78 replies to this topic

[Volume]

CaveMan, on 09 December 2011 - 07:29 AM, said:

hmm....this could be one of the micro-transaction things in the in-game store.

Have "film" (or I guess HoloDiscs, given the timeframe) available for sale that lets you record such and such amount of battle footage and post it for others to see.

Maybe even gain a smidge of pilot XP for reviewing battle footage.

Please do not make players need pay real money to record or watch "replays" - this ruined Bloodline Champions ;/

I fully support recording and analysis of matches. Games like Command and Conquer 3 actually had some built in shoutcasting tools (so you can like, draw lines and circles on the action like a play-by-play on a sports channel)

Basically, this is awesome, but MAKE SURE that it doesn't alienate players or cause a rift between paying and non-paying customers.

I would gladly pay for EXTRA FEATURES, such as, say, replay showcase slots "I did this really awesome thing, here's a 30 second clip of it, I'm going to put it on my profile page" and you can have like 5 of those if you pay a nominal fee (bandwidth, etc.)

Make sure an EXTERNAL site hosts replays (so that PGI/IGP do not charge us for replay bandwidth), make sure that replays can be saved and watched LOCALLY, etc.

Edited by Volume, 23 December 2011 - 12:35 PM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

The Xbox360 game "Halo: Reach" has a recorder feature that allows players to share recorded battles with each other, and you can move the viewpoint around freely instead of being forced to view it from a 1st person view of one of the payers. You can freely view and exchange these recordings over your Xbox360 consoles.

However, if you want to take these recordings and convert them into a MPEG that can be shared over email, then you have to pay for it. I have never paid for this feature, and once I found out that you do have to pay cash to get the videos emailable, I stopped using the feature all-together.

Edit: I guess I would be more willing to use such a pay-per-use feature if I didn't have to pay $60 for the game in the first place, plus an other $60 a year to use it's online capabilities.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 23 December 2011 - 06:57 PM.

[Elizander]

Please consider this. It's not only for personal use, it will allow a lot of media to be generated by the playerbase to increase awareness of the game. I honestly don't remember official videos released by gaming companies but really good ones made by players draw my attention quite a bit.

It really does have to be like HLTV though. It only records data and not a huge AVI file so you can move your view to anywhere or anything in the match.

It does get boring watching only first person view in videos that are supposed to be entertaining.

[Hayden]

Elizander, on 06 January 2012 - 05:01 AM, said:

Please consider this. It's not only for personal use, it will allow a lot of media to be generated by the playerbase to increase awareness of the game. I honestly don't remember official videos released by gaming companies but really good ones made by players draw my attention quite a bit.

It really does have to be like HLTV though. It only records data and not a huge AVI file so you can move your view to anywhere or anything in the match.

It does get boring watching only first person view in videos that are supposed to be entertaining.

This is very true. Soooooo many video editing possibilities, it would be great to be able to replay stuff to make videos with.

[MaddMaxx]

Halfinax, on 22 December 2011 - 10:04 PM, said:

Recording shouldn't be too difficult to include. Just retain the information client side. The server is already tracking the locations of all fielded units anyway, so a recording option shouldn't be too difficult I would think. Many games already include a full battlefield recorder, and I'd love to be able to use it for MWO. Being able to use recordings to work on team tactics, and watch other teams battles for ideas on how to improve your own gameplay is nearly a must for competitive games.

In an Instanced based game the Map(s) and Mech renders will not be Client side though so replaying would have to be done on the Server or have the Maps and Mech files be allowed to be dnld'd to the client. Probably not going to happen and assuming that to be true, how do we proceed from there?

Edited by MaddMaxx, 06 January 2012 - 09:56 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

UncleKulikov, on 22 December 2011 - 06:59 PM, said:

How would it involve more storage, since all of the events of the match are recorded anyway?

For example, a GIF sequence can be viewed in quicktime forward or backwards, and the file size is the same because it's just scrubbing between two different frames. The system in Halo 3 worked similarly, it would record the placement and vector of everything match related several times a second, and it allowed you to rewind in 10 second increments.

I would like a rewind feature, but recording is the main element that should be in. The rest is bells and whistles.

As most are, Halo is a Client side/Online game. We will be using Instances with no gaurantee data wil be available Client side. For hacking/ security reason, I hope that is the case actually.

[Silent]

MaddMaxx, on 06 January 2012 - 09:56 AM, said:

In an Instanced based game the Map(s) and Mech renders will not be Client side though so replaying would have to be done on the Server or have the Maps and Mech files be allowed to be dnld'd to the client. Probably not going to happen and assuming that to be true, how do we proceed from there?

I haven't read anything about the game being instanced. From what I've inferred it's just going to be servers hosting various maps and the outcome of these matches will affect the overall strategic map.

[Liam]

I'm happy with StarCraft 2 replay functionality. Similar recorder would be nice to have in MWO

Edited by Liam, 06 January 2012 - 10:08 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

Silent, on 06 January 2012 - 10:06 AM, said:

I haven't read anything about the game being instanced. From what I've inferred it's just going to be servers hosting various maps and the outcome of these matches will affect the overall strategic map.

