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MookMcMook

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Everything posted by MookMcMook

  1. So true. NPC formula is based off faulty design imo for Virtual Worlds. The population with MMO is players. All that brain power not being used otherwise... for free. It needs large profit. The current market pricing reflects: 1. Generic 2. Derivative results of current products. Hence Free. If the quality of the product is sufficient then sub will be effective. As with UO then EQ/WOW I think DU can be very profitable and sustainably so as an inception game for a genre.
  2. Sub is going to be the right pricing decision for this game. It's be a good game to play whatever the success rate. It's a different genre to most other space games: It's a Virtual World MMO. No Man's Sky in scale seems like a VW but it's just not got any interconnected systems at scale that I've ever seen in it's videos. It's like one large level 1 or something to use a comparison. There's never level 2-100 as it were... SC, has all the hallmarks of a failed software development project. I'd be careful with that one and if you're not refunded I doubt that money is ever coming out of that now esp. given the change of TOS. This leads to pre-purchase of DU: I would not bother personally until they at the earliest hit alpha and even then it is likely better to wait further. Side-note: It's odd that NMS and SC warrant longer sentences the first 2 which are accurate. I guess that's a product of untangling errors and misconceptions. In some cases then the conclusion is, it's better not to bother with information holding too low value given the lack of economy.
  3. Yes, I suspect there will be mega fall-out from that abomination (to put it extremely lightly). As to DU: Honesty is the way forward for people: I don't think pre-alpha is for most people. SO it is best to wait. I can afford to sink 60$ in up front as I don't play computer games much these days and this title as a Virtual World MMO is of especial interest. But that money is the minimum and the maximum I would shell out before the game launches and only for exceptional reasons as above. In fact, I intend to try to learn LUA and use DU as a place to motivate myself, so we will see if I can get my returns on that 60$ via this activity or not in the next 12 months. If you spend money: Have a plan. No plan means often you waste your money completely.
  4. I enjoy the whole Space Tourism thing: "So come to Mars... for the memory of a lifetime!" I think something as simple as that to begin with is going to be very fun given the scale of the game world in DU being created and compared to other MMOs.
  5. Yeah I've come to a similar conclusion as well. Given the delay from the initial dates, and the ambition of the project, it does seem very likely that another year or more is needed as this Summer rolls onwards closer to it's end (almost August now). That said, I'm ok waiting, the project here is special in the MMO genre that tbh it's almost singularly the only one of any interest I have seen on the horizon.
  6. granular details and mechanisms = No. This game is a MMO Scale afterall. macro economic commodities to say fuel functional development constructs (eg more food and more diverse food) = Yes/Possibly if there's time and if it adds more diverse trade and activities for economic simulation systems.
  7. Well, if you think about it, we've already "solved" faster-than-light communication ... so a dyson sphere, pfff!! Child's play. It's all about thinking outside the universe, afterall.
  8. 1. Investment in Financial Investment for some kind of dividend in monetary ROI. 2. Personal spending money investment in a purchase eg clothes, gym membership or game sub. They're different and perhaps the dual (hohoho) use of the word investment is the issue with the communication. I agree with what you said, if I put my spending money into something up front like a theatre ticket I want ALL the info on how good it will be for that princely sum before spending it to book seats.
  9. Generally it's better to develop rule-sets when the underlying mechanisms are actually working and hence the rules are made ORGANICALLY with what players actually do or do not do. If not a problem then no problem. If a problem then a solution AFTER the problem has manifest. Ideally the solution is organic, player-driven and hence it's the players that create the rule-set against what else players are doing. If there's some kind of deeper underlying problem with the mechanic: Fly large slabs of voxels anywhere an d dump them to grief players then that's more of a fundamental mechanic flaw that needs correcting than a problem per se with gameplay.
