411 réponses à ce sujet

[robertthebard]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

PvP shouldn't even be considered for co-op mode, or really any mode. If I want PvP, I can load up one of the MMOs I have that support it. Especially not the invade a game option. Nothing sucks worse than getting to a major boss fight in MP mode only to have some group of "bored" players decide that it's a good time to grief you. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt and a hat. I'll pass.

Hmmmm... I feel like the only viable response for me to give would be... cool story, bro? You obviously did not read beyond the sentence where I mentioned Dark Souls, since my suggestion for co-op did not include any PvP at all.

Or, alternatively, I didn't have anything else that I wanted to comment on?  My "problems/suggestions" for MP are made, and are my only concerns, aside from this little tidbit.  The rest of the dialog is moot, for me, as I may not play it at all, or, as with ME's version, I think I have 5 hours in it since I installed the game, and that may be an overstatement.

[imbs]

If I was personally in charge of implementing pvp I'd just make everyone make a character, same spells as in the main game etc. Then i'd throw people into the largest area possible with random, extremely simple stipulations like FFA deathmatch, team death match. Most complex it would ever get is capture the flag-esque stuff. Then I might add a ranked mode, say dota style, that uses one set of rules only (probably team death match) n then I'd let em at it. Oh, and I'd remove any pausing.

That should all be pretty easy to implement, shouldnt affect single player at all and could even be fun. If EA insist in their folly on Microtransactions then I'd just do the whole cosmetic stuff for money thing.

They could even do the whole battlefield thing if they wanted. Instead of vehicles theyd maybe allow one player per team to be a dragon or whatever else they can think of.

[Iakus]

Darth Brotarian wrote...

iakus wrote...

I know I'm probably reading too much into it.  It's just the unspoken assumption here that MP will be a part fo the game that has me worried.  I probably shouldn't be as worried as I am, since up until a few months before release there was pretty much an unspoken assumtion that ME3 wouldn't have MP, so what isn't spoken isn't necessarilly what's true 

My personal concerns aren't really about gameplay mechanics, though.  It's how to ensure that SP remains a complete game, both in quality and in quantity. As I've said before, only x amount of data can fit on a disk.  That amount can perhaps be expanded, but there is an upper limit.  There's only so many things you can pack in the suitcase.  I've yet to see how that can be addressed.

Multiple disks

A separate MP disk, or a Day 1 download would work for me, yes.  The Baldur's Gate games, which everyone cites as a great example of having a good single player and multiplayer experience in one, was on something like four or five disks even before the expansions. 

However, it is my understanding that adding another disk would greatly increase production costs, and most companies nowadays will likely balk at more than the two disks games are now found on.

It has also been said that making MP entirely downloadable would be too big to manage.  Though I would think the Citadel DLC shows there are ways around that...

[Il Divo]

iakus wrote...

Darth Brotarian wrote...

iakus wrote...

I know I'm probably reading too much into it.  It's just the unspoken assumption here that MP will be a part fo the game that has me worried.  I probably shouldn't be as worried as I am, since up until a few months before release there was pretty much an unspoken assumtion that ME3 wouldn't have MP, so what isn't spoken isn't necessarilly what's true 

My personal concerns aren't really about gameplay mechanics, though.  It's how to ensure that SP remains a complete game, both in quality and in quantity. As I've said before, only x amount of data can fit on a disk.  That amount can perhaps be expanded, but there is an upper limit.  There's only so many things you can pack in the suitcase.  I've yet to see how that can be addressed.

Multiple disks

A separate MP disk, or a Day 1 download would work for me, yes.  The Baldur's Gate games, which everyone cites as a great example of having a good single player and multiplayer experience in one, was on something like four or five disks even before the expansions. 

However, it is my understanding that adding another disk would greatly increase production costs, and most companies nowadays will likely balk at more than the two disks games are now found on.

It has also been said that making MP entirely downloadable would be too big to manage.  Though I would think the Citadel DLC shows there are ways around that...

