2001 replies to this topic

[Dustein]

My feedback:

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 03:38 PM, said:

Why add 3rd person?

• Reduces friction for non-MechWarrior players, non-core players, and expands the MWO market to a broader audience. It helps to make the game more accessible and less intimidating.
  
• Offers up a different style of gameplay and tactics.

Opening up the franchise to Non-MW and Non-Core players they way MeachAssault did, did NOT garner more money, in fact it lost so much money that Microsoft SOLD THE RIGHTS.


MekTek and Living Legend Embraced core players and they made money with a FREE model (not Free to play but FREE).

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

Our target demographic has always been (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes Call of Duty into that bucket.

The CoD demographic is 12-25 and predominantly do use more 3PV and buy AAA single titles in an impulse buy then get bored and move onto new product sales-model.

I recommend abandoning your thinking as the EA and Microsoft model you are emulating has proved does not work. I would also recommend going back and watching your own interviews given in 2009 / 2010 to everyone and anyone who would listen to you on what style of game you were going to design and either
A follow that model.. or
B delete all those old Dev Blog 0 etc and "This will be a Mech Sim game" and "we play TT and MW2 ourselves and loved it" posts and replace them with what you are really thinking.

Being honest will get you money from the people you want to play this game. Currently it feels you have gotten money from Demographic BT to make a game for Demographic CoD.

Regards: a 30yo CoD player who has spend more money on BT / Macross produces that all of the CoD titles combined, including DLC.

Edited by Dustein, 25 March 2013 - 12:18 AM.

[Gimmick]

Well, if you have to do it ....


Let´s just hope it pays out.

[grayson marik]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

Our target demographic has always been (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes anything from Call of Duty to Flight Sims into that bucket.

Actually 3rd will further turn this into the exact average shooter your targeted audience does not want, as you defined it.
Along with consumeables, that are basicly nothing more than power ups, only you dont have to collect them on the battlefield, it is even more becoming more of the average shooter.

But yes, I want to see my mech from the outside too! After the match for replay and switching around in this rteplay from mech to mech to analyze what the opponent team did and how the fight went for everyone... THAT would be an awesome use of 3rd person view.

The plans you are following right now will cause so many issues, you will not even need ragequitting hardcoreplayers to kill your product.
You will do it perfectly on your own.

• 2nd ELO ranking tree for every pilot in 1st and 3rd?
  
• tournaments allowing both modes of play? how so if some of the players only want to play one view?
  
• multiple instances of CW Map or just matchmaking and let the data flow to be represented on just one CW map instance?
  
• network calculations of LOS (pilot view) and LOS (weapon view) 2 times for every viewmode and every mech on the field ?
  
• same network calculations in a mixed 1st/3rd match? Hey, I really want to see how you will get this under one hat!
  
• also networking: state rewind? How to do it, as it is heavily connected to what the player sees on the screen. Want to calculate it twice? And which calculation will the server take as correct when one pilot uses 3rd and the other 1st?
  
• collision control and graphical glitches that appear in one mode and if fixed there, show up on the other mode in different form...?
  
• usage of 3rd in tunnels and caves?
  
• ranking statistics and pilot statistics for every pilot/mech 2 times one per view?
  
• if multiple instances of CW ( one 3rd one 1st one mixed) need of 1 account for each?
  
• mutliple control option instances to have some control settings ( like sensitivity ) seperatly saved for each view?
  
• in mixed games: dead 3rd teammates switching to a 1st playing comrade in their 3rd view guiding him through observation mode?
  
• 1st players forced into mixed matches if no match available and vica versa?
  
• your loss of income through 3rd disables the use of some modules and enhancements that currently cause people to spend MC? ( example: who needs 360 degree target retention with 3rd? or an arty strike if the opponents field of vision is so broad, he will see the incoming rounds in time to avoid them, same with airstrikes?)
  
• and so on and so forth!

Edited by grayson marik, 25 March 2013 - 03:40 AM.

