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This game was fine as a sandbox building game


Sabretooth

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I haven't done real PVP since the days of gold cube meta, but ya this is a building sandbox willing to risk losing the builders by going after the PVP crowd and trying to please everyone with a shoestring budget. PVP focused gamers have so many options, This game would need to be really finely tuned to keep them around. Us builders have nothing better. Maybe it all pays off but I don't think it was a smart gamble.

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On 6/11/2022 at 2:44 PM, Msoul said:

The goal is, and has always been, to attract both builders and pvpers

 

And that's the core of the problem...NQ's original "idea" for DU was way too ambitious for the resources they had. 

 

DU needed a niche...but instead it promised to be a great place for builders, PvP'ers, politicians, pilots, traders, industrialists...when you reach so wide, sometimes your arms break. 

 

I'm not saying DU is better off without PvP...but as a small studio, they needed to pick a niche and stick with it because they never had the means to create both a great building sandbox experience and an engaging, robust PvP layer and make the two ideas gel. 

 

NQ may not be "indie" with over $20 million in investment, but far more simplified MMOs are built with over 10 times the budget...they needed to focus on one niche/player group instead of obsessing over this fantastical metaverse ideal where "everyone can find something to do". 

 

The feature depth required to really bring balance and satisfaction to both player groups was beyond NQ's reach, especially considering that the first years were led by someone with zero experience who didn't understand the difficulties they'd face. That set the stage long ago; NQ today can only change the props and the players, because there's no time to rewrite the script.

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6 hours ago, blundertwink said:

 

And that's the core of the problem...NQ's original "idea" for DU was way too ambitious for the resources they had. 

 

DU needed a niche...but instead it promised to be a great place for builders, PvP'ers, politicians, pilots, traders, industrialists...when you reach so wide, sometimes your arms break. 

 

I'm not saying DU is better off without PvP...but as a small studio, they needed to pick a niche and stick with it because they never had the means to create both a great building sandbox experience and an engaging, robust PvP layer and make the two ideas gel. 

 

NQ may not be "indie" with over $20 million in investment, but far more simplified MMOs are built with over 10 times the budget...they needed to focus on one niche/player group instead of obsessing over this fantastical metaverse ideal where "everyone can find something to do". 

 

The feature depth required to really bring balance and satisfaction to both player groups was beyond NQ's reach, especially considering that the first years were led by someone with zero experience who didn't understand the difficulties they'd face. That set the stage long ago; NQ today can only change the props and the players, because there's no time to rewrite the script.

I personally think it is possible to satisfy both builders and PvPer. DU has all required mechanics now. I offer:

1. reduce safe zone only to zone around Alioth, moons and 2 initial planets and interplanetary space around them. 

2. remove all save zone around other planets

3. turn on planetary battle according space rules (Construct vs construct) 

4. Add powerful shields and base weapons to protect planet and orbit bases 

5. make T3-T5 production possible only in PvP zone. (for example in safe zone all strong power sources are blocked by some suppressor, including weapon and T3+ production)

in this case builders can build everything they want in safe zone but PvPer should build in PvP space and protect it. 

everyone are happy  

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1 minute ago, Catarix said:

I personally think it is possible to satisfy both builders and PvPer. DU has all required mechanics now. I offer:

1. reduce safe zone only to zone around Alioth, moons and 2 initial planets and interplanetary space around them. 

2. remove all save zone around other planets

3. turn on planetary battle according space rules (Construct vs construct) 

4. Add powerful shields and base weapons to protect planet and orbit bases 

5. make T3-T5 production possible only in PvP zone. (for example in safe zone all strong power sources are blocked by some suppressor, including weapon and T3+ production)

in this case builders can build everything they want in safe zone but PvPer should build in PvP space and protect it. 

everyone are happy  

 

You're basically saying that PvP is already fun enough it just needs to be more available. I don't really agree with that. I think combat is far too niche to satisfy the typical PvP-oriented gamer, regardless of how common or restrictive it is. 


