88390 réponses à ce sujet

[carine]

Welp. I hope they're not hyping it up to be more than it is, but that makes me really excited. Not even tentatively excited, but full-blown excited.

Though I loved DA2 too.

[ElitePinecone]

BasilKarlo wrote...

Spedfrom wrote...

Pre-Alpha!! IT'S COMING PEOPLE, HOLD ON TO YOUR PANTIES!

And that interview with Mark Darrah seems as though they're preparing the marketing onslaught. All eyes on E3 2013 for a DA3 reveal on next-gen platforms, is my guess.

E3 isn't until next summer. No way they're waiting that long to unveil the game. Even EA marketing staff isn't that stupid. And seriously people, there's no logical reason to think DA3 will be next-gen. It benefits EA/Bioware none to release a AAA title that's starting off on shaky ground early in the next consoles' lifecycles where it runs runs a high risk of underperforming.

We'll just have to wait and see, I guess.

Did you see the LinkedIn page from that EA Shanghai level designer?

[LolaLei]

Mmmm... Poptart hamster *drools*

[Savber100]

Wiedzmin182009 wrote...


Alistair McNally wrote...

Reviewing all the amazing things and progress today from the #BioWare #DA3 team was a joy - There be dragons...

Love DAO? #DA3 will take you to sparkle pony land on a jet space hamster.

Note how he doesn't say "Love DA2?"  

[Steppenwolf]

ElitePinecone wrote...

BasilKarlo wrote...

E3 isn't until next summer. No way they're waiting that long to unveil the game. Even EA marketing staff isn't that stupid. And seriously people, there's no logical reason to think DA3 will be next-gen. It benefits EA/Bioware none to release a AAA title that's starting off on shaky ground early in the next consoles' lifecycles where it runs runs a high risk of underperforming.

We'll just have to wait and see, I guess.

Did you see the LinkedIn page from that EA Shanghai level designer?

You mean the guy who supposedly worked there for like less than a month?

[Allan Schumacher]

Blair Brown wrote...

its not pre-alpha, well it technically is, but its more like prepreprepreprepreprepreperperpeprepreprper-alpha.

I'll have to echo this statement.

It's pre-alpha in that it's "before Alpha" but don't take this as any indication that we are close to Alpha.

[ElitePinecone]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Blair Brown wrote...

its not pre-alpha, well it technically is, but its more like prepreprepreprepreprepreperperpeprepreprper-alpha.

I'll have to echo this statement.

It's pre-alpha in that it's "before Alpha" but don't take this as any indication that we are close to Alpha.

For the uninitiated among us, how rigid are the classifications? Do you establish beforehand that "features x and y at z level of polish mean we're now in beta", or is something that varies with the pace of development?

I just wonder, because it seems like in pre-production the team spends an inordinate amount of time (it seems, to the outside observe who doesn't have a clue what's happening) on setting up development pipelines and content deadlines, etc. Do you have specific deadlines for finishing levels or game features? 

Wikitionary unhelpfully tells me that in the pre-alpha stage (or prepreprepreprepreprepreprepreprepalpha) features aren't set in stone, but I imagine for something like DA3 the project leads would've sat down months ago and mapped out roughly what the game would look like, if not the specifics of each system. 

The tl;dr version is that I'm wondering how precisely the project as a whole is mapped out at  the very beginning, and how much leeway you have to make changes part of the way through development. 

(Also, without being specific, what distinguishes a prepreprepreprepreprepre-alpha from an alpha build, and an alpha from a beta, except the amount of complete systems and finished content? It seems a bit wooly.)

[Allan Schumacher]

The only one that really has a "rigid" definition is beta, which essentially means feature complete. No new features are going in. But internally, our alpha is close to the same thing. Core features are in, and newer features will generally stop unless some form of playthroughs testing indicates that we need to add or cut some features to deliver the type of product we want.

We do have deliverables for finishing levels and game features, which is a large part of the sprint reviews. We'll break things down into milestones and so forth, and milestones get broken down into sprints. For each milestone the producer types will say "We want the game at this state" and the scrum teams will commit to various work/features to deliver for the milestone goals. We typically have 3 sprints in a milestone, and at the end of each sprint, we show off the stuff we've done to the big wigs like Mark and Aaryn and so forth.

