Atmospheric Territories Mod (Title name change due to confusion and dislikes)...
Webtrance
US Join Date: 2013-11-08 Member: 189165Members, Reinforced - Shadow
US Join Date: 2013-11-08 Member: 189165Members, Reinforced - Shadow
Stop the patches everyday, revert to a stable build with normal lighting, and stop messing with the game. Please. Tutorials are okay, menus okay, skins, and performance fixes okay. But please stop messing with core gameplay.
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P.S. is it bad that this is what went through my head when i saw this thread?
Please explain in CLEAR DETAILS AND EXAMPLES of how?
All i see is more and more players coming back,
More and more playing the game?
I dont see that in killing the game,
Off course the last few patches have created some performace issues, and am sure they already know, if not will know very shortly, and Look into fixing.
Saying that these patches is killing NS2. is wrong.
The only reason player count grew is due to sales not because of patches.
Game play stale. It has been for a long time now.
Only thing i'll agree with is that atmospheric lighting can piss off.
The truth is UWE simply does not have the confidence and the skills/knowlage to make the right changes to gameplay. There are however talented individuals that can do it within the community and are willing to put in the work. You really should start working with these amazing people instead of pushing them away - and I'm not only talking about gameplay changes here.
There is a person in the CDT that could make some real quality changes if she was given charge of gameplay. That person is Rantology.
Rantology worked on gameplay and balance changes with me and Dragon almost from the beginning of ns2. We did lot of work with Andy on the last big gamelpay overhaul and created compmod together. In the end most of the changes that were made in compmod were put in the vanilla game. If she was given full freedom to make changes I have full confidence she would make huge improvements to NS2 gameplay that would make the game more fun for both new players and veterans.
LOL. Of all the countless things on the internet this could have been, I somehow just knew it was going to be that clip.
I don't personally know Rantology or her qualifications, but I feel NS2 could use a strong core of a designer or few designers that have a defined idea of how NS2 reaches whatever potential there's left to unlock. Some people will definitely disagree with the direction and decisions, but I still feel the outcome is better than the present confused mix of ambitions.
Well written Bacillus, I could not have agreed more
The game needs someone capable in charge that is well connected with the community and has experience playing/working with the game. That person needs to be confident in making his/her vision a reality and have the ability to push it through. Even if major changes are made players will be quick to realise if that person is capable or not after trying them out. It's just a question of picking the right person for the job.
I should probably mention that I have not spoken to Rantology if she is interested to take the responsibility or not. I just know from my experience she has the skill set to do it. I kinda put her in the spotlight without asking. Even though she would not take up the torch there are few other in the community that can make this happen.
After the first patch by CDT and in process of time with every build more and more problems appears. I already started to get used to some of them and I'm not sure if someone going to fix that. I don't know.
Before the patches I never had constant redplugs, textures which can't load, fatal errors and more and more.
But in spite of this game became better (even for me) and I can't deny that. At least some changes let game to stay afloat because stagnation always equals death agony.
Odd it's the exact opposite for me..
Before the CDT came along I had crashing issues, red plug issues, and hitreg felt downright awful at times...
The first patch the CDT put out solved my crashing issue and got rid of like 80% of the red plugs.. Hitreg also got waaay better (a lot less dying after rounding a corner bs)
Ironically the very first patch the new PDT put out brought my crashing issue back.. The second one screwed up my server browser, now I'm back to getting red plugs and dying around corners on a regular basis..
It's like they undid everything the CDT accomplished then took it a step further and made things worse. (the server browser being FUBAR is the worst of it)
I've also noticed less available servers during the day. There used to always be at least 3-4 populated NA servers in the mornings. Now I'm lucky if there's one.
It's OK Mofo. Implementing personal side projects into the game seems to be more important than utilizing our 20 page thread full of ideas for player retention... because ya know,,, new lighting is going to save NS2.
This Game Has Been Dying Since It Came Out.
While I question the decisions made recently by UWE regarding the PDT and rapid strategy, I will not deny that it is good to see them working on things again and actively implementing things that community members think up. Shit takes time though. And unfortunately for them, we're going to go for their throat no matter what they do.
If they make a hug(h)e patch that completely changes everything, people (me) will probably get super butthurt and question whether they want to keep playing the game. If they don't make changes fast enough, people will rant on about how they're not listening to us. If they make no changes....nothing will change. If they make any changes...people will rant about how they're manipulating the core gameplay on a whim.
For Clog's Sake People. Give the PDT the time and feedback they need, then watch the stats like they are and figure out where to go from there.
The only side project I see is that wasn't in the player retention thread is the "Project Sticky Shoe" thing. https://trello.com/c/oLJguvTE/174-project-sticky-shoe
What's the point of cluttering up someone's inventory?
Other than that, the lighting should have been like this since the beginning.
I actually really like the lightning change...
