Multiplayer 'Record' function + the future of commentaries - Page 2 - Modern Warfare 2 Forum: Free Call of Duty MW2 Community

Schosch · 10-08-2010, 02:12 PM

All your keystrokes, mouse movements, shots, actions etc. are stored in a small file (a few MB max.), which can be uploaded anywhere and played back on another PC (if it works like in COD 2,4 and 5). There is no video file created until you manually convert/record the gameplay. That file is basically telling the other PC what actions to display.

**abc** · 10-08-2010, 02:20 PM

Here's how the current record feature works on COD games for PC:

COD "records" your keystrokes, player locations, locations & actions of hardpoints, map name etc
Recording this type of data only takes a few MB for a full game and is recorded in INFINITE quality (if your hardware were fast enough & the system's drivers allowed it, you could record in 1 million by 1 million pixels with this method and the file would be same size as if you recorded in 800 by 640 pixels)
To "play" your content COD physically starts a map with X amount of players and makes them all run around using the same keystrokes that it recorded earlier. The people therefore run, shoot and die exactly as it occured when you recorded it.

That's how it works. Now for what you can actually do with it. Here are some very subtle points that unless you fully understand you probably will not understand the last/next few posts on why this format is far superior to what console players currently use:

Anyone with COD can download this file, of only a few MB remember, and "view" it on their system (because their system has the COD engine on it)
Anyone with COD and a SCREEN CAPTURE METHOD (either free software for a PC or potentially costly PVR type stuff for a console) can "view" this recorded demo file and simultaniously record what the system (PC/console) is outputting (i.e. the recorded game) in a USEFUL CODEC e.g. maybe avi or mp4. You could now edit it or upload it to youtube.
Because the COD engine is playing through the game effectively "from memory" compared to playing the game normally, the CPU doesn't have to do much work. You can therefore play in 60 FPS and record to avi/mp4/etc in 60 FPS. Normally if you try to record as you play your FPS roughly halves making it very impractical for slower PCs or meaning you have to record in lower quality. To make this extremely clear: the two problems just described do not apply to this "recording" method. Therefore virtually everyone can record in high quality for FREE.

Here's what, with a little bit of programming and collaboration you could do with this concept if you were willing to spend the money

Spoiler:

on the game:

So, to do this you need two play the game once, then run through it once more whilst recording it. Now, just IMAGINE that treyarch have the use of a rather handy super computer (is this entirely unlikely? Bear in mind they already have lots of master servers not to mention lots of very powerful computers used to design games. Youtube btw also appear to do this, you send them a video and they render it & host it for you.) and will render you're video to avi/mp4/etc once you upload it. You vid is then on a treyarch hard drive ready for them to do what they want, maybe offer it as a download or host them on their site.
One more expansion on the "what if" concept. The last idea seems entirely plausible based on what I know. It does not take a massive leap to ponder the possibilities of treyarch uploading those videos straight to youtube (maybe you can link your PSN id to your youtube channel to ensure videos end up on the right channel) or maybe they'd even license the game engine to youtube so that youtube can do the rendering themselves (note that given the size of youtube, they already have all these potentially expensive supercomputers/rendering-servers...)

One of the dangers of writing long posts is that you are susceptible to being ninja'd, this time by Schosch...

fenny · 10-08-2010, 02:40 PM

i know on PAIN, which is a PSN game, you can record and edit videos then log in on ur youtube account from the game and it uploads the video for you. So mayb it will be something like that.

thanks for the very informative reply :P

oneinchwunda · 10-08-2010, 03:31 PM

Thank you, abc.

Got me thinking a lot about the possibilities.

chaR · 10-08-2010, 05:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oneinchwunda

Practicly every good FPS(game) except MW2 had a function that allowed you to record a demo, and then play it back.

Fixed.

