Single Player (Option to create MODs)

[Archonious]

Hi

 

As we know, game is based on construction and creative. So big part of this is variability, which must be same for every player. But at the same time, if we take "Space Engineers", there are huge amount of great MODs with new interesting items and designs. I fully understand it is almost impossible to introduce in MMO game, so I want to ask, will be option to play Single Player mode and have option to add own mods?

 

I don't interesting about SP as player, but I think, it is great opportunity for developers to find new ideas and get great designs from players.

I don't doubt, you are great developer team, but new ideas could come up from anywhere =)

 

Thanks

Archonious

[norab7]

Hi

 

As we know, game is based on construction and creative. So big part of this is variability, which must be same for every player. But at the same time, if we take "Space Engineers", there are huge amount of great MODs with new interesting items and designs. I fully understand it is almost impossible to introduce in MMO game, so I want to ask, will be option to play Single Player mode and have option to add own mods?

 

I don't interesting about SP as player, but I think, it is great opportunity for developers to find new ideas and get great designs from players.

I don't doubt, you are great developer team, but new ideas could come up from anywhere =)

 

Thanks

Archonious

 

Welcome to the Forums of DU,

 

If i understand your post correctly you are asking whether or not there is a single player section to the game. The answer is almost 100% no, there will be no singleplayer in the sense that you are the only person in the game at any time.

 

There is sections on the game that will have no contact to the other people playing, such as the virtual construct environment where you design and plan out constructs. But any normal gameplay that you will be expecting to do will be online and with other people completely MMO based.

 

I understand that good ideas can come from being a single player (when you can spawn in anything) but there is nothing stopping you building anything in game whilst other people are playing also, the only limiting factor is time. I myself would prefer to build something great knowing that i had to work for it.

 

Mods on the other hand, I'm not 100% sure, I'm sure someone else will have the answer to that, but as i can't recall anything to do with mods i'm going to to assume either there are not going to be any or it's not been asked. But like i say someone else will have to answer that question for you.

 

But yeah, Welcome to the DU forums, i hope you enjoy your stay

 

nora,

[Archonious]

It is more about mods, not single mode actually. Simply, I don't see any option for mods in MMO. But if you ever played "Space Engineers" (which is the closest game, I think, to this one), mods take huge part of game, some of them were integrated into official part of game as well.

So that is great opportunity for developers, first of all.

 

It can be as DEMO, it can be as Single Player, it can be something else... if game will allow to create new items and designs for those who know how to do that.

[Dreamstar]

I do not believe this game will have a single player mode, its intended to be a single universe across multiple sever shards. Similar to EV.E online.

 

In order to preserve a single art direction they do not want to allow players to upload any 3'd models, or other objects not created by the developers.

 

They are allowing some flexibility in the way things work, however I do want to add that altering any mechanics or creating an automated script to fly the ship will not be possible.

https://board.dualthegame.com/index.php?/topic/314-devblog-lua-scripting-and-distributed-processing-units-dpus/?hl=devblog

 

Depending on the systems they give us access to though. You could probably make doors open and close on their own, a control unit for sorting inventory items,... possibly and I say possibly make a railroad and have a car on it that moves on a rail or track when people get inside.

 

We still dont know if things like wheels will exist and so forth, though I intend to ask them for such.

 

Overall though, no this game is intended to be a massive multiplayer experience and they do not have plans for game changing mods.

 

If they allow "mod" support it would probably be more like other MMO's which allow for user interface changes, damage meters, or non gameplay altering things. For now I can tell you this simply isn't a goal of theirs to implement right now.

[Archonious]

 

In order to preserve a single art direction they do not want to allow players to upload any 3'd models, or other objects not created by the developers.

If it is not allowed now, it could be reason of "Closed Tests". But as I wrote, it is opportunity for developers mainly. Players overall won't get much from that.

