PlaneShift
Support => Complaint Department => Topic started by: Sangwa on August 19, 2008, 02:26:55 pm
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I've decided to give my insight to the PlaneShift project's current situation after having played it for enough time (5 years) to comprehend lightly the community, the game rules and the developing body. So, here are a few points that together constitute my critique to this game:
- This game has a good role play environment. However role playing does not need to be consistent (there's no moderation to guarantee such) and so all quality role play is diluted in plots that include concepts that disrespect the settings;
- The game is good as far as interaction with the settings is concerned, but it's very poor as far as Player-Player interaction is concerned. The problem is that players end up not being able to use the rich information obtained in quests amongst themselves (if you try to role play that your character has fixed a poem for a kran that was needing it, another character will tell you that he did the same thing. Why would the Kran need that many equal poems?);
- The game has no plot. GM Events don't seem to point towards a plot-line, or if they do, it's not clear and most players remain ignorant to it. These events still work much like Hack n Slash fashion, where players are a homogeneous mass that pokes around until the only possible route to success is achieved and everyone is rewarded;
- The game's economy is ridiculous, because you just need to do a dull-witted action (mining; which involves only moving around and typing "/dig platinium") to get money, making all other activities ridiculous as far as getting income is concerned (you can't get a market for most stuff, because if you want money you just need to mine plat;)
- The progression system is moronic, because it actually requires you to either mine or fight in order to train anything, yes, even magic, intelligence, etc;
- The game develops slowly. Models seem like they need to be blessed before they come out, game mechanics remain ridiculous for years (like the progression system), etc.;
- If you ask the developing team where the game is headed (since you want to know if you'll stick around this alpha game or not) they won't answer. I don't know it if it's because they don't actually have a strategy set out, or if they are completely silly to the point of actually thinking it's fun to ignore if this game is actually going to be a MMORPG or just a prettier hack n slash. This includes questions like "Are you considering to keep this? Are you considering to implement this? Are you considering to change that?";
- Plenty of times the Game Moderators and Developers represent the team themselves, often having no capacity to lead a public speech and ending up offending players and consequently insulting the team itself;
- There is not an assumed player concept so people confuse themselves placing themselves in categories they believe should be respected ("Hard-Core Roleplayer"; "Role player" and "Player") while its obvious that all players are alike and that they should be an homogeneous class with the same rights and duties (role playing being an obvious duty in a role play game);
- The most efficient and most widely shared "underground" concept of consistent role playing (underground, since it's not supported by the developers or moderators in any way, because there is not a notion of what consistent role playing is in PlaneShift) includes ignoring parts of the game system. That's right. If you go in-game and meet players who are either used to role playing or who are widely (community wise, of course) considered to be consistent role players you'll notice that they ignore some game mechanics (the fighting system for example), rather than using them in their play. This obviously creates sources of tension between players that rightfully want to make use of the game mechanics. Everyone has probably given their opinion as to why they do what they do, but they won't know if the developers are actually going to do anything about it;
- A great deal of the game focuses on love between characters (monogamy, character creation choices, etc.) and a part of the settings itself seems like an excuse to have "love" be transversal between characters in the way it happens in real life. Races can breed with each other, despite being completely different species, and even Krans (assexual beings) can marry;
- Another one of these "obvious excuses for getting more players" is a rule that demands everyone to be able to fight and fend for themselves (an excuse to explore hack n slash mechanics) including scholars, priests and farmers;
- If characters can interbreed casually between each other, despite their "race", and if there is no racism, and if a character can be born in an enkidukai village despite being a klyros and if max stats, stat progression, etc, does not change between "races"... We have different models with different names and different mannerisms and one single race;
- The NPC dialogue system is silly. I've heard people claim it allows for more "immersion" and that it's a "firewall against non-role players", but I disagree (since I don't even consider those two objectives of the PlaneShift Team). You're playing a game and you don't want to be bothered. If your character has its own speech, the NPC's will never understand it. You need to word it in a standard, robotic way, much like would happen if you were to use any other NPC dialogue system. So why do we need the extra bother?
PlaneShift has been for a long while my favourite (almost) MMORPG and I consider it to have the best, wider role play environment in all the other similar games I've played. I enjoy its community thoroughly as well. This is just a critique and I obviously didn't include the positive aspects (like good game moderation concepts [despite consistency not being checked], innovative setting, semi-player-oriented progression, etc.) because I don't need developers to do anything about those particular things. I think it's obvious, common sense and already discussed material what can fix all these issues I've presented.
I consider "Consistent Role Playing" role playing that respects the settings, the game mechanics and the players (example a character that is a son of a vigesimi is consistent, a character that is a son of an octarch isn't [there isn't that option in the character creation menu and there's only one Octarch, so the amount of sons he'd have is limited and the power it has for being such is unfair and as such players shouldn't abuse it]).
EDIT to add last point.
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Je sais, je sais.
