MookMcMook
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Posts posted by MookMcMook
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Some sort of necro thread. It's been said quote-unquote: "This is the story of humanity in the stars" aka "The Civilization Building MMO".
Also I don't think I've actually come across a convincing description of intelligent alien life yet. We're just not up to it yet in our imagination... so let's stick with humanity which still has a lot of work to do on it alone before moving along further! For sure various alien fauna and flora why not? THAT can tell us something about our own originating planet first of all.
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15 minutes ago, Haunty said:
The game content and mechanics are everything I expected based on the information NQ released in the past. The development progress is slow, but I expected that after following other MMOs. The dev relationship with players is better than average in my experience, and communication has gotten better and more frequent lately. At this stage most of the community are backers and passionate about the game, generally good. After release I'd expect it to evolve into something similar to eve-online's community, for better or worse.
I played Elite Dangerous for a while. It was fun but I didn't get the feeling that I was playing an MMO, it was mostly NPCs and content generated by the devs. That's why I'm interested in DU, everything is created by the players.
This is a very insightful post, OP. I mean very. The writing is very much on the wall for those with eyes to see.
As for your post OP, it barely registers a ripple. Some posts like the above, the few words they use the more you know that lies behind them. Other posts like yours the words they use, the less you know lies behind them. You're lucky to get such a high class reply as above, far more than is merited. Perhaps they mispelled their uname as "Haughty".
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On 15/03/2018 at 9:03 PM, mihoci10 said:
Thanks for the info!
You're very welcome. Please do feel free to ask any more questions. Happy to discuss.
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1 hour ago, mihoci10 said:
Hey, I'm new around here and have what is possibly a dumb question.
I'm planning on getting the bronze pledge pack so I wonder roughly when is the release of the alpha stages projected and also for the final release. Also if you could somehow get to earlier alpha tests without giving the whole monthly scholarship.
Thanks for replying in advance!
NQ said they'd update a roadmap for the Alphas. Naturally everything comes with delays likely as opposed to exceptional.
You have to PAY the correct amount to get earlier Alpha version assess. Period.
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51 minutes ago, Megaddd said:
For reference, Hrafnkell Oskarsson worked at CCP for over a good decade of Game Design on Eve Online since 1999, 3 years of game design on World of Darkness (failed CCP MMO), and a good year of writing lore on Eve Online.
I believe he is a fantastic addition to the team.Not sure they could have landed a better fit of experience for the role. Agree. G'luck to Oskarsson: Have fun messing with thousands of players!
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Unigine 2. I don't want cartoonish style either but the animations / models seem fine to me, they're deliberately "blunt" in detail or will be for spaceships etc for performance reasons (graphical trade off) besides that lasts anyway. The game does not need to be stunning, compare to Minecraft block graphics and you'd be doing better.
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Depends where you find toxicity: On the back of a poison-arrow frog it's an essential survival mechanism...
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10 minutes ago, Semproser said:
I wouldn't worry about it, this forum is basically designed for overthinking things. Any discussion about experience with the game is under NDA and we've barely got 4 hours worth of (some very old) footage and descriptions with fairly little actual gameplay. What else can we do but overthink things
LOL! In laughter truth, in wine, wisdom (amongst friends).
JC tweeted a sanctuary on Alioth's moon, it sent out the right vibes to me; you could say it was a "successful moon landing".
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1 hour ago, PyroTechnica said:
Y’know, why do we all actually want to win anyway? What do you gain from winning, and what would you actually lose if you just gave up and let someone else take the win?
"A strange game... where the winning move is not to play."
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On 11/03/2018 at 7:17 PM, Mod-Meldrik said:
A true sandbox mmo at its core
I think most people use "sandbox" as a loose hand-waving about general freedom and creativity as opposed to the standard in almost all games/mmo-rpgs: Restriction.
A "Pure" Sandbox would be closer to Garry's Mod for example.
