Analyzing the State of Ravenfield - part 1

[@Lopqv4]

I would say ravenfield is a little dry right now but really cant blame steelraven being the sole developer working on this game

[@migueeeelet]

Yeah, if I had to guess modders are waiting on the whole story stuff to be properly finished. Once that drops we can get a lot of cool stuff. I wonder how it will integrate with RavenM, it could have a lot of potential for fun coop scenarios. Hell, probably pseudo custom gamemodes, too

[@SOPPI_srn]

@@migueeeelet the thing is, steel hasn't been online for quite a long time now, not informing us what he's working on and when we could get new stuff.

[@vivi7645]

​@@migueeeelet Aaaaand base game Story Mode has been canned, but at least the campaign tools are supposed to still be in development

[@migueeeelet]

@@vivi7645 yeah, I hope the community ends up making what would be the base game's story. It'd be a neat showcase of the game's focus on community made content

[@blaze6254]

Man, I am so happy a new ravenfield KZbinr has joined the community

[@nolberggg]

Yeah there isn’t many… on the plus side, Im less stressed on content expectations lol

[@TheSoviet-Duck]

I am gonna make ravenfield videos soon but right now Im using a 2016 macbook soon when i get back on my PC

[@timewaster504]

You know what this game is missing? A chill KZbinr who isn’t screaming the whole time and makes actually entertaining videos. Oh wait, I’m commenting on his video.

[@kelsiel6147]

My life will be his if he starts presenting random items from the workshop while pointing out their + and -

[@nolberggg]

Had me in the first half for a sec! Thanks for the support :)

[@King_CreepaLot]

Ravenfield desperately needs more media coverage, I'm happy to see you becoming a dedicated RF KZbinr, you've got some great videos. The editing is great, there's no major background noise in your voiceovers, and you've got some very great video ideas.

[@nolberggg]

I really appreciate it! You play a significant role in the ravenfield community so it’s always an honor to have your support. And I agree I feel like ravenfield isn’t talked about a lot, especially here on youtube (outside of baron)

[@versace6609]

Just like SteelRaven, you’re the sole chill KZbinr for this game

[@Novice_Rifleman]

Perfectly constructed analysis and great commentary. Nice job! Excited for part 2! 7:41 "Who is the GOAT of Ravenfield modding?" My answer would either be Sofa or King_CreepaLot. Sofa makes great vehicles and maps whilst King makes excellent weapons, skins, and is a very friendly person.

[@lokthegreat6323]

There’re so many great modders i can name a few like mella, le mieux, smodgy, galahad, weerazer,… i cant count them all and they made my childhood with the game

[@nolberggg]

Thanks! I'd have to agree that those two are the most likely, and I wouldn't be surprised if that's the result i get. By next week I should have the numbers to back it up!

[@raw1175]

Honestly, I am impressed by the level of analysis you’ve done. Most of these videos are just vibe checks but you actually bothered to collect data you’ve earned yourself a subscriber, good sir.

[@nolberggg]

Yeah haha I wanted to take a different approach and try and put some stats behind it. Thanks for subbing, hope you stick around!

[@WuRay-g6l]

Ravenfield isn't dying thanks to dedicated and talented people like you

[@nolberggg]

[@sum1youh841]

Ravenfield desperately needs a better way for modders to directly access bot behaviour. We need more mods like "Courteous AI", "Smoothment", "Let Actors Run Away Mutator", or even a working "bot skill tweaker" which makes the bots feel less like "bots" and not walk in straight lines single file and have more unique responses to certain situations. Ravenfield for me also has a huge problem with deadlocked fights usually only consisting of 3 or less fronts that never change throughout the game. If there was a mod that influences where and when bots can spawn, it might provide a more variable experience. Lastly, I'd really like to see bot collision. Bots dont have collision and it really makes you feel removed from the rest of your team, and sometimes they cluster into a phallanx of guns. With bot collision, the bots may find different routes rather than walking in the AI predetermined path, which once again changes up the variety of the battle environment.

[@mercenarydelta7351]

I'm guessing that the reason why the AI is like that is so that it doesn't become too hard for the game to run on potato PCs. Sure, it's very rudimentary and simplistic but it also doesn't make a low-end PC explode with hundreds of calculations made with a high number of bots. But it would be nice to have some access to the bot code. Funnily enough, there are a few mods on the workshop that randomizes bot spawning, allowing them to spawn at basically any point. However, it spawns both allies and enemies, which could quickly turn into chaos. Bot collision does sound like a nice addition, but I don't think that will be implemented until a more solid AI behaviour is in place.

