In my mind, the fun of Elemental resides in the fact that you’re not just trying to conquer some fantasy world but the world itself is designed to be so organic and unique from game to game.
A lot of the difference between games is a result of things like a tech tree that has different techs in it, a huge library of special content that is integrated into map generation randomly each game, quests, integrated community content, and the divergent paths to victory.
Now, as some of you know, Stardock’s bread and butter isn’t from game development. Our desktop software and enterprise software have always given us the luxury of being able to take as long as we want to develop our games as well as take “risks” on the way we release our games (no copy protection for instance – which, in case people are wondering, the retail version of Elemental will not have copy protection).
And that brings me to a question I wanted to pose to you folks. Would you be interested in us extending the beta? Since anyone can join betas by pre-ordering, we could try something that really hasn’t been done before as far as I know – make the beta experience something truly outstanding unto itself.
Right now, the schedule is this:
This is pretty much the same schedule we’ve been doing since Galactic Civilizations I back in 2003.
But imagine this kind of beta instead:
So what would be the point of this? The point would be to make it a lot more fun to develop the game with the beta testers. Rather than have v1.0 come out in February and then have v1.1 in say April and so on, we simply keep working on the game with the beta testers.
Then, when we release the game, it’s got a ton more stuff.
Here are some thoughts that come to mind:
How many players should/can we allow in a game? 8? 12? 32?
How sophisticated can we make dungeons in the game?
How sophisticated can we make quests in the game?
How sophisticated can we make tactical battles in the game?
How big of a scope can we give the campaign?
We don’t have the financial pressure to release the game in February and because of that, we have an opportunity to try something we’ve not done that we think might be really special and that is vastly increase the contribution of the beta players into the game than what we’ve done before.
The end result would, I think, be a game that could very well be a classic. A year’s worth of player input before it was released to the general public.
Tell us what you think.
I don't think many people play real strategy games online, period. Sure, there are plenty whole play those twitch based, build order oriented ones, but games which are strategic rather than tactical are usually to long for multiplayer. Because as everyone knows, as the length of a game increases, the chances of something catastrophic happening to the players' computer causing inability to continue approaches 1.
FPS games usually have plenty of people on multiplayer, unless the multiplayer code and the game were botched completely.
They most definitely should not do this, it would be extraordinarily misleading. If they extend the beta and development process, starting now, then they are not going to have a complete, polished game by february. It will still have significant kinks to work out, features that are being toyed with, etc. They wouldn't just be adding an extra 5 months to polish a game that they already finished by February. No, it will still be the middle of the development process.
Thinking a bit more about it, if you go for the extended beta, I think you should definitly try and make modding tools (or at least tutorials) available asap.Because the more mods there are available *at the release* the more enticing it will be for several players of the kind that build a strong community.Maybe you could even release some...mods, I mean.
That said, only you know if it's worth it. But 6 month more or less wont make such a difference that the game would feel outdated. Besides, I gathered it's supposed to scale well
Well then, I guess I can't blame you for not knowing Sorry about that.
The exension of the Beta sounds like an excelent idea.
How sophisticated can we make dungeons in the game?, How sophisticated can we make quests in the game?
These seem like great extras but i would prefer focus on the empire/city building before these two.
I would think pretty sphisticated. From reading some on where you are heading with this game you seem to be trying to make a realistic fantasy game (i know thats an oxymoron). To that extend real historical battle were very dependant on the tactics of the armies to decide a victory, not just we have x pikemen and they have y so we win (extrem over-simplification). Would be great to have a deep level of tactical detail and challenge.
To counter this though i would hope the diplomacy is as deep for the non-military minded.
A rich backstory make the races feel more intimate when playing sandbox so the more the better. I would suggest though that the final released campaign not be the one in Beta so the beta testers have the full new story to look forward to on release, especially if we play the beta campaign mode multiple times looking for bugs. Also would be fun to have some bonus for completing the campaigns, noting major but something like a special statue for your capital in sandbox.
Looking forward to this game very much, i think it will be very unique.
If we are including AIs in this, the more the merrier!
How sophisticated can we make dungeons in the game? How sophisticated can we make quests in the game? How sophisticated can we make tactical battles in the game? How big of a scope can we give the campaign?
The rest of the questions above I assume are rhetorical.
As to the extension of the BETA phase, I'm inclined to say I think it's a great idea; however my gut reaction is how will this affect development on GalCiv3?!?
