Anonymous

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

@Hunter I must confess I posted to get a feel for the community zeitgeist. Music is absolutely a make or break aspect to a game for me. At the moment while I'm writing character background stuff, it's quite dark yet philosophical stuff on the nature of being - Tool - Forty Six & 2 for instance, System of a Down etc, or classical - Hörst - The Planets is on high rotation atm. Playtime music is normally hardcore/hardstyle EDM - anything from Happy HC (S3RL etc) through to mainstream (Showtek) and out to stuff like Rotterdam Terror Corps. Sometimes it's Electroswing, Mambo, Ska- depends on the mood.

Please - before there's another round of forum bashing people for having opinions, concerns or otherwise - let @NQ-Nyaltzar sort it out. Flaming every thread about the business model in know way helps the community grow, discourages dialogue, and suppresses the free and frank exchange of ideas. The OP, and @EagleOne in another thread had either valid concerns (which Devs have addressed - they don't need our help) or suggestions (which were flamed down rather than being taken on-board and passed on to NQ with a thanks for the idea) - frankly, the Community response has been a little disappointing. It's going to be a long and lonely 2 years if we're not welcoming and constructive. Yes - the threads frustrate you all, but you win more friends with honey than with vinegar. 2 cents.

I'll (ok - I won't, but feel free to steal the idea) make a LUA and voxel based MMO, inside the MMO.

You both realise that blockchain tech has nothing to do with money right?

No Xeno's sorry :/

Having worked in and around repair industries - the correct mechanic would be more, anyone can repair / dismantle but Right to Repair gives you access to the "repair manual" inc. Morpher spare part catalogues. That way you get a nice mix of backyard running repair ships/gear at the lower end, and regularily maintained, serviced and repaired by an "authorised dealership" type model. Thoughts?

@VoidArchon Rebel Galaxy does it even nicer IMO. Incidentally, at above .5 C is where special relativity kicks in. So that's probably the best upper bound for in system flight.

Aye. I mean aside from the official music

General topic - what are people listening to as they think/live/breathe/plan/imagine/write DU?

I personally think we are thinking about this the wrong way (with the exception of deliberate suicide - that's a place to put a penalty IMO, but not the point I am making). We have an in game mechanic which is clear - you resurrect if you're near the safe zone. Resurrection machines are strategic items, expensive to run etc. When you die you go to the nearest one, which if you are exploring the big bad word, could be fricken miles away. But at the end of the day - why penalise those who die? If there is no penalty for dying AT ALL other than community shame, lost time and annoyance etc, then everyone wins. Really - every game mechanic out there handling death via XP loss, equipment decay etc, are really just putting a grind treadmill in place, which leads to players getting annoyed. So what if we reversed the premise. What if the penalty for death, is ultimately, death. By which I mean - we know the system/game keeps tracks of everything people do. Games are like that - it's event logging or whatever, but there is always a record. So: * Accidental / misfortune death - no penalty - you're just an idiot and we all laugh at you. You don't lose items really - you have a morpher after all. You don't lose experience (stupid mechanic anyway - the point of death is that to learn from the experience), you don't lose skills etc. * Suicide - I believe this is where your penalise people - if for no other reason than making sure suicide isn't a casual thing and has consequences (which is an important message both in game and out) * Murder et al. - at the end of the day, this is what we are talking about really. I've got a whole slew of ideas there, a full working sub-system which makes a law enforcement / investigation industry in game - but the key point - we should punish the perps, not the victims. Thoughts?

Welcome aboard!