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- The most efficient and most widely shared "underground" concept of consistent role playing (underground, since it's not supported by the developers or moderators in any way, because there is not a notion of what consistent role playing is in PlaneShift) includes ignoring parts of the game system. That's right. If you go in-game and meet players who are either used to role playing or who are widely (community wise, of course) considered to be consistent role players you'll notice that they ignore some game mechanics (the fighting system for example), rather than using them in their play. This obviously creates sources of tension between players that rightfully want to make use of the game mechanics. Everyone has probably given their opinion as to why they do what they do, but they won't know if the developers are actually going to do anything about it;
That is probably one of the more essential points of your whole critique. Until the game's mechanics can suit the roleplayer's need for diversity instead of a grind based system there will always be a gap between RP and leveling.
In my opinion both the RP community and the developers could make a greater effort to level the field in this area. Since I'm sure the devs have heard everything they're doing 'wrong' on numerous occasions I'll focus on us here for a moment.
What can we as the community do to make sure the mechanics connect with our roleplay more?
The answer is obvious but apparently not so easy. Start using the mechanics in our roleplay. Here I'm thinking of the most 'in-my-face' neglect of our community: mage characters. How many of you who have magic wielding characters have RPed a spell or magic ability that doesn't exist within the mechanics? I think it's pretty safe to assume that about 90% have .. without even having to take a poll. So is it really that hard to stick to the spells that the Developers create for us? Do we really have to shoot bolts of lightning across hundreds of meters or enslave people's minds with an evil stare? :P Personally I've only rarely played a mage but I found it fun and challenging to limit myself to spells he actually has the glyphs for. Especially when the RP is enriched by actually casting those spells at eachother.
Sure you can't work out your deepest fantasies in every detail but sticking to the rules (read: mechanics) avoids things of getting out of hand, people accusing eachother of godmodding and whatnot.
So why not use some game mechanics more often in our roleplay? Especially when the mechanics are decently developed, which is the case with the magic system for example .. when seen separate from the overpowered combat system and ignoring temporary bugs.
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I agree with using the game mechanics where they exist and trying to stick to them. Complementing should happen only when there's no other choice (i.e. if you want to be a bowman) and then, everything you do as a bowman should be agreed upon by the other players which are affect by this "complementing."
What I don't agree to is role playing fight outcomes when you have a fighting system that does that for you. Sure, after the system has thrown the dice you might want to compensate the lack of artistic fighting (since the models aren't that flexible) with a detailed, written version of what happened. Well, fighting becomes a sad example because of all the problems surrounding it. It's like what you said.
The problem is that this type of concepts aren't motivated or supported by the PlaneShift Team. If they were, players would feel a responsibility towards it and the community could work on it with more effort, probably resulting in grander results.
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Interesting points. You might be able to help change things if you applied to the Settings team or the GM team. That also would give you relative access to what the planned direction of the game is.
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Why not invite the whole DE into settings? ;D Oh, they seem to be XD Anyway, I fully agree with Zan.
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I was going to post this in the Complaints Forum, but I thought it might do just as well here, seeing as the last few comments have touched upon the subject of my own.
First off: I think PlaneShift is great. Congratulations to everyone who has worked on it. With that being said, I see lots of room for improvement.
In my opinion, the most glaring defect in the overall development strategy is a lack of clear communication and mutual cooperation in the community which leads to a split between the development team and the player group. As I see it, the development team is trying to manage PS as though it were a finished product, probably in the belief that such behavior is in the best interests of the player community. In my opinion, this is an extremely counterproductive position.
Everyone who downloads PS is a potential tester. Yet they are not being recognized as such. They are neither given sufficient documentation to do the job of testing, nor are they given direction or task lists to help with the project. They are kept largely in the dark regarding what goes on 'behind the curtain', and a result, their feedback ranges from inadvertently useful to a complete waste of time for those who bother to reply to it.
Why is the general player base being alienated from the process of participating in the development of the game? Why isn’t more being done to gather information from players? Why isn’t the potential represented by the player community towards moving the project ahead being maximized? Why is the development of the project being hidden behind closed doors when this is supposed to be a community effort? Why aren’t specific project lists being made public with suggestions as to how players can help? Why isn’t active recruiting going on for members to help with specific development-related tasks?
I know there is a bug-tracker database. But as far as I can tell, players are invited to send in information related to any bug they detect from anywhere in the game. Doesn’t that seem rather undirected and perhaps even counterproductive? Why aren’t we focusing on specific areas as a group and working in concert to attain bug-free zones and then slowly expanding them? Why aren’t we actively requesting that ideas and possible solutions for current problems or areas of development be sent in for review?
As a long-time member of other open-source volunteer projects, I have witnessed first-hand that those projects which have strategies encouraging initiative among users, viewing them all as potential contributors, are the most successful ones. Those that put restrictions upon knowledge regarding the project, upon who can contribute, when and in what form either fail generally or stagnate to the point of becoming non-growth enterprises.
I would love to help with this project in any way I could, but I don’t feel qualified for any of the positions being offered in the development team. I think many others feel the same way. I am a fairly creative person, and I’m full of ideas. I’m also willing to learn new skills if it means helping the project. But I just don’t see any open channels for interacting with the development team in an efficient and productive manner.
I would like to see more effort go into:
- Maintenance of the forum. Forum maintenance is vital for a project like this. Old threads need to be gone through, their valuable information collected, and then deleted. More how-to’s need to be posted and then kept up to date.
- Coordinating community involvement. Having 10 people testing the same area or NPC at the same time has to be better than having 10 people testing 10 different areas. Create a section of the forum where this kind of information is readily available to people so they can participate in improving PS.