[Klaus]

I just don't understand what they're trying to do here. Bring more players in who wouldn't normally play so they drop 20 bucks buying an Atlas only to quit less than a month later?

They're angering long-term, committed players in favor of a quick cash grab.

Also, the idea of a separate queue is nothing but a joke. The game as it stands can't even properly make matches because of the small player base and broken elo system. Sure, you're bringing in more players who are going to PLAY IN SEPARATE QUEUES.

It's bad for the game. If they want to bring in more people, focus on content and promotional events, not changing the whole game for those who already love it.

[Alois Hammer]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

Our target demographic has always been (in very simple non-marketing terms): the male action gamer looking for a little bit more than your average shooter. You can lump in someone who likes anything from Call of Duty to Flight Sims into that bucket.

So your "target market" is looking for "a little bit more," and somehow that has led you to insist on putting significant effort into making sure that instead of more, they get the same Least Common Denominator mediocrity?

Klaus, on 25 March 2013 - 04:12 AM, said:

I just don't understand what they're trying to do here. Bring more players in who wouldn't normally play so they drop 20 bucks buying an Atlas only to quit less than a month later?

Well sadly, if BigPoint games is any indicator, the above is actually a very workable business model. It's crap at building loyalty, useless at keeping any sort of core fanbase happy, but in a micro-transaction F2P model it's great at keeping the bucks coming in...provided you're up to being about the money to the exclusion of all else, bar none.

Thanks to the rise of modern casual gamers who will literally see an ad, create an account, whip out the plastic for a headstart, then log in and see what the game's about, milking the folks who'll play for 3 weeks then move to their next "game of the month" is good for the bank balance.

Edited by Alois Hammer, 25 March 2013 - 05:28 AM.

[Sears]

I think 3rd Person should be a last resort kind of Mechanic.

First of all if people are having a bit of a hard time controlling their mech. Put in a tutorial to help them control the mech in first person. Takes a millisecond to look down and see the arrow to show which way the mech is facing in relation to it's legs.

Have the Picture in picture of your Mech in the corner that rotates so people can oggle their paint schemes and can visually see where their legs are in relation to their body. As well as this it would show you damaged body parts ect. Options to turn this off for players who don't want or need it.

This one is a bit of a biggy. But how difficult would it be to have the ability to watch replays? I assume the server would keep a record of mech movements and when weapons were fired and what damage was taken, any way to download this log and allow the engine to rebuild the match and allow players to free cam around the replay? Thus fulfilling the I want to watch my mech's pretty colours players. Plus you're giving options to the creatives out there who like to make videos, as well as competitors who like to have games cast.

[Elder Thorn]

Roadbeer, on 21 March 2013 - 04:15 PM, said:

Bryan, please answer this honestly.

I have seen 2 polls on this topic and they have been OVERWHELMINGLY against 3rd person. Why are you guys so stuck on this when clearly the players (by majority) don't want it?

because people who participate in polls are on the forums often and opinions of people who are on the forums often aren't as important as opinions of people who come to the forums once a month or so. The more you post here, the less they will value your feedback, easy as that.
Also, the goal with 3rd person is to draw in new players, those won't be participating in those polls either.

How it should be executed: first dismember it with a battleaxe and then let it bleed out.

How it should be implemented: not
But we want to implement it version:
well.. keep it out of CW and give me the option to drop against 1st person players only, than it'll be fine for me. If am am forced to play against 3rd person guys at any time, i will spam these forums with rage as long as i don't have anything better to do, which might happen very soon as MW:O without CW is allready boring me, i might find another game...

edit:
forgot to add:
Implement 3rd person or even free camera in a replay mode, that's where it belongs

Edited by Elder Thorn, 25 March 2013 - 06:20 AM.

[Hekalite]

I feel 3rd person view should be restricted to trial mechs. This would allow people to get a feel for the game and how their mechs work but it would force them to ditch the training wheels early before it becomes a crutch.