[yamamushi]

 

They are allowing some flexibility in the way things work, however I do want to add that altering any mechanics or creating an automated script to fly the ship will not be possible.

https://board.dualthegame.com/index.php?/topic/314-devblog-lua-scripting-and-distributed-processing-units-dpus/?hl=devblog

 

 

 

I believe the section of that devblog you're quoting would be this one:

 

 

In terms of game design, we could opt for an easy strategy here. If you have the required number of engines in the right direction (no matter where they are), and you check the list of instruments needed, it would "magically" fly. With this approach, all ships would fly the same. Trying to put more engines, or optimizing their position would be more or less useless. Hoping to have an AI helping with automatic navigation would be up to the engineers of Novaquark only. Fancy a new way to drive your ship? Impossible. How about the weapons system? How about drones? All this would be predefined and more or less rigidly identical for all players. That's not what we have in mind for Dual Universe. 

 

...

 

The DPU system goes ways beyond this simple ship stabilization example. Weapon control, whether in FPS direct view on a jet fighter, or in tactical overall view in a battleship, will be handled with DPUs. Scripting a drone can be done with DPUs. Setting the automatic defense mechanism of your castle can be made with DPUs. Factories can be automated with DPUs, etc. 

 

 

Unless I'm understanding it completely wrong, that would appear to imply the opposite is true, that they do intend to allow for people to have AI helping with automatic navigation as well as all sorts of other pieces of automation (scripting drones, automatic base defenses, automated factories, etc.). 

[Blakjac]

Hi

 

As we know, game is based on construction and creative. So big part of this is variability, which must be same for every player. But at the same time, if we take "Space Engineers", there are huge amount of great MODs with new interesting items and designs. I fully understand it is almost impossible to introduce in MMO game, so I want to ask, will be option to play Single Player mode and have option to add own mods?

 

I don't interesting about SP as player, but I think, it is great opportunity for developers to find new ideas and get great designs from players.

I don't doubt, you are great developer team, but new ideas could come up from anywhere =)

 

Thanks

Archonious

 

From the limited amount I have read so far, the devs are specifically focused on delivering an MMO. So the short answer is "no".

 

Whether the devs ever decide to release a moddable server client remains to be seen.

[Archonious]

Whether the devs ever decide to release a moddable server client remains to be seen.

That actually question about. It could be even simple constructor demo. So mod-creators can test their creations, share for discuss or vote. And then developers can make decisions, about these mods.

[Ripper]

I'm not sure what your asking here.  You're wanting to mod the client?  To what end?

 

It has been stated that the game will have a Virtual Builder area, where you can design your constructs in peace.  The blueprints can then be carried into the game world.

[yamamushi]

They are using an HTML5 based UI system, so who knows, we may one day be able to modify at least that part of it quite easily:

 

http://www.dualthegame.com/technology

[Dreamstar]

You are right, I misinterpreted the LUA devblog, I thought it was saying those things WERE impossible, when it actually 180's in the next sentence. The way it was layed out tricked me.

 

 

Though I'd still like to point out that as far as I've been able to discern there will be a difference between Drones, AI Crew Members, and making an automated ship with a DPU.

 

I don't have any more info than anyone else, just speculation and projected insight from the publicly available nyzaltar posts.

 

Making drones do your bidding, yes. Probably a hard limit set by NQ on how many drone DPU you can have. Either by a module limiter, or power requirements, or so forth.

 

AI Crew, no idea on how they work. Maybe you script them, maybe they are predefined by NQ.

 

Making a fully automatic and intuitive AI to fly ships, I don't think NQ is looking to make it so players can have a 1 man empire. I don't know LUA so its difficult for me to say, but I believe they will limit the complexity by some means to prevent people from making an AI army or fleet.

 

 

Not to say there won't or can't be automated ships. I hope so, because I would like to create platforms or small ships to serve as automated rapid transport. Use command units at checkpoints. When players get in, it takes off for the next station. No need even for rails or wheels, though they might make it easier to ensure it goes to the right place.

 

Anyhow, thanks for catching my mistake. Sorry for being misleading.

[ShadowLordAlpha]

You are right, I misinterpreted the LUA devblog, I thought it was saying those things WERE impossible, when it actually 180's in the next sentence. The way it was layed out tricked me.

 

 

Though I'd still like to point out that as far as I've been able to discern there will be a difference between Drones, AI Crew Members, and making an automated ship with a DPU.

 

I don't have any more info than anyone else, just speculation and projected insight from the publicly available nyzaltar posts.

 

Making drones do your bidding, yes. Probably a hard limit set by NQ on how many drone DPU you can have. Either by a module limiter, or power requirements, or so forth.