- Inviting community participation. Instead of letting people post their wishes 'blind', it would seem more efficient to let people comment and make suggestions on specific areas of development which are currently being considered by the development team. Use the player community as a source for ideas and suggestions at the appropriate time.
- Discarding the notion of "spoilers". I know this is a touchy subject for the development team, but frankly, the idea of there even being such a thing as "spoilers" for a game in development is counterproductive. Testers cannot do their job unless they have all the information they need. In this phase of the project, that information which could be considered subject to "spoiling", e.g. the quests, is really secondary. The primary issue is making sure that the mechanical side of the game really works and is bug-free. Once that is established, then secrecy is called for during the creation of new quests which build upon the tried and true mechanical base. As it stands, I think "spoilers" should be available to anyone willing to work as a tester.
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- Discarding the notion of "spoilers". I know this is a touchy subject for the development team, but frankly, the idea of there even being such a thing as "spoilers" for a game in development is counterproductive. Testers cannot do their job unless they have all the information they need. In this phase of the project, that information which could be considered subject to "spoiling", e.g. the quests, is really secondary. The primary issue is making sure that the mechanical side of the game really works and is bug-free. Once that is established, then secrecy is called for during the creation of new quests which build upon the tried and true mechanical base. As it stands, I think "spoilers" should be available to anyone willing to work as a tester.
Well, I'd hate to have "spoilers" revealed publicly, because I really enjoy working these things out for myself. One possibility, assuming this forum software allows it, would be to have a "spoiler-allowed test section" in this forum, open for read/post only to those who enroll as "alpha test helpers," and who "sign" an agreement to confine spoilers to that section.
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The official testing team members have their own subsection of the forums, much like the dev, moderating, and GM teams do. They are free to post what ever info they feel they need to in order to fulfill their rolls as official game testers, which includes spoiler information, in that section and only them and the devs and the global moderators can view it.
Consider it wish granted.
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If you want to properly test PlaneShift, show it by having a look at the BugTracker. Look at some unconfirmed bugs, and see if you can confirm them. Compile your own client with the very latest PlaneShift code by looking here (http://planeshift.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/planeshift/trunk/docs/compiling.html). You can even start writing some small patches to bugs if you want, and submit them to a developer for review. Various PS'ers do that frequently, and we're grateful for that. And when/if you feel you're up to it, you can even apply to the Testing Team by finding Lanarel on IRC or by PM'ing him, giving you access to even more resources to help make PlaneShift more stable.
We can always use more members, so bubba ;)
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I know there is a bug-tracker database. But as far as I can tell, players are invited to send in information related to any bug they detect from anywhere in the game. Doesn’t that seem rather undirected and perhaps even counterproductive? Why aren’t we focusing on specific areas as a group and working in concert to attain bug-free zones and then slowly expanding them? Why aren’t we actively requesting that ideas and possible solutions for current problems or areas of development be sent in for review?
There is no way to assign people to specific area to look for bugs as we dont know where they are to look for them. If we knew then the devs would know what to fix already. yes there are many bugs but unless you are a dev or know how to code nothing can be done about them. Remember even though as a player you are called a "tester" you are still a player the testing team [official] has their own needs that are not going to be posted publically. you want to help build a client and go from there. otherwise there is not much that you can do. You can ask for things to be done but unless you can do it, the request will sit and wait for someone to get to it. Remember the testing team has things they do on a daily and weekly basis to try to make this game better. Do your part and report ALL bugs you find so they can get fixed.
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The biggest problem I have with PS is the rather stratified organization of the development team and some of the "turf wars" that break out because of it (such as the "Devs shouldn't try to reproduce bugs" crud that shows up in IRC every now and then). Also, there's issues with old code that nobody wants to touch and some wackiness with getting art submitted...(in particular, I think that item modelling would be a ton easier if you DCC people were willing to learn some tricks from your CAD brethen...but noooo)
Finally, there's the issue of Rules being not only private, but "spoiler-status" I guess? I understand the concerns about someone fragmenting the community with another server, but I honestly think that would be less likely to occur with an open rulebase...(consider that ANYTHING can be REd)
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- The game is good as far as interaction with the settings is concerned, but it's very poor as far as Player-Player interaction is concerned. The problem is that players end up not being able to use the rich information obtained in quests amongst themselves (if you try to role play that your character has fixed a poem for a kran that was needing it, another character will tell you that he did the same thing. Why would the Kran need that many equal poems?);
For me I think the core of the issue always comes back to the players. There are two big questions here: 1) what are the players empowered to do by the staff? 2) what are the players doing for themselves and each other?
Question 1, I will admit, can be a bit murky at times. In terms of RP, it's very unlikely (for example) that magic is limited to the very cookie-cutter effects of -any- coded spell system. Rather, I would think one can assume that having a given glyph that creates a given effect could reasonably (in terms of non-combat RP) be used to create different (yet similar) effects. For example, if you have the 'Mind' glyph and can do <blank> with it, it might also let you engage in other non-coded, RP-based actions. However, I don't really know what the leeway is for players in this regard. I'm not sure anyone really does, as there are no official spell lists or the like. (This is why most tabletop RPGs have whole books dedicated to their magic systems--there's a -lot- to be said. I'm not suggesting that the Devs should do that here; rather, a few general guidelines about such things would be helpful.)