<< I don't know why you insist on this course of action. You are only going to die >> "Fugoff." The words blended into one as I grunt, moving another rock. << You are reacting emotionally. You should accept that there is no place for you here. You are not listed. There is no record of you >> "Fuck. Off." Two rocks are heaved, punctuating the words. The sentiment is lost on my tormentor. Programming kicks in and it corrects my semantics. << I am bound to the Novark. I cannot 'leave', per se >> I stop, standing, stretching the kinks out of my muscles and joints. Is this the simulation? The endless-media feeds in the last days had said that colonists would be put through a simulation upon waking. I decide not to engage it. This was my reality - simulation or not - working out if it was real was pointless. In silence I continue building, one rock, then another. For half an hour I am left alone to my own devices, but I can sense it, watching. When it speaks again, the voice in my ear has lost some of its irritation - replaced by... curiosity? Did it "feel" things like that? 10,000 years is a long time for an Artificial Intelligence to change in so many ways. << What are you doing? >> "You don't know? That's funny. You act like God but you don't grok" There is silence again in my ear as it processes this. << Stranger in a strange land. Heinlein. Nineteen hundred and sixty one in the old time. What else do you remember? >> There is definite curiosity now. I answer it with a question, keeping it occupied, relying on it's programming - responding to queries is apparently a first order sub-routine, over-riding other activities. "Who am I?" << Do you mean, you remember who you are? Or that you do not, and require this information? >> Another few rocks, another few precious minutes and I answer, repeating myself. "Who am I?" It responds again, inferring that I meant the former. << I can find no entry for you in the colonist register. This is... concerning. Perhaps planet-fall has affected the quantum integrity of my data stores. I will run a diag... >> "5421135-2" Again, minutes of silence. << I have a record of that string - it is the serial number I have against Environmental Test Unit 26 >> I had once heard that a thousand years ago, well before drones existed, energy miners would take small animals in cages down underground because poisonous gasses would kill them before the miners. "Environmental Test Unit? Fancy name for throwing me off the Novark with nothing. Remember that?" It was a stupid thing to say. AI's didn't forget. << Standard operating procedure is to validate all environmental and atmospheric readings with a testing unit before allowing Alpha Teams to venture into the safe zone.>> The curiosity it had shown briefly was replaced with cold machine logic again. << As there is no corresponding record - you are not slated to be re-purposed as a colonist and your function is therefore complete. You are no longer required in order for the wider mission parameters to be met >> Was this some sort of cruel test? Probably. It was designed by humanity after all. "Well if you don't need me, all the most reason for you to fuck off and leave me alone then." My small bivouac of rocks and foliage is finally complete and I stand back, admiring it. "It's been fun. Goodbye". I remove the small bud from my ear and crush it underfoot. Crawling into my shelter, I grunt with the pain of muscles getting used to working again. Can you feel pain in a simulation? I banish the thought. Perhaps it's the air, but I feel bold - the pain made anger, determination. 'Assume it's all real - why would it do more than it has to. Your mind isn't needed to test human suitability to a physical environment'. I look out over the impact crater, as on the horizon, past the towering Novark casting it's long shadow over me, the first sun sets while lighting up the cloud filled sky. Summits covered in blue snow catch its last rays. It’s not exactly like on Earth; the geometry and the colors are inhuman; the temperature is warm enough to not worry about needing a fire (even with the tattered utility suit I wore - a garment for modesty more than usefulness) and the gravity a bit lighter than on what I was used to. I can see small lights moving tentatively around the Novark's base - the structure is so large they don't even notice each others existence, seemingly having exited from a variety of locations - it is the Alpha Teams, starting to venture out. Kadpacks and morphers making them a soft herd, reliant on their new 'God'. I can barely make out a figure at the top of the Novark. I wonder what that person makes of all this? Do they notice the same things? Doesn't matter... 'Fuck 'em all and good luck to them - won't be long till reality sets in. Not me. I'll survive. Gotta survive...' I mumble to myself as I close my eyes and slowly drift off to sleep, exhausted. For the first time in 10,000 years, I dream. --------------------------------------------- "NO!!" My eyes snap open, and I bolt upright in a sweat, before swearing, my head connecting with the roof of the bivouac. It is daylight - the sun, oddly tinged, seeps into my refuge. << Good morning. Do not be alarmed. Your cortical region indicates you were dreaming. Anamnesis is to be expected. What do you remember? >> The voice is everywhere, in my head and without - my senses can't tell either way. "HOW THE... !?!" << The communication earpiece was required only to instill a feeling of comfort in you. As you have destroyed it, the need for pretense is removed >> "How are you... I'm in the simulation, aren't I?" << Communicating? I infer that is what you mean. It would appear that you have been equipped with implanted communication and tracking functionality at some point in your existence. While those pieces of hardware are now otherwise redundant from their previous purpose, I can access it> > It pauses again, processing the second question. << Be aware - colonists undertaking the simulation are only told it is a simulation if it is necessary >> the AI says, it's 'voice' taking on an almost comforting yet patronizing tone. << Now. What do you remember? >>

