More MMORPG please

[levon]

I know the title is a little bit provocative but i think it hits the point of the pain.

 

Ive played during my last 4 years of lifetime almost 3 years StarWarsGalaxies and one year Project Entropia.

My Person: Computer Specialist, Java Programmer, 3D Design (Maya,Blender), 34 Years old.

(Thats only for the little Critters here, which are thinking iam a fool who dont know what hes talking about)

 

 

 

So now to my Suggetions/criticism (or whatever you want to name it)

 

1.) Graphics: LowPoly low Texture:

-In the 21Century with Computers which are on an average of more then 1GHz and good OGL Cards. Hmmm Isnt it possible to improve this? Its all about the Client ... The Server has nothing to do with this. I know how difficult it is to create good LowPoly Models and i know too, the difficulty of good Texturing, but out there are so many creative People which where pleased to give their knowledge and time for a good challenge. (Me included).

 

2.) Interaktivity/GUI/Figthing and so on:

 

- For Example ..Harvesting. The Character Stands arround and is harvesting. The Point .. standing like a statue. A little bit more action would be a great improvement.

 

- The Map: A Good Waypoint(WP) System whould be great. There is a Map, where you can set a point as WP but if you are marking points, lets say at WhiteStone, you go do a mark, your futher set another mark. After while you are loolking at your map. You can see that your waypoints are becoming useless because their are overlapping. My idea is, at the Map Display you have a Feature where you can blend in and blend out the Different WPs, maybe a Categorie System like a tree.

 

- The Maps are not very sophisticated. Lets take Portland as example. Their is a Harbor(surprise,surprise) and the Map? Its more the map of a little Fishermans town. Wheres Harbor there is life, action (a redlight disdrict ).

 

- Fog of War ... you can see almost everything important on the map. Shure its cool to download a map where is all marked. But wheres the fun of exploring?

 

- Fighting: What about special tactics, special moves, more specific Fighter Classes... there are so many possibilities to improve, to give the players more fun. Ok i can do spells, wearing special armor or weapons but this isnt real interactivity.

 

- Magic: Teleport to Range ---> what about Teleport to WP ---> higher costs on a high level maybe magic 35 and all of you Ethereal Points

 

- HUD Ok its cool ... but hmm, more slot, more slots.

 

- Hexagon Walking: Its a pain to see my character walking like C3PO.

 

- Walking over Bridge... The bridges are an arc... i cant see steps ... so why my character i walking over a bridge like he has the hiccups.

 

- Manufactoring/Crafting/Alchemy/Potions ... again ... Statue

 

At Last: Eternal-Lands is a free game, the Developers are doing a great job without payment at their spare time. So Thanks for the Game. The reason why i do this criticism is because i think we are going to loose players in the future.. there game named "Ryzom" they want to make it OpenSource and free like it happend to Blender(NaN), or Guildwars without monthly payment or Project Entropia its Complete Free(maybe not ).

So i think we have to improve much more on EL to dont loose the race.

 

I love EL , ... i want to see the game alive.

 

So now you can start beating me or you can think about it and maybe we can start a good discussion.

Edited December 2, 2006 by levon

[JohnTheWarder]

I think you posted in wrong section 1st of all.

Nvm mod moved it.

- Fog of War ... you can see almost everything important on the map. Shure its cool to download a map where is all marked. But wheres the fun of exploring?

 

They have fog of war map mods.

 

- Fighting: What about special tactics, special moves, more specific Fighter Classes... there are so many possibilities to improve, to give the players more fun. Ok i can do spells, wearing special armor or weapons but this isnt real interactivity.

First off this is a class less game. I also suggested a weapon mastery system but it was deleted off that bat cause Entropy said something like this would never go in the game. So you can see what position this puts us in.

Edited December 2, 2006 by JohnTheWarder

[levon]

 

They have fog of war map mods.

 

 

i have found only a cvs patch ... ? Very usefull for players without experience in compiling C programms

 

But if theres a usefull version ... tell where where i can find it

Edited December 2, 2006 by levon

[kulysoft]

I know the title is a little bit provocative but i think it hits the point of the pain.

