Kirth Gersen

it's working... may be you're confusing the "white bar under the item" with "damaged element" ? visually it's like dyn prop but it's just that the element has been restored at least once and is not 3/3 anymore.

in other words: to get the pack rewards we need to buy a month sub during the first month ? and to get ALL the talent points and the quantas we need to remain sub during the 6 months ? Basically: thanks for backing our game, now pay 6 months to get all your rewards ?! Or I misunderstood something ?

Drop LUA. Use WASM or JS. it's 2021 not 2003. They're millions of people, tools (linters and ide), libraries, transpilers, etc that can produce code for WASM or JS. Sure LUA is popular in gaming mainly because of World of Warcraft (WoW) addons system. But WoW is from 2003 not 2021. Back then PC were slower, with less RAM and CPU cores and the JS ecosystem wasn't very big. LUA was a good choice back in 2003. It's not in the 2020s. Progress have been made since then. JS came along and dominated. Now WASM it the next step. Build for the future not for 2003. There are tons of UI code, physics code, atmo & space flight code, whatever code and libraries already developed. You're losing lot of skilled programmers and a huge existing base code by not using WASM for this game. Even JS is better than LUA nowadays because tons of stuff exist in JS and they're tons of transpilers to JS. And we don't need an integrated 'editing' (IDE) system inside the game. WoW addons were highly popular but you couldn't code at all from the game itself. A skilled programmer won't suffer your basic in-game IDE, it's just a too bad DX (developer experience). It's ok for a few lines of code, beyond that it's just insufferable. Just drop it. Put your effort elsewhere. Provide an extension for VS Code for instance and a local validator/linter/simulator. Get ride of in-game DRM for scripts too. DRM is killing this game. If you don't understand why then this game is doomed. WoW had no DRM for LUA and it was never a problem. And like someone said, we need scripting for UI because the game UI is just a joke atm. So like with WoW, we should able to rewrite the map, talents, markets, etc UI windows with our own. Just expose an API for these and let us do the work it will probably be better than the current game UI... (that's not really hard considering what we have...). I may sound harsh but I'm pissed. This game had so much potential but got ruined by beginner mistakes like choosing LUA and implementing amateur UI. It's a shame.

so basically "CORE COMBAT STRESS" = a global hitpoints value for the ship. ship dead = HP reach 0 or core element is directly destroyed Why not call it that way ("ship HP") instead of a confusing name like "core combat stress" ? people are used to "HP notion" in gaming. not much to 'stress' (which is simply here 100%-HP% left)

Same here. I don't understand why they want to do a pvp centric game. Don't they know about player profils in MMOs ? What is the target audience of DU ? Is the plan just to build an EVE clone with Space Engineers elements ? I don't see any success going this route.

You're really confusing what Game Pass is and Stadia v xCloud. You're comparing oranges and apple. xCloud is only about streaming XBox games because it uses old XBox consoles hardware. There are no PC gaming cloud streaming service from Microsoft. Game Pass (without xCloud part) is just a licensing trick for PC games on your PC. It's not cloud streaming. And technically everyone in the field agree that Stadia is way ahead in term of quality and latency (plus xcloud is still limited to 720p where Stadia is at 1080p free or at 4K with a sub). As for Google killing Stadia this is just an opinion so far... But I agree this is way out of the topic of this thread.

I don't see how this would solve their technical issues or get big. DU is a free game with subs so it doesn't fit in the Xbox Game Pass licensing model. If you're talking about the cloud gaming aspect of XBox Game Pass (= xCloud), it's for Xbox games only. Their 'cloud' infrastructure are just old XBox One consoles put into blades and racks in their datacenters. I don't see DU running in to these (plus they'll have to port it to XBox first). With Shadow it's worst. It's just like PCs in a datacenter and not the same datacenter that the DU servers are in. Still not a solution for DU. Plus the anticheat system they're using has issues with virtual computers. As for Shadow big boost I doubt that. Their 'gaming' model isn't viable. The candidate big players, except may one, are here to buy the talents and the tech to offer 'desktop cloud PCs' for enterprise (in high demand since with the pandemic). They don't care much about the 'gaming' aspect of Shadow. Whatever, my point about cloud gaming was about solving technical issues for DU not marketing/reaching more players who don't have the required PCs. That's another issue.