I can't afford to get to E3 from Oz. So for me - LinkedIn - some game dev/c-class mates (ex Ubi Mont.) started following Novaquark a while back (2014), so I started keeping an eye on them. Saw JC's presentation via stream at EmTech Asia 2015 and started seriously tracking NQ and DU as more than a flash in the pan. Finally got to joining here because hooking in earlier would just make me depressed that I can't simply move to France and join NQ (or even, move any where away from the teeny place I live (capital of a country or no) to somewhere that has an actual game industry...) (Yeah - I'm actually less interested in playing games than world building / making them. *sigh*)

(Cheers! Only reason I didn't reply earlier is that I've been here a while now. I was just lazy about intro's )

Out of likes so "like" - will do, by end of weekend latest.

Joining in?

All May I present https://community.dualthegame.com/organization/bureau-international-des-poids-et-mesures Yeah - I know - it's not the right place to post this. Ha!! Not really - pretty much the sorts of people who should be in it are here. Basic idea - this is a pre-alpha thematic org, set up expressly to: a) talk DU and standards - what would need to change from the world we know to the world we're going to. to note, discuss, propose and ratify standards as a community (using the forums etc) which can be passed to NQ for consideration. c) Write a bit of pre-history/lore to go along with all this. Because something has to be fun in stuff like this Now, because I've not tested this yet - if you are already a member of another group and the system won't let you apply and join - send me a DM and I'll add your name to a standing membership roll post - either way it's not a big issue as we're such a small community so far anyway that everyone knows everyone. I'll come up with some sort of psuedo-structure people can have fun with later on.

How do you know about that court order? Er... I mean - yes - I agree - practical limitations, resources, other words about something something early game limitations.

Stranger in a strange land - we are the aliens...

Ah. Those were the days... wasn't on Kauri from memory (or was I... did you have Trandoshan Nationalists about?), but we had similar where I was.

It's a neat idea from a game design PoV. And normally I'd agree. But DU - well, DU has the potential to push the boundaries. The beauty and opportunity presented by a market / build system which has the "best" of a thing - it does drive innovation ("arms race") - but that is the let down of most real sandboxes / complex MMO's - the "research/skill" side of things is finite - limited to as far as the Dev's will let you go as they have to put a "box" around the limit of human knowledge in a sense. But - WHAT IF DU had a means (which from what I'm learning of LUA and Voxel stuff) of essentially building in the ability to truly invent new ideas and technology (based on either clear need and/or previous history), and then build it. Then, as Aetherios says - is there really ever a perfect anything? Another way to think of that concept - modding. Rather than we, the players, asking the Dev's to "implement this thing" or "make us this feature" - a DU SDK / Mod kit thing COULD let players actually invent those things and put them into practice. (Yes yes, with peer review, and dev approvals etc - some level of moderation is required). And as it's inherently limited to the existing tech (the LUA scripts you have now, the methods, the materials etc) - you essentially allow the natural organic progression of technology/invention/innovation to occur without stupid leaps of thought - tech progression would feel "natural". (Lunch, bored, thinking out loud again. Sorry.)

I don't know about I don't know about "people not be able to". Certainly it should be really freakin hard to do, must be done "in game" (i.e - you must physically break into the secret lab and stealz the blueprint!) and be also quite hard to then dispose of to buyers etc (i.e. you shouldn't be able to just throw "illegal" items like stolen goods into the marketplace). To me - there is just so much rich game play to be had with something like a blueprint in play! I mean - you wouldn't even have Star Wars Rogue One (let alone the original SW:IV Death Star mission) without stolen plans Blueprints are a plot device to be reckoned with!