 

So now to my Suggetions/criticism (or whatever you want to name it)

 

1.) Graphics: LowPoly low Texture:

-In the 21Century with Computers which are on an average of more then 1GHz and good OGL Cards. Hmmm Isnt it possible to improve this? Its all about the Client ... The Server has nothing to do with this. I know how difficult it is to create good LowPoly Models and i know too, the difficulty of good Texturing, but out there are so many creative People which where pleased to give their knowledge and time for a good challenge. (Me included).

 

2.) Interaktivity/GUI/Figthing and so on:

 

- For Example ..Harvesting. The Character Stands arround and is harvesting. The Point .. standing like a statue. A little bit more action would be a great improvement.

 

- The Map: A Good Waypoint(WP) System whould be great. There is a Map, where you can set a point as WP but if you are marking points, lets say at WhiteStone, you go do a mark, your futher set another mark. After while you are loolking at your map. You can see that your waypoints are becoming useless because their are overlapping. My idea is, at the Map Display you have a Feature where you can blend in and blend out the Different WPs, maybe a Categorie System like a tree.

 

- The Maps are not very sophisticated. Lets take Portland as example. Their is a Harbor(surprise,surprise) and the Map? Its more the map of a little Fishermans town. Wheres Harbor there is life, action (a redlight disdrict ).

 

- Fog of War ... you can see almost everything important on the map. Shure its cool to download a map where is all marked. But wheres the fun of exploring?

 

- Fighting: What about special tactics, special moves, more specific Fighter Classes... there are so many possibilities to improve, to give the players more fun. Ok i can do spells, wearing special armor or weapons but this isnt real interactivity.

 

- Magic: Teleport to Range ---> what about Teleport to WP ---> higher costs on a high level maybe magic 35 and all of you Ethereal Points

 

- HUD Ok its cool ... but hmm, more slot, more slots.

 

- Hexagon Walking: Its a pain to see my character walking like C3PO.

 

- Walking over Bridge... The bridges are an arc... i cant see steps ... so why my character i walking over a bridge like he has the hiccups.

 

- Manufactoring/Crafting/Alchemy/Potions ... again ... Statue

 

I love EL , ... i want to see the game alive.

 

So now you can start beating me or you can think about it and maybe we can start a good discussion.

1. Believe or not there are many many people who still uses a P2 or P3.

2. This is not warcraft

 

Manu/craf ...

 

Instead of what ? That chars from other games which moves the heads like they are in some mental institution ? personally i hate that kind of movement

Game is alive and growing.

[levon]

 

1. Believe or not there are many many people who still uses a P2 or P3.

What should i say ... you are right? Do belive you that really?

 

2. This is not warcraft

 

He THIS is not WOW ... omg..

i never said i want a game like warcraft, by the way i never played wow and i never will. I think iam not the only one who wishes a little more of... whatever

 

Manu/craf ...

 

Instead of what ? That chars from other games which moves the heads like they are in some mental institution ? personally i hate that kind of movement

that are things the community and the Devs have to think about .. maybe a crafting/manufactoring window or something like that

 

Game is alive and growing.

 

Good ... i dont know i dont have the statistics

 

A question ... why do you quote the whole text?

Edited December 2, 2006 by levon

[masterpiter]

Hiya

 

Since i know realy well only fighting skills, i decided that i will just reply to that.

 

- Fighting: What about special tactics, special moves, more specific Fighter Classes... there are so many possibilities to improve, to give the players more fun. Ok i can do spells, wearing special armor or weapons but this isnt real interactivity.

 

As much as i would love to see my character doing 5-10 hit supercombo finished with some special move=p( yes, im big fan of 2d/3d fight-games) it wont gonna happen unless characters have a lot more hp.

 

I think perks/atributes should make characters different, but since there is only 1 best type of fighter for PKing (noone positive perks taken, at least 3 (good) negative perks, will 16-26 and and crazy high p/c ;p) it doesnt work perfectly atm, im sure that devs r working at improving that

 

About classes, as Ent stated, there wont be any fixed classes in eL, thats one of the things that makes our game special and different from other mmorpgs

 

eMPi

Edited December 2, 2006 by masterpiter

[KarenRei]

Lots of good ideas.

