128 réponses à ce sujet

[Fernando Melo]

Thanks for all the great feedback & questions folks - keep them coming.

(and yes, you'll be able to store multiple world states on the keep)

[Fernando Melo]

Please bear in mind we still have a long way to go :innocent:.  We'll share more info over time and actually be able to answer definitively more questions as we go.  Meanwhile, I'll try to address what I can (or maybe help provide some rationale around it).

aang001 wrote...

I wish I knew about it... I wanted to join the beta as soon as I heard, but im 2 days 2 late... If it was in the GI updates or something I would have seen it...

Applications are still wide open - are you having issues with being able to apply?  

This may change, but the idea of the beta will be to open it up to more and more people over time, so even if not selected right away there's always a chance to be added to a later batch of users, so go for it!

Ieldra2 wrote...

*snip* since the Keep appears designed to be independent from game engines *snip*

*This* - It's relevant to a lot of general questions being posed, including 'why' a cloud based one, are files involved, etc.  (Sorry to skip over the actual question you had, but this was a great quote I didn't want to pass up ) .

The goal is to create an elegant and seamless solution on any platform (now or future), with the least number of 'moving parts' (ie. steps) required by a user. 

StanojeZ wrote...

Will it allow sharing/publishing "histories"? So that you can go "hey, let's see how my friend's play-through went".

Early days - but one of the benefits of having this data online is these sorts of things are possible

[Allan Schumacher]

IT is just extra work for little gain. The "buggy" direct import was good for current-gen consoles. It did not need to be eliminated just to add a little extra work to import a playthrough onto the same blasted console.

To be clear, the import to same generation consoles hasn't been "removed." It never existed with our current engine. We would have needed to spend the time adding it, plus still come up with a solution for people that move on to other platforms.

In this case, we tried to find a solution that works for all platforms.

[Allan Schumacher]

Is there any reason why something similar to the Keep (an option to select choices we made in our previous playthroughs) can't be included within the game itself rather than having it online only?

The big reason would principally be the usual: cost (in terms of manpower and therefore money). Unfortunately, so I was told by some fellow employees while hanging out during PAX, is that it would actually be a lot of work to do.

Unfortunately, I am not a part of the Keep team and don't really know much, beyond that. But this was a casual conversation at dinner one time and it came up (as Keep feedback was one of the big buzz things released just prior to PAX).

[Allan Schumacher]

Cost as in it would cost more to not add internet functionality or cost as in the profit potentially generated by a required internet connection far outweighs any other alternative?

Cost as in it would take a non-trivial amount more effort to take a system that exists principally on one platform, and to fully implement it into 5 different ones.

I'm talking exclusively in manhours of work to make it work, not any sort of nebulous gains that may or may not be realized by making the system exclusively online.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 10 septembre 2013 - 08:30 .

[Allan Schumacher]

This means that only the in-game UI forms and their controllers need to be made from scratch and I don't think this should take more than one sprint (especially if your sprints last three weeks, but it should be doable in two).

Just to note, I am also a programmer (that happens to work in QA). And it was other programmers that I was speaking to. Yes, we wouldn't have to completely redo everything, and the bulk of the work could possibly come down to mostly UI.

Now, even if it were to only take 1 sprint, and our sprints are 3 weeks (with iteration weeks, so basically 1 month). The current release date for the project is "Fall 2014." So that is 12-14 or so more sprints. Lets assume that we can safely work on this right until the game ships (which is impossible). You are taking about 1/12th of the development time to now work on this. This will have costs in that those people will not be working on other things.

Further, separation of specialties. The online team is the one working on this tool's front end. In other words, knowledge of things like ActionScript and so forth are not going to be necessary. Shifting it to different developers leads to a shifting of what type of expertise is necessary to implement this efficiently. And this shift only occurs if it means we STOP doing the online component, otherwise those people will need to keep chugging away there. This means that the "in game" Keep comes exclusively at the cost of work that would otherwise go into the game.