Even if NQ wanted to make this sort of "simple" change, they probably couldn't without jeopardizing an infrastructure that's already vastly unstable and doing major refactors to the codebase...I mean they couldn't even roll out space TW and had to relegate that to alien cores. It isn't as simple as them "turning on planetary combat" -- with how this game has been engineered, that could mean a lot of refactors. 

 

Your suggest is basically to roll out TW everywhere and make atmo combat work...they couldn't even roll out space TW and had to do alien cores, so I think the challenges here are immense for NQ. I don't think they can support this vision of combat technically, at least not right now. 

 

It might seem these changes would be low in scope, but unfortunately I don't think that's the case. 

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2 minutes ago, blundertwink said:

 

You're basically saying that PvP is already fun enough it just needs to be more available. I don't really agree with that. I think combat is far too niche to satisfy the typical PvP-oriented gamer, regardless of how common or restrictive it is. 


Even if NQ wanted to make this sort of "simple" change, they probably couldn't without jeopardizing an infrastructure that's already vastly unstable and doing major refactors to the codebase...I mean they couldn't even roll out space TW and had to relegate that to alien cores. It isn't as simple as them "turning on planetary combat" -- with how this game has been engineered, that could mean a lot of refactors. 

 

Your suggest is basically to roll out TW everywhere and make atmo combat work...they couldn't even roll out space TW and had to do alien cores, so I think the challenges here are immense for NQ. I don't think they can support this vision of combat technically, at least not right now. 

 

It might seem these changes would be low in scope, but unfortunately I don't think that's the case. 

I agree with you that the changes I offered can be not so easy to implement. I just wanted to say that Devs should focus on what easy to do to improve playability. for example they plan AvA PvP that will be much more difficult because it should be non target PvP. secondly they want to rework lua engine. that changes don't increase players base. I want changes that increase player base. I was flying today all day from my base to Alioth market 6 and I've seen 1 player for all day! on main market in single server MMO!!!

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20 minutes ago, Catarix said:

I agree with you that the changes I offered can be not so easy to implement. I just wanted to say that Devs should focus on what easy to do to improve playability. for example they plan AvA PvP that will be much more difficult because it should be non target PvP. secondly they want to rework lua engine. that changes don't increase players base. I want changes that increase player base. I was flying today all day from my base to Alioth market 6 and I've seen 1 player for all day! on main market in single server MMO!!!

 

Yeah the number of players today is....not great. 

 

I agree that no one will get super excited about LUA refactors, but this again speaks to NQ's quest to reduce infrastructure costs (has been a main focus since they added auto-miners!) as much as humanly possible. 

 

I think they are concerned about the game scaling knowing that most new players won't stay for longer than 1-2 months....if it costs them money to acquire those users (e.g. via ads) it's very easy to imagine those new users costing NQ money instead of earning them money...hence why they're cutting costs as much as possible. 

 

So I agree that they need to focus on feature depth and that they've needed to focus on that for months and months now...but they're still stuck trying to get this thing running efficiently enough to generate any sort of revenue and I think even with all their efforts here the game will not run well on release...

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8 hours ago, blundertwink said:

 

And that's the core of the problem...NQ's original "idea" for DU was way too ambitious for the resources they had.

 

This bring us back to the something seriously off with NQ part. They seem utterly incapable of deliver a product in a reasonable time frame.

And by that I mean that NQ had >150 employees at one time, and still have 73 registered employees. So this is not a small company.

 

Hello Games (No Man Sky) in comparison had 26 employees in 2020...

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15 hours ago, CptLoRes said:

This bring us back to the something seriously off with NQ part. They seem utterly incapable of deliver a product in a reasonable time frame.

And by that I mean that NQ had >150 employees at one time, and still have 73 registered employees. So this is not a small company.

 

Hello Games (No Man Sky) in comparison had 26 employees in 2020...

 

NMS built their initial product with about a dozen employees over 3 years, including creating their own engine tailored to the game they wanted to create. 

 

This is the difference experience makes -- it doesn't matter how accomplished JC was in robotics and AI, he was a novice in gaming. 

 

By contrast, Murray was already an experienced developer when he founded Hello Games with two other experienced developers. They knew how to build games from the start. JC made a basic prototype and believed he could create an MMO from it...that was hubris, not ambition.