 

Feel free to develop them and submit them as patches.

 

As to the specific case of allowing more player interactivity with combat, I do like the idea -- not of fixed reactions, but of player-defined actions and reactions. Definitions in a format that translates to things like "IF <your opponent's weapon arm is down>, AND <they're moving it upwards>, THEN <parry> into <thrust>.". For any case that's not defined, the player "does whatever". Each monster would have a different combat style, and you could optimize your fighting for those monsters. Heck, one could even customize spells.

 

Unfortunately...

 

It'd be a fundamental change to combat, so I don't expect to see anything like that. At least not without a major influx of coders and lots of people wanting the change.

Edited December 2, 2006 by KarenRei

[levon]

Lots of good ideas.

 

Feel free to develop them and submit them as patches.

 

This is the sort of answers i like... unfortunately iam a java programmer not a c/c++ programmer.

But i would be happy to help with the modeling and texturing.(its my new hobby to play with high-end 3D Modelling Software)

 

As to the specific case of allowing more player interactivity with combat, I do like the idea -- not of fixed reactions, but of player-defined actions and reactions. Definitions in a format that translates to things like "IF <your opponent's weapon arm is down>, AND <they're moving it upwards>, THEN <parry> into <thrust>.". For any case that's not defined, the player "does whatever". Each monster would have a different combat style, and you could optimize your fighting for those monsters. Heck, one could even customize spells.

 

thats what iam talking about... maybe its easier not to make the whole combat complete interactive... maybe more like deciding a tactic with the possibility to change that one or two times during combat

Edited December 2, 2006 by levon

[HeLLRaiZeR]

Most of the suggestions sounds good, but it's easy to talk when you're not the one doing them.. There is a first person camera coming soon anyway.

[Aislinn]

Most of these comments are discussed elsewhere. Either they already exist, they are being worked on, being considered, or are not happening anytime soon.

Remember, search is your friend.

[conavar]

Good Ideas cant fault your logic

 

Im not a programmer but to me most of these changes seem purely cosmetic ? (might be wrong) and plenty of work needs doing before little tweaks are made here and there ie: finish C2 maps / placement of Npcs etc etc ...

 

And we musnt forget the game is still only in its Beta stage and im sure the Devs are proberly working on some of your ideas (as Aislinn states) and a hundreds others .

 

As it has been said its a classlass game but my self personally i would like to see more skills so players have the option be totally differant from one another if they so wish ( more than likely been suggested before so i will not elaborate).

 

My only answer is if you would like to help with the Dev of the game contact who ever you need to (sure the mods will point you in the right direction)and have a talk to them .

[JohnTheWarder]

Most of these comments are discussed elsewhere. Either they already exist, they are being worked on, being considered, or are not happening anytime soon.

Remember, search is your friend.

 

I was gonna say that but its nice to revive some topics every once in a while.

[ttlanhil]

I'll ignore all the stuff where you should really have searched first, and comment on a few points...

Java Programmer

eww

1.) Graphics: LowPoly low Texture:

EL has a custom graphics engine, made by the volunteer developers. and many computers EL runs on have some problems as it is. EL is slowly getting better as far as looks, so it'll happen anyway

A Good Waypoint(WP) System

with the pathfinding in the client that can go around stuff, a simple linear waypoint (which is usualy the case, in games with waypoints I've seen, they're used so it doesn't have to find a way around stuff) is redundant

Their is a Harbor(surprise,surprise) and the Map? Its more the map of a little Fishermans town.

look at how many people are about seridia, and irilion, are actually small islands, by earth standards. like many issues in games, it's exaggerated.

Hexagon Walking

that makes pathfinding more complex, and pathfinding is already one of the main time users of the server

Walking over Bridge... The bridges are an arc... i cant see steps ... so why my character i walking over a bridge like he has the hiccups.

because height-mapping is done at a series of levels. when you go up/down to the next level, you move... 10cm or whatever it is. smooth walking up/down slants and arcs would mean either collision detection on the ground for everything around, which is more work for the computer, or more complexity (and probably size) in the map files (and there's another advantage to EL. not only does it work on a lot of older 3d cards, it's a relatively small download)

[Roja]

Maybe some day when we become rich enough to higher people to work for us, and become a small company, then we can make bigger and better games.