Quote

"
Is this game going to have lots of servers like a WoW or are you hoping for a single persistent server world like EVE Online?


[MATT C] Each game spawns its own dedicated server"

The spawned dedicated Server is otheriwse known as an "Instance." There are other direct mentions but I didn't look beyind this one.

Edited by MaddMaxx, 06 January 2012 - 10:13 AM.

[Halfinax]

The renders are always done client side unless is browser based. That's why they have hardware specs, and graphics sliders etc. The server sends and receives all the computational data, but all the rendering is still done client side, and the information is still sent to the clients computer. Recording just the raw data coming to your machine and then later rendering it on your machine isn't a big deal. You would essentially just be recording the data, and then rendering it later to make videos. "Instanced" does not mean that the client receives no data, and/or does not render the graphic components on their machine. The question is whether or not the client only receives the data that is within their immediate viewing range. That is unless I've horribly misunderstood what "instanced" is being used to mean in this case, but generally the term "instanced" is just used to differentiate it from "open world"

Instanced = small number of users on a server. Typically for games/areas that have large amounts of complex data that have to be tracked simultaneously.

Open World = All players are one a single server, and typically combat is roll based and mostly automated so as to reduce the hard calculations the server has to do.

[MaddMaxx]

Quote

"Having players participate in instances tends to spread out populations of players, instead of concentrating them, which may reduce or level the workload for both the server and client by limiting the number of potential interactions between players and objects. Because the player characters in the instance do not need to be updated on all the information going on outside the instance, and vice versa for the characters outside the instance, there is an overall decrease in demands on the network, with the net result being less lag for the players. This also reduces the demands on each player's computer, as the number of objects to be processed can be more easily limited by the game's developer. The developer can better reason about the worst case performance requirements in an instance because they do not have to consider scenarios such as hundreds of players descending on any location at any time."

As you noted. Less data shared via Client Server and determined by the Dev. FPS play further helps with this. So I guess we will have to take a "wait and see" posture on this one as well.

Edited by MaddMaxx, 06 January 2012 - 10:37 AM.

[UncleKulikov]

MaddMaxx, on 06 January 2012 - 10:00 AM, said:

As most are, Halo is a Client side/Online game. We will be using Instances with no gaurantee data wil be available Client side. For hacking/ security reason, I hope that is the case actually.

That's not correct for Halo 3, which is on the Xbox 360. It can be played offline, so all of the data is available on the disc for local retrieval. Halo 3 is the one with the recorder. I may have misread what you said, it sounds like you are saying Halo is run server side, and just displayed on the unit.

If there is an installer for MWO, then all of the intense files (textures, sounds, models) will be stored on each user computer. The user's inputs would be sent to the server running the match, and all of the response data would be sent back to the user computer. That prevents the hacking and abuse, since none of the calculations are done on the user computers.

Even if it's just an instanced game, all of the data from the player's inputs needs to be sent to the server, and all of the other inputs need to be transmitted to the user computer to display things appropriately.

And since all of the data that is required to reconstruct the match travels from and to your computer, it should be quite simple to record all of the vector data in sequence and store it in a separate file for reconstruction later.

Edited by UncleKulikov, 06 January 2012 - 01:42 PM.

[Fresh Meat]

this would be great

[Rathverge]

Instanced games host data server side, resources client side. This creates issues with not server recording. Unless all you are talking about is a direct video port, then just pay the 10$ for Fraps or similar programs. Im not too concerned either way, but a delayed spectator mode would be great to see in the game for recording purposes, at least for some games (not random arranged matches)

[Qetchup]

would love to be able to watch commentated matches

[Sprouticus]

Making a system to record the info server side and make it available as a text based file should be easy.

Making a tool to turn that into an actual recorded battle...that might be pretty tough. Each user will have the CE3 system installed so rendering it would be doable. But then you have to create a UI for the playback, including changing views, playback speed, etc. That would require time.

Personally I would like it but if it werea choice between this and say.....3 new mechs or new maps or a better metagame experience, it becomes less appealing.

[Malikai Constant]

I think a feature like this would be a fantastic addition. It would be well worth their time to incorporate into the game so that at the very least you could watch matches that you have participated in personally. I think it adds alot to the experience to be able to review both for strategic reasons such as figuring out what you did wrong etc. and also just for the fun of being able to see your mech in action from different perspectives.

Being able to watch other peoples matches could be fun too, depending on if they were of some significance, for example organized matches or special sessions of play with the developers etc.

I have enjoyed this feature in other games and hope they include it in this game as well, Cheers!

[Mattiator]

This would be incredible!

[John Clavell]

Do WANT!

[PirateNixon]

Halfinax, on 08 December 2011 - 09:17 AM, said:

I've been hoping something like that will be implemented. Especially if it is similar to the Source engine version where the whole battle is recorded and not just the player view.

My only fear with this is that this would allow opposing forces to completely dissect your team's strategy. Sure this may not matter in some random game, but if there are ever any organised battles that have any implications you'd have a complete dissection of the opposing forces strategy after every battle.