 

DU's problems start at the very beginning as they so often do.

 

We're far beyond "the design of this game needs to change" at this point -- at this point, I'd be surprised if the game was able to physically run on release, never mind if people actually stick around for more than 1 billing cycle. 

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19 hours ago, Catarix said:

I personally think it is possible to satisfy both builders and PvPer. DU has all required mechanics now. I offer:

1. reduce safe zone only to zone around Alioth, moons and 2 initial planets and interplanetary space around them. 

2. remove all save zone around other planets

3. turn on planetary battle according space rules (Construct vs construct) 

4. Add powerful shields and base weapons to protect planet and orbit bases 

5. make T3-T5 production possible only in PvP zone. (for example in safe zone all strong power sources are blocked by some suppressor, including weapon and T3+ production)

in this case builders can build everything they want in safe zone but PvPer should build in PvP space and protect it. 

everyone are happy  

oh man.... Ive read so many me, me, me, me posts from pvp lovers, its becoming embarassing to me. 85% of this game is PVP zone, but you still want more, up to 99% or even a 100% of all area MUST be pvp. Also the me, me, me, me, with the ores. Like special ore should only be availabe to people who want to pew pew or risk to pew pew. Builders cant make elevators or gates,! I could agree with 1 or 2 pvp planets, so there can be war in gravital air (thats why they could introduce gas-giant planets'') and could have, like 5 times more T5 ore in those zones.

And tell me, if there is no safe-zone, would you build a base, that will take 8 months to complete only to see it destroyed in 2 days by [fill in a name like Legion]?

The list of players that rage-quit because of the loss of 1 m-core while hauling or d/c while trying to land, goes on and on... losing a whole base WILL make people throw important stuff(read: desktops, laptops, deskchairs, keyboards, mouses, coffeecups, headsets) through unopened windows. I can assure you that

 

As a builder, I was satisfied with the way it was set up after 0.23. I could build and mine whenever and wherever I wanted. Never been into pvp territory in 16 months of playing. The fact that 'Legion had won DU' didnt bother me at all. I would never meet a Legion pvp ship because I do not come into their space. So I wont see their builds unless its on a tube video. 

 

And so, this game was fine as it was: a sandbox building game (with pvp possiblities) and expanding the building part would also benefit the pew pew people.

Because pew pew people also like to build a home base, they also like more cockpits, they also would like to colour their wings and engines on their ships.

This dumb focus on pew pew play is not the thing that needed attention.

I think having a pet would attract more players to come back than the 'pvp-improvements' they have made. They could have introduced pets, that have abilities that boast your character, like boast building speed or adjustor power(being explained as agility). Also let them have talent points also, maybe only develop when you take them with you. Just to display all the pets (read: DU pokémon) would be something people would visit (builders that visit pvp players, wtf???)

 

Character creation, is something that this game lacked for almost 2 years now, (there is a new update that adresses this, I think)

just a spacesuit colour,

in an mmo space game.

Please help me God, at least give us more humanoid races, like having a tail, or a shark's head

 

But as I was saying in my first post: nq is trying to proof me wrong, let see what will happen

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20 hours ago, Catarix said:

I was flying today all day from my base to Alioth market 6 and I've seen 1 player for all day! on main market in single server MMO!!!

For what reason should players invest time in the game now? I don't currently spend time in the game either, but in other games, it's fun. I will only invest time in DualUniverse again (maybe) after the wipe and release. 

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1 hour ago, Sabretooth said:

oh man.... Ive read so many me, me, me, me posts from pvp lovers, its becoming embarassing to me.

etc... 

Oh man, I feel your anger. I didn't want to disappoint you or anyone. The current gamestate is result of wrong decisions, not a 'waiting wipe' or something. People don't play because there is nothing to do. It is impossible to create an MMO with core mechanics like building. 100 or 1000 builders are not enough. So without competition, this game will die. I don't want it to die.

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1 hour ago, Zarcata said:

For what reason should players invest time in the game now? I don't currently spend time in the game either, but in other games, it's fun. I will only invest time in DualUniverse again (maybe) after the wipe and release. 

people don't invest in games... people play games. if there are no people it means the game is not interesting

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