We're holding on to CW as a last resort, but for the past few years it has seemed like a grind. Grinding is good, it's what makes players play, but the problem becomes when the player is aware of the grind.
have you ever wondered why people keep screaming "META CHEESE BUILDS"?
easy; the grind has been uncovered, the numbers have been calculated and "the best" builds have been created... all due to a lack of content.
this game used to hold so much promise, but as we see, it was nothing but.
the community still stands as people say in the forums "I'm leaving" and I don't blame them. Like turning off the radio because it only plays 2 songs. We have had, community map makers and modellers with skills and programs (I myself have 3DS MAX 2014 and an extensive lineup of programs costing THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS, just for community content for this game.) but a handful has moved on to other games with open arms and even a few have been picked up by companies like CLOUD IMPERIUM and GAIJIN ENTERTAINMENT for their abilities and drive under internships. PGI has seemed to shut out the community for some reason, a reason which only illicit "we'll think about it"s or "Maybe later"s.
The basis of Battletech is " Progressus, Set Sempris Status Quo" where no matter how much things change, they always stay the same.
This feels like SPACE WORLD WAR ONE, but for all the wrong reasons
Here's to coming home before Christmas... 2014 to 2017
Granted not a great reason to fight for. I would prefer for fun and a fair fight but since that rarely ever happens it is to grind c bills in hopes of some other little thing that makes the current mech a little bit better.
Repeat ad nauseam - not much of a long term goal really.
I don't think you meant to say this... rather, what I think you meant to say is that we're holding onto the dream of CW, one which has yet to be realized.
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but for the past few years it has seemed like a grind.
Considering Closed Beta didn't even start until March or April of 2012, I would not say that 18 months counts as a "few years". It might seem like years, but it, indeed, has not been. The announcement for the game was made on October 30th, 2011, which is two years and one-half month ago, which still does not count as a "few" years.
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all due to a lack of content.
this game used to hold so much promise, but as we see, it was nothing but.
That's just because you, and many others like you, keep saying the dream is dead. Just because you keep saying it does not mean it's true. Does PGI need to communicate "mo-betta"? Yes, they do; they're utterly horrible at communication. However, that's because they're busy building the game. Do you remember reading about the Public Test for DX 11 two weeks ago? At the Launch Party, Bryan Ekman said DX11 was the largest hurdle they were working to clear and, once that was done, UI 2.0 would not be far behind, followed by CW. Okay, so, that didn't work, it was supposed to be out by the end of October, beginning of November, and then we would see UI 2.0 before the end of the year. Remember that? Well, since it's only the middle of November, they likely ran into some snags they weren't counting on, so we need to be patient. I know, individuals are going to scream "I'm tired of being patient, give me game, NOW!?!?!" and then bang their clubs on the ground to establish dominance. However, I'm not a programmer, but I have built web sites and Excel workbooks -under no one's scrutiny or timeline- and even I know about the issues involved with getting a game like this out.
Is MWO grindy? Yes. Are you really SELFISH enough that you would fail to understand the difficulties with bringing such a beautiful and complete project to potential millions of ravenous fans? I hope not.
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the community still stands as people say in the forums "I'm leaving" and I don't blame them.
They'll be back.
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PGI has seemed to shut out the community for some reason, a reason which only illicit "we'll think about it"s or "Maybe later"s.
I can't argue this, you're right about it, and I have said so, many times. PGI is terrible about talking to the community, and that's problematic. For a full three weeks after the September Command Chair, concerning preliminary plans for how the Merc Corps Interface was going to work, there was good will and quietus on the forums... not anymore.
Slow down, everyone; breathe, enjoy what you have. If you don't enjoy what you have, go away for a little while, and then return. I, for one, hope that my hope will not be bashed in and, thus far, even though I've been rowdy in a couple of places, it has not been, overall.
Do you remember reading about the Public Test for DX 11 two weeks ago? At the Launch Party, Bryan Ekman said DX11 was the largest hurdle they were working to clear and, once that was done, UI 2.0 would not be far behind, followed by CW. Okay, so, that didn't work, it was supposed to be out by the end of October, beginning of November, and then we would see UI 2.0 before the end of the year. Remember that? Well, since it's only the middle of November, they likely ran into some snags they weren't counting on, so we need to be patient. I know, individuals are going to scream "I'm tired of being patient, give me game, NOW!?!?!" and then bang their clubs on the ground to establish dominance. However, I'm not a programmer, but I have built web sites and Excel workbooks -under no one's scrutiny or timeline- and even I know about the issues involved with getting a game like this out.
There are, or were, people that played in Word of Lowtax that held jobs developing user interfaces for software and/or game development, under timelines and scrutiny, and they made it clear that what PGI has shown should have taken around 6-7 months development time to complete, and that's with ample roll outs and updates for users to test.
Keep in mind we've been getting promises of changes to the user interface since the beginning of closed beta (March or April of last year as you said).