But how does this work exactly? I've played games like Skyrim, Oblivion, Fallout, Dark Souls, etc, which are massive but manage to fit on one disc. That's why I think it's a head-scratcher why multiplayer on the disc immediately indicates that some single-player content was cut.

[Iakus]

Il Divo wrote...

But how does this work exactly? I've played games like Skyrim, Oblivion, Fallout, Dark Souls, etc, which are massive but manage to fit on one disc. That's why I think it's a head-scratcher why multiplayer on the disc immediately indicates that some single-player content was cut.

I haven't played all of those games, but the ones I have are massive, yes.  But largely empty. not much in the way of voicework.  Little reactivity to choices (beyond who tries to kill you).  How many lines of dialogue are there in Skyrim compared to Dragon Age 2?

Not to mention the new fashion of making games more "cinematic" has to eat up a lot of space.

But hey, if they want to put DA3 on the Infinity engine instead of Frostbite, I'm perfectly willing to explore MP options for that  

[SwordofMercy1]

I actually hated ME3 multiplayer... Mostly because it became super repetitory, people would randomly kick you out of the game for no reason, there was no differing game options, and it took away from the Singleplayer.
So no, I am not looking forward to the DA multiplayer. What are you going to do, Button Mash everyone and everything? Multiplayer would just stick out like a sore thumb and make absolutely no sense game mechanically-wise. I mean, Bioware would have to completely redo the combat system for the ENTIRE game, and we all no they aren't going to do that if EA is behind the wheel... or they'll just copy the Gears of War combat style... HOWEVER, if the singleplayer was exceptionally good, I would bot bash on the game for having multiplayer. So there's a little optimism for you.

[JJDrakken]

No

Reason: That means it's most defiantly going require EA's crappy software.  That means, not only not play ME3, but my experience with DA series stops with 2 as well.



JJ

[JJDrakken]

Also, I suggest you guys make different versions of the game or DLC for MP. I bet SRPG sells more then your MP stuff.


JJ

[Fast Jimmy]

EntropicAngel wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Well, he does have a bachelor's in Computer Science.

Wow, that isn't totally stalker-esque that I know that.

Hmm.

I would call that more engineering, personally [have a friend with a Bachelor's and (soon-to-be) Master's in CS...or was it CE?].

Doesn't matter I suppose.

Off topic, but... if we call those with a doctoral degree "Doctors," why don't we call those with Master's degree "Master?" It only seems fair. 

[Volus Warlord]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

EntropicAngel wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Well, he does have a bachelor's in Computer Science.

Wow, that isn't totally stalker-esque that I know that.

Hmm.

I would call that more engineering, personally [have a friend with a Bachelor's and (soon-to-be) Master's in CS...or was it CE?].

Doesn't matter I suppose.

Off topic, but... if we call those with a doctoral degree "Doctors," why don't we call those with Master's degree "Master?" It only seems fair. 

Or Bachelor's degrees Bachelors, or...

[PsychoBlonde]

Allan Schumacher wrote...
You've been tasked to solve these questions!  How would you try to address them?  Breaking the problem down is usually a big help, and you've already started to do that by asking various questions.  What are your answers to them?  List some pros and cons for each of your answers, and I will do the same!

I realize I'm a bit late to the party, but I've adopted kind of a "wait and see" approach to this whole MP issue because as far as I've seen nobody's even been really clear about what they consider to constitute "multiplayer".  Is a social networking thing where you can share your character info "multiplayer?"  Or are you talking strictly about people being able to bring their own personal character into a shared gameplay space and play "the game", that meaning "the entire SP experience only with more people".

Let's assume the latter.  Let's assume the point is for multiple people to be able to join in what was before simply a single-player campaign.  So what are the major pitfalls?  It seems the way to figure this out would be to identify what the particular "single player" elements are and how to translate those to a multi-player experience.  So, it's NUMBERED LIST TIME!!!  (Note that the proposed solutions are for illustration purposes--there are infinitely more specific possibilities.)