 

But until then, the reason why we have progressed as far as we did is because we kept the game small, and within reasonable limits to work on most computers.

 

Also, however nice more eyecandy may be it is not a requirement for a succesful game or project(e.g. runescape, southpark).

 

 

Eternal Lands is not the best MMORPG around, but it's not the worst either. As far as I'm concerned, we're right where we should be for the present time.

[crusadingknight]

- The Map: A Good Waypoint(WP) System whould be great. There is a Map, where you can set a point as WP but if you are marking points, lets say at WhiteStone, you go do a mark, your futher set another mark. After while you are loolking at your map. You can see that your waypoints are becoming useless because their are overlapping. My idea is, at the Map Display you have a Feature where you can blend in and blend out the Different WPs, maybe a Categorie System like a tree.

I like it... I *think* there may be a mark filtering patch, or maybe even merged into CVS at present, though nothing more complex then suffix/prefix filtering yet.

 

- Magic: Teleport to Range ---> what about Teleport to WP ---> higher costs on a high level maybe magic 35 and all of you Ethereal Points

You mean, as in a longer range teleport, hooked into the map for coordinates? That's quite a nice idea too, and can be implemented.

 

Ryzom" they want to make it OpenSource and free like it happend to Blender(NaN), or Guildwars without monthly payment or Project Entropia its Complete Free(maybe not ).

So i think we have to improve much more on EL to dont loose the race.

I doubt any of those games actually compete directly with EL; With the features now leaning more towards event and community interaction, we're probably more competing with Second Life than anyone.

[Derin]

So now to my Suggetions/criticism (or whatever you want to name it)

 

1.) Graphics: LowPoly low Texture:

-In the 21Century with Computers which are on an average of more then 1GHz and good OGL Cards. Hmmm Isnt it possible to improve this? Its all about the Client ... The Server has nothing to do with this. I know how difficult it is to create good LowPoly Models and i know too, the difficulty of good Texturing, but out there are so many creative People which where pleased to give their knowledge and time for a good challenge. (Me included).

I think the graphics are great. There is a lot of life in the models and most of the items are displays of sheer beauty. Making better textures would involve a lot of work and sometimes you just have to sit back and say: "Hey, I like what I see and this is good enough"

Of course, you can always improve things, but sometimes there is little to gain compared to the work it involves.

 

- The Maps are not very sophisticated. Lets take Portland as example. Their is a Harbor(surprise,surprise) and the Map? Its more the map of a little Fishermans town. Wheres Harbor there is life, action (a redlight disdrict ).

The maps are quite sophisticated actually. There are just loads of objects in the maps, mainly just to look good, and there are also secrets in most maps (which you will have to find by yourself)

When it comes to Portland or any other settlement EL is working under the assumption that there is a life and that most settlements (and to some extent the maps) are bigger thatn shown in the game. "Wheres Harbor there is life" yes here is, and it is mostly player based. You will have to try to see the bustling harbor docks, ships unloading, seamen singing etc. There is a normal non-adventureous population af NPCs but every single NPC is not shown, only the important ones (ie the ones you can interract with)

 

- Fighting: What about special tactics, special moves, more specific Fighter Classes... there are so many possibilities to improve, to give the players more fun. Ok i can do spells, wearing special armor or weapons but this isnt real interactivity.

Being classless and with a "locked" fightsystem, there is less room for special moves than in , say, an average fps. Its a different style, which you may or may not like.

 

- Magic: Teleport to Range ---> what about Teleport to WP ---> higher costs on a high level maybe magic 35 and all of you Ethereal Points

In short; teleport to anywhere on the map.

There are two answers to this;

Roleplaying: The magic schols of Draia have not been able to channel the power of the magic stream in such quantities that allows teleportation at longer ranges. The portal rooms are extra dimensional spaces which requires a different energy focus.

English: some things are meant to be a little "costly" and transportation is one of those things. This means that moving from A to B can be achieved in a few manners but none will take you anywhere you want instantly.

