New GFX engine for SI

[The Real Redi]

Something crossed my mind today, and seeing as the most common reply i get from Mythic is "Sorry, the email you sent us was blank!" i have taken to posting on these boards in the hope that someone in the know might 'fill me in' as the Mongol said to the Vicar...

From what i am lead to believe, Shrouded Isle will have a new GFX engine, allowing long grasses, butterflies, water effects, shadows and most of all, less lag with a faster frame rate. Ok, so am i to believe that those who don't buy the upgrade will not get the more capable GFX engine? If this is the case, then this is a bastardly sneaky and rather piss takey scheme to make more cash from Mythic right there!

Apart from any in game effects, such as mezz/root etc, the main killer (i have found) in RvR, is when the lag gets so bad you either fall from a stairwell, a wall or a roof, or you get wasted by someone who happened to be facing away from the melee. Even with /effects self it will still lag horrifically when more than 10 people are doing anything at any one time, thus a lot of the fun is taken out of things such as dragon raids and keep defences, as its like watching a powerpoint slideshow sometimes.

Ok, the characters, classes, items, quests etc will co-exist no problem, but what of those who dont buy SI? As far as i can see, the ones who can afford SI will have the most sick advantage of being able to move around without the lag that those who dont own it suffer from. This also mean that SI owners will start to stride away, and in the end, the only people who will achieve anything will be those without the lag.

Unless Mythic hold up their hands and say "ok, we fooked up the GFX engine so far, but when SI is released, the GFX will upgrade for every subscriber thus far like patches do, and we will perhaps keep those who pay our wages happy, instead of l337ing a section by giving them a huge advantage", then i expect that the already dwindling numbers on the euro servers, will become even thiner, as people start getting frustrated with the imbalance...

Having an online game release an expansion pack as tweaked as this, and charging people who have already shelled out for the software, and the subscription, is a massive piss take and surprises me that mythic wants to make all this work for themselves. Having just the graphics engine update for free would calm my angry demeanor a bit, leaving the other races & classes & islands for those who have bought the expansion pack. Christ, it wouldnt break the bank and i wouldnt mind betting that it would satiate a hell of a lot of folks here, just being able to walk around in a crowd without looking like you have rickkets...

 

[old.Trine Aquavit]

Every indication from Mythic is that only people with SI will get the new engine. This seems fair enough to me - incorporating a new engine is a bit more than just a patch, it's a significant development effort and Mythic would be mugs not to try to cover their expenses - they are running a business after all.

Those that don't buy SI will get the same engine they've always had (it won't suddenly get worse), though I concede that in certain situations they will be at a competitive disadvantage compared to a SI user.

At the end of the day, though, Mythic are producing an expansion that looks well worth the dosh: new engine, new races, new classes, new zones. And there won't be many players who do not shell out for it (if you can afford the subs & internet charges you can probably afford the expansion).

 

[pudzy]

Its wednesday tomorow and I did'nt know

 

[liste]

this is not facts, as i cannot say i know it, but this is how i have understood it so far:


The gfx engine itself, will be downloadable, or even auto patched on all clients, except those who have SI, as they have it already.
the nifty effects, will only be enabled in the SI expansion, but the Cure For Lag, will be free for all, due to the realization that their engine choice was rather piss poor.


So, the advantages a SI owner will have, will be:

Access to new characters and reaces
Access to new zones
Access to the GFX panel, where you can enamble the new graphical goodies.

The skins of the new chars will ofc be patched as well, so the people who doesnt have access, dont get a missing texture, to look at




That is what i have understood so far. might be bullocks

 

[old.chesnor]

Originally posted by old.Trine Aquavit
Every indication from Mythic is that only people with SI will get the new engine. This seems fair enough to me - incorporating a new engine is a bit more than just a patch, it's a significant development effort <snip>

You'll have to explain why a free upgraded GFX engine for the masses is a 'significant development effort'. Because I don't buy that. This game is a client/server application. The user just needs the client software to play the game. As we all know (what with it being patch day soon ) this game is designed such that new content is easily downloadable. That can come in the form of new gfx/sounds/zones, or a new game engine. There is no overhead associated with distributing an upgraded game engine to existing customers via this method (apart from bandwidth). The only reason why Mythic may yet choose not to do it is on purely commercial grounds.