Question 2, though, is quite clear. Players can play, treat things IC, and generally foster a better RP environment. This does not depend on the GMs, the Devs, or anyone other than us--the players. PlaneShift isn't 100% functional, no, but it works just fine for conducting IC activities with one's characters and interacting based on whatever premise we have. If we've read the settings and done our best to adhere to them, then until we are given more specific guidelines (as per my Question 1), we should frankly just get out there and enjoy ourselves in RP. As this game is a work in progress, I see no reason why the Devs/GMs/etc. can't inform us if we're seen to be "doing it wrong"; until then, the only people we can blame for a lack of RP are ourselves. I've been involved with MU*s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUSH (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUSH)) for over ten years, and for most of that time I've been an admin or running one of my own. Players often complain of a lack of "things to do," but the truth is that we have as much power to generate interesting stories for ourselves and for each other as any of the GMs do.
Ahem. Those points made, I think there are plenty of great RPers here, and I fully appreciate and support the efforts of the Devs, GMs, and others working on this project! Lovin' it a lot, everyone.
I would love to help with this project in any way I could, but I don’t feel qualified for any of the positions being offered in the development team. I think many others feel the same way. I am a fairly creative person, and I’m full of ideas. I’m also willing to learn new skills if it means helping the project. But I just don’t see any open channels for interacting with the development team in an efficient and productive manner.
The bugtracker really does seem like a decent way to do this, at least as well as can be managed. I only started using it last night, but it really does seem like a good idea and a good way to keep on top of what needs to be examined. It sounds like you might want to consider hooking up with the official testers, perhaps... I don't know exactly how all that works, but I certainly see your point. Sometimes you really want to help, but just don't know how to do it. :/
A general note on all these points might be, as Bubba points out, that we could really have better communication about some things. I mean the players as much as (or more than, in some respects) the Devs/GMs. We could work on creating RP, for example, that doesn't just center on the dramatic elements of our characters' lives, but that instead is designed to be inclusive and draw other people in to our stories. I think we can all find ways to improve the experience for ourselves and everyone if we give it a try.
Cooperative RP--it's like magic! :sorcerer:
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Anyone who says we either don't listen or aren't working off of information gleaned from the players is on the crack.
Anyone of the opinionated folk here is welcomed to join the team and earn that "inside view" in proportion to their contributions at any time.
We often take people who do not have extensive background in a given field and teach them over time.
Bubba should join settings.
Sangwa should cut out the backseat driving and take the wheel.
We have heard all of this before, join the team, break the cycle.
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We have heard all of this before, join the team, break the cycle.
If you have heard it all before isn't your job to break the cycle Xillix? Or a better question should be if you have heard it all before why haven't you done anything about it?
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We have heard all of this before, join the team, break the cycle.
If you have heard it all before isn't your job to break the cycle Xillix? Or a better question should be if you have heard it all before why haven't you done anything about it?
Post of the day.
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The problem is just "joining the team" isn't enough to fix some of the deep-seated problems. The fact that PS is a "chimera" (part-open, part-closed) project is one of the main ones, along with the fact that PS is written in a very old dialect of C++ (c'mon...is there a reason why we have to reinvent wheels that Boost provides for any sane C++ project? + CS has just gotten namespace aware and PS still isn't good with 'em + we use crap like csArray all over the place where the stdlib provides better!).
We need to A) loosen up on art at least somewhat (not accepting art that has internal polygons makes very little sense UNLESS CS can't render such models). B) Write up a comprehensive PS Coding Style guide and C) dispose of csArray, csString, csHashTable, and friends. Using Boost to provide such things as string algorithms, threading, signal/slot support, and the likes would be helpful too...
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Do it better, please, I welcome your infinite wisdom, all of you.
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The official testing team members have their own subsection of the forums, much like the dev, moderating, and GM teams do. They are free to post what ever info they feel they need to in order to fulfill their rolls as official game testers, which includes spoiler information, in that section and only them and the devs and the global moderators can view it.
Consider it wish granted.
:oops: LOL! Yeah, I'm obviously a newbie here. :)
When I've had a chance to run through my fill of the quests, I'll probably volunteer to help with something. In the short time I've been here, I'm impressed with the community and the direction Planeshift seems to be going. I like the in-character emphasis, and the preservation of a sense of mystery. :thumbup:
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Sangwa should cut out the backseat driving and take the wheel.
Sorry for being my usual self, but I believe Sangwa's guild leadership prohibits him from becoming anyone beyond a dev prospect.
And correct me if this changed, but prospects don't quite "hold the wheel"
Also, Mathy ftw.
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The only valid point i see in the original rant... is that communication should be better between the player/testers and the devs. I know that certain people, Xillix, Caarrie and Xordan for example, have done quite a bit lately, IMHO, towards fixing this. On the topic of communication...
1. Is there a way to use the "news box" on these forums for something like the following:
a. Server status, similar to laanx.fragnetics.com
b. Update/version information, similar to planeshift.it
c. Prominent bugs that need more information/attention, like the map boundary/change bug and the attacking bug
2. Is there a more efficient way to run the "wish list"? I have seen both new requests marked as duplicates and old threads being used where someone got admonished for bumping an ancient thread with new tweaks/concepts.
