Dedicated Spectate Slots
Warmonger
Join Date: 2003-02-04 Member: 13126Members, Constellation
Join Date: 2003-02-04 Member: 13126Members, Constellation
I brought this up before back in the alpha or early beta but it didn't seem to make any traction with the devs so I'll try again. I think NS2 desperately needs 1 or 2 dedicated spectate slots. There are numerous reasons, which I'll list a few:
<ul><li>New players can spectate to learn aspects of the game and get a feel for what is going on without feeling overwhelmed while playing.</li><li>Spectators are not causing an inbalance on the teams as they currently do now (by taking player slots).</li><li>Videogames are entertainment. Sometimes when you aren't playing you like to watch a match, like you would watch TV. As mentioned above, this can cause problems because your taking a player slot and causing a balance issue with the teams. Obviously this makes the players frustrated.</li></ul>
I had some more but I'm so darn tired I can't remember them right now lol. I thought a comment from the Kotaku review was particularly relevant:
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->After one loss (which admittedly, I had only joined the server six minutes prior to), when thrown back into the lobby, I more or less hurled myself through the door marked "spectate" in despair. I needed a break, and neither the tutorials nor the hands-on experience had yet taught me what Natural Selection 2 was all about.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I hope the devs will seriously consider this. Many other games have implemented this system in the past and it works great. Obviously, I'm not implying this should be a hard-coded option, but something a server operator could turn on or off and adjust the amount of slots dedicated to spectators.
<ul><li>New players can spectate to learn aspects of the game and get a feel for what is going on without feeling overwhelmed while playing.</li><li>Spectators are not causing an inbalance on the teams as they currently do now (by taking player slots).</li><li>Videogames are entertainment. Sometimes when you aren't playing you like to watch a match, like you would watch TV. As mentioned above, this can cause problems because your taking a player slot and causing a balance issue with the teams. Obviously this makes the players frustrated.</li></ul>
I had some more but I'm so darn tired I can't remember them right now lol. I thought a comment from the Kotaku review was particularly relevant:
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->After one loss (which admittedly, I had only joined the server six minutes prior to), when thrown back into the lobby, I more or less hurled myself through the door marked "spectate" in despair. I needed a break, and neither the tutorials nor the hands-on experience had yet taught me what Natural Selection 2 was all about.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I hope the devs will seriously consider this. Many other games have implemented this system in the past and it works great. Obviously, I'm not implying this should be a hard-coded option, but something a server operator could turn on or off and adjust the amount of slots dedicated to spectators.
Comments
Oh, so now you can change the camera perspective <b>in a video stream</b> all by yourself? I didn't know that. And the video quality of online live video streams reached the quality of in-game imaging quality? Impressive!
/sarcasm off
It's backwards thinking like this that is causing the whole videogame industry to go backwards instead of forwards. It reminds me of a small fraction of new players clamoring for a third person view in NS2 and the devs said that they are actually entertaining the idea, which seems absolutely absurd to me.
Anyway, Husar pointed out one of the reasons that streaming and spectating are two completely different things. I, for one, don't want someone constantly talking when I'm watching a match - I know what's going on and I don't need someone explaining obvious things to me.
Anyway, Husar pointed out one of the reasons that streaming and spectating are two completely different things. I, for one, don't want someone constantly talking when I'm watching a match - I know what's going on and I don't need someone explaining obvious things to me.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
For the weak reasons you listed, streaming is fine. A proxy like HLTV would be cool to watch competitive games though. Multiple spectator slots is a bad idea as it would put more strain on the already terribly performing servers.
Weak reasons? What does the reasons make so weak having a dedicated spectator slot? Warmonger is telling you that video streaming and spectating in-game are two different things. So it is fine to have both. Having video streams doesn't cancel the need for dedicated spectator server. I could even think of a hybrid. Watching in-game while listening to an audio stream of the commentators. I even imagine you could switch between commentator view and your own. It could save so much bandwidth and those who are bound to a narrow bandwidth can actually watch the game in high quality.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->A proxy like HLTV would be cool to watch competitive games though. Multiple spectator slots is a bad idea as it would put more strain on the already terribly performing servers.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Oh come on. You are nitpicking now. Of course a method should be chosen that doesn't hit player slot performance, just like the HLTV system you mentioned. Once the replay recording is implemented you can redirect that live replay data stream to a spectate server and redistribute from there to other viewers without affecting the player slots. So whether you are transparently bypassed to a spectate server when you go in spectate mode or you connect directly to a spectate server should not be a big difference.