  10. AI is a very interesting feature for any game and can be fun. But as you point out above: Just use players for the same function with much more dynamic result of combat for example. In your example, the space whale (lol though there's a sci-fi book with that in it I think) is not so much an engaging combat entity as a type of market resource for players to harvest for example given DU's core feature of a virtual economy. Meanwhile the dog can eat pedigree chum and players of DU can feast on the banquet the devs ARE cooking.
  11. Agree, a complete waste of time feature. DU will have so much interactive game space from it's fundamental systems interacting. The idea that micro-features need to keep being developed at the end of other features (developing infinite twigs for tiny branches or thin trunks of feature trees) is for the fairies at this stage of development. I find a lot of conversations start like this with MMOs: "Oh look how nutritious the label describes pedigree chum! If only it was made for humans to consume, though." LOL.
  12. I'm just going to enjoy being a grunt. I like the fun of a crew of a BIG ship that can take down a lot of other ships due to size, crew number and ship power hence. At it's best it will feel like being on a winning team in a tight match but obviously space, ships and chewing lots of gum! There will likely be amazing builders, traders and some sith-lord like people who manipulate everything from the economy to orgs etc, they'll be the empire builders and destroyers - not simple grunts.
  13. My visions is perhaps extreme, but 1v1 dogfights is like taking a water pistol against a nuclear submarine: The water pistol is a 1 person affair: The water piston could even be made by one person. The Sub a couple of hundred crew affair with all the R&D tech behind that too...
  14. I disagree, tactics = closer to moment to moment aka visceral reaction stimulation (skill). Strategy = closer to planning, designing, context of making the various decisions in an encounter and executing a strategy over a longer period of time, maybe involving numerous defeats and deaths but ultimately "winning the war". How much "tactics" we get out of combat in DU, I see this as "nice to have" but far from essential: It's a BIG UNIVERSE = a numbers game ultimately.
  15. You are better off waiting until NQ determine the NDA is to be lifted then it is obvious:- 1. Technically it is ready 2. You can determine directly the game play quality for you. Don't make the same mistake you've already made with SC. On that subject have you looked into a refund. You could then always repurchase with no significant loss and absolute risk removal on that money, that way, and even reinvest it into DU anyway. /suggestion.
  16. Yes, it can be like Dr. Rhino. It's dependent on new advances in the dev of the game and info.
  17. I think Nano is right above. When the ship is destroyed: The actual voxel materials and elements will all disintegrate into destruction out of the game world - MOSTLY. All that value and added-value needs to be destroyed to keep the economic engine spinning. I guess a small residue of material will be SALVAGEABLE as an interesting by-product of large ship fleet destruction for example. But not large enough for a large number of scavengers or a regular source of material? I do like the idea of specialist kit on ships for salvaging however.
  18. I don't really know tbh. Though to keep answers GENERAL, the internet is similar to a mirror of the human psyche eg prevalence of porn for example... and the inhibitions which are permissible and filter up from the sub/un-conscious or whatever the hell makes up most of the software running in our brains compared to the small fragment that thinks it's running things (!) whatever computer analogy fits the so-called conscious "active session" mind. DU as a part-sandbox will become an expression of some of that for sure.
  19. Linux user here. It is not going to happen for DU. iirc CCP attempted a Linux client and the maintenance was not worth it. Maybe it's a good thing? Linux distros end up concentrating on other aspects than hardware races? Guess Windows as a dual or multi-boot is not such a bad thing for gaming? Like I said or did not say, I like Linux a lot more than Windows, but can see why it ain't happened in a big way for big games.
  20. It might be that cities and population density should be a function of population size and paying customers. IE Large Orgs end up creating these things for their large memberships out of "blood and fire" (or space equivalent). So maybe it will come after. I kinda assumed it would come first, but it really depends on the game systems and how much agency of player combat and how intense competition is. I do agree, creativity seems high ceiling in this game as you describe above but maybe a product of war as opposed to an alternative? Yeah I think you hit the same idea as me: Cities being a product of org success as a consequence and suitably well organized and defended and functionally useful to the industrial-war-complex of the org itself and it's continual power projection? I do hope to see my Gothic Cathedral with JC Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor though!
