The last few weeks have been pretty intense. Demigod has been unlike anything we’ve released before. The good news is that its sales have been really good and despite that first week which saw our network brought to its knees, the game’s average review scores have been 4 out of 5 (well over 4 out of 5 after the first week).
Our chief technology architect, Jeff Bargmann, who I brought onto Demigod a couple of weeks ago when it became clear that we were going to need to develop our own network solution for the game is clearly obsessed based on the 4am emails he sent me over the weekend. Jeff is also the lead developer on Impulse, ObjectDock, ObjectBar, Fences, and numerous other projects. When I absolutely positively must have something amazing done right and quickly, he is my go-to guy. So this weekend he’s been working on various proxy solutions. Cari, our lead game developer also found ways to solve some of the Pantheon and Skirmish issues that were reported over the weekend.
I don’t want to make any promises but given the success of Friday’s update and the likelyhood that the proxies will go online this week, we should be nearing the point of diminishing returns for getting people connected on the multiplayer match making side. I also know that Gas Powered Games is looking seriously at in-game connectivity.
Personally, I think the long-term solution is for us just to host the games entirely. That’s what we’re doing in Elemental for its multiplayer – our servers host the entire thing from the start.
But with the connectivity issues in MP likely to substantially diminish this week, it’s time to start thinking about what we should do next.
Demigod v1.1
So on the horizon there’s Demigod v1.1. Now, question is, what should be in it? Now, these aren’t expansion packs but I can think of a few things on my personal list that may or may not agree with what you guys want so let’s talk about that.
Here’s my personal preference list for v1.1 in brief:
Now, this doesn’t include DLC content such as Clan Wars, Scheduled Games, Group Join, etc. This is just v1.1. But it does give you an idea of some of the things we’re thinking of.
What would you like to see in terms of new features?
more foxes tbh ...
Modding
Signed!
With all due respect, fix the server issues that has plagued the game for the last two days. (servers been down at night for me in AU, early US central mornings)
replays.
and a firefox plugin to play them in the browser.
naw, just kidding.
The concede option would make an excellent addition. I think that it's implementation should be carefully considered though. I think that, when it comes to 'ranked' games, such as Pantheon, perhaps the whole team must agree to concede before someone is allowed to concede without penalty. This might actually be a good way to handle it anyway.
An example use case with a 3v3 could be below... I've tabbed out the alternate scenarios.
A1-User: Player #1 hits 'Concede' from menuA2-System: Message 'Are you sure you want to concede?' A3-System: Yes & No buttons displayedA4-User: Player #1 hits 'yes' A4A1-User: Player #1 hits 'no'A4A2-System: Game continues-END- A5-System: Message to all players on Player #1's team 'Player 1 wants to condede the match, do you agree?'A6-User: All other players hit 'yes' A6A1-User: Majority of players hit 'yes'A6A2-CONTINUE TO A7- A6B1-User: Majority of players hit 'no'A6B2-System: Message to player #1 'Your team want to continue, do you still wish to concede - it will have a negative impact on your points!'A6B3-User: Yes A6C1-User: NoA6C2-System: Game continuesA6C3-END- A6B4-System: Player is removed from game and has negative impact on their profileA6B5-System: Give remaining players choice to continue or freely concede with no penalty. A6D1-User: Both players decide to concede.A6D2-CONTINUE TO A7- A6E1-User: Both players decide differentlyA6E2-System: Message to player #2 (who decided to concede) 'Your team want to continue, do you still wish to concede - it will not have a negative impact on your points'A6E3-User: YesA6E4-System: Player is removed from game and there is no negative impact on their profileA6E5-END- A6B6-User: Both players decide to continueA6B7-System: Would you like to replace player #1 with AI or not?A6B8-User: Yes A6F1-User: NoA6F2-System: Game continuesA6F3-END- A6B9-System: Replace conceded demigod with AI.A6B10-Ssytem: Game continuesA6B11-END- A7-System: Message to all players 'the forces have darkness/lightness have conceded the match'
A1-User: Player #1 hits 'Concede' from menuA2-System: Message 'Are you sure you want to concede?' A3-System: Yes & No buttons displayedA4-User: Player #1 hits 'yes'
A4A1-User: Player #1 hits 'no'A4A2-System: Game continues-END-
A5-System: Message to all players on Player #1's team 'Player 1 wants to condede the match, do you agree?'A6-User: All other players hit 'yes'
A6A1-User: Majority of players hit 'yes'A6A2-CONTINUE TO A7-
A6B1-User: Majority of players hit 'no'A6B2-System: Message to player #1 'Your team want to continue, do you still wish to concede - it will have a negative impact on your points!'A6B3-User: Yes
A6C1-User: NoA6C2-System: Game continuesA6C3-END-
A6B4-System: Player is removed from game and has negative impact on their profileA6B5-System: Give remaining players choice to continue or freely concede with no penalty.