To be honest, I will buy the expansion, as I think most people who lurk around these forums will. But I also think that not giving existing customers who do no wish/cannot afford to/cannot run SI on current PC an upgraded GFX engine is outrageous. Let's not kid ourselves, the 'upgrade' isn't really and 'upgrade' at all. Its a fix to an engine that is utterly incapable of rendering the chaos that is RvR on all but top-end spec PCs with effects self and names off. The wavy grass (I really hope they have options to turn all this superfluous eye candy off, because as an ex-Q3er I value framerate much, much more than unneccessary eye-candy) is a mere diversion, to get the wow-factor.

I will go 'wow' if Mythic don't offer the engine upgrade to existing customers who don't buy SI. But it will be 'WOW WHAT A BUNCH OF CNUTS" rather than "WOW LOOK AT TEH EYE CANDEH!!!1122"

 

[The Real Redi]

"The gfx engine itself, will be downloadable, or even auto patched on all clients, except those who have SI, as they have it already.
the nifty effects, will only be enabled in the SI expansion, but the Cure For Lag, will be free for all, due to the realization that their engine choice was rather piss poor."

hope your right, Liste...

It dawned on me earlier that even though i have ADSL, 512Mb ram, P4 2G, and a GeForce3 (have a 4 ti200 (or is it 500?) on order though) i still suffer horrible jumpy slideshow graphics when too much going on, and i started feeling uber pity for those who are running on the 'recommended spec' as laid out by mythic:

Pentium II 450 MHz
128 MB RAM
600 MB free hard disk space
16 MB 3-D accelerated video card
Internet access

<coughs> yus, and i bet that all the dev team and people who work on it have tried using this setup to play it... I mean, seriously, 16Mb Video??? i had 64 and it was pissing awful sometimes!

ah well... must be us... <shrugs>

 

[Gabrial]

Originally posted by old.chesnor


You'll have to explain why a free upgraded GFX engine for the masses is a 'significant development effort'. Because I don't buy that. This game is a client/server application. The user just needs the client software to play the game. As we all know (what with it being patch day soon ) this game is designed such that new content is easily downloadable. That can come in the form of new gfx/sounds/zones, or a new game engine. There is no overhead associated with distributing an upgraded game engine to existing customers via this method (apart from bandwidth). The only reason why Mythic may yet choose not to do it is on purely commercial grounds.

There is no overhead in distributing the GFX engine upgrade, but I suspect there is overhead involved in developing it. Either a) They had to buy it and need to get their money back somehow or b) They had to pay people to develop it.

 

[old.Trine Aquavit]

Exactly, Gabrial. It may not be much of an overhead to distribute it but it has been a significant overhead to develop it/purchase it/integrate it.

Simply put: giving the GFX engine away for free will reduce sales of SI, which will reduce income, which is needed to cover the cost of development of the expansion and to generate profits.

Many of us have already stated that the most important enhancement in SI is the new GFX engine. With the engine as a part I wouldn't be surprised if as much as 80% of the active accounts bought SI. Without it, I'd be surprised if as many as 60% bought it.

The only things Mythic would gain from making the GFX engine a freebie would be a small amount of customer happiness (which would last about a week) and that there would only be one GFX engine to maintain.

 

[lairiodd]

This is a question that I asked on rightnow

1) if you dont get the expansion pack, will the new graphics engine be provided as a patch or is the graphics engine part of the expansion, so that only those with the expansion get the benefit of the new graphics engine and 2 separate clients will be used depending on what type of account the subscriber has ?

2) I assume that in the event of you having 2 accounts, the expansion packs will have some kind of CD-Key so you need 1 per account. Is that true or false.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
They replied:

Hello,

- The upgraded graphic engine will only be available with the add-on. That said, some new textures will be available through the patch.

- You will need one copy of Shrouded Isle for each account you want to upgrade.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


So, gfx engine is part of SI. Mythic apparently hinted that that would not be the case but no one has ever been able to show a link to that interview or grab bag and there is certainly nothing like that on their SI website

 

[old.chesnor]

As a business decision that is very poor. When you consider the majority of Mythics income comes not from selling units of daoc but from subscriptions, it seems odd that they would discriminate in such a clumsy way. Its obviously a means to coerce people into purchasing the expansion in order to recieve the new engine.

Blizzard did something very similar with d2, only allowing players who had purchased the expansion to play the game in an increased screen resolution. But this is a very different circumstance. In the case of d2, the game was perfectly playable in the smaller resolution, but nicer to play in the larger res. Daoc is almost unplayable for many people using the current engine in large scale RvR. The new engine isn;t about the implementation of 'wavy grass' and 'reflective water'. Fundamentally it allows customers to do what it says on the back of the box. Large scale RvR, not lagfests where you fall through stone floors or watch a 1fps slideshow of your own doom. The engines deficiencies are a bug, that needs to be fixed. For free.

