'Player down' indicator mod

Sweed · Post by **Sweed** » Sat Sep 30, 2006 3:52 am

Anyone else try to mod this little file? I play with the Bruins so when we wear black or play against teams in black or dark blue it's impossible to see the black ring around the player indicating he is down on the ice.

I went in with ps-pro and changed the black outer circle to a ligth shade of blue. It works well with the black uniforms, I can finally see players go down to block a shot, get knocked to the ice, or the goalie cover the puck or go down for a save.
Trouble is it doesn't really show up for the white uniforms even though they use the same player down file. When a white uni player goes down you can see a change in the icon but a blue ring does not appear. Kind of hard to describe but he almost diappears since the outer ring seems to show as white but yet you still see it and know where he is (like I said hard to describe without seeing it). Still better than the black circle since I can tell if a player from either team is down.

I did try some other colors, while trying to avoid normal jersey colors that might conflict, without much success. The blue I found seems to show and work the best. So has anyone esle tried this? Have you come up with a color that really stands out?

One example of how this has improved the game for me..

In my last game Boston at St. Louis Chara took a shot from the blueline and three Blues plus the goalie went down to the ice to try to block the shot. Looked very cool and I guarentee I would have never seen it without the new file.

Post by **archibalduk** » Sat Sep 30, 2006 10:34 am

Could you show us a screenshot at all? Maybe we could then suggest a better colour.

Post by **Minstrel** » Sat Sep 30, 2006 10:48 pm

I've did something similar with the 'puck glow' in testing since my Hawks are always red and so is the 'glow' and changed it to a light grey.

I will look into the 'player down' matter when I get a chance. I wonder if the view problem could be improved by making the 'down' player to be a diamond instead of a circle? I'd have to test it to know for sure.

Sweed · Post by **Sweed** » Sat Sep 30, 2006 11:25 pm

Minstrel wrote:I've did something similar with the 'puck glow' in testing since my Hawks are always red and so is the 'glow' and changed it to a light grey.

I will look into the 'player down' matter when I get a chance. I wonder if the view problem could be improved by making the 'down' player to be a diamond instead of a circle? I'd have to test it to know for sure.

Yes, that's a good idea changing the shape if it would work.

archibalduk wrote:Could you show us a screenshot at all? Maybe we could then suggest a better colour.

I tried to grab a screenshot but either my timing is bad or when you hit pause the man down effect goes away. Anyway while not perfect it at least works better than the black for me.

Post by **B. Stinson** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 9:59 pm

Normally I would ignore something like this, but about 99% of the teams in the game have a black icon(I wish it was more team specific)... so what I did was make the 'player down' icon a block... so whenever a guy goas down, his icon goes from a circle to a block. It's far from a good solution, but I didn't feel like experimenting to find an 'inside glow' color that would work with all thousand or so teams in the game.

My orginal idea was to move the glow from the inside of the icon to the outside so it wouldn't be where the color is... but to do that I would have to make the image bigger - and as I've found out with other stuff, the game probably wouldn't load it then.

Oh well, I think my blocks will do for now.

Post by **inSTAALed** » Sun Oct 08, 2006 11:59 pm

I found something that works for any color but black.

I put a black X through the middle and it works well with most teams... when they aren't black.

Heres how it looks in game: http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/9033/playerdowniy3.jpg

Post by **Minstrel** » Mon Oct 09, 2006 12:33 am

I haven't had time to even open Photoshop in the last few weeks with the drafts but a combo appraoch might work here eh?

A block with a black x and a white cross; that should cover for even when teams use black correct?

Post by **inSTAALed** » Mon Oct 09, 2006 1:30 am

Minstrel wrote:I haven't had time to even open Photoshop in the last few weeks with the drafts but a combo appraoch might work here eh?

A block with a black x and a white cross; that should cover for even when teams use black correct?

Thats gotta be it.

I can't test it out tonight unfortunantly, but maybe with the draft winding down you can give it a shot?

Post by **Minstrel** » Fri Oct 20, 2006 5:46 am

Well, it doesn't seem the game will recognize anything but the black outline and 'red' center (which is the default recolored by the game for each team shade/indicator) so I've instead put together a little experiment here that I'd like some people to check out/test and let me know what they think. It turns the player indicator into more of a triangle and then the 'down' image is an upside down triangle. So it's an up arrow when a player is standing up and a down facing arrow when down.

http://ehmtheblueline.com/TestImages/player.zip

Try it out for a few games and let me know what you think, if people like it I'll add it as a formal download.

Post by **inSTAALed** » Fri Oct 20, 2006 11:24 am

Works pretty good I'll say.

Post by **Minstrel** » Sat Oct 21, 2006 7:43 pm

I'd dig it if anyone else could give this a test run and let me know what you think

Sweed · Post by **Sweed** » Sun Nov 19, 2006 2:54 pm

Minstrel wrote:I'd dig it if anyone else could give this a test run and let me know what you think

Sorry took me a while to get back to this. Took a couple of weeks off waiting for the patch and meant to try this out when I started playing again. Every time I got to the ice it would hit me that I hadn't switched in your player down mod.

Well I finally remembered to do it before playing today and I really like the mod. Very cool when I had a guy knocked into the boards and saw him go down even though my Bruins were in their "blacks". Really helps me to see and understand what is going on in the game. Nice work.

Post by **Minstrel** » Sun Nov 19, 2006 5:03 pm

Yeah, we get similar issues with the Challenge playing Columbus as they are a dark blue that would also be real hard to see if not for this change.

I've also noticed it makes those "pulled down from behind to prevent a breakaway" penalties much more noticable. Instead of the players just stopping and one going to the box and being like "hmm.. penalty I guess?" I'm instead like "Oh yeah you better have pulled him down because he was GONE!!!"

Glad you found it helpful

I should add this officially today

Post by **Minstrel** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 2:35 pm

Added officially to the files listing:

http://www.ehmtheblueline.com/forums/dl ... ile_id=259

Post by **inSTAALed** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:44 pm

Hopefully some more people will check it out, it's really helpful once you get used to the triangles in place of circles.

Post by **Minstrel** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:47 pm

Is it just me or does it seem to make it a bit easier/more realistic looking with the sticks? It seems without the circles covering up the sticks you can see people shifting their sticks etc. more clearly but I may just be making that up

Post by **inSTAALed** » Mon Nov 20, 2006 8:54 pm

Minstrel wrote:Is it just me or does it seem to make it a bit easier/more realistic looking with the sticks? It seems without the circles covering up the sticks you can see people shifting their sticks etc. more clearly but I may just be making that up

I haven't really looked but I'll check next time I go and play again.