I'm not at all happy with the choice to include a mixed 1st person and 3rd person queue. ELO style matchmaking works best when the pool of players is saturated. This level of fragmentation shouldn't be even considered until server populations rise. I would suggest the following roleout to test the waters:

Stage 1: training grounds only.
Stage 2: 1st person queue or 3rd person queue only.

That will give you some data which will allow for a more informed decision regarding the desire for 3rd person. Right now the "if you build it they will come" hypothisis has only circumstantial data to support it. There are far too many other possible reasons which could account for a lack of player retention. With no exit poll (common in monthly sub games), you are relying on self reporting, which is just not good enough. You should consider a mixed mode queue only if supported by data.

I also considered suggesting an even more restrictive introduction of trial mechs only, but I figured that would induce a whole ton of forum bitching. But maybe that's exactly what you need to see how many people get hooked but won't continue if they are forced to switch.

[Alois Hammer]

Fastidious, on 24 March 2013 - 01:36 PM, said:

Only skimmed the thread, but respect for the devs for engaging in some discussion.

I'll give them that when there's any real discussion. What we've got so far is a monologue they keep repeating over and over and over regardless of anything we say. The closest thing to acknowledgement that we're given here goes "Yes, but...[repeat that we're getting third person like it or not]."

[Phaesphoros]

(Not having read any of the previous 45 pages of posts.... though I have pity for those who have to read & evaluate this....)

From previous Mechwarrior titles, I don't think you'll get that much of an advantage using 3rd all the time (e.g. aiming). Therefore, I'd suggest:

• Introduce 3rd person as a test mode. Whether on testing grounds, or with frozen stats while having it enabled, don't care. Less QQ maybe if people can experience it before it goes live.
  
• Enable 3rd person on testing grounds / training grounds. It's good to show how torso twist and leg turning work complementary (wasn't there a MW4 tutorial that did this?). If you want it to be more immersive (i would appreciate that), call testing grounds "simulator mode"; IIRC like in Starlancer. Reasoning: If it's only simulated, no problem to add a camera somewhere. Fights are not simulated, therefore no indestructible, invisible floating cameras that even work under ECM.
  
• Maybe let people use it only during cadet bonus time. This'll introduce 3rd person as noob mode and 1st person as TEH mode.
  
• Lock to either 1st or 3rd, w/o ability to change in-game. 3rd has quite some disadvantages. Maybe not the best solution to attract more players, though.

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 03:38 PM, said:

We would like to invite your constructive feedback on how you would like to see 3rd person executed

Now, I feel the urge to open a new account with pilot name "3rd person".... ;P

[EvilCow]

After thinking about it, my conclusion is that you cannot really implement 3PV to be balanced and not an advantage in itself. The simple fact that you can see areas not visible in 1PV makes any balance attempt destined to fail (over hills, sides, behind).

Now, since PGI stated that they will introduce it anyway and regardless the community opinion, a single question remains to be answered: will we be forced to use or accept 3PV during CW and tournaments or 1PV will be the standard?

Since I think that splitting even CW and tournaments is not realistic then the only suggestion I can do is to make pre-launch lobbies available before 3PV and with a no-3pv setting available, this way the 1st person view ghetto will be at least able to organize something by themselves.

[Ozric]

I had other thought, this time about a way to split up the vision modes without splitting the community. And it's something we can all agree needs to be in the game somehow anyway. In this example, I am assuming that CW remains 1PV only.


Solaris VII

Arena type matches/ladders in the classic Solaris style. 3PV would be fully available, but 1PV would not be restricted. The increased field of vision of 3PV would be of great benefit in a Solaris furball, and it would look great on youtube/twitch because of all the close range explosions.

