Goblin Squad Member
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I just have to say that it is disappointing to hear that it is technically unfeasible to pull of realistic day/night lighting in an MMO.
Again, it's technically feasible. Practically speaking, it's a bad idea.
Anyway, it is disappointing that trying to solve this is hard to overcome in a competitive virtual space. I'd have thought that an MMO, which has all sorts of opportunities for servers to sense patches would be the answer, but evidently the cheaters ruin things for everyone.
I'm not sure which "everyone" you're talking about, here. I'd wager that your average MMORPG player would find the inability to see where he was going at night pretty off-putting.
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As you noted, you didn't really spend much time stumbling around in the dark; you just had to have access to night vision. So basically it's just a night vision "tax", which doesn't sound super-exciting to me.
That's not what I said, I believe the best light source that character ever had was Greater Light Stone, which it's PnP equivalent would be a Sunrod or an Everburning Torch. When grouped with friends in those zones some of them had night vision because they were playing races that had night vision, some of them were caster and had access to spells that would help them see, these people would help guide me through these zones.
I'm sorry that you have a hard time seeing the fun in the teamwork that was in involved and the friendship that evolved out of overcoming things like darkness but it was also a small part of many other instances. Ryan has already said that he see's no need for it, so I take that Twilight nighttime is set in stone in PFO. And maybe Ryan is right, maybe darkness that can cheated around has no place in a game where PvP will have such a strong influence on world. Maybe, meaningful darkness is better suited for PvE and single player games.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'm lucky in that my LED monitor has its own dynamic contrast built in. I can play a game with the gamma settings at default and walk into pitch darkness in a Skyrim dungeon and out into blinding snow.
I sometimes forget about it when I'm playing Rift and can't see a damn thing in Iron Tombs or Hammerknell and I have to turn the dynamic setting off so I don't piss off some random pug.
All this talk of cheating the system and hackers shooting magic missiles at the darkness or whatever...If I drop a human with no lightsource into an underground tunnel, they are not going to be able to see anything...no matter how much you turn up the gamma.
I quoted Elth above because what he mentions would actually be really cool and allow for effects like daze. Not all of us have an LED monitor, but quick transitions between light and dark could be simulated to great effect (similar I suppose to getting drunk in WoW, although the effects would be different).
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Practically speaking, it's a bad idea.
Why? Aside from the "annoyance" factor (I'm sure immersive darkness, the fantastic potential for the vision rules and the spiffy visual effects would far outweigh having to pay a few coppers for a torch) I haven't seen one solid excuse for why it's a bad idea.
(And yes, the hacking issue seems very weak to this uneducated pleb. It's sad to see it written off so easily by so many. Still, I needn't beat a dead horse. Zesty's said it all better than me.)
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Goblin Squad Member
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Personally I like the idea, one of my favorite dungeons in DDO was the rainbow in the dark, which basically does just that, the whole dungeon is nearly pitch black, one character is given a light source, and you pretty much can't see more then 10' from what that character is holding. Lots of fun in that area, mobs surprise you, traps are 10x scarier etc...
Though I do have to agree with Ryan on the technical side, if it were mainstream, IE a common challenge in more then 1-2 special areas, people would design cheats. The fact is for an MMO client to function, the client itself has to know most of the area around you ahead of time, things are being pre-rendered long before you reach them. (otherwise enemies would appear as wire frames with white blurs on them as it loads the image unless you had a godly GPU), and as a result anything that is sent to the client, can be intercepted and translated by an illegal program, that would force it to render in daylight settings.
Bottom line, as a treat for one very small seldom used part of the game, I could see the idea as plausible, few people will go through the trouble of attempting to find a cheat for something they will do once for an hour and never repeat again, but if you made it a core mechanic that everyone needs on a daily basis, it will absolutely be abused.
Practically speaking, it's a bad idea.Why? Aside from the "annoyance" factor (I'm sure immersive darkness, the fantastic potential for the vision rules and the spiffy visual effects would far outweigh having to pay a few coppers for a torch) I haven't seen one solid excuse for why it's a bad idea.
Having everyone fork out a few coppers for torches is a pointless "see in the dark" tax. Is that really a laudable purpose -- to drain a small amount of money from each PC?
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Having everyone fork out a few coppers for torches is a pointless "see in the dark" tax. Is that really a laudable purpose -- to drain a small amount of money from each PC?
I'm... I'm really not sure if I'm being trolled here. When's the last time you counted out a few copper pieces? Honestly?