[Entropy]

The graphic is not really that low poly low texture as you might think.

In a scene with water and shadows, there can be up to 200K triangles.

You would be very surprised on how many people out there have integrated video cards. Actually, MOST of the computers in the world have an integrated video card, with poor performance.

Of course, there is room for improvement, which is why our volunteers always improve the engine.

 

I don't know if you are aware of that, but a good 3D engine (UT, Crytek, Doom 3, Gambryo, etc.) range from 500K to 1M USD. We do not yet have that much money.

 

The fog of war on the maps has not been implemented because it is trivial to diable, especially in the context of an OSS game. So why bother to implement something many will disable by cheating?

 

Magic: Teleport to Range ---> what about Teleport to WP ---> higher costs on a high level maybe magic 35 and all of you Ethereal Points

That would be a very bad idea. People could use this feature to bypass mazes and would totally ruin the economy (would take just a few seconds to go from a storage to a mine).

 

Manufactoring/Crafting/Alchemy/Potions ... again ... Statue

And there is a good reason for that. A lot of people manufacture in groups, especialyl near storages, and if we were to add animations for that we'd have a big laggfest.

[freeone3000]

Dude?

It's not that hard. (Backticks indicate shell commands.) Assuming bash:

1) Download source. Berlios has instructions.

2) `cd elc`

3) `for i in $(ls *.diff) do patch -p1 < $i; done`

4) `make`

5) `nano ~/.elc/el.ini` (change port to 2001)

6) `./el.x86.linux.bin &`

 

And it's running so where you can test it.

 

As for C? Might as well learn, it's not hard. Cept for the whole pointer thing.

 

Anything that doesn't involve more data than is already sent (and trust me, a lot is already being sent) can be either applied through a patch through the above method (remember to save as a .diff) or made on your own. Note that when running modified clients, *always* run on the test server.

Edited December 3, 2006 by freeone3000

[levon]

Instead quoting and give an comment to all post, i think ill make a real suggestion to stop beating me.

 

Waypoint-System

 

 

 

This is only a 5 Minutes Work.. but i hope it shows what i have in mind.

[levon]

And another suggestion to the Advanced Teleport to Range thing.

 

Maybe it can go like this:

 

1.) you have to be Magic Level 35

2.) read a good high pricy bood

3.)Then you have to make a Special Waypoint. This want a special spell ... lets call it "Curse a place" (whatever)

4.)Then you have to make a daily donation to the Magic-School to focus the magical force to this point.

 

The Advanced Teleport to Range Spell want maybe a special Sigli lets call it "kitoen"(KirktoEnterprise) this sigli

will cost lets say 10K gc and you can use it only 10 Times.

 

Ethereal Points Cost... all of them

5% Chance to go to Hell

5 % Chance to go to a differnt place ... maybe pkmap

 

and after that you damn hungry too. And you need a cigaret

Edited December 3, 2006 by levon

[levon]

I cant hold myself ... this i have to answer

 

 

I don't know if you are aware of that, but a good 3D engine (UT, Crytek, Doom 3, Gambryo, etc.) range from 500K to 1M USD. We do not yet have that much money.

 

what about crystalspace?

 

Manufactoring/Crafting/Alchemy/Potions ... again ... Statue

And there is a good reason for that. A lot of people manufacture in groups, especialyl near storages, and if we were to add animations for that we'd have a big laggfest.

What about the F9 key?

[Entropy]

what about crystalspace?

Did you try CS? Did you see it in action?

 

What about the F9 key?

What about it?

[levon]

what about crystalspace?

Did you try CS? Did you see it in action?

 

no i but i take a look at it right now.

What about the F9 key?

What about it?

it only visibly to the player right? If yes... why dont ya use the same technic to put more animation into the game?

[Entropy]

it only visibly to the player right? If yes... why dont ya use the same technic to put more animation into the game?

 

Oh, you mean to see only your avatar manufacturing and stuff? Not everyone else?

[levon]

exactly thats what iam talking about ... it would be attractiv to players to have an eyecandy thing.

i know that some players are liking rudimental games... but this is a 3d game so i think beautyfull things(useless) things are good too get players... or not?!