A Sandbox = Object manipulation and/or rule manipulation
7 minutes ago, BlorgonSlayer said:given the tools of "god" to customize their universe
Serendipity smiles today this is an eg of the latter option of a Pure Sandbox... And hence I'm going correct what DU is, using this: It's NOT a pure Sandbox as above, Raw Manipulation -> Raw Creation.
In DU the sandbox layer is already designed with PURPOSE (Telos) to create a Physical UNIVERSE (hint: Dual Universe name) via the voxel objects. It's already moving away from Raw Manipulation without pre-defined purpose. But that means the building and hence world interaction has just gone off the scale... hence it very much is a very sandbox game.
6 minutes ago, BlorgonSlayer said:"different" are not really different at all.
Nothing new under the sun. And yet each day is an entirely new day.
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11 minutes ago, DarkHorizon said:
I'm going to stifle this baby in the crib before it becomes a problem here.
Let's not add forty more letters so it's correct and everyone is catered to. Just make up a short acronym and run with it.
Tual Universe, the best F.A.S.T. game of 2018!!!1
Freaking
Awesome
Super
Time
It's not a problem. It's like trying to catch cat tails; just a pointless game.
But the emphasis difference is useful for exchanging ideas and so that adds value.
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1 minute ago, Falstaf said:
@MookMcMook oh certainly, genres and definitions evolve over time. But we use certain words to communicate certain ideas.
Perhaps we should say today an RPG is defined as such and such. Though a platformer won't suddenly become a RTS game.
But I share your idea that DU is blurring the lines in certain areas. For an MMO it's certainly trying to improve on what's possible in a persistent universe.
Who knows, when DU is a few years old people might invent a name specifically for the type of game it becomes.
For sure, "sandbox": "What's that thing in the sky? Oh that's a bird. See it has wings. What's that really big one then? Oh that's a plane..."
On one level.
MMOVW.
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5 hours ago, Falstaf said:
Like I said, I disagree with you on that. And a quick Google will show you that the definition is a variation on what I said.
But you are free to have your own ideas on what is or isn't.
If being the hero is central to something being an RPG then Halo, Doom etc would be RPGs but everyone agrees they aren't. For the reasons I mentioned earlier.
But like I said you are free to see things your way. And while I think your perspective is interesting I can't agree with it.
I'm sorry I used hero or trope where I could have used ego or convention with respect to mmorpg. That's more appropriate. I don't need to persuade or propaganda any ideas here, I do feel it's right to try to communicate effectively ideas however if at possible.
Put it this way, a lot of game systems have mechanics and aesthetics that are deeply incongruous. You can say a particular genre is composed of the mechanics used, I say BS. That's a convention dependent on the current means employed and will change in time as it always does. Anyway, we'll see how DU manifests, there's a "groove" here, if you can follow it with your finger, it is weaving an interesting prospect.
2 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:What I'm saying is that perhaps the things that sets it apart is also the thing that makes it shallow and unable to live up to the hype that surrounds it currently.
So I'm just saying, I want to believe in this game, based on how exited people are about it, but it really doesn't seem like anything special to me,
There are other games out there that offer similar things, without the limitations that this game has imposed on itself.
Really you're misconstruing DU: There's not a lot of hype about it. That's the whole point: It seems to me people are blind eg SC or NMS: How on earth are people so blind as to not understand what those games are or were going to be (not)?? This clearly proves that people don't see what is in front of their eyes. And that is a big reason why the games market (marketing) or other markets end up the way they do.
What is exciting is the tech in DU. We don't know if that will translate to a great game system on top of it. But given most if not all mmoRPGs never ever get past first base, it IS exciting to see progress to base 2 for once.
Finally, I've already provided factual evidence of where PHYSICALLY the game is different in design and that's only for starters: People are only going to get lost in semantics or sentiment, until they start using what's in front of them.
Btw the way NQ has approached this is not the only way, but the tech they're using is you can be clear about this a very impressive way to design such a virtual world. So talking of limitations is a joke not to be taken seriously.