A6D1-User: Both players decide to concede.A6D2-CONTINUE TO A7-
A6E1-User: Both players decide differentlyA6E2-System: Message to player #2 (who decided to concede) 'Your team want to continue, do you still wish to concede - it will not have a negative impact on your points'A6E3-User: YesA6E4-System: Player is removed from game and there is no negative impact on their profileA6E5-END-
A6B6-User: Both players decide to continueA6B7-System: Would you like to replace player #1 with AI or not?A6B8-User: Yes
A6F1-User: NoA6F2-System: Game continuesA6F3-END-
A6B9-System: Replace conceded demigod with AI.A6B10-Ssytem: Game continuesA6B11-END-
A7-System: Message to all players 'the forces have darkness/lightness have conceded the match'
In the current system 'time out' window, I think all non-timed out players should be given the opportunity to click a 'kick' button or some such, so we can (if everyone votes it), expedite the players timing out, rather than waiting the full 30 seconds. Like my use case above in this scenario, we should be able to choose if the player is taken over by AI or not at this stage.
I also think, when it comes to match made games, players should be able to indicate a preference for a bot free game (at least to begin with - unless someone drops etc).
Being able to pool a teams resources together for a citadel upgrade or item purchase would be good. So, either a 'bank' we could put money into at the citadel that could only be used for citadel purchases, and the ability to transfer money to each other for strategic item purchases.
Ally portraits on the left. I play Sedna, and sometimes targeting heals becomes far more cumbersome than is necessary. If I'm standing near or on top of my ally, the targeting wants to snap to me, making me fidget with the pointer until the demigod I want to target is highlighted. Or, if it's Rook standing on top off Oak and I want to heal Oak, it's very time-consuming to ensure I don't waste my cooldown on the wrong person. If I can target a portrait, then I don't have to fight the controls and can focus on what's more important: who needs healing.
Favor Points for support. The way I play Sedna, I don't do a lot of damage overall (though, every so often I can string together a lot of kill steals with pounce), so I end up contributing to the fight primarily by keeping my team in the fight. I am just as vital to the team's success in an encounter, but I'm getting fewer favor points out of the deal. Healing should somehow be factored into favor points, with shield having similar treatment.
Ally mana. Having mana bars invisible to the enemy makes the metagame more interesting and robust (having to weight risk and reward more often), but making them invisible to teammates just creates cumbersome communication when I have to stop and type "I have no mana." On the topic of mana and health bars, it's a pain to mash the tilde key at the start of each match to get the settings I want. There should be a toggle in the options menu.
Item balances. This one is more obvious and probably doesn't need pointing out, but there are too many items that go unused and too many items that are must haves. Items like Vlemish Faceguard are almost mandatory. Also, what's the deal with the dispel scrolls? Worthless.
Minion controls. I hate how being even remotely near a tower makes my monks want to attack them. I don't have the patience to babysit stupid AI, so small things like "stand ground" would be nice.
Keybindings. I can't change all of my controls. Minion hotkeys are too far away from my gaming homerow, and I can't move them where I want to because the camera controls are locked. I play with my demigod tracked, so I don't need to move the camera left or right (just rotate and zoom), so I should be able to use those keys for more important tasks. Plus, I hate having the camera rotation inverted the way it is, but am stuck with it.
A.I. does matter
Agreed on the Concede button - so long as it's a team decision for the entire team to resign, not a single player. Make it a majority vote instead of a unanimous vote if need be - or heck, put an option in the lobby to let the players decide what they want.
3-minute grace time to Smart Quit... others have already commented on this: "provided you haven't died yet" or reduce that time to 30~60 seconds.