Given what this game want to achieve, imho, the only viable solution would be cloud gaming. This game is made for cloud gaming. Trying to sync a 'client' in each player PCs is just a technical nightmare: there are cache/sync issues load time / zoning time LUA script sharing and performance latency physics issues (remember alt-f4 to stop ship and how it's badly solved) requiring an anti-cheat system on each PC which leads to more issues but more importantly: In the mid & long terms it will prevent adding some major attractive features to the game because of its client/server nature and technical limitation. On the other hand, cloud gaming could solve all theses issues and reduce a lot the operating costs. Teaming with Stadia or Luna which also have the big cloud infrastructures for the servers is just a no brain win-win. With total control on the clients and the physics engine which could be unique and server side.: just imagine what could be possible. DU is the 'killer app' cloud gaming desperately needs and cloud gaming is the only long term viable technical solution for a game like DU. I just don't understand why NQ isn't going this route, even more that they're already giving tons of cash to Amazon AWS. (disclaimer: I've programmed networking code for games and dealing with client/server issues in the last 20+ years so it's not just a 'feeling').

in theory yes. in practice you have to deal with teams, skill sets, build process, project management, etc implementing in C is not always possible because the people who can do that have higher priorities, these are not usually the same that can do stuff in LUA. Plus they're still iterating so no point implementing in C something that is not yet full designed and stable. They have metrics we don't have and they're paying a lot of money to AWS (Amazon) for their servers & traffic. Every optimization on server side, storage size and traffic volume translate to real money savings. And may be some optimizations client side lead to less load on servers even if the client itself runs slower. I'm a seasoned dev (C/C++/C#/Go/JS/TS) but I can't judge if their proposed change is good or not because we don't have their metrics and context.

At this stage I wouldn't give much importance to this "letter". It really looks like an investor standard boilerplate letter to avoid wild speculations and to buy time before announcing the real decision(s). The next official communication will tell the fate of the game.

IMHO I think that's the root problem. He clearly had no experience and knowledge of MMOs and their social dynamics and what changed from the early days 15+ years ago. As for the new CEO, he's a pure finance guy so either he's here temporary till they find a new CEO or he is here to liquidate or sell NQ.

From what I've seen this past year in DU and from my 30+ years of gaming and 10+ years of game development, I can say that: - NQ is inexperienced with game development and more generally with software development. They're learning both as they go making a lot of mistakes. - The game is clearly not designed from the ground up to be a game. Like some other projects out there, notability No Man Sky, the starting point wasn't a video game but some cool computer technologies. For DU it was dual contouring voxels combined with classic 3D models (the elements). For NMS it was their adaptive procedural generation system. Usually games are designed the other way around: you plan your gameplay systems and then invent, create or reuse computer technologies to implement these systems. So basically the 'game' aspect of DU is not yet fully designed and finished and they're sill iterating based on what their tech can do it. For short: "we have these cool techs, what game can we make with them ?" instead of "let's make this cool game : which techs do we need to do it ?'. - the beta is at best an early alpha - the alpha was a PoC/tech demo - they clearly don't play their own game, at least not like a normal player would (playing with cheat codes like spawning infinite resources/money or instant travel to anywhere doesn't give you the actual "feeling" a normal player get but rather a distorted one. Designing and iterating the game with that distorted feeling is a very bad thing to do. All seasoned game designers know that. Same for metrics/Excel based game design decisions. - they don't clearly know what their target audience is. I think at least 2 more years are required to have a real beta. Doing this in the open with paying customers will not be a good journey.