There's also additional dependencies too, as a UI artist will also need to be assigned. So looking at the things that need to be done, we'd have to evaluate whether or not we're willing to sacrifice the other stuff they'd be working on.


I do not want to cut the online component, because there are advantages for that. It'll still exist beyond DAI, we can deploy it and roll out betas independent of the game's release. It may even be possible to leverage beta data ourselves in our playthroughs and so forth. All this on top of the fact that it definitely has long term advantages in terms of reducing work in inventing the wheel. So unless we were to replace the online component, it definitely means that the UI Programmer and UI Artist (assuming that's all it takes) has to come from somewhere.


Things not really considered in this are that we can't keep adding stuff to the disc until the day before ship and whether or not platform independent issues become a large issue (a high risk factor).

[Allan Schumacher]

Clockwork_Wings wrote...

I wonder how it will be framed?  Based on the website's splash page, I'm thinking a moving illustration, like Varric's narration, and possibily narrated by Varric.  Probably opening with something like, "Let me recite the tale of the warden for you..." and then questions on the race, background, class, etc, with Varric repeating what you choose as the next question loads. 

I hundred+ question survey is going to be...really boring.

What little I know about it, it doesn't appear to simply be a questionnaire of what previous choices you made.

[Allan Schumacher]

Plus, I think the Keep is only intended to be used at the start of a game, so it's not like you can modify events as they happen in-game.

That is correct.

[Brian Mills]

Thanks GuitarShredUK -
I think this is a known issue (?) but I've still "borrowed" your screenshot and have forwarded it on to the team working on the site.

[Allan Schumacher]

ElitePinecone wrote...

Yeah.

Also, I wouldn't be concerned about the Keep not offering a range of choices - they've said it'll include major and minor choices from both games, plus not every choice will necessarily have an impact in Inquisition. This worldstate we're making is intended to be one that they can draw from for all future games.

(So to pick an example, Inquisition might not react to whether Hawke gave the qunari their book, but that might come up again as a plot point in DA5.)

IMO, the biggest advantage is that it's easier to maintain going forward.

People have imports into DA2 that are effed up because of bugs.  While those specific issues may never be resolved, it means that going into DA3 it's easier for the player to set the state right.

There's also HUUUUUUUUUUGE advantages to testing the import system.  I wrote a simply program that would extract and randomize the plot variables from DAO for DA2 testing, but there were still issues and it's possible that the randomization stuff didn't appropriately test the system in ways and some stuff slipped through.  The alternative is to do playthroughs and build a save game library with a lot of permutations which can be time consuming.

Now playthrough testers can set up the flags and go, which is a much faster testing setup.

[Ryan Warden]

Thanks Brian. For what its worth, I think the issue is with Sophos rather than the website. I have web filtering on to block potential suspicious sites, but there may be some function somewhere on dragonagekeep.com that may look odd to certain security apps.

Anything to help you guys out

 

This may be fixed by Sophos on Friday. We should have more information then.

[Brian Mills]

To any of the devs that have posted here - are there any updates re. Sophos web security and dragonagekeep.com? Unless the site is added to a filter, I still get a "High Risk Website blocked" notice or an SSL connection error, depending on the browser. Thanks

 

There was a possible fix for this for last Friday, but if you're still seeing this, it would appear not to have worked.  Thanks for the update - I'll update our internal bug that is tracking this issue, but I don't think we'll have a new ETA for a fix in the immediate future.

[Brian Mills]

How do I register for the beta?

You can register for the beta by visiting the Dragon Age Keep website and filling out a survey. You’ll need a valid EA/Origin account to sign in. If you have played one of our PC or console games online, you need to log in with the email address associated with your EA/Origin Account. If you don’t have an EA/Origin account, you can create one on the BioWare Social Network.

 

=====

 

Will that link get updated or are new accounts still permitted to be setup on the old site?

 

You can still create new accounts there.  I would expect that link will remain up until the keep is launched.