The other ideas people are coming up with (UI stuff, etc) are great too, but I'd be happy for now if just the Concede button was made available for v1.1 - the connection issues and bugs you have and still are dealing with already.
Why?
Also The UI enhancements sound good, I mean portaits of each ally on left or right side, Allowing Sedna & Oak to cast Spells on allys without having to go through the time consuming & Annoying factor or finding the right demigod.
About smart quitting, if there are uneven teams (like 2 v 1), please don't even give the person a disconnect. That is just bullsh1t
* More content (demigods, maps, especially)
* Better AI (sometimes demigods stand near the shrine for 2 minutes doing nothing, make them respond to portals that have been taken, etc, they don't seem to care much)
* UI improvements, as to make the game more intuitively commandable (I bet that isn't proper english). See the irish dude for some tips.
With all due respect, Frogboy, but if you expect us to give you feedback here, on this thread, then what about the rest of the forum? There are dozens of threads up there, with all kind of great suggestions, feedback, bugs fixes and balance. Who is keeping an eye on them, if i may ask? They are at least two threads that i know of, with easy to fix improvements or fixes, that could be easily done for the next patch. Why don't you know about them (or any other staff members, form SD or GPG)?
This been said, i'm glad that you are considering hosting the games in the future, as it is clear that p2p is not meant for 10 player games, without causing problems to some players. I know this is not a quick fix, but better late then never. I wish it was done before the game shipped, but...oh well.
I for one can't play the game. Only 2v2 games, the rest are a massive lag fest (constant ping of ~1500). The automatchmaking in skirmish mode is an absolute mess. In custom games i can't see the ping of the "host", or anything. If the host doesn't say in the game description where he is located, i could end up in a match with players from 5000+ miles away.
So i don't know, for me the patch should fix the connections and improve the matchmaking and the mp UI in impulse reactor. After this is fixed, you can start on the rest. At the moment, i don't care about the rest, as i simply cannot play the damn game.
Better Pantheon matchmaking. 2v2s are boring. It should always attempt to maximize the number of players and minimize the number of games. Right now it launches as soon as it finds 3 other people pretty much. Instead it should accumulate people over a set time interval. As soon as there are 10, match them up and launch the game. If it doesn't find enough people in that time, then and only then should it start games with fewer people or restart the timer.
Alternatively, for a more robust system, allow people to select their matchmaking preference. Anyone who selects 3v3 the system will try to place together and so on - this depends on a large pool of players however to make shorter waiting times.
1. REPLAYS!
2. random map/mode selection (as well as random DG selection)
3. UI improvements. allied DG unit portraits, clickable for targetting purposes. custom hotkeys and more hotkey featues (hotkey targetting is important, especially one for target self, and target nearest enemy DG).
4. Citadel Piggy Bank so teams can collaborate more easily on Citadel Upgrades.
And maybe some improvements to the way citadel upgrades work:
http://forums.demigodthegame.com/350937
Replay's, take favor(when it works) from rage quitters.
They said not new content btw so that idea's gone.
100% Agreed Its the best idea currently imo, This would bring team games ever closer together & clan games would be epic
Can you put an option in game settings to hide which God's are chosen (opposing team). This would stop players looking at the opposing team and then choosing the best counter strategy DemiGod.
Tals
Quiet a good one actualy, So Choosing is not a counter game, Sounds good Optional also so thats even better
yes thats enough kittens
One thing I'd like to see is a list of how many games of a certain type are being played at a given moment. Somewhat like what battle.net does. In the main multiplayer menu, there could be a small box to the right of all the buttons that shows, for example:
Skirmishes: 150 games being played; 25 people looking for games.
Custom Games: 340 games being played; 7 available games.
Pantheon: 260 games being played; 19 people looking for games.
I never play skirmishes because it's a shot in the dark, and you have no idea how long it might take to find a game. If I had some idea how many skirmishes were being played and how many people were actually looking for a game, I would be more inclined to try.
P.S. also fix the \nosound performance issues so I can start playing with the sound turned on!
All those changes sound reasonable.
I would also like for Pantheon matches to hide the choice of enemy demigods. This is how other competitive online games do it - like Street Fighter IV - and it means that even if there are bad matchups, you can't just pick a character solely for that purpose.
Patch 1.1 looks great.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:
Sign in or Create Account