So if in the 'vision' for this game , industry is for only 10% of the player base why so much effort and development resources go into industry ? Why industry wasn't introduced later once 90% of the rest of the game is done and stable ? You could have started by having all bots sell all possible elements and focus on everything but industry... but you didn't. I don't get the logic from a game studio management point of view. care to explain NQ ?

One issue is the positioning of this game: - is it a mmo with progression so with give us progression + end game etc. but expect to feed us regularly with new progression and end game content. - or is it a mmo sandbox where there is no endgame and we really don't care if anyone can have top industries and warp in all their ships and whatever. just give us new toys and tools from time to time and we will play in our sandbox for years. Because from what I see here and in discord, a lot of people want a real sandbox where they can do , alone or with other people, whatever they can imagine with few restrictions as possible. But also a lot of people just want a standard mmo where what the others have or can have is more important than what themselves have and cannot have because their fun is about ego and how they compare to others. I'm not sure you can really reconcile these 2 communities. So you'll have to choose eventually and clearly market this game in one way or the other.

Just forget about ATV. Their influence was clearly bad on this game. Learn about the history of MMOs to avoid repeating the same mistakes other already made in past. And play your own game (without the cheat codes).

Failed experience. Let's move on. At this point NQ should scrap everything, close the beta. Persisting will hurt more the game. Go back to a closed alpha without NDA. Because that NDA is what misled this game: small echo chamber with a few people without fresh ideas and fresh opinions from the outside world. Do like Starbase: don't invite people to a closed alpha simply because they give you money. Invite people who are constructive and actually test and brake stuff.

imho the problem with industry isn't solved by schematics, it's just pushed back. The problem was the "zero cost" of producing: once you have your machines (refiners, smelters, ..., assembly lines) you don't need power , fuel or whatever to use them. You have no upkeep at all. You just need to input ores. That's why even a solo player could gradually build and use a huge industry: what he already has cost nothing to run. That's why ores were more valuable than their contribution in final products: because it cost nothing to transform them once you have the industry so for instance 10L of hematite are worth more their ratio in <whatever is made with 10L of hematite> because they are less 'specialized'. Schematics don't solve that. It's a band-aid, a bad one. Their timing is bad. The implementation is sloppy and it adds unneeded complexity (talents and tiers of machines). In a few weeks the situation will be the same but a lot of players will be gone. Running costs (power, fuel, fees, whatever) was what was needed. And they said it's planned so why not wait till then ?

rule #1 of online communities: before replying to someone's intervention in a discussion they didn't start, look at their post history and post count. There is no point feeding the trolls or attention seeking behavior. Just ignore them. It's the best course of action. They're not here to debate or exchange a point of view.

Thank you Naunet, the mute was lifted a few minutes after your message.

Hi Naunet, thanks for replying. I'm not very familiar with discord. I don't know who issued the mute, all I got was a 'Dyno' message with no details. A friend say to contact @ModeratorMail but that ended replying this: I'm not sure opening a ticket just for this is worth it considering the ticket average time resolution. Thanks.

I'm a long time supporter. I get a full day ban from the discord over that joke : https://discord.com/channels/184691218184273920/304455542162587649/787072941657161758 during the whole hour I was in the channel, numerous people were insulting and trolling each others and no moderation occurred. I mean wth NQ ? you can't take a joke? ss in case:

That whole DRM thing is just a big waste that will hurt more the game than anything else. When Apple send the IPhone blueprint to Foxconn there is no DRM involved. These documents are kept secrets and between them. period. When someone buy an IPhone he cannot modify it using 'b' or generate a blueprint from it. Period. it's a 'sealed' construct. You can't modify it. period. you can't generate a blueprint from it. period. You can't edit & view the lua inside. period. But you can eventually 'erase & reformat' a seat/PBs and then the lua for that seat/PB become editable. If the sealed lua is bugged or whatnot then next time don't buy from that guy or erase & paste a fresh lua from an open source repo (open source code is better anyway). Anyway copyrighted/closed source lua code makes no sense in a future where humanity tries to survive and rebuild. Eventually add 'salvaging" to destroy the construct and get some materials back from it. The game doesn't need every cores to be modifiable by their new owner. When you buy a construct it's sealed or not. period. if not sealed you can do whatever you want with it , create a blueprint, copy the voxels and see & edit the lua in all the seats and PBs. if sealed no one can modify it anymore even the 'creator'. There is no need for creator information. What we need is salvaging. There is no need to have DRM complexity on blueprints. It's up to designers and manufacturers to trust each other when their blueprints change hands. The blueprint itself has no value and shouldn't because it's just 'papers'/build instructions. It's simpler like that and lead to much more interactions between players. We don't need people to sell blueprints. Go find trusted manufacturers if you want to make money from just design or be a manufacturer too. designers --> BP & trust --> manufacturers -> sealed cores & tokenisation --> vendors --> final user --> use/repair/change lua/resale or salvage Keep the magic "one time use" BP & compactification for small cores and allow these to be sold in the markets and allow a 'one time only' compactification for all xs cores. For bigger constructs, add "tokenize for selling". set a price. In that state the construct can't move and anyone with enough money can right-click 'buy' directly on it (like a dispenser). put your constructs to sale on your parking somewhere , add some fancy ads on screens and whatnot and you're good to go.

Self hosting costs are way more than Steam fees (even more if you use AWS like NQ does). People are just ignorant about what is required to host and distribute a game. They're totally clueless about "TCO" and opex costs in general. The whole 'steam fees' debate was relevant only when you reached a very high volume but since then you can now negotiate reduced fees for very high volumes. Don't be fooled by the FUD that the Epic marketing team distilled in the press these past years. Do the real math (aws, xsolla, staff, etc).

I find surrogates a missed opportunity. It's something new & fresh in a mmo. They should expand on it: - leveling surrogates instead of a single avatar. put a limit on max talent pts you can invest in a single surrogate. - level/buy/trade/sell surrogates. Allow surrogate to be shared (one player controlling it at a time). Surrogates are like NPC in fact. - allow equipment/enhancement on surrogates. require surrogate modification station to change equipment/enhancement so you can't 'in the wild' switch from mining to building to repair,, etc - your main body/avatar doesn't exist in the world, you stay in the arch and control surrogates, one at a time but you can switch anytime between the surrogates you have access to. - allow surrogate to be sent to existing/allowed surrogate pods like now (and jump from pod to pod). restrict inventory like now (a surrogate with at least an item in its nano inventory can't use a surrogate station). - remove warp drive, let surrogate fly ships. This will allow you to do something else with another surrogate while your ship is on a long trip. This will force people to establish trade routes, share surrogates, etc. the point: change body/move body is fast but moving goods and ships is slow. This will create a whole new & fresh type of mmo where you play various characters and switch from one to another. AFAIK this hasn't been done already.

That's funny I'm the total opposite here. I think DU would be a hit if it had a 'solo, offline,standalone' version with a eventually a local server for small co-op. Integrate with Steam Workshop to allow players to share BP and lua and you have a clear winner that could bring cash to develop the mmo. The MMO choice was (sorry 'is' !) too ambitious and cost too much in term of hosting to allow a free large scale public beta (not sure AWS was a wise choice but I'm biased here). And I'm not sure there are enough potential players for this kind of mmo... Also technically the game is an mmo but with a too heavy client. Too much is done 'client side' to lower the backend opex but this lead to limitations, cheating issues, and imho very difficult tomorrows. For instance, I really really wonder how they will fix the 'alf-f4 , ship completely stopped'. Well time will tell but I'm very worried. Strike a deal with Stadia may be ? Last point: NQ should really try to use the community to develop parts of the game: open up the file datamining (at least recipe/talents json files, the current locked .ung files is just ridiculous ), add an API/XHR to the client (within lua as a webrequest method+event or make Dual.Exe as a local REST server) , make the whole game UI modifiable (like WoW) and you will see the community will help you code. This will save you dev resources to focus on backend stuff.