3. Can we as, a community, stop being so caustic? This post, at least in my mind, is nothing more than an attempt to rant and rave about the perceived injustice of Y'liakum because the random comments in other threads just didn't get enough attention.
4. Just so everyone knows, there has been quite a bit of work towards making it easier for people to submit bug reports. It still requires, yet another, login, but Caarrie was working on a guide (don't have the link handy), and there have been some changes made to the bug tracker also. I am not a Dev, but if anyone has a problem with writing a bug report, PM me and I will do what I can to help make it dev-friendly.
Well... flame on... this is my 2 Trias...
[EDIT] Point 1 is to say that right now I have to go to three different sources to get information. Why can they not be consolidated into 1? The two recent updates were not mentioned in the forums, only on www.planeshift.it. The server status has tons of threads here about how it is down, and links to laanx.fragnetics.com...
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How is that reunion going, Mathy? Leadership treating you good? You got all the help you needed to make it come true, right? Everything fell in your lap as expected? Good, good.
PS is 100 times harder than that.
why haven't you done anything about it
This makes me want to go right to your house and slap you in the face. You have NO idea what Xillix has done in the last two years. None. Xillix himself has turned the rusty and empty Settings Department into a working machine. He has helped push forward features that players have been asking for for years. He is the only reason I and most others in Settings are on the team. He is the reason there are close to 300 quests in the game, the BF area exists, more rewards are given in quests and for loot, more Settings themed events go on on a large scale, more books are ingame (and MANY more on the way), and many many more things I don't know about.
You have no idea, and your statement shows what kind of person you really are. Frankly, it is not someone I would want to know.
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[EDIT] Point 1 is to say that right now I have to go to three different sources to get information. Why can they not be consolidated into 1? The two recent updates were not mentioned in the forums, only on www.planeshift.it. The server status has tons of threads here about how it is down, and links to laanx.fragnetics.com...
Different servers, Different people with access, Different people with time to update resources, Also some people dont want info in all those places.
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How is that reunion going, Mathy? Leadership treating you good? You got all the help you needed to make it come true, right? Everything fell in your lap as expected? Good, good.
PS is 100 times harder than that.
why haven't you done anything about it
This makes me want to go right to your house and slap you in the face. You have NO idea what Xillix has done in the last two years. None. Xillix himself has turned the rusty and empty Settings Department into a working machine. He has helped push forward features that players have been asking for for years. He is the only reason I and most others in Settings are on the team. He is the reason there are close to 300 quests in the game, the BF area exists, more rewards are given in quests and for loot, more Settings themed events go on on a large scale, more books are ingame (and MANY more on the way), and many many more things I don't know about.
You have no idea, and your statement shows what kind of person you really are. Frankly, it is not someone I would want to know.
Xillix did his job, as would someone else in the same position. However, since this game is available to us, the public, we have to do our job as testers, the people who actually play the game, and report back what could be fixed/improved. How is it then, that we can't do our job unless we're a part of the team? What are we if nothing we say/do is accounted for?
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Useless.
Unless you use the bug tracker whenever the chance to do so arises.
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We have heard all of this before, join the team, break the cycle.
If you have heard it all before isn't your job to break the cycle Xillix? Or a better question should be if you have heard it all before why haven't you done anything about it?
Thats pretty lame Mathy :thumbdown: XilliX has done a lot for the game. He works hard on breaking the circle, is a driving force in settings, recruits , makes event and so on. Accusing XilliX having done nothing about it while doing nothing at all for the game is lame.
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I'd like to say there are a lot of good points in this thread that are being worked towards. Those points are not being discounted. That being said, I consider some others to have no grounds to stand on, and bring nothing constructive to the table.
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That being said, ...... bring nothing constructive to the table.
On that note, http://dgworkwear.co.uk/dgworkwear/images/FR%20AS.jpg (http://dgworkwear.co.uk/dgworkwear/images/FR%20AS.jpg) for all.
;)
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The FUNDAMENTAL problem with PS is the fact that it's a "chimera" (part-open, part-closed) project. What we are seeing is a combination of 2 factors:
1) closed parts (art mainly) don't keep up with open parts (the state of the art within CS) which prevents PS from exploiting the latest technology CS has to offer (animesh, Bullet for CD and Physics, full use of shaders, the rendermanager)...
2) open parts (much of the PS code) is held back to keep up with closed parts (art, DB) causing frustrations for all.
Add the 5+ year old heaps of cruft and bit-rot to the picture, and things just get worse on both fronts. What makes matters worse is that our coders seem to INSIST on NOT leveraging the C++ state-of-the-art... (expression-template-progression-scripts that can be written either in text or directly in C++, anyone? I think it's doable...) (look at the fact that we have csArray and csString ALL OVER OUR CODEBASE! /me beats Jorrit thoroughly with a bound copy of the C++ standard)
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Thats pretty lame Mathy :thumbdown: XilliX has done a lot for the game. He works hard on breaking the circle, is a driving force in settings, recruits , makes event and so on. Accusing XilliX having done nothing about it while doing nothing at all for the game is lame.