Option 2 please, release in August (or later) and take all the time you need to release a truly polished gem. Like Blizzard does with its games: Elemental will be done when it's done
Chalk me down as one of the many in the YES camp for the longer beta period. I've got insanely high expectations for this game and you'll need all the time and beta tester power you can to stand a chance of meeting them
That said, as others have pointed out beforehand, it's probably not a surprise that you get an incredibly postiive repsonse to this question on these forums.. I mean the vast majority of people interseted at this stage in develompent (and thus reading the dev journals and posting) are going to be pre-ordering/planning to beta test already. Given that, we're all going to be playing the game all the way through anyway so the lack of an official release is going to make very little difference saving the potential for an even better game at the end.
PS I also love the picture of the swamp monster thingy! The only way it could look better would be if it was more super-slug shaped and had a giant medallion around its neck with the name Geoff on it... but maybe that's just me
When you've got a chance to try something this unique you've got to take a chance. Not many developers are this free of publishers prodding you to release. Go for the longer development cycle.
The only thing I would suggest as far as the schedule is concerned is to keep the release date the same, but decrease the time between all of the initial phases. The hardest problems to fix with games aren't usually with the individual components (world map, tactical combat), but with how they relate to each other and how balanced they are. I'd rather see more unpolished components together early on to get a better picture of how things could/should work, then put the final piece on later in the cycle and then not have enough time to balance the product as a whole. We might also think something like the world map is working great and then near release we find that the whole game warrants a feature that greatly changes the world map.
I can't see players playing with more than 8 in a multiplayer game, but there will be singleplayer people who will player with whatever the highest number their computer can tolerate is.
What you should do is essentially have no engine limitations that prevent having 100 players (making screens have scrollbars and such). Then set some very high number for singleplayer (32 perhaps), but then have a lot of messages warning the player if they are adding more than the map, their computer, or the game was designed to support. If they want to keep going and have a bad time, that's their choice.
The reason I advocate such a system is firstly because computers will always get more powerful and eventually the lag won't be an issue. Secondly, there will be people who will make mods that would appreciate having a huge number of players (think a deathmatch mod or something like DotA). You don't have to make it that easy to increase the player limit to 100, but it shouldn't be difficult for a modder to do.
Take that one as it comes.
I wrote quite the post on a system that combines small component tasks and semirandomly puts them together to create a complex and interesting quest. The post is:
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https://forums.elementalgame.com/360530
Things that you should include:
-Basic unit facings as they allow intuitive bonuses for attacking from the sides and behind.
-A simple fortify/defensive command.
-Passive special abilities for many units.
-Some extra unit buttons or an area for button popups for units with special innate abilities (i.e. dragons or units enchanted with fire breath actually using their breath attack). These buttons could also be used to expend or activate worn or carried items (caltrops, faery dust, magic amulets). This is key for allowing modders to do a lot of fun stuff.
-Lots of different weapon types with tactically different uses.
Fun, but I could go either way with
-Height bonuses.
-Morale (can easily simulate effects with stat loss instead of making it its own stat).
Things I'd rather not have at all
-Complex unit stances.
If things are to get very complicated and customizable I would rather that part be with unit equipment, training, and enchantments than having too many tactical options in battles.
I can tell you that while Elemental will have good mutiplayer features, it is predominantly a single player game.
If SD isn't under financial pressure, I think a longer beta and an "official" launch in August is probably better. It's late enough in the year to hit the Christmas wishlists, but early enough to have built some momentum, so sales might even be a bit better. Google had Gmail in "beta" for years, and it didn't seem to affect it's popularity. I say go for it.
I would love there to be height bonuses. It would create strategic value in holding the high ground. Also, extra range for archers on high ground would be much appreciated! This would also apply to archers on walls, for example.
Morale would be wonderful as well, in my opinion. I could live without it, sure, but morale is something that can't be accurately mimicked with stat loss. For one, I really want there to be a rout mechanic in the tactical combat; it gets tiring when everyone always fights to their death in every fight. If I right an force of 500 of elite Bear Cavalry into a rabble of 1000 poorly armed militiamen, they should turn and flee. Morale, and morale-based effects, allow for lots of strategies that simply don't work otherwise.
My one wish for tactical battles is that you at least make them more sophisticated than something like HoMM or King's Bounty, where there are no counters at ALL. If you could approach the level of sophistication in something like advance wars (large maps with terrain bonuses that affect stats AND movement) as well as (a few) soft counters that aspect of the game would be pristine. I think it's mostly those stupid, tiny maps that many WRPGs use in their tactical battles that ruin them.
However, it seems like a bit much for the AI to handle well, especially with custom units...
Side note: Advance Wars has plenty of hard counters. Take the missiles unit. At full strength, it can kill any air unit in one shot.
+1 in SUPPORT of the later release date, take note of all the games pushed back till Q1 2010 now, Elemental might get overlooked if released in February.
Plus the longer a game is being activly worked on with community input ( via beta suggestions ) the better!