[@nolberggg]

I would agree, though I'm not a game developer so I have no idea how difficult that would be to implement. It feels like the next natural step for what can be controlled in Ravenfield, especially after the trigger system and missions is fleshed out

[@mercenarydelta7351]

@@nolberggg I've dabbled in a bit of game making before. One way to improve the AI would be to make it have procedurally generated paths (paths that they make as they go) compared to the navmash path (a navmash is basically the area where bots can go. It's only generated once). It could even implement the wandering behavior that Minecraft NPCs have, where they target a set of coordinates on the map that the bot can see and have them go over to it, where it will either generate a new wandering point to go to or beeline for the enemy that they see. However, implementation is gonna be hard. Given the fact that procedurally generated paths require multiple calculations per bot, let alone all 60 of them, it's gonna make the game much heavier to run. Especially when used with mods that impact performance.

[@migueeeelet]

@@mercenarydelta7351 Yeah, this is very likely why bots don't have collision. I had edited a Garry's Mod mod that added bots and made their navmesh pathing add a random cost (positive or negative) to individual nodes, in order to randomize them a bit, but it's still subject to the navmesh. That was a much more restricted engine though, perhaps in Unity you can have the soldiers NOT take the shortest route through each navmesh area, but go through different spots in it.

[@nolberggg]

@@mercenarydelta7351 Thanks for the insight! I'm curious the hit to performance with this type of ai. Maybe procedural generation could be togglable for when playing with a smaller bot count so that you could enjoy both better AI and stable performance?

[@Csp499]

Another factor to development that we tend to forget about is technical debt. As the game's been expanding, we've been expecting things from it that Steel clearly didn't account for when he made Funny Blue and Red Block Man Shooty Game. To put it another way, as more people and business move into the once small and remote "Ravenfield City", the government has to juggle building new infrastructure to accommodate growth, while also replacing old lead pipes and filling potholes that the locals could just ignore back in the day.

[@migueeeelet]

You're damn right! A good example of this is H3VR - if you check the recent devlog videos, half of them are Anton Hand dealing with either technical debt, or having to retrofit a new addition into the old content. These games get bigger than we think

[@nolberggg]

This is a great point. I'm curious how much of Steel's time is preoccupied by this side of development, or how much of a limiting factor the old infrastructure is on the new.

[@Mystic-yt2lk]

raven field is like the ship of Theseus- even when we change everything, it is still raven field

[@gigachadgaming1551]

The entire point of the ship of theseus story is that it’s unclear whether or not it’s still the ship of Theseus 💀

[@Mystic-yt2lk]

@@gigachadgaming1551 well the ship still sails - so I'm happy

[@UNcappedRAVEN]

You are an absolute legend for this!

[@epicdude3659]

this video jsut reminds me that i started playing before EA9 or 10, whichever one had the parachutes, because i remember just jumping out of aircraft and landing on the ground ragdolled with no impact to my health at all, because the parachute update also added fall damage

[@maximfyodorovich4489]

One thing annoying with steam workshop, once an item goes down it also deletes from your pc

[@nolberggg]

Yeah this brutal, especially since there is no warning or proof of the mods existence afterwards

[@svijj_]

For a one-man team, I'd say the game is doing quite well. However, I did hear some players voicing their dissatisfaction, saying that Steel focused on "making characters with anime faces" for the scripted mission rather than AI improvements. Indeed, I too would like to see some improvement on that front, but from what I know coding bots in Unity is one hell of a spaghetti code, so it's not an easy task. Good video, as always, and an informed one as well! Funnily enough when such a topic is brought up in any gaming community, only a few dare to actually do their math and statistics

[@nolberggg]

The faces were an… interesting choice, but in the grand scheme of things I don’t mind. As for ai though, I agree that it needs improvement, but I’m sure that’s a lot harder to actually implement! I’m glad you enjoyed the video!

[@TryalArrow]

In my opinion (typed this out to further emphasize it), the only missing 'nice' factor is a good bot AI. Steelraven settles that and everyone will be happy

[@nolberggg]

I agree, AI has always been a bit of a struggle over the years, though there has been some good improvement. From what I hear its a pretty tough issue with no clear solution

[@Gangneung17]

ur my favorite ravenfield youtuber keep up the great work! first one to like too

[@nolberggg]

I'm honored! impressed you got here so early too!

[@muscalay7516]

Meh it’s really hard to play it right now. There’s no decent gun mods without having to download a crap load of content or deal with totally different animation styles. And the BOMBERS HAVENT WORKED IN LIKE A YEAR. they don’t bomb ground troops. I just want some consistency

[@SphericalitMapping]

I had the Ravenfield 2016 beta versions.