I understand what you're saying and, I agree, this is taking a LONG time to do. I have plenty more what-if's to offer you, but I won't. The game is stable, we know PGI is moving forward, even at a snails pace and, though it's not 100% alright with me, it's what we have to work with, for now, and I'm alright with that. For now.
I don't think you meant to say this... rather, what I think you meant to say is that we're holding onto the dream of CW, one which has yet to be realized.
You do realize the insanity of this statement, correct?
An 'online game with RPG elements' in a universe with very deep factions, was placed into open beta with no guilds, realistically no party system (I can't link up with people I see in game - I've actually never bothered to look into how to run as a team; any menu option in the UI that held promise for doing so was greyed-out), and the depth of factions amounted to a decal next to your name.
I hope you can appreciate just how ludicrous that sounds - and why I am scoffing at your "Well, CW isn't going to be a reality."
In the world of online games - that's kind of like saying: "Well, keyboard support is not going to be a reality."
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Considering Closed Beta didn't even start until March or April of 2012, I would not say that 18 months counts as a "few years". It might seem like years, but it, indeed, has not been. The announcement for the game was made on October 30th, 2011, which is two years and one-half month ago, which still does not count as a "few" years.
Actually, design and development included - MWO has been worked on by PGI since around 2006 when the rights were purchased from Microsoft.
This cropped up around in 2009. Back then - the concept was for a reboot of the MechWarrior series, returning to pre-clan invasion years to allow new players to more easily grasp the tension between the Inner Sphere houses.
Then we didn't hear anything except for the lawsuit involving Harmony Gold.
Then, in 2011 - we got the MWO announcement.
Even if we presume that they only 'started' work in 2009 - that's roughly 4 years of development. Since artwork likely began as far back as 2008 - the Phoenix package and marketing concept has likely been done since the resolution of the Harmony Gold Lawsuit (around 2011, if I remember correctly).
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That's just because you, and many others like you, keep saying the dream is dead. Just because you keep saying it does not mean it's true. Does PGI need to communicate "mo-betta"? Yes, they do; they're utterly horrible at communication. However, that's because they're busy building the game. Do you remember reading about the Public Test for DX 11 two weeks ago? At the Launch Party, Bryan Ekman said DX11 was the largest hurdle they were working to clear and, once that was done, UI 2.0 would not be far behind, followed by CW. Okay, so, that didn't work, it was supposed to be out by the end of October, beginning of November, and then we would see UI 2.0 before the end of the year. Remember that? Well, since it's only the middle of November, they likely ran into some snags they weren't counting on, so we need to be patient. I know, individuals are going to scream "I'm tired of being patient, give me game, NOW!?!?!" and then bang their clubs on the ground to establish dominance. However, I'm not a programmer, but I have built web sites and Excel workbooks -under no one's scrutiny or timeline- and even I know about the issues involved with getting a game like this out.
Hate to break it to you - but a game like this is relatively easy to produce. I made a few in my spare time - called a mod.
Engines like CryEngine were designed to use special scripting files that direct the game engine's functions and tell it how to handle resources it's already programmed to use. It's actually easier, today, to 'mod' than it was back when I was doing it - because the engines these days support much more control than they used to (and people had to get very clever - a battletech themed mod for C&C: Generals had to compound two or so different vehicles onto each other to overcome the two-weapon restriction - something that was never done in the game, originally, and the developers never had support for).
The only difference between what we modders were doing back then and what PGI is doing right now is that PGI, allegedly, hired people who have experience in artwork development with full featured suites for developing artwork, has an engine designed to be tweaked to work with a wide set of games (though it is hardly the choice I'd make), and is actually being paid so that they can spend all of their working day on such a project.
We created our own maps (in games that were never supposed to have new maps), we added in new graphics libraries (C&C: Renegade was given support for DX9 shaders that didn't exist for years after the game was released), we created new weapons/vehicles/items and added RPG overlays to games that were never designed with them in mind.
"Forge" in Halo? Thank mod teams and communities for that. Halo was one of the first and most widely modified games on the Xbox specifically for the purpose of editing weapon placement and even creating new maps. And you had to jump through some hurdles to mod your xbox.
So... this whole notion that people who are paid to develop the game are somehow allowed to not develop the game while continually releasing marketing gimmicks... doesn't quite sit well with me. And it shouldn't sit well with anybody who doesn't like ****** insemination.
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Is MWO grindy? Yes. Are you really SELFISH enough that you would fail to understand the difficulties with bringing such a beautiful and complete project to potential millions of ravenous fans? I hope not.
But the game is launched. That means it's complete, right?
No... it's still using the same UI from closed beta. That has been "in the works" for around a year, or more, now.
You've programmed web-sites. How long does it take to program a few pages with some links and database queries in it?
Now add just a little bit of extra time because you're dropping an already-programmed 3d scene render into the background (a slightly more complicated version of "Hello World" for OpenGL and DirectX scene nodes).
So... like a week, right?
One day to lay down the framework, a second day to test it, a third day to pretty-it-up, a fourth to polish, and a fifth day held in reserve for contingencies?