I saw the battlefield screenshot before and it looked like they didn't initially consider height, which might mean it would be a huge pain for the art department to have to make all the transitions look good. My favorite fantasy tactical combat is AoW:SM, and that has height working fairly well. I'm not against it being there as it's intuitive, but I wouldn't be too disappointed if it wasn't. How would battlefield height correlate to world map terrain? Would there be some tactics skill that just gives you a better chance to have high ground close to you?
There's also the annoyance of constantly chasing down armies. There's two types of games. Games where everyone in a battle has a good chance of ending up dead and games where most people will end up alive but running and/or wounded. They both have their downsides.
The problem I have with morale is that it's usually such a complex effect that I've never seen AI successfully deal with balancing their morale on the strategic level and the tactical level. They always need to get artifical morale bonuses. It's either I'm winning every battle by making them run away really quick or their stats are so inflated that they fight to near death anyways. As with the height, I could enjoy the game either way.
I completely agree the longer beta is better by providing a healthier and more content rich product which will help with longterm sales.
I recommend a supported selection of 24players which has been successfully popular for Dominions_3 (Fantasy_TBS). If you provide the option for a 24 player multiplayer game the feature will be used the same as in Dominions_3. I know with the 64Bit version the massive giant maps will have singleplayer and multiplayer gamers both interested in more opponents. I would also recommend leaving the option open for even more players... perhaps not supported at first, but an open door for those interested in larger games.
I'd advise a system as seen from the original AgeofWonders where you could explore dungeon type sites. In the original AgeofWonders there was only one single level, but for Elemental I would advise many dungeon type sites having multiple levels... 5, 10, and even 20 levels. It's much more intensely scary entering Level 17 of an evil dungeon as compared to Level 2.
I'd recommend setting up a variety of different quests. Those which are not enjoyed by the community will be voiced with a thumbs down. The sophistication of the quest is not as important as the level of enjoyment done for actively doing the quest. A fun quest might be planning to an assassinate another opponents hero... while a not so fun quest would be babysitting a weak of group citizens as you safely deliver them to another town.
This is a difficult question to answer since many games have used many different methods. I do recommend multiple players allowed on a battlefield since it's not only logical, but provides more strategic options. I also suggest having the game include a battlefield for assassinations.
I recommend Stardock creating a topic in the forums listing what options are being considered for tactical battles and then have the community voice decisions.
For the campaign I would recommend providing a campaign which has replay value. Typically a campaign is provided with a fixed set of maps, a fixed set of enemies and one big final enemy, a fixed number of heroes, and well you get picture. As a result gamers are lucky to play the campaign once or maybe twice before knowing virtually all details and then the campaign is never played again.
So here's the ideas so the campaign will have replay value:
1) Have the AI enemy opponents and the one big final enemy AI opponent be randomly generated. One game the big final enemy could be an evil immobile eye of fire channeller and the next game it could be a demi-lich channeller. This will provide new enemies each time the campaign is played.
2) Include all the side quests as being randomly generated. Here new side quests so each time the campaign is played the gamer can investigate and be rewarded for different quests.
3) Allow the heroes who appear during the campaign to be pulled from a random pool of heroes. Also don't have them available always in the same locations as this will allow the campaign to be easier to second time around.
These are some ideas... and hope this provides some ideas as well.
No thanks. I'd rather just play a roguelike or classic RPG if I wanted to do that. Even having two levels causes confuses a lot of people. I think their brains would explode if they were flipping through that lots of Z levels. Maybe a little mini window that says level X, but still only ever shows the level you are on sounds fine. I would much rather abstract those portions of dungeon exploring. If a dungeon is twenty levels deep I'd rather have my hero sit there for X amount of time, occasionally giving me pop ups, choices to make, and battles to fight than actually have to explore manually. That can get pretty tedius.
Agreed with the battlefield assassinations and multiple players on the field. There's a good thread about that in the other subforum.
funny you should say that. I was just talking to someone about how much I'd like to make a rouge-like out of Elemental's system.
As long as anyone can get into the beta simply by pre-ordering, I don't see any reason not to have an extended beta.
I actually like this idea! I'm all for dungeon exploring but I wouldn't want a 20level dungeon in this genre. However this suggestion is perfect for a multilevel dungeon.
I'd say the dungeons should be lower priority then a lot of other features- it doesn't sound as exciting to me as some of the other things in the game.
Great idea. now i cant wait for beta to start.. Always good that a company thinks of its product and quality it deserves.
Well, there's also people who already know they want to make mods with multiple maps. If the dungeon system lets you build a map and then layer it in the main map file with some kind of connection point (crypt, cave, teleporter, etc), you could do some really neat things both with that AND with the mod tools.
So what is the count now? 80 for "longer", two (2) for "current" and two (2) "maybe" posts?
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