2 hours ago, Kurock said:This is an sandbox MMO.
It's actually:-
1. Sandbox
2. Simulation
These are then creating a Virtual World MMO (MMOVW). It's one reason it's an exciting prospect.
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34 minutes ago, Falstaf said:
I think we have to disagree on that.
RPG has nothing to do with being a hero. It has to do with how the interactions with the world are done. Stats dictating the outcome of an action.
Ultima, EVE, Star Wars Galaxies etc were all based on stats. Sure they have a strong emphasis on the world but at its roots they are still RPGs.
An MMOVW would be something like Second Life.
And DU has a strong community and world building focus but that has nothing to do with the definition of RPG.
You're merely talking about "Skill Abstraction" systems.
The design emphasis of mmoRPGs very much is orientated around some peculiar notion that the CHARACTER (hero's journey completely ripped to shreds btw) is the centre of the universe "so to speak". Look at the designs. Or if that does not appeal, just put it that these mmoRPGs designs have much much more in common with each other than they do with DU, DU being an outlier to the extent it should have a different categorization merely through relative divergence.
It's for this reason that these "worlds" have been such low interaction environments: As @BlorgonSlayer has been saying there's a cost associated to MMO scale and this very much is the cost of these mmoRPG designs: They're dead worlds or ghost towns. For some financial reason devs of mmos have assumed that each player is predominantly a power-projection of the player's ego. It's a limited and limiting design. The real potential is in networks of players within a highly interactive virtual world building construct... combining what computers do very well networking and data:-
Physical systems -> logic -> player conceptual basis of the preceding -> Virtual World simulation game systems eg social tiers: combat, trade, politics and so on... these large systems then generate the necessary emergence.
RPG is just a genre trope afterall in video-games it's not a fixed thing: ""Stats of chars is wot players H-M like in the market"" I say complete BS. Bartle did an interesting analysis recently: What things DON'T players like in games and that's partly how you end up with various genres. Fair enough: What about beyond that though? What creates new experiences via making video-games?
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13 minutes ago, Falstaf said:
I'm not sure I understand you.
DU is played with a character that learns skills over time and allowing your character to be better at activities because of it. Character skill trumps player skill.
It also uses Stat rolls to calculate damage etc.
Those are both defining characteristics of RPG's.
So by game design DU is a MMORPG.
Emphasis.
mmoRPGs = You the player are the "Hero": The focus.
mmoVW = The "World" building is the focus.
Of the design. The latter can include RPG elements, the former does not include virtual world building of sufficient depth and interactivity and mutability.
It's interesting, Koster recalls that a lot of game journalists were, "Like, why would players want to bake bread and become a baker/boulangerie shop?" Yet often in many forums you have players piping: "Where's an MMO I can simply "be", not some dang hero saving the entire world, or be a simple farmer or whatever: Ie players don't want prescription, they want interaction that creates roles of some interesting consequence from their OWN actions and decisions as they experience the game world.
For example, I am getting impressions that DU will be very helpful for players to be very cooperative to achieve really interesting things. Less emphasis on individuals, more on the world works like such, we need to get groups of players to do various things cooperatively to interact with it most interestingly. That sort of vibe... Idk, I'm not a pre-alpha tester.
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11 hours ago, MookMcMook said:
It'll be DIFFERENT from most of what is out.
8 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:It'll DIFFERENT from most of what is out.
How did you lose the "be" btw in your quote?
8 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:However, it is drawing heavily from some other games that are in development now, and due to the approach they are taking in combining all these aspects, I'm not sure they are going to do it better than those doing these things independently. Yes, the graphics are amazing, but due to the voxel system, star citizen's graphics will always be better. Yes, it is an exciting open world sandbox space sim, but due to the graphics and single shard, it is less immersive and realistic than something like Empyrion.
Yes, you're inherently right.