 

AI Crew, no idea on how they work. Maybe you script them, maybe they are predefined by NQ.

 

Making a fully automatic and intuitive AI to fly ships, I don't think NQ is looking to make it so players can have a 1 man empire. I don't know LUA so its difficult for me to say, but I believe they will limit the complexity by some means to prevent people from making an AI army or fleet.

 

 

Not to say there won't or can't be automated ships. I hope so, because I would like to create platforms or small ships to serve as automated rapid transport. Use command units at checkpoints. When players get in, it takes off for the next station. No need even for rails or wheels, though they might make it easier to ensure it goes to the right place.

 

Anyhow, thanks for catching my mistake. Sorry for being misleading.

But i want to make the borg

[yamamushi]

I don't think it would be very fun to have everyone commanding their own massive drone fleets, but I think having drones flying around a capital ship to protect it would be useful.

 

Or even mining drones that work on a few asteroids at a time. 

 

As far as AI goes, I'd be happy with just being able to tell my AI to fly me to a a given planet and for it to navigate my ship around while I grab a drink in the galley. I think LUA, combined with some sensor input, could lead to some really cool AI-like features though.

 

Or even "AI" in the sense that some emergency features could be automated. I'd like for airlocks to shut down automatically if there's a hull breach for example. 

 

That's not really AI though, and more of just event handling. 

[Magster]

As complicated as this looks to become, I can't imagine they would spend time on creating a single player mode.

 

As far as handling your own large fleets is concerned, maybe they should make their views very clear early on, regarding the use of ISBoxer and macros etc. People can and have been very imaginative in the past, with those tools.

[Anasasi]

As complicated as this looks to become, I can't imagine they would spend time on creating a single player mode.

 

 

A game of this scale won't ever have a single-player moddable section, it's just way to big of an undertaking for such a small team. 

 

They might end up opening player item input eventually, but, who knows. 

[magnatron]

interesting idea to get more inspiration to the devs, sadly im not sure many modders would create mods that no one is going to use. in end im sure most would just write a post for the idea's forum and go back to playing.

 

also isn't the code they write obscured or encrypted to try to cut down on hackers and cheat programs? if the cheats got too wide spread im sure it would negatively effect the player base and result in an exodus. although i freely admit i am ignorant to software development so i could very well be completely off base here.

[TrihXeen]

I don't see the point in creating "mods" other than aesthetics that aren't in the game(I only say this because we don't know the extent of customization in the game at this moment). From what I have read, the coding you would have to do for a mod, is doable in game. So there would be no point in making an add-on.

 

Honestly, I believe that a single player version of the game would just completely obliterate any storage room you have on your computer unless you have a bunch of terabyte drives, like miniature database amount of space. As well as a system that can handle not only your movement and location, but keeping track of everything that you render in, do the math for how much a planet has rotated and moved around its sun, while it wasn't rendered in. I could see the servers this game running on would be dual cpu slot boards that have 128 gigs of ram if not more.

 

All in all, the idea of the game is it being community driven. Even if they did release a single player that was limited to one solar system, that could potentially take thousands of people away from the MMO experience. It's no fun being the only person left alive in the universe, trust me.

[Archonious]

All in all, the idea of the game is it being community driven. Even if they did release a single player that was limited to one solar system, that could potentially take thousands of people away from the MMO experience. It's no fun being the only person left alive in the universe, trust me.

It is not about full game version with all features (As example, demo version of "Planet Nomads". Little piece of ground for creating something). It is exactly for MOD creating. New item, which can be rated by community and be voted in future for realisation in full game. Pretty simple.

[TrihXeen]

I'm not against MODs. We would have to wait and see what the game will entail before pushing the issue of player made items being added to the game before release. If the game has as much customization as is being hoped for, then we wouldn't need MODs. That is my hope for DU.

[Archonious]

I'm not against MODs. We would have to wait and see what the game will entail before pushing the issue of player made items being added to the game before release. If the game has as much customization as is being hoped for, then we wouldn't need MODs. That is my hope for DU.

I see these forum discussions only as "Hey Devs, it could be nice if game would include this or be easy adaptable to this in future". In other way, forum discussions before release is nearly pointless