And Gabrial, you can kid yourself that Mythic need to sell SI in order to recoup the implementation costs of the new engine. Bundling the upgraded (fixed) gfx engine with SI serves one purpose for Mythic, making it a must buy for its customer base.

Terrible decision, but I fear we are (mostly) all so hooked, that not only will we just shrug, but we will all rush out and buy it like the junkies we are

 

[malenka]

I too have a high spec PC and a cable connection. I too suffer from the screen freezes and 1 frame per minute in mass rvr.

And I too will be rushing out to buy SI. Not because of the wavy grass and the new content, but simply for the new gfx engine. They have got us by the short and curlies.

 

[Gabrial]

Originally posted by old.chesnor
And Gabrial, you can kid yourself that Mythic need to sell SI in order to recoup the implementation costs of the new engine. Bundling the upgraded (fixed) gfx engine with SI serves one purpose for Mythic, making it a must buy for its customer base.

No, Im fairly confident that they DO need to get their money back somehow. If this was not the case, wouldnt they just give away the expansion pack? I mean, look at the implentation of DF, the addition of new mobs etc as part of routine patches. These are free so why are we paying for these new mobs/areas in an expansion pack? I suspect that the main reason they are charging is for the GFX engine - as people have said it is probably the single most important reason to invest in the add-on. TBH, I think the game is great and the fact that they have acknowledged the problems and fixed them (albiet for a price) it fantastic.

Its just a fact of business - you cant keep releasing stuff for free sadly. The game runs OK but has some problems in large scale battles - many games will have similar problems. The difference here is that its being fixed but at cost.

 

[old.chesnor]

You misunderstand me Gabrial. I am not saying the Mythic should release the expansion pack for free, that would be bad for business. What I am saying is that the decision to only upgrade the gfx engine for those who purchase the expansion pack is a clumsy attempt to force everyone who plays this game to buy SI, regardless of whether they want the new content or not.

Clearly, a game such as daoc is not cheap to produce, but the implementation of NetImmerse in the current game means that most people can't participate meaningfully in RvR. This is a bug, as I already have stated. No end user of a game, or indeed any software, should be expected to pay for bug fixes.

EDIT:

From the CoC :-
"Players undertake not to make use of any bug, not to use any undocumented functions and not to exploit any possible design faults. Players also undertake to notify the presence of any bugs, undocumented functions or design faults they may discover to GOA personnel as soon as possible."

You could validly argue that all those players who have machines not blighted by the horrendous lag in large scale RvR are exploiting a 'bug' or 'design fault' in order to gain unfair advantage over others. Clearly the slowdown can be categorised as either a bug or a design fault, as they claim to have fixed it.

 

[The Real Redi]

Ok, if you bought a car and whenever it was sat in traffic, it started sputtering and farting and stalling, you would take it back and demand they put it right. If you bought a television and it didnt have the red channel, youd take it back.

When i buy something, i expect it to work. period. full stop. I dont expect to buy something, then keep being asked for more money, until they fix the problem that they should be responsible for.

Anyone from Mythic happens to read this, please can you give me a link to the financial breakdown for the last year? I would love to see how much cash you ahve earned from the hundreds of thousands of people who have PAID FOR the game, then they PAY FOR a subscription, which inevitably runs out, then they will pay you yet more. As long as mythic keep the servers up, they keep earning. Simple.

Err, not meaning to sound out of place here, where the fuck does it all go? I mean, are you going to start charging those without Shrouded Isle less for their subscription, as they wont be getting the most from the game? Are you to charge the SI owners more?

Cmon, theres got to be a card up your sleeve here, otherwise your going to start coming across as a bunch of crooks...

 

[Gabrial]

Originally posted by old.chesnor

Clearly, a game such as daoc is not cheap to produce, but the implementation of NetImmerse in the current game means that most people can't participate meaningfully in RvR. This is a bug, as I already have stated. No end user of a game, or indeed any software, should be expected to pay for bug fixes.

Point taken - and Redi's about the car analogy.

To be honest, I have trouble identifying because I never go on these large scale hunts although the Lag in DF when a legion raid is in place is aweful - if its similar/worse then its a huge oversight by the testing team when they designed the game. I guess beta testing would not find it cause from what I can gather there were never any 'zergs' back then?

Maybe they never really contemplated the prospect of 200 people all fighting at once?

