Separate magazines & bullets

[Barrett]

This idea would work for an OPF/ArmA type game (simulation), but not really for Cod/CS style of game.

 

[GreyViper]

It might sound interesting, but its not. If you go to fight then you usually have full mags and so do opponents. Im not sure about you, but would it be really interesting reloading RPK that way or C-mags?

 

[Tagaziel]

Man's got THE point. In combat you don't reload bullet-by-bullet. Unless it's a WWI/WWII simulation.

 

[SuAside]

you could easily say that during combat, you're limited to a certain amount of magazines. if you want to do tactical reloads (means you reload before the mag is empty), you're stuck with half a mag if you shoot up enough ammo to get back to that original one.

BUT if you get out of combat and a certain amount of time passes (doesn't have to be much) the game assumes you transfered rounds between magazines to have full ones.

you would obviously not have to actually 'manually' reload a freaking Beta-C mag.

 

[requiem_for_a_starfury]

Man's got THE point. In combat you don't reload bullet-by-bullet. Unless it's a WWI/WWII simulation.

Was anyone actually suggesting having to reload bullet by bullet? The actual reloading of magazines from boxed ammo, or scavenged half empty magazines etc could easily be handled with a drag and drop merge function as in JA2, or with games with out inventories, an option (outside of combat?) to refill magazines from any ammo cases you might find or by right clicking on a dropped weapon and having the options, take weapon, take magazine, and take ammo. The latter would automatically fill up any magazines that you might have.

Though in the middle of combat, being stuck behind cover watching your avatar's hands frantically load a magazine from a crate of ammunition while the enemy was relentlessly advancing would add an adrenaline rush of it's own. As long as you've got the option to interrupt the loading at any point and slam that magazine home (full or not) or draw your back up weapon. Hell it might even make pistols useful.

It would certainly add to the survival aspects of a game like Stalker. Having magazines that needed to be filled from boxed ammo would be better than the current box ammo only, which automatically merges when loaded but splits apart into the original amounts when dropped, transferred or sold. It would add to the decision making when finding a new weapon, you find a great rifle, several boxes of ammo for it, but only have two magazines do you take it along/swap your current weapon for it in the hopes of finding/buying more magazines later or stick with the weapon you have, for which you have plenty of magazines.

Add into the equation auto and manual reloading (of weapons), most games will auto reload if you carry on attacking when your gun is empty, if you had it so auto reloads were quicker because you just drop the empty magazine and replace it with a full one, and manual reloads having your avatar eject the depleted magazine and place it in your pack/ammo pouch before inserting a full one. That would make things more interesting even if you were using the same ammo as the enemy but your weapon used incompatible magazines, like say you had a Beta-C mag while they were using rifles with ordinary 30 round magazines.

It could also be interesting for ammo management in games without an inventory, where instead of being able to carry so many rounds for each weapon you'd have a limited space that could carry so many assault rifle magazines etc and the more of one type you have reduces the number of any other type you could carry. Crysis got it half right with remembering that there was a round in the chamber when switching magazines, but it was annoying that you could carry nearly 1000 combined assault rifle and smg rounds, while equipped with a shotgun and sniper rifle. But if you didn't have all that other ammo you were still limited to only 40 spare shotgun shells.

 

[Silencer]

I swear I've played a game where you had separate magazines before, but I can't think of it. It was like a Rainbow Six/Ghost Recon kind of game. Anyone else?

Rainbow Six HAD separate clips, which might have led one to having a bunch of 2-3-bullet mags at the end of the day.

 

[Dracon M'Alkir]

Man's got THE point. In combat you don't reload bullet-by-bullet. Unless it's a WWI/WWII simulation.

If you're a one-man killing machine like in Far Cry, out in the middle of fucking nowhere alone, then yes. You will find yourself sitting there reloading round by round.

 

[Nonagon]

Though in the middle of combat, being stuck behind cover watching your avatar's hands frantically load a magazine from a crate of ammunition while the enemy was relentlessly advancing would add an adrenaline rush of it's own. As long as you've got the option to interrupt the loading at any point and slam that magazine home (full or not) or draw your back up weapon. Hell it might even make pistols useful.

This guy has the right idea!

In a hypothetical game with said feature I would have it go like this:
If it is an FPS, like Stalker for example, every time an enemy AI is actively trying to kill you, it is considered "Combat mode". During combat mode you are left with the number of magazines and the number of bullets in said magazines until combat is over (SuAside's idea works, clips could refill over time) or until you refill another clip mid-combat.

As for C-mags, I guess someone should be allowed to ATTEMPT to refill them mid battle, but of course the better idea would be to simply switch to another weapon, like a pistol or a knife, etc.

Turn based would be pretty easily done, use your imagination.