We have heard
If you have heard
"You" can be a plural pronoun and logically, so was it in this sentence.
Therefore logically, unless Xillix equals the dev team, or for some reason refers to himself as "We", Mathy's post shouldn't be treated as an accusation towards Xillix alone, but instead a question why is it that everytime a player wishes to see something changed, they are told to join the team (while apparently the wish alone isn't enough to trigger a change within the game mechanics).
One could answer
"to speed up the development"
or
"to show it's not so easy to make changes"
or probably Xil's choice
"to give the proposed idea more support in Planeshift's almost democratic dev environment"
But sure, there's also the old good and totally unlame "OMG! Xillix works hard. You suck!" and going to #PS to tell people to slap the troll.
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My invitations to join the team should be taken as earnest invitations.
We do in fact need the people.
I have worked with many people who were once the type to spend their time complaining rather than building, many of them actually happily call me boss now.
Estimated time to fulfill all sangwa's requests 10 years.
The team is composed of very critical, powerful, active, and dynamic minds; we are in an idea rich environment. The team is largely COMPRISED OF ROLEPLAYERS and is certainly LED BY RPERS.
Join now your critiques do NOTHING.
(http://www.demotivateus.com/posters/404-error-nothing-found-demotivational-poster.jpg)
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I just wanted to add something regarding testers. Many say 'tester first, player second', but I think for most it should be the other way around. Have fun playing, but if you find something wrong or missing, let us know. The bug tracker is one of the best ways to do so. Devs, GMs and the test team members just do not have time to play enough.
If you do like testing more and want better access to information and the devs, you might want to join the test team. We have some more resources (such as a test server with Laanx data and rules, wiki, forum), get access to new art to test before a release, and communicate with the devs. But our main job is to make sure reports in the bug tracker have correct info, are tested, etc, and to do specific tests before new releases to find new release stopping bugs. This can be really satisfying, as we prevent big bugs from entering the game every time.
If you like testing more than playing, ask me or one of the test team members (Caarrie, Peeg, Vornne, Thomphoenix) for more information, and keep an eye on the thread Caarrie recently started and which will have more info soon.
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If you feel you have to vent, please do.
Let me show a sampling of what I have done to alleviate this cycle:
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=29670.0
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=28285.0
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=32564.0
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=32405.msg383284;boardseen#new
All of these are initiatives I pushed to give players feedback.
I have made thousands of minor changes requested by players both personally and via my team and others.
This is before you account for polls run to elicit player response and use as evidence of my arguments through the devs.
Include also the pushing of the gm police events, a specific response to MATHY and SHAMAN'S complaints.
I have done more to engage the community than any of the people who found Mathy's "witty" attack sooooo humorous, or all of them combined.
Thanks for the encouragement folks.
Draklar, If wishes were horses I would command a Mongolian hoard and have them all deposit excrement on your front lawn, however wishes don't do sh*t.
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OK OK, I relent Xillix. I am not computer literate so can you briefly explain to me and your listening audience what is involved in coding a game? Maybe if we understood more then we can understand why it seems that things do not get fixed or things seem that they might not be improving? For example: I have brown hair in game and now it is white, as is everyone's elses. Is it so hard to correct this? Would it be so hard to make a child character? How about making the characters have different clothes? You get the idea.
It is always a good thing to have understanding of how things are done. This will help us all.
Thank you,
Mathy.
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I am not computer literate so can you briefly explain to me and your listening audience what is involved in coding a game? Maybe if we understood more then we can understand why it seems that things do not get fixed or things seem that they might not be improving? For example: I have brown hair in game and now it is white, as is everyone's elses. Is it so hard to correct this? Would it be so hard to make a child character? How about making the characters have different clothes? You get the idea.
It is always a good thing to have understanding of how things are done. This will help us all.
Mathy, if you really want to understand what it takes, go and try it. Learn C++, that's the best way in my opinion. In the worst case you'll understand what the devs face, in the best case you'll be able to help them. Here are some resources you can use:
Visual Basic Tutorial by Microsoft (http://www.mediafire.com/?rb0edd6gbfa) (some say it's not be best choice to start immediately with C++)
Teach Yourself Visual C++ 6 in 21 days (http://www.mediafire.com/?4vzw0vbyh5o) (here a more "hard-core" tut)
And don't tell me that you can't. Everybody can do it if they want to.
Btw XilliX is the settings leader so not much to do with "coding the game" really.
And as a final note: It is always a good thing to be nice and respect the other party.
Edit: PM me if you need help or more resources (in order to find what fits you best).
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if all of that was easy do you think we would still be waiting on it?
xillix is not a coding dev so he cant outright answer any of that any better then i can. All bugs and features take time to find and fix. Not all bugs or features are just issues with PlaneShift some are issues with Crystalspace. Also there are not many coding devs with time to fix some of these issues, as they are working on other parts of the game. Also PS lacks the number devs to do some art stuff and also Talad has to approve it all before it gets ingame, and the engine then has to support what the art team does, which all takes time to do. If you have skills to offer no matter what they are apply to the correct department and help out, even if that means you apply for GM or tester it all helps out in the end to make ps a better game. Just remember just because you want x and y done and ingame does not mean it will be ingame NOW, it might take months or years to get the right people together to get it done right.
