When will LOUD get integrated into FAF?

FtXCommando

Let me quote Brutus quoting Uvesos summary from our develop chat:

@Brutus5000 said in Simspeed: What performance improvements could be ported from LOUD MOD?:

Let me quote Uvesos summary from our developer chat here (the question pops up every few months):

We are already working with Sprouto (the maker of LOUD) together for month.
He joined our AI-Development Discord and is sharing his knowledge with us.

The changes in LOUD compared to FAF are insane huge. Some examples:
LOUD is using special maps to increase the gamespeed (flat maps to reduce the c-engine pathing)
It has reduced graphic effects on units. (removed blinking lights, optimized build beams etc)
Also sounds like ambient sound on units are removed.

Many people think that's all what it needs to be fast, but the real speed changes are inside the code.
In Loud a Air unit class does not have any functions from land or navy units.
Every lua file does first localize any global used function like WaitTicks(), table.getn() etc. to increase the speed.
Almost every function is optimized/rewritten/moved to a different location.

But FAF itself has also some functions that makes FAF slower than the original game.
The veterancy system (callbacks to every unit that is involved in a fight)
Shield damage overspill (search for overlapping shilds to transfer damage to nearby shields)
Reclaim (unit.lua function SetRebuildProgress is cloning every wreck on the whole map in some cases)
And many other stuff that we have in FAf to prevent cheating or fixing c-engine behavior.

So there is no compatibility at all.
It would be easier to implement FAF into LOUD.

Asking if we can make LOUD as mod for FAF is the same than asking if we can make SupCom2 as mod for FAF.

Azraaa

tl;dr People ain't really ready to remove stuff for Performance on FAF. It's a fact you have to face if you want better performance, but I want to stress that we do not just strip the game down. Nothing has been truly stripped from LOUD. Theres a lot of myths about LOUD that are not true. Most of the simspeed is purely from code optimizing and when implementing or doing anything in LOUD. The first though is how will this affect simspeed?

ZLO

i don't understand... why you need to change anything game-related to make it faf compatible?
i mean.... you want to integrate loud so that i can launch current patch and like... select loud AI there and play like that? well apart from things about optimisations we should also mention that there is a ton of balanse changes, new units and stuff like that.
If we want to add loud we should add it as featured mod at best... but then it would probably need to download a ton of thigns...

maybe if people want to play loud we just make them install loud just like it is installed normally and then on faf you can just ask where is your loud installation folder.

What needs to be integrated is loud and ice adapter and ability to host loud games vya FAF so more people can play loud together.... no need to make some sort of FAF+LOUD hybrid and on need to try to integrate loud improvements into FAF or faf vet system into loud....

FtXCommando

This is about integrating LOUD as a submod on FAF. In general it's incompatible with our code repository, our mod vault, and our map vault.

To quote Brutus once again:
"So for the players there is absolutely no gain of we offer it as a featured mod. It even has a negative impact: since our updating process sucks you download all the changes models and maps and stuff, just to throw it away and re-download all FAF files as soon as you play a regular game."

Anachronism_

Why couldn't we just have an option on FAF to link a 2nd installation directory of FA for loud, so that we can host/join loud games via FAF client and with ICE?

speed2

There's no "just do that to make it work". It's not compatible.

left_boy

@Emperor_Penguin I went ask in their discord and such a thing would be possible. Just have a as separate thing in a "LOUD" client tab. The development needed on that would be limited. But there is no such a project on FAF's side as of now.

Anachronism_

Hmm, perhaps that should be added to a "to-do" board somewhere...

Brutus5000

@axel12 said in When will LOUD get integrated into FAF?:

@Emperor_Penguin I went ask in their discord and such a thing would be possible. Just have a as separate thing in a "LOUD" client tab. The development needed on that would be limited. But there is no such a project on FAF's side as of now.

An integration into the FAF client will not happen - at least as long as I'm in charge for technical shit here. LOUD would be a foreign object in our ecosystem:

LOUD is not compatible with our featured mod system. This is a question of effort, but due to the following points, it would be pointless.
LOUD is mostly incompatible with common FAF benefits such as: UI/Sim mods, coop, custom AIs, lobby features, game ending modifications. But if we integrate LOUD, people expect stuff to be working.
LOUD can be played without Steam Linking. Putting LOUD into FAF would mean the need to obey the Steam Linking rules which might split their community for no reason.

Mixing these things up will cause a lot of questions, invalid bug reports, annoyed users or confused users. People already have trouble following the concepts of featured mods, sim mods, ladder, leaderboards. Yes, we could add a client tab called LOUD. But it would need a huger banner saying "USING LOUD DOES NOT WORK WITH ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS CLIENT." Whats the point of this?

If you want to play LOUD use the LOUD launcher.
If you want to play FAF use the FAF client.

This is the end of the story and I will lock this topic now.