But let's take a minute and use that line of reasoning elsewhere, shall we? "Why have different weapons? Do we really want to impose a 'weapon tax' on each PC? All characters should weild a sausage on a bun straight from character creation! Low light vision? All cahracters should start with a Kholwurst sausage! Nothing more, nothing less! God forbid somebody have toys that I dont have! Mustard? No mustard! What if somebody hacks into the game and-"
It's a potentially interesting (and more importantly, relatively inconsequential) little thing that could add to the gameplay and/or atmosphere depending on how its implimented. The nay-saying is kind of worrysome. I implore you all to go and fork out 10 dollars for Amnesia (or something else that does the whole light/dark thing better. I'm certain there would be) and come back with a second opinion.
...what? What do you mean you have lives?
Bottom line, as a treat for one very small seldom used part of the game, I could see the idea as plausible, few people will go through the trouble of attempting to find a cheat for something they will do once for an hour and never repeat again, but if you made it a core mechanic that everyone needs on a daily basis, it will absolutely be abused.
I'd back that. Darkness is a big feature of the dungeons. It has its time and place. The dungeon crawl may well be it. Can we at least agree on that?
... please? :(
Having everyone fork out a few coppers for torches is a pointless "see in the dark" tax. Is that really a laudable purpose -- to drain a small amount of money from each PC?I'm... I'm really not sure if I'm being trolled here. When's the last time you counted out a few copper pieces? Honestly?
I can't tell if you're agreeing with me or disagreeing with me. You're saying that it's a good idea since it does nothing other than drain an insignificant amount of money from the PC. I'm saying it's a bad idea since it does nothing other than drain an insignificant amount of money from the PC. Is that the same thing?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'd back that. Darkness is a big feature of the dungeons. It has its time and place. The dungeon crawl may well be it. Can we at least agree on that?... please? :(
As both me, many others and Ryan have said, it would be awesome, but it would have to be limited to only 1 or 2 dungeons not every dungeon. Because if it is in something that people will do on a regular basis, then people will cheat it. There is absolutely no way to design a game to make it hard for people to modify a client to adjust lighting.
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You're saying that it's a good idea since it does nothing other than drain an insignificant amount of money from the PC.
Nope. I'm saying that's a pretty weak argument to make, especially twice. I ask you: who cares?. Its an utterly insignificant amount of money and likely two mouse clicks to buy a stack. On the other hand I'd like to see darkness implimented. For reasons I've listed, for spookiness (what you can't see is always scarier), atmosphere and for nostalgia (the dank, dark dungeons of old.)
If the developers take note early in the process that indeed, darkness is cool. Well... hooray. If not? Thats pretty reasonable as well. I'm just easily baited by this kind of argument. "NO! STOP! BADWRONGFUN! DARKNESS CAN'T BE GOOD BECAUSE ITS A MINOR INCONVINIENCE!" without stopping to consider what could make it fun.
While I can't speak for Scott, I think we can draw one valuable lesson from this thread. Canadians are afraid of the dark.
As both me, many others and Ryan have said, it would be awesome, but it would have to be limited to only 1 or 2 dungeons not every dungeon. Because if it is in something that people will do on a regular basis, then people will cheat it. There is absolutely no way to design a game to make it hard for people to modify a client to adjust lighting.
I'd back that. Darkness is a big feature of the dungeons. It has its time and place. The dungeon crawl may well be it. Can we at least agree on that?... please? :(
Of course. I mean what self respecting Necromancer doesnt light a few candles? :P
On a somewhat related note, it's now very, VERY dark down under, and I'll be buggering off to bed. In the spirit of this thread I shall attempt to do so groping around in the dark It may be a bit presumptuous of me but I'll apologize if I ruffled any feathers. You're a thickskinned bunch though, so no worries.
You're saying that it's a good idea since it does nothing other than drain an insignificant amount of money from the PC.Nope. I'm saying that's a pretty weak argument to make, especially twice. I ask you: who cares?. Its an utterly insignificant amount of money and likely two mouse clicks to buy a stack. On the other hand I'd like to see darkness implimented. For reasons I've listed, for spookiness (what you can't see is always scarier), atmosphere and for nostalgia (the dank, dark dungeons of old.)
How is holding torches (or light spells or whatever) in your hand spookier than having torches on the wall of the dungeon? Wouldn't they shed an equal amount of light? Or am I missing something? (Probably.)
Having said that, I can think of one good reason to have different light levels in a video game -- then you can create "stealth puzzles" that involve running from one pool of shadows to another to sneak up on the bad guys. I'm not sure how that would work in an MMO, though.
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Goblin Squad Member
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You're saying that it's a good idea since it does nothing other than drain an insignificant amount of money from the PC.Nope. I'm saying that's a pretty weak argument to make, especially twice. I ask you: who cares?. Its an utterly insignificant amount of money and likely two mouse clicks to buy a stack. On the other hand I'd like to see darkness implimented. For reasons I've listed, for spookiness (what you can't see is always scarier), atmosphere and for nostalgia (the dank, dark dungeons of old.)How is holding torches (or light spells or whatever) in your hand spookier than having torches on the wall of the dungeon? Wouldn't they shed an equal amount of light? Or am I missing something? (Probably.)