It's not like we're dealing with huge amounts of data and information, here. We may as well have built the home screen for MWO in any one of my programming courses within the first three days.
Or do you work for Sebelius?
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They'll be back.
Oh, sure - people will come back every now and then. But will they stay and spend money? Will it be a game that they run to tell their friends about?
You realize that that is how games like WoW became so popular, right? It was this alternate reality that you could share with your friends in your afternoons. You could talk about any random thing while killing monsters and working as a team against whatever threat happened to be nearby.
It didn't get popular because of the graphics. It wasn't even all that balanced in the beginning (though it has been dumbed down considerably).
How did Path of Exile become as popular as it has (and if you haven't heard about it, you will eventually... as in just now)? It's because it is a game that people install and go: "Holy {Scrap}, this is awesome - I'm telling my friends so we can go slay the demons!" It's a game that you -want- to tell people about.
MWO is a game that you -wish- you -wanted- to tell people about.
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I can't argue this, you're right about it, and I have said so, many times. PGI is terrible about talking to the community, and that's problematic. For a full three weeks after the September Command Chair, concerning preliminary plans for how the Merc Corps Interface was going to work, there was good will and quietus on the forums... not anymore.
Slow down, everyone; breathe, enjoy what you have. If you don't enjoy what you have, go away for a little while, and then return. I, for one, hope that my hope will not be bashed in and, thus far, even though I've been rowdy in a couple of places, it has not been, overall.
I can count on one hand the number of noteworthy changes that have occurred since I first started playing the open beta. That's been about nine months ago, or more.
I'm sorry - but soon you'll realize PGI is indefensible on its handling of this game - unless, as I said, you work for Cathleen Sebelius.
I didn't say that CW would never be realized, I said it has YET to be realized. I stopped the moment I read that. Other people, a lot of them, have liked the post I wrote, because they read the whole thing. (NOTE: What the hell happened to all of the people who liked that particular post? I received like 25 emails with notifications of people liking that... ahh, that's right, I copied it into another thread, and that's where all the likes came from, hehe. I have to find that other thread, but I don't even remember what I was searching for when I found it.)
Stop, drop, and roll... you'll be alright, I promise.
Hate to break it to you - but a game like this is relatively easy to produce. I made a few in my spare time - called a mod.
So... this whole notion that people who are paid to develop the game are somehow allowed to not develop the game while continually releasing marketing gimmicks... doesn't quite sit well with me.
What doesn't sit well with me is people who put down others efforts claiming it's so easy and they could (and have) done so much better in the past.
Working for a real company is different from tinkering with mods in your spare time.
EDIT: You can't tell me it's not worth fighting for.
Edited by Ecto Cooler, 24 November 2013 - 05:46 PM.
Ecto Cooler, on 24 November 2013 - 05:29 PM, said:
What doesn't sit well with me is people who put down others efforts claiming it's so easy and they could (and have) done so much better in the past.
Working for a real company is different from tinkering with mods in your spare time.
No, it's not the same.
Working in my spare time - I have no deadlines. I have only the praise of others and the popularity of my mod as rewards beyond my own "I did it!"
Working for a company - I should have deadlines. When I do not meet them - I should have a damned good reason why not (and my supervisor should not be finding out the day it was supposed to be due) - and I should have a list of options I am exploring to resolve the problem.
There are standards of quality that have to be met. There is the fact that I will not have a job if the game I am working to produce is not competitive with other games and solutions. I just bought the Fear trilogy and Skyrim (caving to the valve's wonderful world of Steam, which I am convinced is going to bite us in the rear after they are more of a monopoly than they already are). Why? I -just- got access to all of my awesome Phoenix package early-ness that I spent $80 on months ago.
And as for mods being all that functionally different from game development?
Which is the engine that PGI should have selected for this game, to begin with. Real Virtuality runs circles around CryEngine when it comes to the sorts of weapon simulation this genre requires.
Anyway - DayZ started out as a -mod- of Real Virtuality 3's engine (ARMA 2) which had a persistent world that used server-side scripting to keep a sort of RPG meta-game embossed over the top. It saw such extreme popularity and success that Bohemia actually contracted the guy to make a full game using complete access to the Real Virtuality engine (you know - what PGI can't seem to get CryTek to help them with).
I grew up in manufacturing. I've spent years in various technical fields and troubleshooting. Software development is not some kind of incomprehensible dark art.
Just because it is above your head and experience does not mean it is above mine - and I'm telling you that you're being abused. There are predators in this world that take advantage of the willingness of others to believe that a degree or title actually equates to competence/expertise. PGI is, I believe, one of those.
All of the factors indicate such. I can list off example after example of various projects that have been done to better quality and depth than what PGI has illustrated in MWO and have been on similar budgets, staff rosters, and project goals.
What PGI is doing is a more mild form of debauchery, but it's part of a growing and disturbing trend - expect 2013's coverage to include more developer-centered controversies:
What PGI is doing is a more mild form of debauchery, but it's part of a growing and disturbing trend - expect 2013's coverage to include more developer-centered controversies:
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