 

[The Real Redi]

dammit... work was boring, so i flamed Rightnow... probably banned by the morning... heh!

edit: although, this is the most constructive thread, and least flammable one, ive seen here in my life lol!

 

[old.Trine Aquavit]

Originally posted by The Real Redi
Ok, if you bought a car and whenever it was sat in traffic, it started sputtering and farting and stalling, you would take it back and demand they put it right. If you bought a television and it didnt have the red channel, youd take it back.

When i buy something, i expect it to work. period. full stop. I dont expect to buy something, then keep being asked for more money, until they fix the problem that they should be responsible for.

Hehe, if you look at the terms and conditions of the software license that you agree to when you install the software, it pretty much says that the software doesn't actually have to do what it's supposed to, and that the software supplier is not legally bound to fix anything.

The truth is: if you don't want to pay (and play) you don't have to. In fact you probably have a legal right to take the product back and get a refund if you can prove that it is 'not fit for purpose', but I don't see many courts believing that it took you 30 days /played to work it out

They're running a commercial business: they reckon they can generate more money by making the graphics SI only than they can by giving it away free. I think they're probably right. The expansion isn't going to bring in a huge number of new subscribers (no expansion of a MMORPG ever has), it's mainly there to generate direct revenue from existing customers (cross-selling) and help customer retention.

 

[The Real Redi]

In my post to Right now i suggested either

a) Provide it free to current users as they are loyal, and have shelled out already (on several occaisons, adn will continue to do so for subs). Besides they are the ones with the characters of a season where it will matter the most.

b) either charge those without SI less for the subscription, as they are using the substandard engine, or, charge SI owners more.

I refuse to accept that they can provide a shit-um service like this to one half of their player base, an allegedly decent one for the other half, then charge both groups the same amount to play it?

Did the steerage passengers on board the Titanic have to pay the same price as 1st class? nope, and they got left for dead, as they were the least important. Mythic have obviously laid out there intentions: to make as much money as poss, and screw the reputation we get. If they continue to expand the game, eventually, those of us without SI will fall behind as new things are added, based on the new engine, until Mythic abandon the old engine completely, and leave paying customers in the sh!t...

added to that, will newly purchased games come with the good GFX? Imagine how you would feel if you bought this game in say 3/4 months time, start the game, and find out that your no playing a complete version? that makes it a beta version, right?

 

[Tesla Monkor]

I wouldn't count on getting the enhanced engine without buying the SI expansion for one simple reason:

The new engine costs Mythic money. Money they do not get by providing you with it as a free patch. I find it very unlikely that they (Mythic) would get the new 4.X engine free from the people who build it, seeing as the previous engine was 3.X.

Common sense. Not that I don't want people to have the new engine, but I'll buy SI anyway, as will most of you, so the point is pretty much moot.

 

[Ramshie]

Did the steerage passengers on board the Titanic have to pay the same price as 1st class? nope, and they got left for dead, as they were the least important. Mythic have obviously laid out there intentions: to make as much money as poss, and screw the reputation we get.

While I do agree that Mythic could be fair and give the engine to everyone, your logics are faulty. The expansion is not free. While it is arguable that the engine should be given away for free, it is also true that people who will not buy SI will naturally not have to buy the CD, which will cost a few months subscription worth of money anyway. Thus the suggestion of SI owners having to pay more per month is, in my opinion, not fair. Like has been said above, the expansions are mostly made to keep the already existing playerbase happy, thus ensuring monthly income in the future. I for one would not be a happy camper if I suddenly had to pay more per month than the ones that did not spend money on the expansion.

--Ramshir, Prydwen, Albion

 

[Gabrial]

How about giving people who upgrade a months free subscription then? That would be a nice little bonus wouldnt it?

 

[Taggart]

Hey bro as bad as you may think it is, having to pay for an upgrade(add on pack) its not as if mythic is the only ones to do this, UO has done it once and is going to release a new one soon, Everquest done the same and so will many others. Shit happens mate, the world is just like that and they want all ya money!

As for the lagg etc you were talking about, i had the same problems aswell with my old computer, i couldn't do a dragon or relic raid as i would lagg out all the time but i got a new comp and with the really good connection i got i can have effects on when there are shitloads of people rvring and i still get no lagg.

 

[Trelawney Hope]

It seems there's no pleasing some folks...

Well Mythic could just keep DAoC going as-is and keep tweaking a bit here or a bit there, and well - stay in the past.

But no - in total fairness, they have said that technology has advanced and they have undertaken a major project to reach new heights and improve our gaming experience and enjoyment, and to test our latest kit. Too right! When I see the latest games coming out - i'd love to see some of this applied to DAoC.