Having said that, I can think of one good reason to have different light levels in a video game -- then you can create "stealth puzzles" that involve running from one pool of shadows to another to sneak up on the bad guys. I'm not sure how that would work in an MMO, though.
Well I think the idea of carried torches is limited field of vision. IE lit torches throughout the dungeon means you can still see to the end of a 50' long passageway, when you are holding a torch, you can only see 15' in front of you, and thus things are more likely to pop out and surprise you is the idea. But as mentioned, also a drawback as it would be very easy to cheat the system and trick the client into showing it to you anyway
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Goblin Squad Member
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Why?
We've given you like eight different reasons why. It's potentially very frustrating, it will be utterly bypassed via client-side patching, it affects certain players more than others, it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day, etc., etc.
If you want to ignore those reasons, go ahead.
Aside from the "annoyance" factor (I'm sure immersive darkness, the fantastic potential for the vision rules and the spiffy visual effects would far outweigh having to pay a few coppers for a torch) I haven't seen one solid excuse for why it's a bad idea.
The "annoyance" factor, as you call it ("frustration" would be a better term, I think), is a solid reason for why it's a bad idea. And you should only need one solid reason.
(And yes, the hacking issue seems very weak to this uneducated pleb.
"I mean, sure, I don't really know anything about what we're talking about, and sure, some guy in charge of the project with years of experience in the MMO industry told me it's never going to happen, but what does he know anyway?"
It's sad to see it written off so easily by so many.
This ought to be telling.
I didn't say that no reasons were presented. Only that they were shallow and handn't convinced me yet. Your post does little to convince me otherwise apart from saying "THIS IS BAD BECAUSE ITS BAD." "THIS WILL LOOK AWFUL BECAUSE ITS AWFUL" a whole lot. Maybe its just the speaking in absolutes, or maybe just the general frostiness of this post... But its rubbing me the wrong way.
It's potentially very frustrating.
I don't agree. I think it tends more to "minor inconvinience" than to "game ruining". Eliminating frustration as a good thing, but you and I seem to have very different ideas about what this means.
I dont think nixing an idea because it's a slight, (very slight) hinderance. There are plenty of frustrating things that SHOULD be part of the game. Randomized dice rolls, meaningful difficulty and player chat. You have to draw the line somewhere, and saying "we should have an ignore function" is a lot different to saying "we should have no chat functionality, because somebody might trashtalk me."
Which of these options is no fun? I'm only asking for you lot to make some consessions. :P
it affects certain players more than others
Does it?
it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day, etc., etc.
Oh come on. Wasnt it you who said "nighttime looks cool"?
If you want to ignore those reasons, go ahead.
Oh. Jolly good then. Moving right along...
"I mean, sure, I don't really know anything about what we're talking about, and sure, some guy in charge of the project with years of experience in the MMO industry told me it's never going to happen, but what does he know anyway?"
Thats pretty much exactly what I was saying, here. Drawing light to the fact that a), Ryan knows better than me. But more importantly b), seeing such a defeatist attitude already is a bit of a downer. But as you say, this aught to be telling... And it is. it says a lot about the atmosphere here. I'll try not to make things any worse... But I totally am.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I didn't say that no reasons were presented. Only that they were shallow and handn't convinced me yet. Your post does little to convince me otherwise apart from saying "THIS IS BAD BECAUSE ITS BAD." "THIS WILL LOOK AWFUL BECAUSE ITS AWFUL" a whole lot. Maybe its just the speaking in absolutes, or maybe just the general frostiness of this post... But its rubbing me the wrong way.
Actually, I have been really tempted at times to say "THIS IS BAD BECAUSE IT IS BAD," because that's how clear it is that it's bad, but I haven't done that. Instead, I've laid out multiple reasons for why it's not a good idea. You like to ignore them, I guess, but that's on you.
I don't agree. I think it tends more to "minor inconvinience" than to "game ruining". Eliminating frustration as a good thing, but you and I seem to have very different ideas about what this means.
I dont think nixing an idea because it's a slight, (very slight) hinderance. There are plenty of frustrating things that SHOULD be part of the game. Randomized dice rolls, meaningful difficulty and player chat. You have to draw the line somewhere, and saying "we should have an ignore function" is a lot different to saying "we should have no chat functionality, because somebody might trashtalk me."
Man, if only we'd had you in the whole "Make everyone anonymous to everyone else for the versimilitude and our player rights!" thread.
Which of these options is no fun? I'm only asking for you lot to make some consessions. :P
I don't agree that introducing real darkness is a minor inconvenience. I think it's a significant inconvenience, and I believe that even a slight inconvenience needs a hell of a lot of pros behind it to justify the cons.
Does it?