Single-player element: the player makes up a distinct character that is "their" character and has a specific individual role in the story and action.  Well, obviously it wouldn't work to have every member of a multiplayer campaign play THE Warden or THE Hawke.  

Solution 1: So, you could make the PC be more of a generic person--AN Inquisitor instead of THE Inquisitor.  So you could freely have more than one and they can come and go as they please.  But then, instead of being intimately and personally involved with the story, they may seem more like an outside, uninvolved observer.  This may or may not be desirable and from some people's perspective may wreck the single-player experience because even in the single-player the game would have to be constructed so that you're treated as an interchangeable part instead of as an integral and individual part of the story.

Solution 2: game-joiners operate NPC companions (either existing ones or ones they make up who have no lines and no story role) in combat but don't actually have their own PC in their friend's game.  To me, this is probably the WORST solution.  It only recreates the single-player expereince for ONE person while everybody else is just a tag-along, particularly during dialog.

Solution 3:  This is the EXPENSIVE solution, but to me it'd be the best one: design the game from the ground up with the possibility of the party containing more than one PC.  Backstories (inasmuch as they exist) need to be written as "you plus your buddies" instead of just "you".  Ideally there would also be individuating factors like letting everyone pick their own backstory and personality and have options that depend on those factors take on a more multi-faceted approach.  If you wanted to do a REALLY GOOD job, this would include such options as different PC's within the same game having DIFFERENT FAVOR/DISFAVOR (or whatever companion relationship system you're using) levels at the SAME TIME.  This wouldn't necessarily have to be all that difficult.  Some extra code for vital situations to determine which PC's level is the "primary" one--you'd base the situation reaction off that one.  Probably whoever has the highest overall level regardless of whether it's good or bad.  Then you can have the code look at any remaining PC's other than the primary and have it trigger a secondary/tertiary/whatever reaction.  So, say I have max rivalry with a given companion but Player Two is fairly well up the friendship scale.  We'd get the rivalry action, but Player Two might get an extra line or two of dialog or a note along the lines of "you're okay but your friend is a dick and I just can't take it any more" or similar.

SWTOR already has a multi-pc dialog system, and while I don't think it's the best possible system it could be used as a basis.  I personally would prefer a system wherein even the players who don't "win" the dialog challenge still get to say SOMETHING or at least make a face, but this could be done (although probably not all that cheaply), by saying, okay, X is the max number of PC's in the party, so for each important response (the "choice" lines, not the "tone" ones, a random roll for who "wins" the tone type options would be fine), here's the Primary Response that the winner gets, and IF the other PC(s) made a different choice here's the Secondary Response that they make.  You could also include a switch for people saying I/We at different times based on how many people picked a given choice, so if you have 3 PC's and two of them picked the same thing, that choice auto-wins and the Speaker says "we think" instead of "I think".  That certainly wouldn't be any more complex than the various he/she switches in the game.  This stuff is all optional, but I think the more subtleties like this you implement, the better the system would be.

Another thing would be to allow the same number of in-party companions regardless of the number of PC's.  This might require some combat tuning/scaling, so that if you have more PC's, there are more enemies or the enemies are tougher.  I don't think limiting total party size would be a good option--the companions are too big a part of the game, so you should be able to have them regardless of number of PC's--or omit them, if that is your desire.  There would also have to be some gameplay changes.  Perhaps the NPC's are controlled by specific players instead of all players being able to control all NPC's.  Perhaps there's no pause button.  Perhaps the NPC's become fully automated.  Those are minor issues, though.

A further issue would be the Progress issue-the single player game is only partially linear, so there could be a lot of problems with joining a game where they've done stuff you haven't and you've done stuff they haven't.  Saying "everyone must start the game together and play together at all times" is an option, but probably not the best one.  Nor do I think resetting and repeating the content is a great solution--ideally, you want it to be almost as seamless as the single-player game.  This is primarily only a problem with game-matching where you potentially have strangers playing together.  

