn't vote because I would say it depends on (a) how it's done and (b) how much recoil. The kind of recoil and pitch changes in Doom 64 for example are great. It's the kind of recoil in something like LegenDoom I'm not a fan of.

[comet1337]

subtle recoil is always good
stronger recoil isn't bad either, but should be relatively fast and sharp, but not too strong compared to the firerate (looking at you, D4D plasmagun, vibrating PoS)
lastly there's the question of what kind of recoil
zoom based, pitch changing, player moving with a_recoil, screenshake with a_quake

[Gutawer]

There needs to be a "don't care" option . I don't really get bothered by its abscence or its presence, unless its an exaggerated amount.

[Matt]

What kind of recoil?

- muzzle climb that temporarily raises your pitch
- muzzle climb that permanently raises your pitch, i.e., you have to manually move your view back down
- the above, with or without an aiming deadzone (which granted is unworkable in GZDoom multiplayer anyway because movement prediction will wreck it like nothing else)

- temporary change of fov

- effect on gun sprite (cf. vanilla pistol, RL, plasma and BFG compared to shotgun and chaingun)

- moving the player backwards (terribly silly for anything but the biggest weapons)
- causing damage to the player and occasionally forcing them to drop the weapon (see above parenthetical)

[ReX]

Weapon recoil is one of several elements that can enhance (or detract from) gameplay, depending on how it’s implemented. Much like weapon-reload, which some people detest and some people swear by, recoil can introduce a factor to which the player must adjust during combat. Personally, I actually like it in the context of games like Quake and Half-Life. In DooM I quite like things the way they are.

[comet1337]

What kind of recoil?

- muzzle climb that temporarily raises your pitch

quake 2 machinegun, you were the worst
want to hit something? pull your mouse back
stopped shooting? behold our wonderful floor textures

[Matt]

Q2MG would be permanent raising - temporary is more like what you see in a lot of GZDoom weapon mods nowadays.

It was also ridiculously overdone for the amount of damage that stupid little peashooter did and even that wouldn't be so bad if it had been the only thing throwing off your aim rather than it being in addition to a shotgun-like spread that also affected your first shot!

(Psychologically it might also have been more manageable if other guns were subject to the same sort of muzzle climb to a lesser degree...)

[ZippeyKeys12]

Do you guys feel that temporary pitch and fov change together is a bit too much for a general weapon(rifle, shotgun)?
Because I don't want to give people migraines.

[Matt]

How many shots does it take to kill a typical monster? The perceived power and annoyingness of effects should be scaled according to its use.

[FFFFRRRR]

Personally, I don't need a lot of recoil in Doom. It isn't required to make a fun weapon for such a simple game.
Though I don't mind it. When it maks a weapon feel powerful and reasonably beefy, that's nice. Whether I enjoy permanent Pitch-Changes depends on the gun. If the gun is powerful, and that is its disadvantage, its fine.

With that said, you can make recoil a major part of the gameplay. A good example for that is CS:GO. To make that really work in Doom, you'd just need Hitboxes, so that the player could get rewarded for recoil-control and precise aim. Because recoil throwing off your aim would not make sense when enemies are large (Arachnotron, Baron, Demon...) and it doesn't matter where you hit them. At when very-long-range combat isn't a thing.

[Matt]

Arachnotrons in particular are very often placed for long-range engagements.

[Skelegant]

Do you guys feel that temporary pitch and fov change together is a bit too much for a general weapon(rifle, shotgun)?
Because I don't want to give people migraines.

I think that works well for a powerful weapon with a longish loading time (like the SSG), but if someone's sensitive to that kind of thing, then a pitch/fov changing AA12 would probably give them a cranial hernia

[ZippeyKeys12]

Thanks guys, I think I'm going to reserve it for medium tier weapons and add an option to disable the fov changes as it doesn't really affect gameplay compared to the temporary pitch change.

[Hexereticdoom]

I personally like a lot most of weapons with recoil, as long as it's not too excessive and make just temporal changes to the player's pitch.

On the other hand, I HATE all those weapons that deviates permanently the player's centered view when are shot repeatedly, forcing you to use always the 'center view' key after using them.

I guess it's a matter of taste of each player, after all...