With this game mode being available to anyone and not connected to CW in any way, the fact that it is 3PV would not detract from the core gameplay experience. It is also a legitimate gamemode in its own right, not just a throwaway ladder, meaning that most players would take part in both CW (1PV) and Solaris (3PV). This is important because if we get a nasty 1PV/3PV split in the community it would be a nightmare for everybody and we might have to wait another 10 years for somebody to try to make another mechwarrior game. If each vision mode has its proper place, maybe we can avoid the split all together.


PS: Another small point is that I don't think there's much point in them releasing a 'gimped' 3PV, as it would not achieve what they say they want to achieve with it. When it drops is has to be really, really good.

[Krell Darkmoon]

EvilCow, on 25 March 2013 - 07:04 AM, said:

Since I think that splitting even CW and tournaments is not realistic then the only suggestion I can do is to make pre-launch lobbies available before 3PV and with a no-3pv setting available, this way the 1st person view ghetto will be at least able to organize something by themselves.

Didn't you hear, along with dividing the Player base on View, we're also going to be divided by Region.

So we'll get a 9-12 different groups going.

North America 1st Person only
North America 3rd Person only
North America 1st n 3rd
Europe 1st Person only
Europe 3rd Person only
Europe 1st n 3rd
Asia/Aussie 1st only
Asia/Aussie 3rd only
Asia/Aussie 1st n 3rd

The big question is why are they asking for FeedBack if they only plan on ignoring everything said?

[Kraven Kor]

Bryan Ekman, on 21 March 2013 - 03:38 PM, said:

One poster mentioned something that I thought was more than fair. List some of the ideas we've been toying with in order for it to work. These are just SOME of the ideas we've been discussing:

• Camera is locked horizontally to the torso. This is not a peek around corners mode.
  
• Camera is locked vertically to the torso, you can only look up and down as far as your torso can.
  
• When approaching cover (to rocks/building etc), the camera pulls IN so FoV is greatly reduced when standing close to something.
  
• 3rd Person is not a free-cam.
  
• HUD will be significantly reduced if not completely removed.
  
• LOS targetting is NOT affected by 3rd person. If you cannot target it from 1st person, you cannot target it in 3rd.
  
• ONLY the targeted enemy (Press R) can be identified in 3rd person... all other HUD indicators are turned off.

Again, these are a few of the ideas we're working on. Please keep that in mind when posting.

But all of that doesn't clarify: Will they see mechs behind the hill?

Or will performance take another hit due to the double and triple check on LOS to see if the mech should be rendered?

Even without a HUD, just visual confirmation from being able to "look over hills" and "see around corners" is a huge advantage, a huge problem, and the largest part of most of our concerns.

Either you have 3PV where the player gets info that 1PV would not provide, or you have double- and triple-checking of LOS for pilot and weapons, etc. as another poster mentioned.

It's just bad all around, I'm sorry.

[Phaesphoros]

Wanted to point out an idea I got while formulating my previous post:

Troll people by making 3rd person not work under ECM (noise). Reasoning: An invisible, indestructible, floating camera cannot work or transmit the video stream successfully under ECM.

Not a brilliant idea (doesn't help against snipers who look around corners using 3rd person), though.

[Ozric]

Phaesphoros, on 25 March 2013 - 06:55 AM, said:

(Not having read any of the previous 45 pages of posts.... though I have pity for those who have to read & evaluate this....)

Please do read the rest of thread. There are a lot of the same posts over and over, but also at least some ideas, and counter arguments for other ideas. Of all the issues to plague MWO the 3PV storm is the worst yet, and requires careful consideration. There are too many TLDR posts in this thread for its own good.

[Alois Hammer]

EvilCow, on 25 March 2013 - 07:04 AM, said:

Now, since PGI stated that they will introduce it anyway and regardless the community opinion, a single question remains to be answered: will we be forced to use or accept 3PV during CW and tournaments or 1PV will be the standard?

And that's the sticky wicket- they say that 1st person and 3rd person players will be kept separate, making it a non-issue. But nothing can change the fact that we're also dealing with the same "they" who said there'd be no Coolant Flush added, then added it.