What I would do would be to have the game auto-save the progress of everyone in that MP game to a unique type of save called a "character log", and then update everybody's quest logs to have all completed progress of everyone already done in the "session log", so you'd all be at the same story point and able to go on from there, but if you later leave the game you can freely go back and do the other stuff *without losing your character progress*--you'd keep your gear and xp, just the story would be reset back to where you were.  You could even have the option to keep the session progress if you wanted to, so you would still be considered to have done everything you did in the session so you still have available what you personally hadn't done without falling behind what got accomplished in the shared session.  You probably would not be able to reset to an earlier stage of chain quests, though, only unrelated stuff.

Take home point:  I see there being three major issues: Can I play MY PC?  Do I still get to interact with stuff?  How is my game progress handled?  Solve those, and you're pretty much home-free on the MP, assuming you want to make a game where the MP is integrated to the entire game and not just some side thing.

[BrowncoatN7]

Nope. I hope it's not linked to single player like Mass Effect 3's was.

[Fast Jimmy]

lament.ballad wrote...

Nope. I hope it's not linked to single player like Mass Effect 3's was.

No matter how many times this is stated, I don't think it can be said enough. 

For the record, I am fine with SP affecting MP. Just not the other way around. 

[Paul E Dangerously]

The only real way I'd like MP is to have some sort of co-op option, but that really has to be designed in from the ground up. Otherwise, maybe something along the lines of the Tales Of series where a buddy can take the reigns of one of your NPCs.

I'd prefer nothing at all, but if it's mandated, there you go.

[Dutchess]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

EntropicAngel wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Well, he does have a bachelor's in Computer Science.

Wow, that isn't totally stalker-esque that I know that.

Hmm.

I would call that more engineering, personally [have a friend with a Bachelor's and (soon-to-be) Master's in CS...or was it CE?].

Doesn't matter I suppose.

Off topic, but... if we call those with a doctoral degree "Doctors," why don't we call those with Master's degree "Master?" It only seems fair. 

You're supposed to. When I finish my master, I will be "Master of Science". Sounds awesome. That's the title. Currently I'm "Bachelor of Science". Which is totally off-topic, I know.

Ontopic: not looking forward to multiplayer. Highly unlikely I will ever play it.

[MsCKS2000]

Me3 multiplayer done right in DA3 sounds like something I will be spending alot of time on, along with my friends.

There's just not enough good Co-op experiences out there, so if BioWare can pull it off, I'm sure it will find a way onto my harddrive, even if it means buying it from the Origin Store.

[shnig_1]

hmmm sounds like mp is semi-maybe-somewhat confirmed.......interesting. I just want to see the game already, hopefully before e3, but certainly there will be some at e3

[Fast Jimmy]

renjility wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

EntropicAngel wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Well, he does have a bachelor's in Computer Science.

Wow, that isn't totally stalker-esque that I know that.

Hmm.

I would call that more engineering, personally [have a friend with a Bachelor's and (soon-to-be) Master's in CS...or was it CE?].

Doesn't matter I suppose.

Off topic, but... if we call those with a doctoral degree "Doctors," why don't we call those with Master's degree "Master?" It only seems fair. 

You're supposed to. When I finish my master, I will be "Master of Science". Sounds awesome. That's the title. Currently I'm "Bachelor of Science". Which is totally off-topic, I know.

Ontopic: not looking forward to multiplayer. Highly unlikely I will ever play it.

Sweet.

I'm going to need the BSN to begin refering to me as "Master Fast Jimmy." Beginning now. 

[The Hierophant]

Master Fast Jimmy? That sounds like the name of a porn star.

[Fast Jimmy]

The Hierophant wrote...

Master Fast Jimmy? That sounds like the name of a porn star.

Hey, times in college were tight and...




...oh, you were speaking metaphorically.

[The Hierophant]

Oops you let that one slip by.

[Fast Jimmy]

The Hierophant wrote...

Oops you let that one slip by.

Well, I wouldn't call myself a STAR... 

[The Hierophant]

Fast Jimmy...

Well, I wouldn't call myself a STAR...

Fortunately you were allowed to have a unique moniker as there's people who go through their whole careers being called guy#3 or #2. 

lol