1. All games end up drawing from other games. Minecraft drew heavily from "Infiniminer" for example, but it was Minecraft that blew up the Voxel genre you could say. I always felt Minecraft was like the true heir to the original Populous at a higher resolution... God I loved that game and still do
2. Again agree, an MMO's USP is SCALE, that sacrifices "granularity" as you point out (of detail). But that scale is potentially huge with respect to networks of players. A lot of money and lot of focus has been on SC but it won't scale... that vision hence is limited despite the stunning movie-like quality. You have realize the USP of GAMES themselves is not story, it's not sensory stimulation, though these are often v necessary in combination: It's interaction. Look at the interaction at scale potential. Will it end up that way: That's the question for the moment but we can refer to the preceding to conclude we're on the right road/tracks unlike other game designs. That is what I see and hear from NQ's conception and technology they're bringing to DU. Again we're ON the road, we're not "there" yet.
3. Graphics I believe are far over-rated: In fact what they're really good for is market discoverability and purchase boost. Not necessarily a good or great game that lasts. MMOs not only scale in the size of the virtual world but in the time they endure as games and hobbies for players to keep feeling involved and excited by. A big part of that is how successful the communities in the games develop and what FREEDOM and CREATIVITY they find. It's not graphics.
I'm just waiting for one faction to produce a Star Wars Themed War Fleet modelled on "The Empire" against another fleet idk maybe Transformers The Fleet or something else suitably "jarring".
8 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:The point remains, even at the level of customization that exists now, it is more than will ever exist in DU. Also, I'm not sure how you could downplay the immersion in EGS. You literally have to eat multiple times a day to survive, and you can get a poisonous spider bite and die if you don't treat it. These aspects are being further developed in coming updates as well, where simple medical issues can progress to more severe issues. So I'm not sure how you could think there is minimal immersion there. It's one of the most immersive games I've ever played tbh.
Yeah the personal survival stuff is too granular for an MMO. It's a different genre and scale of gameplay. Those MMOs that went that route ended up being obsessively grindy killing early player fun too quickly.
3 hours ago, Falstaf said:I think the major thing you must keep in mind is that DU is a MMORPG.
As said above:-
1. Many games today are derivative of making a platformer innovate within the platformer GENRE. Eg MMORPGs do this: DikuMUD -> EQ -> WOW -> Most other 3D Themeparks. They never deviated to reassess the original question of what an MMO should be and how best to represent that: It became a game design problem to tap a market to turn a profit and the cut corners are EVERYWHERE in these games and players know it or experience it.
2. The interesting innovation is when games take an entirely fresh reappraisal eg how do we simulate worlds/space at scale? UO -> EVE -> DU I feel go in this direction. I'd call them a separate genre: MMOVW (massively multiplayer online Virtual Worlds).
It's good NQ simply call DU: "The Civilization Building MMO". Similar enough to the above acronym that it does not matter but "identifiably" NOT "mmoRPG" most importantly. If DU is sufficiently different as I think it is and will be then, people will notice that irrespective of name tags used. So "all's well that ends well... a rose by any other name."
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Is DU really that "highly rendered graphics"? I don't think so. It's already an area of sacrifice. What's quite impressive is the LOD seeing stuff in the distance: I want to book my space tourism ticket already. Look at SC, it's ridiculous how much like a movie it looks in comparison.
Yeah there's no water particles or collision, those are trade-offs: Performance, granularity of detail trade off for a scaled mmo and gameplay: These were discussed in the forums somewhere with some input from NQ.
As to which is a better approach? Lots of servers with smaller populations but more realism and granularity (survival stuff is in this category) or a single shard. Personally, the bigger single shard population of players is a bigger pull. I think the shared story makes the story more interesting.
Planets are proc gen atm and they use an algorithm for generating the correct type of resources and proportions. It's an area they can iterate on over time. Again they've managed size, so extras eg animals or some such, it's a future consideration. Given how much voxel terraforming there is and construct design, it's not a big issue.