Yes. As I've already explained, people play at specific times throughout the real-world day. Someone who typically plays at a time when it is night-time in-game will have a less enjoyable and more frustrating experience than someone who typically plays at a time when it is day-time in-game.
Oh come on. Wasnt it you who said "nighttime looks cool"?
Night-time does look cool. Stars are cool. Constellations are cool. Different color palettes on terrain due to changes in lighting are cool. But you don't see the terrain if it's dark. You see darkness. And then you light a torch, and you see maybe 30 feet of terrain. As a result, your art design is being under-utilized - 40% of the time, you cannot make an impact beyond those 30 feet of vision.
Night-time should be a different aesthetic experience. Not a worse one.
Thats pretty much exactly what I was saying, here. Drawing light to the fact that a), Ryan knows better than me. But more importantly b), seeing such a defeatist attitude already is a bit of a downer. But as you say, this aught to be telling... And it is. it says a lot about the atmosphere here.
*sigh* The atmosphere here is important. No one is discouraging ideas, full stop. Some of us are trying to temper expectations and refocus discussion on productive topics.
MMOs are horrendously intricate beasts, from a design standpoint. You're looking for your game to have a tail, because the amount of time a player spends in your game correlates well with the revenue you make off them. But if you make the game frustrating - and even minor frustrations can build on themselves to eventually discourage someone from continuing to play after months of putting up with it - you're harming that tail. There are countless examples of MMOs that have been promising, only to be killed by a handful of features that someone thought was a good idea but that ended up being very unpopular. And, beyond that, MMO development is filled with examples of the devs promising to listen to the fan community during the development process, only to have the fans scream bloody murder when the dev team chooses not to implement features that the community wanted without understanding that those features would have been bad for the game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So, the devs are in the concept phase of MMO building and we cannot try to explain to them why some of us feel a current direction removes a necessary feature from the game?
If they did not want our feedback, they would not have given us this forum and encouraged us to express our thoughts. This particular thread is about how some feel darkness should be implemented. If you don't, I am disappointed by your need to ridicule those who do.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I hope you weren't saying I was ridiculing (there is a post from both myself and Scott up there.)
The devs want our feedback, and give us theirs. Providing explanations and such is good, but (in my personal opinion) when a dev weighs in on the subject and pretty much concretely explains that it won't work and why, it's time to accept that and move on to a new topic.
No one is forcing you to participate in a discussion you feel is dead. Personally, I am going to continue to express why I feel the route they stated is less than the alternative. I did not say BAD...just less.
Especially since the CEO of a company usually takes the advice of his/her "experts". If we can convince them, they can convince the CEO.
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Goblin Squad Member
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All this talk of cheating the system and hackers shooting magic missiles at the darkness or whatever...If I drop a human with no lightsource into an underground tunnel, they are not going to be able to see anything...no matter how much you turn up the gamma.
Turning up the gamma isn't how the cheating works.
It has been a while and I'm making educated guesses at parts so I might be off a bit, but the principle I understand of how darkness is bypassed is because your computer is drawing the screen image you see every frame. That is for good reason because it would easily eat up all the game server's resources to draw the screen for every player.
Instead of drawing it for you, the game sends you the information for all the stuff you can possibly see (even if something is behind a wall, the server doesn't have an easy way (without a lot of calculations per player per thing) to determine if something is too far behind a corner for you to see or if it is just partially blocked by that corner (so you can see part of it).
If you spin around to see what is behind you, because of latency of information through the Internet you need to know that orc is behind you before you turn around toward him so that you computer can draw him as you are facing him and have him appear into existance a moment after you look into his direction. The game sends you everything you might see, including things your character isn't able to detect because it doesn't have the processing power to make that precise determination itself just based upon blocking walls and lack of strong light.
Now, since their computer has all that information, it is a "simple" enough hack to trick the game draw everything at normal light levels (or even draw things that would be hidden behind walls) even without a special monitor.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Yep. I guess there wasn't enough of a difference between day and night to even notice when a cycle had passed.That's assuming in-game time is mapped directly to real world time, which is not the case in any RPG I've ever played.You've never played WoW?
I find that odd because they felt distinct to me. Wow: Day/Night Cycle
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Goblin Squad Member
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The moon is rising from the same place at which the sun set... fascinating.I find that odd because they felt distinct to me. Wow: Day/Night CycleYep. I guess there wasn't enough of a difference between day and night to even notice when a cycle had passed.That's assuming in-game time is mapped directly to real world time, which is not the case in any RPG I've ever played.You've never played WoW?
Also the moon seems to be attached to the night/day cycle rather than it's own unique clock so that it and the sun are not visible at the same time.
But what is that fascinating?