We're still very much adding new features now. We may have concepts for things we want in the game, so we aren't just randomly adding things, but as development goes along you realize that the original idea just isn't as awesome as you envisioned, so you tweak it to make it more enjoyable (this is called "iteration"), and to flesh out the gameplay aspects, the writing, etc.

[Ilidan_DA]

Liam wrote...

"Thank you @Bioware for the Dragon Age comic and DA3 shirt"!




Mark Darrah wrote...

Shirts!



Mike Laidlaw wrote...

Ending the year with a team gift pair: hardback of Stolen Throne and team shirts. (Shy model not included).



Cameron Lee wrote...

Hover gurns! #DA3

Comic books and t-shirts for everyone on the best team #DA3

Gave out about 200 shirts and books already. Lots left over, maybe for give always in the new year...

[Cameron Lee]

The “pre-alpha” disc is for people to take home over Christmas to allow extra feedback on plots and the features we have in the game at this point. We're not close to alpha.

Nothing is ever simple in game dev, but you can think of the various stages as:

Pre-alpha = In production
Alpha = Feature complete (fix bugs & polish, last minute changes)
Beta = Feature & content complete (fix bugs & polish)
Final = Pray to the old gods you guys love the game

[Lintanis]

Savber100 wrote...

Wiedzmin182009 wrote...


Alistair McNally wrote...

Reviewing all the amazing things and progress today from the #BioWare #DA3 team was a joy - There be dragons...

Love DAO? #DA3 will take you to sparkle pony land on a jet space hamster.

Note how he doesn't say "Love DA2?"  

DA2 fans not soo whingy 

[Face of Evil]

Is that the Black Cliffs of Kirkwall in the background?

[Fiddzz]

Face of Evil wrote...

Is that the Black Cliffs of Kirkwall in the background?

yes

[TheInquisitor]

Cameron Lee wrote...
Final = Pray to the old gods you guys love the game

Well you guys know what we want for the game... So just obey us and all will be good

[TheInquisitor]

Also... Cool T-shirts! Where can I get one?!

[Steppenwolf]

Yeah, I sure could go for one of those shirts.

[Allan Schumacher]

FemaleMageFan wrote...

Cameron Lee wrote...

The “pre-alpha” disc is for people to take home over Christmas to allow extra feedback on plots and the features we have in the game at this point. We're not close to alpha.

Nothing is ever simple in game dev, but you can think of the various stages as:

Pre-alpha = In production
Alpha = Feature complete (fix bugs & polish, last minute changes)
Beta = Feature & content complete (fix bugs & polish)
Final = Pray to the old gods you guys love the game

If i am correct you guys are using scrum right? Since it's a modular based approach do you find determining these stages difficult?

We do use Scrum, but we still have goals/objectives just to keep focus on delivering the product at hand in a timely manner.  I think it was Darrah that said in the release of BG2: "Give me a developer with infinite resources, and I'll give you a game that never ships."

So it's modular, but within the scope of ideas that we get out of brainstorming and idea spitballing that comes out of preproduction.

[nightscrawl]

Can you please sticky this again? x_x

[ShaggyWolf]

You know, if you guys were looking for cool shirts to sell at the BW store when DA3 comes out, I think you just found one.

And... you know... if you want to send me one for free for suggesting the idea... my size is athletic fit/small, pleasethankyou

[Steppenwolf]

Anyone else really hoping one of those pre-alpha disks gets "misplaced" and we finally get some concrete details on the game?

[GithCheater]

BasilKarlo wrote...

Anyone else really hoping one of those pre-alpha disks gets "misplaced" and we finally get some concrete details on the game?

No. 

We would get more than  concrete details ...

We would get massive spoilers that will ruin future enjoyment of the game

Modifié par GithCheater, 23 décembre 2012 - 04:26 .

[Steppenwolf]

Why would the details of a pre-alpha build of game systems ruin our enjoyment? It's not the full game and it's meant for gathering feedback on mechanics of the game, not the story.

[Yuqi]

TristanHawke wrote...

Also... Cool T-shirts! Where can I get one?!