[@nolberggg]

oh wow, old school... its crazy looking back at where the game used to be, especially with the boxmen

[@Gangneung17]

to answer to who the goat ravenfield modder is probally Sofa

[@sontung4552]

Hoidersan and sudelo nams?

[@dangkhoanguyen4386]

​@@sontung4552 Hoider has left the community only sudo still active

[@enzotoronto371]

the best upcoming ravenfield youtuber! keep going man, i set aside parts of my day just to watch one of ur new videos ;D

[@nolberggg]

I’m honored, glad you like my videos!

[@SOPPI_srn]

What the community needs is a proper modding guide. Especially for the new trigger system in EA28. There's just not enough players being transformed into modders, and existing modders cannot access new features like trigger system that easily. From my experience, only a few modders that has scripting knowledge or a huge amount of spare time can get trigger system to work since Steelraven hasn't made any tutorial on triggers and has never provided an example map that modders can use to study how to set up trigger system in the RFTools toolpack. Considering it has been 9 months since EA28 has released, only 12 maps with trigger system just shows how hard it is for modders to use the new trigger system without any user manual.

[@nolberggg]

Personally I would love a proper modding guide. I've tried to get into modding this game, but unfortunately I've found it very difficult to learn without any coding or dev background (though I do wonder how much of that is my own incompetence). Also wow, I wasn't aware of the struggle with the trigger system. Triggers seems like such a great opportunity for map makers, so its sad to see that its not widely available yet. On a side note: your mods are phenomenal! I've been told modding vehicles in this game is hellish compared to maps or weapons, so thank you for your additions to the workshop!

[@SOPPI_srn]

​@@nolberggg Thanks, modding vehicles actually aren't that hard. (I think making animation for weapons and making mutators is the most difficult since they require a highly skilled modder to be made) Btw, Modding really doesn't require any coding knowledge. I think the hardest part is to know what each parameter provided does, cause sometimes they have names that don't tell a lot of information about what they do, and sometimes there are issues that are fairly hard to find the cause for if you have not suffered from it beforehand.

[@SOPPI_srn]

@@nolberggg Also it would be great if I am allowed to translate this and post it on a Chinese website, this kind of content is pretty rare in CN ravenfield community.

[@nolberggg]

@@SOPPI_srn yeah I’d be open to it! My only concern would be diluting my views, but I don’t get much from that demographic anyways. I’d appreciate it as well if could credit my channel, if possible. Can I message you on disc to talk more about this?

[@SOPPI_srn]

@@nolberggg Yea sure. It seems that I can't send the link to my discord server in the comment. I'll leave it in my youtube homepage

[@ryanmaad853]

I agree that things aren’t necessarily bad and Steel deserves his breaks, but also I am surprised he hasn’t brought on someone else to help develop alongside him. It would definitely flatten out the spikes a lot if he had someone who could frequently push out quality of life improvements for him while he worked on the big ticket updates

[@nolberggg]

I'm surprised as well. While he has occasionally had help with smaller tasks like character models, art, RavenScript, and the in-game map editor, there hasn't been substantial assistance with the core game development. It seems there could be a lot of routine work that doesn’t necessarily need creative input, which might help smooth out the development process. Nevertheless, I respect him for maintaining his commitment to the game and his vision

[@ahmadbani1452]

Need more updates honestly. I understand raven is the sole dev and he's busy with the single player, but there's not really any updates and news om the project

[@migueeeelet]

Some sort of news similar to Anton Hand's (H3VR developer) would be neat. The year of radio silence on U27 was pretty annoying

[@migueeeelet]

Covering the workshop separately is a good idea; something that is still unclear to me to this day is whether a mod from 2022, 2020 or even 2018 still works, or if it's obsolete. I can imagine people seeing these old mods and going "wow, no updates, workshop is dead, game is dead", when in reality it's just that those mods don't need updating (which is a good thing - the game is robust and mods don't break easily). It'd be great if you could explain that part

[@nolberggg]

That's a good suggestion! I'll do my best to provide that information. While most modders have been quick to update their mods, there are still many outdated mods on the workshop that no longer function due to game updates. I can try to create a timeline showing when these compatibility breaks occurred and which updates caused them

[@andywu4177]

great video as always

[@nolberggg]

Thanks!

[@claudiophilips9313]

Man i love this game here since before steam it was basecly my childhood

[@nolberggg]

itch.io days... who knew ravenfield would have evolved so much since then

[@Gangneung17]

finally yay!!!!!