I do agree, I would love interesting biome parameters for more biological representation in the game...
It'll be DIFFERENT from most of what is out. Too many games are made these days according to the established tropes of an established genre: People seem to expect a certain formula when it's been done a thousand times... Games originally arose not to become like previous games but to represent something we could experience or imagine and how that might be represented creatively using computers: The latter is a more interesting way of developing games. Instead "build a platformer"... *sigh*. This is what I like about the simulation dream. Could we represent worlds and how do we do that and what's the essential stuff to make if feel right: So much more interesting. Today's mmorpgs are all the former and it shows (bar a few exceptions).
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47 minutes ago, Falstaf said:
Minor correction, star citizens server structure does not even compare to DU. It splits the world in instances, with a maximum of 40 players per instance. I'm not sure if this is currently in the game or still on their to do list. This might improve over time but they can't do what DU will do or what EVE does.
Networking is nightmare. Until you see it working it does not work! Probably should use this standard for DU atm too to be consistent. They have done the bots and they are boosting the performance and working on increasing player load for pre-alpha, so the signs are good they're doing things in the right order! Those that don't, won't have anything near approaching an MMO. That applies even to MMOs.
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With respect to the networking problem:-
1. Large Population Total
2. Population Density Problem
It seems DU is designed (design intention) to be around EVE. I can't think of any other MMOs that invested into networking technology to the same degree (with 3d graphics). Bear in mind the reason for multiple shards is primarily number 2 and even then many mmos deliberately partition Total population via levelling zones, instances, game modes, quest hub bread crumbs and so on. Bear in mind large crowds in mmo combat are often a zergy mess and poor quality gameplay irrespective of performance meltdown too. The main problem is MMO as a genre has a USP arounding CONNECTING PLAYERS in high quality social interaction ways: Think of liking or following on facebook or twitter for example for social network. Trade is a primary means of this "There's No Catholic Or Protestant When Trade Is Being Conducted" is an old saying from days of yore for example.
So that is exceptional category and the virtual economy is what will result if the game has:-
1. Enough social groups
2. Enough complexity in the sink-faucet of valuable resources
3. Distance/Scarcity dimensions
4. Politics and Territory above this.
A lot of "mmorpgs" don't really make any sense. If you have economic pressures and incentives this fuels a lot of gameplay behaviour by individuals and groups. And that needs a lot of SCALING UP. Eg EVE. I think this simulation is a key component of virtual worlds: They must have designs that make more simulacra in gameplay behaviours emerging as they might in say historic epochs of human history at a high level. Obviously DU is a "what if...?" with humanity in the future beyond Earth and our own solar system and in other solar systems within the galaxy. Interesting if the simulation follows some of what we currently know and assume about large scale drivers of human group motivations and patterns.
, then add voxels to that networking scale. I'm surprised how BLIND people appear to be
And the other thing: I don't see a lot of voxel games but when you do see them and you see how creative they are, then that's a huge dimension for mmorpgs. Not just that but look at the above COMBINED with voxels by comparing game world sizes:-
Ultima Online - 55.9 km²
World of Warcraft - 80mi2
Asheron's Call - 500mi2
Guild Wars: Nightfall - 15,000mi2
The Lord of the Rings Online - 30,000mi2
(NOT AN MMO) Elder Scrolls Online - 62,000mi2
WWIIOL online uses a ½ scale map of Western Europe with 52,000 km2 (20,077 sq mi) of accurate terrain (800 m resolution satellite data).
Life Is Feudal - 441km2
Now look at DU:-
Dual Universe - ALIOTH ONLY: 45,238.93 km2
Now add to this... (still only Alioth...): Volume of physical planet Total = 1,150,346 km3
Bear in mind the volume of the Atmospheric Belt surrounding this physical volume (some of which will never be used oc) and then the amount of volume above this in Space radiating out used too. Does anyone have some info on the atmospheric radius of Alioth? You can see a thin layer clearly in the latest backer portal video.