So basically we're being asked to take them at their word when they've already demonstrated that their word changes more often than M a d o n n a 's costume during a concert.

"No really, this time we mean what we say, not like last time when we told you what we thought you wanted to hear then yelled 'You just got Punk'd!' and threw our word into the trashcan."

Edited by Alois Hammer, 25 March 2013 - 08:09 AM.

[Heeden]

Kraven Kor, on 25 March 2013 - 07:42 AM, said:

But all of that doesn't clarify: Will they see mechs behind the hill?

Or will performance take another hit due to the double and triple check on LOS to see if the mech should be rendered?

I don't see why performance should take a hit there. It already checks line-of-sight to see if you can target the mech, that same check can be used for rendering (if they go with a "no peaking" policy).

To continue my earlier post here, which managed to stay on-topic rather than trolling/being trolled/whatever the hell this thread has degenerated in to; I'd have the Arcade/Simulator mode restricting mech visibility so they are only rendered when a LoS check is passed, but the Holo Display could/should allow any mech the camera can see to be visible. That would differentiate 3rd-person-only mode from 1st-and-3rd in an interesting way.

Quote

Even without a HUD, just visual confirmation from being able to "look over hills" and "see around corners" is a huge advantage, a huge problem, and the largest part of most of our concerns.

An advantage yes, but it's only a problem if only one side has that advantage and/or the other side is unaware. Two consenting mech warriors should be able to play with each other however they like and adding options for different ways to play can make for a nice change from the main game mode.

Edited to fix link.

Edited by Heeden, 25 March 2013 - 08:32 AM.

[Mystere]

Assuming PGI can establish some kind of visual/sensor parity between 1PV and 3PV, then there should be no need for different queues. As such ...

grayson marik, on 25 March 2013 - 03:36 AM, said:

• 2nd ELO ranking tree for every pilot in 1st and 3rd?
  
• tournaments allowing both modes of play? how so if some of the players only want to play one view?
  
• multiple instances of CW Map or just matchmaking and let the data flow to be represented on just one CW map instance?
  
• ranking statistics and pilot statistics for every pilot/mech 2 times one per view?
  
• if multiple instances of CW ( one 3rd one 1st one mixed) need of 1 account for each?
  
• in mixed games: dead 3rd teammates switching to a 1st playing comrade in their 3rd view guiding him through observation mode?
  
• 1st players forced into mixed matches if no match available and vica versa?
  
• your loss of income through 3rd disables the use of some modules and enhancements that currently cause people to spend MC? ( example: who needs 360 degree target retention with 3rd? or an arty strike if the opponents field of vision is so broad, he will see the incoming rounds in time to avoid them, same with airstrikes?)

The above become irrelevant.

grayson marik, on 25 March 2013 - 03:36 AM, said:

• network calculations of LOS (pilot view) and LOS (weapon view) 2 times for every viewmode and every mech on the field ?
  
• same network calculations in a mixed 1st/3rd match? Hey, I really want to see how you will get this under one hat!
  
• also networking: state rewind? How to do it, as it is heavily connected to what the player sees on the screen. Want to calculate it twice? And which calculation will the server take as correct when one pilot uses 3rd and the other 1st?

If network-level calculations are separated from rendering, then the former will need to be performed only once.

grayson marik, on 25 March 2013 - 03:36 AM, said:

• collision control and graphical glitches that appear in one mode and if fixed there, show up on the other mode in different form...?
  
• usage of 3rd in tunnels and caves?

Obviously, any bugs related to the above will have to be dealt with.

grayson marik, on 25 March 2013 - 03:36 AM, said:

• mutliple control option instances to have some control settings ( like sensitivity ) seperatly saved for each view?

Depending on how 3PV is implemented, there may be such a need for additional control settings.

[Mystere]

Heeden, on 25 March 2013 - 08:10 AM, said:

To continue my earlier post here, ...

Unfortunately, the link does not go to your earlier post.