[@justaperson3204]

It’s A good game when you like to look at your Steam library I don’t know what to play like you played for a couple hours and then you think like I’ll try that game instead

[@rez_tez3733]

What mods are you using to get your weapons to move like that?

[@nolberggg]

It’s a combination of insurgency style sway mod and bodycam mod. I have bodycam set to borderless and fairy low sensitivity

[@sirsir8163]

One can dream of multiplayer

[@Linksdrift]

Great video once again, may I ask which maps you‘re playing on?

[@nolberggg]

hey! sorry meant to get back to you sooner: Skirmish supremacy map 3: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2940591420 Islet: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2885997795 Customs: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2870881058

[@Linksdrift]

@@nolberggg thank you! Great to see you actually interacting with xour community! Hope for you to continue with this channel, already saw half a dozen videos of yours and they are amazingly well done! 👍

[@TheDoc-010]

i wish it was free or something' but it's good Ravenfield is like the og of youtube

[@Helix142]

see my problem with ravenfield is well alot of things tbh i made a whole thread on steam called ravenfield improvements and well i hope a alot of the stuff i said does get added but man the silence kills me. and the other problem is will we be waiting all this time for what could be a small update if so thats not great in of itself so im hoping all this time is done working on a major update.

[@nolberggg]

I totally agree. I'm okay with slow updates, but I think some transparency on when breaks happen or a road map would be neat. The beta branch hasn't seen an update since 5/20, so hopefully we see progress soon

[@Helix142]

@@nolberggg at this point im just hoping its a large update it would so very much kill my vibe if this next update turns out to be something small given we waited so long. like i can play ravenfield made abunch of collections [cause you cant just upload configs via ingame another feature that should be there but isnt] and had fun made a single really large map [another problem why cant i change my workshop mods thumbnail FROM the workshop itself] maps name is dry nexus btw if you wanna check it out. i used my half life collection [its public if you want to also check it out as well] for the map

[@christsoug8533]

What is the map called?

[@christsoug8533]

Please show us the mods you are using. I haven’t had any new mods since 2022💀

[@nolberggg]

Oh wow thats quite the hiatus, welcome back! Also I saw you asked for the map which I've bundled into this comment Some of the mutators I believe: AI medics, body cam mod, insurgency style sway, LeMieux's gore 2, first person ragdoll, Lemiux's suppression mod, no hit and kill sounds Maps: Skirmish supremacy map 3: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2940591420 Islet: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2885997795 Customs: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2870881058 Weapons are from Spec Ops Pack: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2204061980

[@christsoug8533]

@@nolbergggthank you very much!

[@NoivesMan]

Subscriber 756. Vi va la Raven!

[@nolberggg]

Welcome! 🫡

[@Viper45-g2f]

without the workshop this game would never be, the base game as it is isnt good and the mods are much better, with the longer updates people would get bored fast

[@nolberggg]

This is pretty much the start of the script for the next video lol. The importance of the workshop to this game cannot be understated

[@Viper45-g2f]

@@nolberggg yeah

[@steamnamebbderinvade__]

So Raven City is Texas!

[@CharaGonzalez-lt7yw]

Steel doesn't really need to add much stuff. He's working on giving power to the modders which will allow for much greater content to be easily accesible by all. If you want an example play Sofa's Penumbra or Secret Convoy

[@nolberggg]

These are my thoughts as well. The more Steelraven enables modders, the better

[@manojkumarbhambhu7955]

What maps did you use

[@nolberggg]

Should be these: Skirmish supremacy map 3: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2940591420 Islet: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2885997795 Customs: steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2870881058

[@binman9236]

what mods are you using in the footage?

[@nolberggg]

Some of the key ones I use are AI medics, body cam mod, insurgency style sway, LeMieux's gore 2, first person ragdoll, no hit and kill sounds. Those are the main ones that come to mind. If there was anything specific, let me know and I can find it!

[@binman9236]

@@nolberggg cheers!

[@ninochaosdrache3189]

For me, the game just felt too lifless when I played it. Stupid AI, no music, no battel cries, it just feels bland and soulless to play.

[@nolberggg]

That's completely understandable. The game is definitely rough around the edges. I've played this game on an off for a while now, so its unique "charm" has grown on me!

[@bakelite1488]

this is just massive cope "ravenfield is like a city" WTF?!?!?! hahaha just accept the game is stale and only has a couple of hours of enjoyable playtime

[@nolberggg]

To each their own! It's a niche game thats understandably not for everyone