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Goblin Squad Member
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I find that odd because they felt distinct to me. Wow: Day/Night CycleYep. I guess there wasn't enough of a difference between day and night to even notice when a cycle had passed.That's assuming in-game time is mapped directly to real world time, which is not the case in any RPG I've ever played.You've never played WoW?
Watch the video again but hold your hand over the top of the video so you never see the sky.
If you're in 3rd person with a more or less isometric view of your character (which is how I played) you'd never know if it's day or night.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Watch the video again but hold your hand over the top of the video so you never see the sky.
If you're in 3rd person with a more or less isometric view of your character (which is how I played) you'd never know if it's day or night.
I cropped out the entirety of the sky; anything you see in the "background" is distant mountainside. Those are from the same zone, and they use the same set of textures.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I find that odd because they felt distinct to me. Wow: Day/Night CycleYep. I guess there wasn't enough of a difference between day and night to even notice when a cycle had passed.That's assuming in-game time is mapped directly to real world time, which is not the case in any RPG I've ever played.You've never played WoW?Watch the video again but hold your hand over the top of the video so you never see the sky.
If you're in 3rd person with a more or less isometric view of your character (which is how I played) you'd never know if it's day or night.
Did what you said and covered also but a very small portion of the bottom of the screen and I could still tell see an easy difference between light and dark.
While it has been a while since I have played Wow, I don't recall my camera continuously pointing at the ground so that I never saw the sky.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Watch the video again but hold your hand over the top of the video so you never see the sky.
If you're in 3rd person with a more or less isometric view of your character (which is how I played) you'd never know if it's day or night.
I cropped out the entirety of the sky; anything you see in the "background" is distant mountainside. Those are from the same zone, and they use the same set of textures.
Scott, I concede that in that area there's a much more distinct difference between day and night. That particular screenshot was from early in the video before I tried the hand trick.
Anyways, all I'm trying to say is that there wasn't enough of a difference for me to notice one way or the other back when I tried the game. I didn't make it to all the possible areas I could have where the difference is more obvious.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Watch the video again but hold your hand over the top of the video so you never see the sky.
If you're in 3rd person with a more or less isometric view of your character (which is how I played) you'd never know if it's day or night.
I cropped out the entirety of the sky; anything you see in the "background" is distant mountainside. Those are from the same zone, and they use the same set of textures.
Scott, I concede that in that area there's a much more distinct difference between day and night. That particular screenshot was from early in the video before I tried the hand trick.
Anyways, all I'm trying to say is that there wasn't enough of a difference for me to notice one way or the other back when I tried the game. I didn't make it to all the possible areas I could have where the difference is more obvious.
If you played as a night elf, I can see that maybe being the case; their starting zones are designed to appear to be in a sort of constant twilight. But most of the game's zones have pretty distinct day/night cycles. I expect PFO will, too.
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It's potentially very frustrating, it will be utterly bypassed via client-side patching, it affects certain players more than others, it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day, etc., etc.
Scott, you say that "it's potentially very frustrating". How do you know this? Have you experienced this frustration first hand? What do you mean by "it affects certain players more than others"? Scott, you say that "it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day". What in game experience to you have with this?
Actually, I have been really tempted at times to say "THIS IS BAD BECAUSE IT IS BAD," because that's how clear it is that it's bad, but I haven't done that.
Bad for a PvP MMO? Bad for PvE MMO? Bad for a single player game? Bad for multiplayer game of the non-massive variety?
I don't agree that introducing real darkness is a minor inconvenience. I think it's a significant inconvenience, and I believe that even a slight inconvenience needs a hell of a lot of pros behind it to justify the cons.
In the realm of inconveniences, and mind you this is just my opinion, walking somewhere in MMO is a major inconvenience, running = somewhat less, riding a ground mount = even lesser, a flying mount = way less, casting a spell and teleporting to near your intended destination = minor inconvenience.
Scott, should we eliminate walking, running and mounts and also any classes that can't teleport from MMO's?
I'd also like to point out that I don't believe we're talking about "real darkness" e.g. you can see your sword in front of your face. We're talking about "meaningful darkness", darkness in which racial benefits like dark vision or low-light vision would be an actual benefit to those races. Races without would obviously use torches, lanterns, magic items, spells to cast light or grant enhanced vision.
Scott? Have you ever played Everquest?
Yes. As I've already explained, people play at specific times throughout the real-world day. Someone who typically plays at a time when it is night-time in-game will have a less enjoyable and more frustrating experience than someone who typically plays at a time when it is day-time in-game.
You're assuming that all MMO's use WoW's day and night cycle and that PFO will follow that same path. A simple solution would be to have 5 hours of day, 5 hours of night. That way no one would ever have to always play in night-time or in day-time. Which, in my opinion was a pretty poor design decision on Blizzards part to make the day/night cycle follow the real day/night cycle.
10 minutes in MS Paint.