For those of you who wish to remain playing the existing game - you can! You'll get the game updates some new textures and content, but no spanky new GFX engine. No change to your subscription - business as usual.

For those of you who probably spend £20 on a round of beer or a few packets of smokes, etc. you can pay to have the latest and greatest experience Mythic can offer for you for a more than reasonable sum of money considering the number of hours we love to spend on it, and the effort that has been put into the development

As for Loyalty to a product - People will vote with their wallets and I for one am really looking forward to what they've done with the updated NetImmerse engine.

Been playing since March '02 and I will enjoy a fresh overhaul of the existing realms GFX plus ongoing game additions and the introduction of some new classes and locations - Bravo Mythic!


_________________
Trelawney Hope
Eldritch
Hibernia
Prydwen
_________________

 

[Brunore]

Originally posted by Trelawney Hope
It seems there's no pleasing some folks...

Well Mythic could just keep DAoC going as-is and keep tweaking a bit here or a bit there, and well - stay in the past.

But no - in total fairness, they have said that technology has advanced and they have undertaken a major project to reach new heights and improve our gaming experience and enjoyment, and to test our latest kit. Too right! When I see the latest games coming out - i'd love to see some of this applied to DAoC.

For those of you who wish to remain playing the existing game - you can! You'll get the game updates some new textures and content, but no spanky new GFX engine. No change to your subscription - business as usual.

For those of you who probably spend £20 on a round of beer or a few packets of smokes, etc. you can pay to have the latest and greatest experience Mythic can offer for you for a more than reasonable sum of money considering the number of hours we love to spend on it, and the effort that has been put into the development

As for Loyalty to a product - People will vote with their wallets and I for one am really looking forward to what they've done with the updated NetImmerse engine.

Been playing since March '02 and I will enjoy a fresh overhaul of the existing realms GFX plus ongoing game additions and the introduction of some new classes and locations - Bravo Mythic!

Good Post!

I 100% agree, I love the game as it is and SI will just bring more.

Some people you just cannot please and will do nothing but moan and moan, if the game is that 'bad' then play something else and leave us to enjoy it.

 

[SevenSins]

Having read the thread, I agree with the costumers, aswell as the defenders of the engine.

Mythic has either been self-coding this new engine, or bought it.

Which doesn't matter it both costs about the same. Even when you compare the times mythic has spend working WITH the new engine can be included here, hence the fact that something you make yourself you thorougly know, but something you buy you will have to learn to play with, thus both will lead to the same "working hours" for there team one way or another.

Thing here is, Mythic has been openly stating that i.e: The lag problems will be fixed in a patch that comes with Shrouded Isles, and I think 99% of the people know that since it was officialy stated on the Shrouded Isles webpage as soon as that sneak preview page went live. As also it was stated on the herald, and in several interviews with the Mythic development team if I am not wrong.

I "could" be wrong about this, but I'm almost 99% sure I'm not because this was the thing that I was waiting for with the release of Shrouded Isles.

I for one totally agree for charging for this new engine, hence if they bought it then the price would be absurd due to it being used for commercial activities, and if they had build it the price would be absurd due to "working hours" of the development team of that engine.

The bad part tho here is, that Mythic has been letting out more or less that the new fixes, for i.e: laggy RvR would be fixed upon the release of Shrouded Isles in form of a patch, which they have now taken back and somehow forced you, to either buy the new expansion or keep playing lagged.

This in a costumers point of view is totally unfair, and it is sort of lame from Mythic itself to partially withdraw what they had already promised.

Other than that what I already stated, I will buy the new engine, but the, in my eyes, commercial game Mythic play here, rather than to satisfy the community (I'm talking the memory leak in DAoC) to let them buy something that will fix it.

Like I said before it is a good strategy, especially with christmas coming up. But basically they have put 2 things in 1, that is an expansion, AND a fix which you'll both have to pay for =\

-The SevenSins

 

[old.Krusha]

we still have to wait til march before SI goes EU anyway ....

 

[Aeternus]

Im pretty sure I read on herald that the engine will be patched, since its apart of the daoc subscription....

 

[Tenko]

To be honest I dont believe that its unfair to pay for the upgrade as it will of cost alot of money.

We on the other hand will pay what? £20? (the origional price of the game), £25?

Pfft! Like someone said earlier, triple that and you'll get how much money I'll spend tommorrow night on the town with the wife. Why we arguing about bloody peanuts?