Now suddenly people who boosted their gamma for an advantage are whining and screaming on the forums because their advantage has been taken away. (at least somewhat)
Can't see aliens in a dark corner without using your flashlight? GOOD!
Can't see level 3 cloaked aliens as ridiculously easy as you used to? GOOD!
This atmospheric change is one of the best things they've done to the game since I started playing it. It looks amazing, makes flashlights useful, and minimizes the advantage that gamma boosters gain.
It was one of the initial plans, alongside the Fade actually having a minor flickering/sparking effect on lights as it would blink past. And... Dynami... Heheheh You know what I was gonna say
That is why many have asked for it to be a server side option... meaning pub servers can force everyone to be immersed in particles in all their glory while comp scrim/gather servers can turn the shenanigans off.
Its a win-win.
Don't forget the Onos was originally intended to shake props and move lights around too, too bad prop physics never happened.
Hehe yes indeed! I also reference that in me Walls of Lame video
Well at least the Onos shakes and makes sand come... from... space station... ceilings... WUT!
The lightning change was a good addition to the game, there is just no reason not to have the option to turn it on or off. The worst part of that addition though is the impact it had on performance.
Not being able to disable it makes big part of the community unnecessary frustrated because they are not playing ns2 to be immersed but for the gameplay mechanics. Playing fps game in darkness is simply not fun for a lot of players. If we add the issue of fair play to the mix more experienced players will counter this change with gammapanel anyway leaving players that don't use it in a less favourable situation.
There is a really good reason why ns2+ is this popular, it allows you remove so many unnecessary clutter in ns2 and makes the game much more enjoyable to play. Since we are on that topic I would like to quote this from the Ranked or not ranked thread:
The work behind compmod and Ns2+ can not be underestimated. The work that @xDragon and @Mendasp have done for this game is the key reason why the game is still played actively today. I'm surprised how little credit has been given to them and I think its shameful how UWE has not acknowledged their work. In truth UWE should really have approached them long time ago to work with them on the ns2 development in one way or another.
I also agree with compmod, we tried to avoid creating it as long as possible until it was clear that UWE was not going to do things properly. Then it was just a question of the competitive scene dying out or make something happen. It's also not suprising that most of the comp made changes made it into the game considering how strong the comp mod team was.
The skill and knowlage required still exist within the community to make ns2 great, it's just a question to start working with the right people and channel it to the game.
If this is going to be baked-in to the game for some time to come, I think the fairest options would be to:
- Take greater advantage of colored lighting options (or other things like behavioral changes in animated environmental props) rather than straight lighting intensity decreases in order to achieved desired atmospheric effects.
- Reduce the degree of the lighting change universally.
- Create a server-side option to enable or disable the lighting mode.
My preferred response would be a simple user setting, but I understand the arguments against it. That said, given how many other things we can turn off (rich infestation, ambient occlusion, atmospheric lighting, NS2+ options, etc.) it seems that we already have a strong precedent of enabling users to selectively adjust their visual experience of the game at the expense of strict consistency, and pretending otherwise so as to ensure that this particular change remains universal is moderately disingenuous, especially if there's an associated performance hit for some users.While I could easily make the feature work better in a competitive environment (and a pub one, I dare say) and even offer a complete rollback toggle through NS2+, I already stated I stopped work on NS2+ (and the reasons are out there and plenty of people have read them, so there's no need to repeat that), similarly, dragon won't roll back any of this either.
So for the first time in a very long time, mods won't come to the rescue here, so that shouldn't even be a justification for a feature not being suitable for everyone. So that argument is not valid anymore (should have never been an argument, either you design something right, or you don't).
Seriously, if you don't like the thread, lock it. Or sink it and announce it. These ninja sinks are poor form and reflect very poorly on yourselves.
Fine, go back to build 249!
The point of the post was that you (developers) don't have to change for the sake of change. Again, you're changing the core game enough that comp play requires a mod to fix it. If you don't fix the lighting for comp play and make it a part of the core gameplay that cannot be toggled, you will loose players.
No it's not wrong. If game changes cause me to not play the game, then it is in fact, killing NS2. I am a game thermometer of sorts.
As far as lighting goes, the game should be based on tracking/aim skill, ambush tactics, dodging, positioning, and teamwork...which it is for the competitive scene and somewhat for seasoned pub players. Making lighting changes adds a new element. It's called darkness. Darkness now gives aliens a new tactic. That tactic is called "Sweetie Dark." Meaning "I'm gonna kill you because you can't see me as well as you once did and I made you miss your shots and not because I'm good, but because the lighting sucks in this room."
I suppose we'll just have to go back to using Gamma Panel again. http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/gamma_panel.html for old eyes. But seriously, remove the gamma slider option in NS2 if you're going to mess with the lighting and force people to play that way. I mean, why have a gamma option in the first place?