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@ Mathy, Vengeance made a podcast in which he explains about how Planeshift works. You can find it herel (http://devcast.ps-mc.net/?p=4)
The bottom line: Planeshift is a huge and complex project and adding or changing a feature usually takes a lot of time, especially if unexpected bugs need to be solved. An other reason why it takes a lot of time to implement even the 'simplest' of feature wishes is that there are less than a dozen active developers and they are working on many different things. It's a matter of priorities. Also different devs have different skills and work on different things, which explains why sometimes features which may seem to be not so very important are implemented before long lasting and more crucial bugs are solved. Also, to give you an idea about how much the creation of an MMORPG involves: a commercial MMORPG is created in about four years by over 100 professionals, working full time. Planeshift is created by far less people, who work on Planeshift besides their regular jobs and often have to learn on the job. That's why every improvement seems to take forever.
Patience is the most important word to planeshift players. The best is to try to enjoy what you have so that you can be happily surprised when something new is implemented.
@ Xillix: keep up the good work! And maybe take a break from the forums ;-)
@ All other people: sorry I waisted your time by saying things you heard many times before.
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Amen.
(Probably my first and last one-word post)
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I have brown hair in game and now it is white, as is everyone's elses. Is it so hard to correct this?
Of course not. You just convince the CS devs to fix it. Maybe you could try to convince them this is a high priority thing :)
Would it be so hard to make a child character?
If you have people who can do this, it is not hard. My guess of what they should do:
- create small male and female versions of the races. Maybe a good 3D art person can do one in a few days (assuming you are not content with the same but smaller). Of course after that there are all the animations, new versions of all armor, etc.
- adjust character creation so you can select to be a kid. THis requires some new life events (settings person can do that), GUI (2D person for making new selectable options), rules persons (to limit stats and skills), database changes (to store all this), etc.
- new code may be needed to make children be different from adults, by limiting stats/skills, new commands may make kids have parents, etc.
In all this (art, animations, rules, database, code) if someone makes a small mistake, there will be bugs that have to be found and fixed.
How about making the characters have different clothes?
Some art person should make a piece of clothing, and then make that look good on all races, for all animations. You want different clothes? Well, that means more work.
You get the idea.
I hope you do too :). Actually, what you ask is mostly art, which I have not much clue about (and where there are hardly any devs at the moment). For new features coding wise (how difficult can it be to get rid of progression points?) the same applies. TO do things correctly, people need to spend weeks thinking how to do it properly, then implement it, and then repair all the introduced bugs. This is weeks (months) full time, so doing this in your spare time means multiply this by a lot.
For many things, different people are needed (3D art, 2D art, rules, settings, coding algorithms, coding commands, coding event handling, coding graphics handling). If one of those is not available (in this example, probably half of them), it will not be possible to implement. Or someone who is working on many other things, needs to do it.
So even if you can only help a bit in one area, it can mean more progress. If you help settings, a settings person may have time to do rules, a rules person may help code commands, and a coder may have time to take art lessons and do the rest :)
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...Would it be so hard to make a child character? How about making the characters have different clothes? You get the idea.
This makes me want to go right to your house and slap you in the face.
Add my heartfelt agreement here.
Now, personally I take issue with the way racial art is set up for this game - it's inefficient, largely redundant, and makes it exhaustingly difficult to implement even a simple change across the board (such as, say, new clothing). But that's what we have going on right now, so Mathy, YES. It WOULD be that difficult. Moreso than you seem capable of comprehending. And that goes for anyone who wants to point out how nice it would be to have new racial assets - new armor types, clothing options, the missing races... there's a very good reason they've not been added yet, and it's NOT because we're lazy, incompetent, or ignoring the issue. It's because an extraordinary amount of work is required to make each acceptable and useable in-game.
http://www.webreference.com/3d/lesson101/ (http://www.webreference.com/3d/lesson101/)
http://www.psychodogstudios.com/betterbodies/vw_tutorial.pdf (http://www.psychodogstudios.com/betterbodies/vw_tutorial.pdf)
http://www.cgindia.org/2006/05/tutorial-character-animation.html (http://www.cgindia.org/2006/05/tutorial-character-animation.html)
Texturing tutorial (http://www.vertextemplates.com/tutorials/3d_studio_max_tutorials/3d_studio_max_tutorial_REALISTIC_TEXTURING.php)
...And that's just the TIP of the iceberg. You want change? Progress? Quit whining, do some homework, and chip in.
EDIT: If you want a clear view of how character art is set up, and WHY it's so hard to implement something as seemingly simple as clothing options, just go find your characters.zip file and unzip it. Behold. You must now fill each of those folders with five separate files (_arms, _legs, _hands, _feet, _torso) with the desired clothing texture. And don't think it's as simple as copy-paste, since each race model has its own unique UVW map, and the textures will not line up nicely from one race to the next.
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One thing, here. I fully realize that making whole new textures or models requires a lot of work--I've done enough of it to know. However, changing the color of a texture (thus allowing for different clothing colors, hair colors, skin tones, etc) takes seconds. It's as hard as 30 seconds in Photoshop to change a texture if you have a decent white template and maybe a few minutes to change a color value in a line of code somewhere. (Although, I understand that there may be a genuine bug dealing with the 'shaders,' so that's a solid reason why that part isn't working.) I'm not saying "do it now!" What I am saying is that, to some of us, it's a mystery why that seems to be such a major difficulty. I fully and respectfully believe that these challenges do exist and we, as players, need to respect those challenges and take them seriously, being patient and such.