Yukimaru · 10-08-2010, 07:13 PM

I can just see someone getting a bunch of people together to do nothing but 360 noscopes then montageing it.

fenny · 10-08-2010, 07:41 PM

theres no need it records every game you play for like a month i cant remember the exact time limt

Olaf Vikingsson · 10-09-2010, 09:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fenny

i know on PAIN, which is a PSN game, you can record and edit videos then log in on ur youtube account from the game and it uploads the video for you. So mayb it will be something like that.

thanks for the very informative reply :P

Are you seriously even more mentally challenged than I previously thought? THERE IS NO VIDEO. The game DOES NOT RECORD A VIDEO. I breathed a sigh of relief when I had finished reading Abc's post but you just had to come along and prove me wrong.

Fandom Ruck · 10-09-2010, 10:23 AM

Initially yes. But the multi-player teaser did show "record" & "screenshot" buttons in the editor.

fenny · 10-09-2010, 06:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ViS

Are you seriously even more mentally challenged than I previously thought? THERE IS NO VIDEO. The game DOES NOT RECORD A VIDEO. I breathed a sigh of relief when I had finished reading Abc's post but you just had to come along and prove me wrong.

w/e

on PAIN:

u play the game
u replay what u just did
then u can edit it
then u can upload it to youtube from the game

Quote:

Originally Posted by IGN

We reported earlier today on a video upload feature that's present in the latest update to Sony's Japan-only Mainichi Issyo game for the PS3. This feature allows players to record their gameplay sessions and either save the resulting clips to the PS3 hard disk, or have the footage instantly uploaded to YouTube. While Mainichi Issyo is currently the only PS3 title to have this feature, Sony's plans for YouTube compatibility appear to be a bit more expansive.

It turns out that the YouTube compatibility is one of those secret updates that occasionally make it unannounced into a PlayStation 3 firmware update. The functionality was added to the PS3 operating system via Version 2.35 of the firmware, which became available to PS3 owners today.

Having your firmware updated to 2.35 doesn't mean you can go into any game, record your gameplay sessions, and upload the clips to YouTube, though. Individual game titles have to support the feature for it to work, and currently Mainichi Issyo is the only title to do so. However, Sony told Japan's Impress Watch, "It's possible that similar functionality will be added to other games as well."

In Mainichi Issyo's case, videos are captured at 320x240, 30 frames per second and saved in an MPEG-4 file at 768kbps. Sound is recorded at 64kbps in AAC format. The maximum clip length is ten minutes.

Upon selecting to finish their recording sessions, players are given the choice of either saving their clips to the hard disk or uploading them to YouTube. Choose the latter option, and you're prompted for your YouTube user name and password. The game then uploads the clip on the spot, showing a progress bar while you wait for the upload to complete.

Source

It seems you are the mentaly challenged one, as you are blinded by old technology. So stfu

o and heres a example on a disk based game

oneinchwunda · 10-09-2010, 06:57 PM

Did you not realise the fact that this is CALL OF DUTY, before you wrote that post.

Platy · 10-09-2010, 07:00 PM

^ That.

I heard dedicated servers were popular since forever. MW2 was released in 2009 without them. Strange huh?

**abc** · 10-09-2010, 07:00 PM

Sigh. No-one is as mentally challenged as either of you two want to like.

Vis reads what people actually write not what they probably meant to write. You know what happens next.

/~~babysitting~~

moderating

oneinchwunda · 10-09-2010, 07:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by abc

You know what happens next.

/waitsforViS

fenny · 10-09-2010, 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oneinchwunda

Did you not realise the fact that this is CALL OF DUTY, before you wrote that post.

Yes i do but no one has played or decoded the game yet, so i am just proving to vis that the technology is there and that some games DO record the video not the keystrokes, which he was so sure about that they didnt.

Yukimaru · 10-10-2010, 02:00 AM

Recording the key strokes is more efficient than just straight video recording. Plus with if it actually just recorded video all you could do is watch what only you did. The trailer shows the camera going into a free roam mode which means what you are viewing is a recreation of your match using the info provided by the saved key strokes.

Keegs · 10-10-2010, 02:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by abc

Vis reads what people actually write not what they probably meant to write.

This.

Yukimaru · 10-10-2010, 04:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by abc

Vis reads what people actually write not what they probably meant to write. You know what happens next.

