45 replies to this topic

[Tyler Valentine]

Sandpit, on 24 February 2016 - 12:07 PM, said:

PGI was handed a roadmap 3 years ago of what players wanted and expected from CW.

I think what we have now and what we've seen them working towards (such as Phase 3) is PGI's limit as far as their programming abilities go. What we have is what we'll have from here on out. I don't think there's any need to go into a list of things that MWO has been missing for years now that other games seem to have implemented seamlessly.
Even on the same engine

So it's not technology limitations.
PGI is profitable to the tune of millions annually so it's not revenue issues
They have been "hiring" staff for 3 years now so it's not a dev team size issue

That leads me to believe that it's simply their limitations as devs in general. (and before anyone even tries to say it, please note not once have I said they were "bad" "incompetent" or anythign else, simply pointing out a few things I've observed over the years)

In other words, we've hit the "limit" of PGI's ability and knowledge. I really think they should do two things.
Hire a cryengine expert because it became painfully obvious they were WAY out of their league with this engine when it took them over a year to design a GUI (that got implemented and updated like twice and still has a long list of features nowhere to be seen) It continues when you look at how "complicated" it seems to be for PGI to implement what have become industry standard type features such as
collisions
dynamic drop deck tonnage
lobbies
a persistent universe that doesn't require hour long ceasefires to update a map
etc.

That's not a knock on PGI's abilities, it's simply stating that I feel they get in way over their heads with an engine they knew very little about and had zero experience with.

Then hire a PR/Marketing type staff member to manage things liek social media, dispersing information across multiple platforms to players, sending out newsletters, sending out comstar intercepts with fun fluff, etc.

Finally, Russ needs to walk into the office, look everyone square in the eye and let them know that from here on out workflow practices, dev times, deadlines, and everything else form the ground up is going to be reviewed and adjusted if need be.

If Russ is going to continue to be the "face" of PGI, then he needs to know what's going on with all the various teams or have a dedicated staff member available to answer his question before giving out information to the public. how many times have we seen the "misspoke" issue come up with Russ passing along info to players that's outdated, inaccurate, etc.?

Again, that's not a knock on Russ or PGI, simply stating that if we're going to realistically talk about how PGI could improve things, they need to do a little internal housekeeping and review some of their processes because I'm sorry, but 2 years to get to "phase 3 of BETA" is unacceptable at this point.

You're a live game taking money form customers. It's ok to have beta, it's not ok to let major portions of the game languish in beta hell for years at a time.

Sandpit, do you have enough money to just buy PGI? I feel like you would do a much better job of managing it.

Maybe we could all pitch in...

[Dawnstealer]

I'd drop my unit in a Fortress. Long Tom III, bebbeh:

[Dirk Le Daring]

El Bandito, on 23 February 2016 - 11:13 PM, said:

[font=verdana,geneva,sans-serif]For what reason? but what else do you need it for?

For the fun of it. I never said you had to buy one.

martian, on 24 February 2016 - 12:34 AM, said:

Don't tell me that you have really expected that you will have your own Leopard, Union or Overlord.

The only thing I expect at this time is delivery of the Kodiaks I pre-ordered.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

A really fun topic.

It all comes down to what they have in design for all of this, including dropships, jumpships, decals for these, repair and rearm, how all of this works into the faction map and the logistics there, and how it works with the mech bay and unit coffers and private coffers....

So much potential here.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

I am sure I am missing something in the equation to but that shows whats involved at least in part.

That's why I think this topic is great and with common sense I think players can figure out or at least get an idea whats in design for all of this.

Something else I missed that works into this possibly or maybe is completely independent of this is the new character creation and skill tree.

A more diverse skill tree would be a great thing. Only question is, what sort of skills would be really cool to put into it. Lots of potential there.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

Not completely unrelated at all is the question, are players mechbays in game on a jumpship? On a planet? How does this fit into the sim. Because that's how they are going about design I am almost certain. These guys making this game are not dumb. Got to look at how it all fits together, and they are keeping their cards close to their chest.

Maybe a division of mechbays. As you get dropships the larger pool shrinks. So if you have 60 mechbays, they should maybe be represented as planetside, a garrison setup. Buy a leopard class dropship, 60 becomes 56 mechbays planetside, four in the dropship ? And so on... Maybe that could work.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

Whats just in design and whats being worked on is a fun guess to. But like anything built for the first time, like this game, in a extremely under developed and new industry as video games are, they will be doing a lot of going with what makes sense and works on the fly. Other industries are old like ship building just as a random example, video games is in its infancy. So there will be some trial and error and all sorts of things going on.

As the saying goes.... Rome was not built in a day Too many people do not understand this.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

So can players buy dropships? Almost for sure. Jumpships to put those dropships on? Good question.

Both were shown in the most recent trailer.

I hope it happens eventually. Gotta love the video.

Johnny Z, on 24 February 2016 - 01:31 AM, said:

Last of all, I know one thing for sure, I'm saving my creds and MC up.

I'm saving my CBills too.

[Dirk Le Daring]

Sandpit, on 24 February 2016 - 02:40 AM, said:

The principles of how to create a CW environment can easily be found and used in any of those examples
players did it without the tools and resources available to PGI 20 years ago.

This was done by players familiar with pen and paper, role players effectively, who used their imagination , since it was not possible to code it into, say MW2 (NetMech was the battlefield). It was all written down, and thus records were kept. I remember how that worked. Unit, Clan and house leaders were in frequent contact with each other. They kept track of unit strength, who took, held, or lost what planet. And the number of mechs was recorded, so that when a battle took place the force numbers were known, and that many mechs were fielded. So, if Jade falcon had sixty mechs, they played until victory, or all sixty mechs were destroyed. It was a very good setup, and a result of the mighty pen and paper, tabletop battletech, and the human brain (the greatest tool of all time).

[rolly]

Oh to dream.

Perhaps what they meant by "deep economy" was how much real money players would be sinking into the game and "persistent" referred to the patching and hotfixing?

[Johnny Z]

Dirk Le Daring, on 24 February 2016 - 03:31 PM, said:

This was done by players familiar with pen and paper, role players effectively, who used their imagination , since it was not possible to code it into, say MW2 (NetMech was the battlefield). It was all written down, and thus records were kept. I remember how that worked. Unit, Clan and house leaders were in frequent contact with each other. They kept track of unit strength, who took, held, or lost what planet. And the number of mechs was recorded, so that when a battle took place the force numbers were known, and that many mechs were fielded. So, if Jade falcon had sixty mechs, they played until victory, or all sixty mechs were destroyed. It was a very good setup, and a result of the mighty pen and paper, tabletop battletech, and the human brain (the greatest tool of all time).

Yep totally right.

The entire pen and paper games entering the market at the same time as computers could have been a move by the print industry to stay relevant in the entertainment industry and compete with computers. They stepped up their game so to speak. Either way they worked well together for an over all improvement for computer game design at least. The total fallout of this is mostly just common sense.

These days theres huge competition for entertainment industries. Games putting the squeeze on all sorts of things even the illegal industries which is a good thing even if they don't like it much. The most obvious move recently is the legalization of bud. They are losing tons compared to yester year. Funny stuff how things work and whos running what.