I'm not sure why, but I find if hilarious that it took you 10 mins to "illustrate" your point.
I play almost exclusively during nighttime hours and having to stare at a mostly dark screen doesn't appeal to me at all.
Spooky atmosphere is nice but darkness is hardly the only way to evoke spookiness. They could just use some muted colors/blue tint and sound to do pretty much the same thing without all the hassle.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Scott, you say that "it's potentially very frustrating". How do you know this? Have you experienced this frustration first hand? What do you mean by "it affects certain players more than others"? Scott, you say that "it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day". What in game experience to you have with this?
One game that comes to mind talking about darkness is Minecraft (a very open sandbox game). It, in general, is how I imagine full looting would work out even. The day/night cycle moves relatively fast, when night falls things get very bad, very quickly (creatures spawn in the darkness in that game, and most are harmed by daylight or become more passive when in the light.). Exploring in darkness limits your vision to a very small area where, if you can see something, it is likely to late to be able to evade it. The area is so open that things can attack you from any direction and you drop everything you have if you are killed.
The result is, in that game, when darkness falls, I waiting inside until daylight. I get a bit braver once I have sword and armor, but that doesn't change the fact that the limit of vision makes large threats out of things that would be easy to avoid that I still spend half the game above ground within my shelter.
I have MineCraft, on the surface world night isn't much darker the night in WoW. In caves, being that you can't carry a lit torch, the dark is very dark and you're right the treat is upon by the time you notice it. This isn't the level darkness that I would like to see in an MMO like PFO... at least not without being able to carry a lit torch.
I'll go ahead and apologize for my tone this morning. If folks havent guessed I'm something of a night owl. What occured to me to make me want to jump on the forums so early is beyond me.
Now I'll totter off and catch up! Hurrah!
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Goblin Squad Member
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ZM, are you reading Scott's posts? He may be rude or brusque, but he's answering the questions and providing arguments for the positions he advocates (or decries). Eg:
What do you mean by "it affects certain players more than others"?
He means that some people will cheat (by installing patches to allow them to ignore the effect of the day/night cycle) and some wont.
The best people can do (him too in my opinion) is ignore who said what and just say what functions they want and why or what they dont want and why. The CEO of the company developing the game has pretty much said "It's not worth it to implement a day/night cycle" - isn't that enough to suggest that we should devote our requests and discussions about what would be cool to something else rather than debating the merits or otherwise of something which is deemed impractical?
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Man, if only we'd had you in the whole "Make everyone anonymous to everyone else for the versimilitude and our player rights!" thread.
I... wow. Sounds like I should be glad I wasn't. :P
I actually, being an Australian, (and thus, rarely seeing the light of day on WoW's non-atlantic servers) am not a huge fan of the 24 hour day/night cycle. I'd much rather see something more like minecraft, with significant differences between night and day, but I can understand this mightn't translate so well to the MMO.
Night-time does look cool. Stars are cool. Constellations are cool. Different color palettes on terrain due to changes in lighting are cool. But you don't see the terrain if it's dark. You see darkness. And then you light a torch, and you see maybe 30 feet of terrain. As a result, your art design is being under-utilized - 40% of the time, you cannot make an impact beyond those 30 feet of vision.
Night-time should be a different aesthetic experience. Not a worse one.
Okay, yeah. This is a good point, though I do think you're immediately jumping to the worst conclusions here (I dont doubt that a bit of pessimism is needed, though. Dont get me wrong.) Real darkness (in moderation) is not necessarily going to look worse than a blue filter and some starlight. Likewise the use of this darkness is DEFINATELY going to drive players away, because it will BEYOND ALL DOUBT be incredibly frustrating, and thus not worth the aesthetic and immersive factors it brings (especially for rogue players such as myself.) The inclusion or excusion of this feature WILL DIVIDE THE FANBASE AND RUIN CHRISTMAS FOREVER. What I'm seeing as a totally biased bystander is reasons why it'd ruin everything based on unrelated factors like a rigid 24 day/night cycle, hacking and having very little faith in the art team. :P
Zesty has the right idea. Meaningful darkness. Not absolute darkness. (Also I dont know about your games (you did bring the "30ft ahead" thing into the equation... but dont torches shed light for 60ft in pathfinder?)
There's a very small amount of areas I can see being well and truly this dark (under a clear night sky not being one of them) and I can see them accomodating it quite well. I don't see hacking being a serious problem, as it can easily be achieved with a potion of low-lightvision or a good chunk of the race choices.
The best people can do (him too in my opinion) is ignore who said what and just say what functions they want and why or what they dont want and why. The CEO of the company developing the game has pretty much said "It's not worth it to implement a day/night cycle" - isn't that enough to suggest that we should devote our requests and discussions about what would be cool to something else rather than debating the merits or otherwise of something which is deemed impractical?