Well it is kinda hard to know what someone meant to write when what they typed didn't come out as intended. So it's not ViS' fault if your post makes you look like your mentally retarded.

fenny · 10-10-2010, 05:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yukimaru

Well it is kinda hard to know what someone meant to write when what they typed didn't come out as intended. So it's not ViS' fault if your post makes you look like your mentally retarded.

an intelligent person would beable to see through the miss typing

**abc** · 10-10-2010, 05:45 AM

This is getting OT but it's worth it because for everyone calling each other retarded it's 95% two stubborn people misunderstanding each other. I'll put it bluntly.

You can not blame vis for reading what other people write and basing his thoughts etc on that - this is not an unreasonable thing to do. Likewise it would perhaps be beneficial to try to bear in mind what those with poorer communication skills meant - unfortunately this only has a limited scope. Getting along with each other shouldn't be hard

Now, where were we?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yukimaru

trailer shows the camera going into a free roam mode which means what you are viewing is a recreation of your match using the info provided by the saved key strokes.

That is a pretty defining spot. In terms of software you can not free roam around a 2d image (i.e. a video) for free roam you have to be creating a 3d object in real time (e.g. running the game using keystrokes) There IS software that can look at something 2d and extrude it but only for simple objects like cubes, spheres etc. Likewise there are lots of pieces of software that work by viewing one image and predicting the next one however these A) cost the same as a car per copy, I personally am hoping BO is below $20k... and B) can only do it in very limited circumstances.

This reason and all the others presented in this thread are sufficient to convince me at least, that BO is far more likely to use the keystroke>playback>record method than the record-in-real-time-whilst-you-play-at-half-your-original-FPS method (for a start, doesn't one of the consoles run COD games at 30, 40 or 60 FPS (?) either way, a number which when halved would provide poor gameplay - they wouldn't include something so fundamentally determental to gameplay)

Platy · 10-10-2010, 10:00 AM

Bit of research (googled Black Ops Theatre Mode) I found this thread posted after the reveal last month. THISISTHELINK Mod can delete it if they feel it's innappropriate.

Anyway, the guy played the game at the reveal and got some details about it. I'll c+p some of it.

How it works

Spoiler:

Like magic... end of blog. I obviously jest but it is somewhat magical what this theatre mode allows you to do. All your recent games are available to pull up in the theatre to get some video for your file share, which we'll go over in a minute. I asked Josh Olin how many videos get saved and he kind of grinned and laughed and said a ton. So for you people used to Halo and only getting a few... I played over 15 games and ALL of them were on the list to pull into the theatre for editing.

Once you find the game you want and you are in theatre you have so much freedom of what you're doing here. The time bar at the bottom is great because it puts green bars on the timeline when you killed someone and red bars on it when you die making it very easy to get to the action.

You are able to do first person, third preson or free roam on the camera allowing any angle you want for the game. You can also slow down game play and speed up gameplay to record your segment. On top of all this, you can watch the game from any players point of view in the game, providing a great resource to watch top players gameplay and strategy and really helping on competitive gameplay options.

Now while in theatre mode you there is a button to record which means in order to have this video in your file share for the community to view, you need to record the gameplay or segments. Once in your fileshare, the entire community can view your video and you can tag the video, rate videos etc. Players on your friends list will be able to go in and look at your recent games whether you have them saved or not... time to clean up that friends list!

The segment editor on this is very cool and allows you to take clips (up to 10) and put them together with transitions. Right now there were only two transitions I got to see hands on: Cut and Fade but was told there would be many others in the November release. Now because it is only 10 segments, the amount of clips to put a montage together would be limited but if you had 10 nice multi kills to put together could be a pretty sick video for the community to watch.

Questions still remaining

Spoiler:

The key part is in the second spoiler. Fenny's point that the technology is out there is valid, but CoD doesn't look like they're going to use it.

oneinchwunda · 10-10-2010, 10:03 AM

So... BO WILL USE THE DEMO RECORDING FUNCTION FROM PREVIOUS COD GAMES, EVEN ON CONSOLES.

Read abc's post for how they are stored.

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