That said, I would squee over variable hair/skin/cloth color. ;) Anything that made characters less generic-looking would be :love:.
I also know I have to wait for it, and I'm willing to do so. I just hope some of the little stuff gets tossed our way sooner, while the bigger stuff will take (understandably!) much longer.
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I was to say I am saddened by what I just read:
http://www.mpog.com/gamelist.cfm/game/30/view/forums/thread/196330
I am deeply sorry. All of you have no idea how very much.
Mathy.
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I don't think you need to worry too much about anything that particular poster has said. He has taken the entire discussion out of context. I think that anyone who reads through this thread will see that.
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I was to say I am saddened by what I just read:
http://www.mpog.com/gamelist.cfm/game/30/view/forums/thread/196330
I am deeply sorry. All of you have no idea how very much.
Mathy.
No worries. How does that saying go "Can't please everybody all of the time" :). He is free to express his opinions as he pleases. I guess he does it there because he's afraid that bid bad moderators will come down on him if he tries to post here. And that is our right as well since this site is paid for by me and under my total control :) ( yeah I am evil :devil: ).
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No worries. How does that saying go "Can't please everybody all of the time" :). He is free to express his opinions as he pleases. I guess he does it there because he's afraid that bid bad moderators will come down on him if he tries to post here. And that is our right as well since this site is paid for by me and under my total control :) ( yeah I am evil :devil: ).
No offence Andrew, but could that be one of the issues here? Ever heard the "Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer"? As long as they stay here, you are on the control. When they go somewhere else, you lost the control.
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I honestly did not want to make such a mess. Please do not continue to argue over what I did. It makes me feel worse.
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One thing, here. I fully realize that making whole new textures or models requires a lot of work--I've done enough of it to know. However, changing the color of a texture (thus allowing for different clothing colors, hair colors, skin tones, etc) takes seconds. It's as hard as 30 seconds in Photoshop to change a texture if you have a decent white template and maybe a few minutes to change a color value in a line of code somewhere. (Although, I understand that there may be a genuine bug dealing with the 'shaders,' so that's a solid reason why that part isn't working.) I'm not saying "do it now!" What I am saying is that, to some of us, it's a mystery why that seems to be such a major difficulty. I fully and respectfully believe that these challenges do exist and we, as players, need to respect those challenges and take them seriously, being patient and such.
That said, I would squee over variable hair/skin/cloth color. ;) Anything that made characters less generic-looking would be :love:.
You already found the reason: there is a bug with the shaders, so hair colour does not show. For all races you can choose different hair colours, and for some even hair styles, faces and tattoos.
For most 'clothing' that exists now, a different colour does not make sense. Plate armor has plate armor color, leather is leather :)
One other point: even a little time is too much if there is none. Devs spend all the time they can (and more) on this game, they cannot add more time to a day. So it is all about priorities.
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I'll lock this thread then and since there is not smilie that will fit I will use this:
(http://www.hydlaa.com/images/crazy-kitten.jpg)
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hmm.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOMdTdgcxb4&feature=related
:-X
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I would like to make some comments on the following points that Sangwa has posted:
- The game's economy is ridiculous, because you just need to do a dull-witted action (mining; which involves only moving around and typing "/dig platinium") to get money, making all other activities ridiculous as far as getting income is concerned (you can't get a market for most stuff, because if you want money you just need to mine plat;)
I agree. We have discussed this in much detail on and off over the last couple of years. There are many different directions we could go and many of the devs have strong opinions on each of those directions. But whatever we decide would require a significant effort from one or more devs to solve. This is truly one of those problems waiting for someone to come along and take control.
- The progression system is moronic, because it actually requires you to either mine or fight in order to train anything, yes, even magic, intelligence, etc;
Personally I think the progression system is nightmare. From what I understand the “pay for points” was a last minute compromise. But until it is fully addressed, we need more ways to make money and more ways to garner experience. Any suggestions are welcome.
- If you ask the developing team where the game is headed (since you want to know if you'll stick around this alpha game or not) they won't answer. I don't know it if it's because they don't actually have a strategy set out, or if they are completely silly to the point of actually thinking it's fun to ignore if this game is actually going to be a MMORPG or just a prettier hack n slash. This includes questions like "Are you considering to keep this? Are you considering to implement this? Are you considering to change that?";
from Sangwa
http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33413.0 (http://hydlaa.com/smf/index.php?topic=33413.0)
Not sure who you are asking and how you are asking, but I can assure you that we have both short term and long term plans. Most of the short term plan gets implemented each release. And some of the long term plan makes it into a release. As more people volunteer for each dev group, we sometimes have pushes in specific types of game content. So it is hard for us to be able to tell ahead of time just what will make each release almost until the release date, especially since real life keeps interfering. But the point is well taken and I agree that we have to do a better job in communicating where the game is headed and when we hope to get where we want to go.
Not everyone is a developer – so if you cannot develop then please keep playing. And please keep posting what you want to see.