 

 

Thanks Brian. The site loads fine, as long as I keep the URL added to a safe site filter within Sophos. However, just from looking at the web error console (I mainly use Firefox or Safari) there are quite a few errors returned due to HTML problems or other code e.g. missing parts of functions etc; this may be contributing to the error with Sophos and site risk. Would it be useful if I could pass these on to someone (not pasting on here, which may not be appropriate)?

 

You can either PM me the errors, and I can forward them on for you, or you could try emailing onlinecommunity@bioware.com, which should eventually end up at the same location.

[Fernando Melo]

I know we've been a bit quiet recently, but we'll have a bunch more info 'really soon'.  And we'll definitely be able to answer more specific questions as we get closer to launch.  

 

But in the meantime I couldn't help notice that some of the recent questions here about Keep, incl whether devs said this or that, I had actually talked about on this youtube interview (in case some of you hadn't come across it yet, and wanted to hear it from the "horse's mouth" as it were  ).

 

Also, Keep beta sign-ups are still open. Folks are not picked by 'first come, first serve', so even if you register now you still have just as much chance as anyone to get in.  Good luck.

 

Lastly, I know some of you are not on twitter, but even if you don't have an account (and don't create an account) you can still keep an eye on #dragonagekeep  (or your fav dev or official account for that matter, by replacing #dragonagekeep with their twitter name  ).

 

Between the BW blog, here on the forums, and twitter, you'll have all the latest Keep info we can share. 

 

F.

[Ryan Warden]

To any of the devs that have posted here - are there any updates re. Sophos web security and dragonagekeep.com? Unless the site is added to a filter, I still get a "High Risk Website blocked" notice or an SSL connection error, depending on the browser. Thanks

Welp. While the Sophos person I spoke to tried very hard to answer my questions, s/he was not able to say why the site was flagged in the first place... nor how we could fix the problem. All I could do was submit the site for a re-review, something that we've already done a couple times. I resubmitted, but apparently it's still being flagged.  

[Justin Edmond]

You guys remember if your origins email is the one they send invites to if you get them? It's my husband's email since he controls our Origins account and so I just wanted to make sure.

They'd be sent to the email origin uses.

[Joe Hegarty]

So, if we signed up before, but when we go to the new screen it says "Apply For the Beta" do we need to do it all over again?

 

When you click "Apply for the Beta" it should just pop up the "Thanks for applying to the beta" screen if you are already signed up.

[Jeff Rousell]

I already signed up long ago but when I click on "Apply for the beta" I have to complete the form again.

 

Everyone who previously signed up is still there.  We just have a glitch in checking if you've previously signed up due to changes in our login flow.  We're working on a fix for this and should have the site updated soon.

[Justin Edmond]

So I wanted to make sure I wasn't having the same issues. Keep said to sign in with my origin account, that sent me to a sign in page and now it's trying to load a page called dragonagekeep.com/teaser, but it won't load. Did I break it? Is this just me, because other pages are loading just fine?

 

Did that ever happen again to you Zenbry?

 

Also: if anybody had the issue with the survey coming up again, could you check the site and let us know if it's still showing up for you? The issue should be resolved.

[Justin Edmond]

When I check out the DA Keep page it still asks if I want to Apply for the Beta...

 
Did you signup using the same account?
I just looked up your current account (the one you use for the forums) and it looks like like your application is in. Could you clear your browser cache and let me know if it's still an issue.

I fhtagn...

 

Edit: same for you Andraste_Reborn, could you clear your cache and check again for me?

[Justin Edmond]

What happens when you click the button? does the full survey pop up?

[Justin Edmond]

Oh thank the maker.... I was worried it was going to be another late night

[Justin Edmond]

Sounds about right Revan; we'll simply have your most recent application on file. 

 

Hope that gets everyone sorted out; Thanks again to all of you for offering to help with the beta

All these applications really mean a lot to us developers.

[Justin Edmond]

soo...nobody here got an invite for the keep thus far? unless of course they told the peeps via email not to leak anything xD ............
just do it please

 

I got in

[Allan Schumacher]

Without any visibility on how many people were granted access, it's tough to read much into whether or not anyone posting in this thread made it in.