This is where the VOXELS really shake things up as you can see purely using the simple crude comparison of world size AREA vs Volume.
In most mmorpgs there's tiny amount of volume for starters: Limited free-form flight and interaction in this dimension or else gradient rise and fall. I think some mmorpgs have swimming deep in seas/lakes. But overall the ground is texture and hence area interaction mostly.
Not only can players go up and down in locomotion the actual physical layer is useful for resources and building structures too with voxels.
Then add the space around the other planets and the total solar system, then add more solar systems... And I barely mentoned what sort of huge data on the voxel manipulation changes to the world as well as the number and diversity of constructs multiplying changing the landscape or spacescape too.
You can see that in theory, DU is really something else. Again EVE compares, but it's "empty space" (I really liked the theory behind their dust game linking but sadly it did not work in practice).
Let's come back to the advantages of SCALING PLAYER NUMBERS (if it's possible):-
With so much space, there needs to be lot of players for that space to make a tiny impact on it. That is to say, most mmorpgs, they are not complex interaction systems at all: Neither socially nor in game world interactions either.
It will be interesting to see if DU achieves high physical interaction that itself drives further social interaction and that drives more of each and so on...
It's still early days so that may explain why many don't seem to twig: Another NMS etc!
But then... go back above look at those numbers, even add your own... did I already say people appear to be blind?
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2 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:
Again, one of the few things that distinguishes DU from EGS is the single server.
Are you sure about that? I don't know EGS so an explanation would be interesting.
2 hours ago, BlorgonSlayer said:It seems NQ is putting a lot of stock in that idea.
IS. Scale, networking, size, population density, all those reasons and more.
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1 hour ago, TheKoolBanana said:
While there will be similarities to EVE, people need to stop comparing DU to it:
- Because Dual Universe will be undoubtedly better,
- Because Dual Universe already has a thriving community and the game isn't even public yet..
- and mostly because it will be far far far far better than EVE Online.
Not keen on these descriptions because they resort to subjective qualifiers too much ie subjective experience vs impartial object.
At a high level:-
- EVE is more simulation. DU is a combination of sandbox (1st) and then simulation (2nd). THIS is a huge difference. It is not better or worse necessarily. For example today EVE has a thriving virtual economy DU does not. For example today DU has a sandbox voxel terrain construction + destruction manipulation interaction EVE does not.
- Community: EVE is oriented around combat which is a huge driver for the virtual economy simulation. DU will have more orientation around builders and creativity for the sake of creativity. We just don't know how the combat layer will pan out yet. This will generate different community interactions and in-game culture. I do expect a lot of EVE players to be interested in DU as EVE along with DU are both VIRTUAL WORLD MMOs (MMOVW). I expect those who are interested in ED and SC might be interested too given the large universe size and spaceship dimensions (1 design 2 build 3 script 4 crew 5 use).
- Let's not invite hubris. ps that avatar you use is simply awesome art.
edit: what @Dunbal and @wizardoftrash both said and @blazemonger of course given the detail on EVE.
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18 hours ago, blazemonger said:
Like your post and agree mostly but had to chuckle at this line after which you kind of go overboard on the over thinking yourself ..
I've had "training".
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Looking at the video, it looks to me that DU will be a fun game to collect "photos" in game and that sort of thing, maybe gifs and even videos too. The whole space tourism thing.
What software can the DU community (Noveans), particularly those experienced with using such, suggest for use for this purpose with DU running?
Stephen Hawking, modern cosmology's brightest star, dies aged 76
in Off Topic Discussions
Posted
I'm more impressed by Hawkins' will to live and do, while suffering a severe condition, than all his work. I don't have that type of strength, but it's a universal kind of battle for everyone in a way. But to keep battling and want to be a productive member of society, this is a really good thing I think people see in Hawkins' life. He just happened to have a cool hobby too...