We're just discussing the merits of the idea while this thread is still alive and its still on the table. While I was sad to see Ryans opinion on whether it was a bad idea or not. Its early yet, he's just one man, and I'm interested enough to continue the discussion regardless.
I also havent had much time on these forums so I was surprised to see such a direct and definiative answer this early in the process when we're still wondering whether the game will be isometric or not.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Sure - I don't really share Scott's antipathy for people listing "in the clouds" pipe dreams they'd like implemented.
Nonetheless, it does seem to me that people are treating this a little bit as if we're all brainstorming ideas for further consideration and I personally think that's a mischaracterisation. We're giving feedback to the typically approachable developers but it's ultimately their capital at risk and they're the ones with the actual technical knowledge of the industry.
Ryan's position may be shiftable, but is it worth the effort? We could be arguing different views on whether the various pathfinder society factions should have a significant presence or not (just to pick a random example off the top of my head, not because it's a burning issue). Things like that might be much more useful to the developers.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Scott, you say that "it's potentially very frustrating". How do you know this? Have you experienced this frustration first hand?
Yes. I have experienced being out at night and not being able to see where I'm going. It is less than ideal. If you've never experienced it, trying shutting all your doors and windows at night and turning out every light you have. Then prepare a meal. Is it possible? Probably. Something I want to experience in my leisure time? Not at all.
What do you mean by "it affects certain players more than others"?
Good lord, people, I've explained this twice already.
If you, as a real live person, are only able to play PFO between the hours of 10 PM and 2 AM, you will never see daylight and will always have a more frustrating experience than someone who plays around noon. Also, what Blazej said.
Even if you off-set it so that day/night are staggered, you will still have people who regularly log in only to find that they've logged in at the wrong time, and that it's dark out, and they don't want to stumble around in the wilderness with a 30-foot-deep FoV.
Scott, you say that "it makes the game visually unexciting and undesirable to explore for roughly 40% of the day". What in game experience to you have with this?
I have played games with something resembling actual darkness. The dark parts of the game are not visually exciting. You know why? Because there's nothing on the screen.
The "40% of the day" figure is an estimate, based on the idea that the game world's primary source of light is a heavenly body that rotates around the world at a constant speed, thus ensuring that it is above the horizon half the time and below it the other half. I then shaved an additional 10% off to account for periods of twilight, both before and after the periods of actual darkness. Thus, 40%.
Bad for a PvP MMO? Bad for PvE MMO? Bad for a single player game? Bad for multiplayer game of the non-massive variety?
Does it matter? We're talking about the hypothetical of me become so out-of-my-skull fed up with these posts that I start ranting in all caps. That hasn't happened yet, and I don't think it's worth speculating on.
n the realm of inconveniences, and mind you this is just my opinion, walking somewhere in MMO is a major inconvenience, running = somewhat less, riding a ground mount = even lesser, a flying mount = way less, casting a spell and teleporting to near your intended destination = minor inconvenience.
That's a fair assessment. The inconvenience, however, tends to scale with the distances you're expected to travel. For instance, good game design would be set up in such a way that you aren't required to travel very long stretches at a time before you receive a mount.
Scott, should we eliminate walking, running and mounts and also any classes that can't teleport from MMO's?
All of these things serve a compelling enough gameplay interest that they ought to be included. They are easily managed by solid game design.
On the other hand, we have outlined several obstacles to implementing darkness that even truly dedicated game design would do a poor job of overcoming.
I'd also like to point out that I don't believe we're talking about "real darkness" e.g. you can see your sword in front of your face. We're talking about "meaningful darkness", darkness in which racial benefits like dark vision or low-light vision would be an actual benefit to those races.
Right, except that unless you're implementing "real" darkness, messing with the in-game gamma and contrast is a lot like giving yourself permanent darkvision.
Races without would obviously use torches, lanterns, magic items, spells to cast light or grant enhanced vision.
Right, so being relegated to torch/lamplight means that you'll have...what? A limited range of vision? If so, you run into the can't-see-where-you're-going-and-all-that-pretty-scenery-is-wasted problem. And if you have an unlimited range of vision with a torch or lantern, what's the point in requiring them? Just make them automatic.
I'm not sure why, but I find if hilarious that it took you 10 mins to "illustrate" your point.
I am not a clever man.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Anyones who's played Ravencroft PotM (NwN PW) knows that meaningful darkness is one of the greatest editions to an RPG game. The world shifts from a relatively safe place, to something rather terrifying, in all the best ways possible. Its one of the most loved features of the game. Anyone currently talking about WoW in this conversation is a brain dead toad. Hop through hoops else where.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Anyones who's played Ravencroft PotM (NwN PW) knows that meaningful darkness is the greatest edition to an RPG game.Greater than villains?
Revised. 'One of'.