  21. *Clips heels smartly together.* "Ouhya!" Short and simple directives, now we're "shoot first, talk later!" Ah, the last italic point, yeah, you may be right here but not only expectations: Early adopters may well be more hardcore and less mainstream as a founder population afterall... well we will see. Still all works wonders for me as it appears to be.
  22. I'm surprised at this bold prediction, although it does not matter to me if the above happens and makes the game MORE sci-fi-military thematic via player behaviour: That is my preference afterall: I like a believable world working within it's own logic. The reason I'm surprised, is that the voxel manipulation is highly interactive world-interaction tool for players: Players will find simple reward via simple messing with the world in this way: Even digging a small pit is strangely rewarding ala minecraft. Let alone creating some sort of condo or barge-house-on-the-riverbank, or so on: Gothic Cathedral Post or Pre-Romanesque (!) with a little JS Bach Toccata & Fugue in D Minor LUA scripted in perhaps etc. If this is apparent I could see NQ changing their design around including this sort of play behaviour via enlarged safe zones (for the time-being or else some other variant implementation perhaps taxes or so on..). I find it difficult to guess further, as this whole building side of gameplay is not MY main interest at all, but I try to consider what other preferences different people seem to like and take pleasure from enjoying: And this building Landmark / second life sort of /sims type of thing does seem v popular, strange to me as it seems?
  23. To begin with it's going to be a much paler imitation of some of the things in EVE: Eg Economy will be player-driven, so again there's room for emergent player interactions from territory -> resources -> markets -> profit <- Fighting Around The World! But before that and different is the sandbox stuff: Voxel creation gameplay which adds a very DIFFERENT gameplay emphasis apart from the above. Personally I'd say both are Virtual World MMOs, that's where they may end feeling categorically similar but different gameplay experiences.
  24. Hmm, good job OP for starting this "conversation starter"! And some awesome replies so far by everyone. I'd try to begin from first principles (hehe and drive everyone spare by doing so... hehe)... City in RL: As above the economic reasons (and mate selection also as Nanodot points out: "Sexy Cities" for young people defo a big incentive, that energy probably channels most of the economic model of many societies; whoa anyway side-tracking again, where were we?) City in DU: It's going to be a BASE OF OPERATIONS I think first and foremost: A Spacebase, let's think about that:- 1. Location for resources 2. Defensible location on planet or elsewhere 3. Node in orgs trade routes and market hubs 4. Density of these becomes an attractor in itself So that's what it is mostly is. What would it look like? 1. Places for ships to land and dump cargo and fill up with stuff. 2. Places for others to make ships and other stuff. 3. Builders want to build buildings no doubt perhaps fortifications and rooms for various functions. 4. Maybe a long-term plan to attract new players flashy stuff just for showing off a nice ambience/atmosphere? 5. Some functional fun stuff: death race tracks and themeparky stuff that might be fun to bet on... 6. Markets and "bars" purely for novelty and maybe ingame music and such like? 7. Some second life weird stuff like architectural challenges people seem to dig... "here's my condo on lake Ta-Ho of Alioth". 8. Tutorial centres for newbies? Personally I love sci-fi military novels so just see large centres as military bases with the required logistics and economic supplies, but no doubt others will see many other things especially if there's lots of interactive stuff to mess with? How much of the above will be under some protective bubble or Spectre Style Hidden Bases underground? There will definitely be a demand by in-game players to "stand and stare" and soak up all the creativity possible from building and designing "in space". "So come to Dual Universe, for the memory of a lifetime!"
  25. Apologies my reply was indeed tone deaf: It's a very very good thing (for philosophical reasons I won't go into!): Here's some:- synonyms: distinctive, individual, characteristic, distinct, distinguishing, peculiar, individualistic, different, typical, special, specific, representative, unique, personal, private, essential;
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