Title says it all, would you prefer ragdoll physics to apply when a person dies, or have death animations (ex. shoot a guy with shotgun point blank in a limb, he loses the limb while shouting in pain, he tries to grasp where his limb should be, then falls over dead, or if it was his legs, he falls over and writhes in pain before dying), or have death animations play then go to a ragdoll after the death animation finishes?


I'd for one like to see the return of the death animations from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aF54vf9fqw&feature=related and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMLbEAxjzj8. Or perhaps something like Black Ops, for example, I played the campaign of Black Ops and I used a Dragons Breath SPAS-12 and blew the legs off a an NVA soldier, he flopped to the ground and screamed loudly, shaking his burning stubs in the air, then died and went ragdoll.

It would be great to have death animations back (or at least an option).

Death animations that go ragdoll when they are done sounds good.

Death animations look so awesome. Its more realistic.(kinda)

Death animations until they finally collapse towards the ground, then ragdoll for realistic 'floppage', body rolling down slope, etc. Any decent death animation implementation would be a huge piece of work though, if done right. Much easier and cheaper for the devs just to have them go 'AHHhhh....' and ragdoll.

I'd pay for that extra realism, though

Edit: One thing I didn't consider earlier- death animations are all well and good in a turn-based game, but how realistic would it be in a realtime game, for the guy you just fatally shot to be clutching his missing arm and moaning "Ya bastidge, ya got me!" for 3 or 4 seconds, at the same time as you're still pumping another 3-4 12 gauge rounds into his head? That's one thing that wouldn't migrate too well from the old games for that reason, methinks. The death animation would have to be unaffected by your continued actions, and there goes the realism.

That sounds like an awesome idea! I could imagine shooting a Raider in the chest with a Plasma Rifle, and the Raider falling to his knees with a hole in his chest with "plasma goo" dripping out and then going ragdoll. That would make killing in Fallout even more fun! :hehe:

i kinda want both i would want a death animation when you do a critical hit.

Or kill a person in VATS.


Now, that isn't realistic, why would he be standing there? You act as though the animations are long and fixed, even old games like AVP 2 had awesome death animations, you could blow an aliens arm and head off, it'd drop to its knees or scamper about swinging its one arm randomly before collapsing, you could shoot a man in the leg, he flew back a few feet and moaned in pain as he bled out.

Death animations sound appealing but unless there were literally dozens of them, covering various demises, character types etc, they're going to look firstly silly and secondly get very repetitive very fast. Rag-doll allows for randomness without the need for vast resources.

Perhaps they could do them for the major characters but even that would be difficult given the number of ways we can kill people in FO.

Sorry to be a killjoy because it is an appealing idea.

I wouldn't mind Death Animations as long as they weren't varied, the same ones would get boring very quick. :sadvaultboy: Though, in all honesty I would love me some Death Anims.

Animations are way better. Ragdoll was good enough 10 years ago.
That being said, when I hit something with a stake gun I expect to see it nailed to the wall.
So a combination with animations on the majority I guess.

I want both. H&D2 and the new Call of Duty had something like that.

Thats awesome.

Unless their animations don't start until you're completely finished shooting, it just wouldn't work. For single-shot kills, sniping at range (or any kills in VATS, where you automatically stop shooting as soon as the mob is killed), that sort of thing, it would fit. But if you're 10 feet away and disintegrating them with a full drum from your minigun, while they're stopping to go through a canned death act- not so much. There should be nothing but ragdolls and gibs, then.

:facepalm: I already said that they aren't fixed animations, have you seen any of the Black Ops death animations? They are half ragdoll as it is.

Haven't played any CoD since MW2. If they've learned to make it work without getting hoaky, then go for.

Some sort of combination. Like seeing death animations on crits.

It'll be fine as long as it doesn't go the CoD route.

CoD route: get shot in the head, clutch arm as falling down.

I think that halo does an excellent job of combining ragdoll and animation together, however you may view the game, it still has really good death sights?

No, I am not talking about the multiplayer animations, the NPC animations.

Like in L4D2. Death animations and then turn into ragdoll. But also while the death animation is in progress, the enemy should still be able to react to further violence. Like if you shoot a hole in his gut, he falls down to his knees. You can let him be, and he'll fall forward and die and become a ragdoll. But instead you shoot him in the shoulder, and he reacts to the shot. Then dies.

Also, with this I would like for not everyone to instantly die if you shoot the leg or the arm off. They could fall to the ground, screaming. Maybe try to crawl a few feet, but they will die in a few seconds. It'd kind of be a part of a death anim, since they are pretty much dead already, but still moving.

Ehh....I don't have a need for mega violence. I really don't mind it as it is now.

This would reshape mindless killing I think. I personally would love to be able to enter vats with a .44 revolver cue up a few torso shots and watch in slo mo as my enemy clutches their chest in pain only to be shot in the stomach.

It would be also awesome if they go into the cinematic death thing but then they are still able to kill you. Like if you shoot the person in the arm he pulls out a pistol with his other arm and has a "final stand" moment.

L4D2 did it perfectly, great death animations with ragdoll physics afterwards.
I want that.
Maybe we could get some better EW kills then over the 'entire body goes goo/ash'.

Death animations when done well, like they where in the originals make for much cooler deaths. Having Death animations followed by ragdoll would be the best I think. You'd have to tune the physics way down however, from what we've seen in the gamebryo games so far. So that way you still can have bodies effected by explosions or environmental changes. You just won't get the glitchy "punch or shot that sends target into orbit" effects.