I appreciate that people will not grasp what I mean as many will not have experienced this. I have however experienced games which do everything for you save playing the game for you; those games are rubbish.
Night cycles in most games are no different from their day cycles. To this tune, limiting visibility is ultimately an annoyance in any game. In PotM however, you physically feel your balls shrinking.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I also havent had much time on these forums so I was surprised to see such a direct and definiative answer this early in the process when we're still wondering whether the game will be isometric or not.
No one should be wondering at whether the game will make use of an isometric FoV. It won't.
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Goblin Squad Member
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But I have experienced games which do everything for you save playing the game for you;
A game that gets out of its own way and just lets me play the game actually sounds pretty good.
In PotM however, you physically feel your balls shrinking.
This should be your PFO tagline: "It's so immersive, your balls will shrink!"
Anyones who's played Ravencroft PotM (NwN PW) knows that meaningful darkness is the greatest edition to an RPG game.
Sweet! Definately going to check this out. Is it a module or a server?
This should be your PFO tagline: "It's so immersive, your balls will shrink!"
Gotta say, this has serious potential.
No one should be wondering at whether the game will make use of an isometric FoV. It won't.
No? I saw a whole thread on this. Do we have a definative answer? I haven't checked it out yet. I'd be for it, but I'll let that be known in another thread.
Scott, while a lot of what you're saying is very true, I see it more as things to be wary of if Darkness were implementedon any level. I see no reasons to strike it from existance, but rather potential problems.
However, be honest. Why bother going to the trouble of hacking the client when you can spend 3 cp on a torch? I really don't get why people are riding on this so hard, but we'll have to agree to disagree.
How sophisticated do we expect stealth to be? I'd really like to see shadows play a big part of this, but I've yet to see that in any RPG to date, so it's probably out of the question. What do you folks think?
Anyones who's played Ravencroft PotM (NwN PW) knows that meaningful darkness is the greatest edition to an RPG game.
Sweet! Definately going to check this out. Is it a module or a server?
This should be your PFO tagline: "It's so immersive, your balls will shrink!"
Gotta say, this has serious potential. :P
No one should be wondering at whether the game will make use of an isometric FoV. It won't.
No? I saw a whole thread on this. Do we have a definative answer? I haven't checked it out yet. I'd be for it, but I'll let that be known in another thread.
Scott, while a lot of what you're saying is very true, I see it more as things to be wary of if Darkness were implementedon any level. I see no reasons to strike it from existance, but rather potential problems.
However, be honest. Why bother going to the trouble of hacking the client when you can spend 3 cp on a torch? I really don't get why people are riding on this so hard, but we'll have to agree to disagree.
How sophisticated do we expect stealth to be? I'd really like to see shadows play a big part of this, but I've yet to see that in any RPG to date, so it's probably out of the question. What do you folks think?
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Goblin Squad Member
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No? I saw a whole thread on this. Do we have a definative answer?
Yeah, Kalmes popped in to say that isometric is basically a thing of the past, and to voice support for a variable camera and fully-rendered world, like most major MMORPGs currently make use of.
Scott, while a lot of what you're saying is very true, I see it more as things to be wary of if Darkness were implementedon any level. I see no reasons to strike it from existance, but rather potential problems.
Even if you got rid of every absolute barrier (the ones that make the idea a total non-starter) and only had to contend with the ones that are a matter of player taste, it's still a huge risk - you're going to end up spending a lot of development time on a "feature" that you may very well discover turns a lot of people off of your otherwise excellent game.
However, be honest. Why bother going to the trouble of hacking the client when you can spend 3 cp on a torch?
Off the top of my head? You like two-handed weapons. Or a sword and a shield. Or you're a sneaky character, and don't want a torch broadcasting your ambush position. Etc.
How sophisticated do we expect stealth to be?
Honestly, I don't expect stealth to be much more sophisticated than the systems we see in modern MMOs (essentially, invisibility outside a certain radius). We might get something more robust, but I wouldn't count on it.
I'd really like to see shadows play a big part of this, but I've yet to see that in any RPG to date, so it's probably out of the question. What do you folks think?
Again, tough to do well. There are a number of different technical options you can explore in terms of how shadows are handled (and, realistically, you want your graphics engine set up so that shadows can be rendered in more or less detail depending upon the user's preferences/system specs). As with all advanced lighting, shadows are processing power-heavy, especially when rendered in significant detail. Also, if you want to have truly dynamic lighting (for instance, allowing torches carried by players to cast moving shadows over terrain, and then allowing those shadows to be used by stealth characters), you're going to have to have a lot of checks handled server-side - so much so, in fact, that I'm willing to bet that light-level checking dynamic lighting for the game's stealth mechanics isn't in the cards. I'm sure Mark Kalmes could tell us more (since I'm guessing based on some really rudimentary knowledge of lighting).