I don't want to buy this game if it doesn't have multiplayer I love playing Age of Wonders multiplayer with my group of friends. I don't need a big long singleplayer story line, I find that boring and pointless so the only thing I really want is multiplayer.
I couldn't find a mention of multiplayer on the forthcoming game.
Thanks,
Thraka
I guess multiplayer is rather low priority. The game is designed to take up to 800 turns with each nation taking turns one after another and each battle involving humans (does AI vs AI use auto resolve?) would include both sides taking 1-20 turns one after another. Assuming that each turn is on average 2 min and each battle is on average 2 min and there are 1 battle per player per 5 turns, a game involving 5 human players running for 400 turns would take 5*800 (time needed for each human to do his turns)+80 (battles)*5*1 (time to do battle) = 2400 minutes or 40 hours of pure play time, in real time such a game would probably take a week with players doing. There are likely not many people interested in that, therefore priority probably low.
In AOW multiplayer works, because AOW is generally designed for fewer terms and more simple empire management and allows for simultanous moves. (But this design also causes AOW to suck in single player.)
To answer your question is MAYBE and NO! but far far far faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar down the chasm road I'm happy to say.
Would be nice to have multiplayer, but if the price to pay for it is a less immersive over simplified SP experience, I am more than happy to sacrify MP.
Besides, there are plenty of MP games out there nowadays, and in some of them the requirement to be MP-compliant greatly spoils the SP part.
You don't need to nerf the game for MP. That's a pretty hard lived myth. Look at games like Civilization 5 and Europa Universalis. No need to change the MP game.
When it comes to the unique In Game Unit Creator in Elemental/Fallen Enchantress, that's a great thing to play arround with while waiting for other people to finish their tactical battles. Just an example.
What we want is this great SP game available in MP! Not nerfed, but even more expanded with dlc's and expansions the years to come. A nerfed down version with MP will have no customers.....
In my opinion the game is nerfed, if not by forcing some particular gameplay mechanics, by consuming resources that could be dedicated to other things. Let's put in another way. What would you prefer, an expansion with MP as the only major feature, or an expansion with a new SP feature? With limited resources, doing something means not doing something else.
Its not a myth in case of individually controlled battles involving 2 players taking alternative moves that to have mass appeal a game needs to different. A multiplayer TBS game in which completly alternate moves take place one after another is possible (though still few will play civ on marathon), but one with individual battle control needs to reduce number of turns to make up for the time used to fight the battles.
Take AOW, in that game for multiplayer simultaneous move feature is normally switched on and normally auto resolve in battle vs AI and monsters is used, because otherwise the game takes too long. There are even people playing AOW as PBEM meaning tactical battle control is gone.
FE is slower game than AOW, does not include simultaneous moves, does not include any multiplayer function, has a suboptimal autoresolve battles (poor dark wizards), so a lot of things would have to be done to make it so multiplayer friendly that somebody beyond a small group uses it. And that i suspect is the basic consideration for Stardock to include features, so how many customers would value such a feature vs the effort needed. In that respect multiplayer probably ranks rather low, hence its a feature they will not include soon.
Of course, Stardock might say otherwise, but thats my guess how they would evaluate it. Obviously, just having multiplayer without any adjustment would be preferable over not having it.
Of course MP is nice because AI's suck so much, but games such as FE are just not very convenient to play as MP: the logistics are just too tedious for people with a real world life... Yes Civ V does have MP, but how small is the Civ V MP community compared to the global Civ V community ?
As Brad mentioned recently, it's also a question of whether Stardock can attract the talent to write the multiplayer code. If you are or you know someone like that, nudge them to send in their resume.
I played an 8 hour straight multiplayer game of Empire Earth. Don't say it would take too long for multiplayer, allow me to decide how much time I want to spend playing multiplayer games. There shouldn't be an issue with saving games either.
I know a group of 6 players who have been playing a Civ multiplayer game for about 3 weeks. They don't mind it, they have fun doing it. It's a shame because this game seems pretty good but I only really devote my game playing time to playing with friends and family.
I'm thankful they haven't wasted TIME and RESOURCES on multiplayer yet. Galactic Civilization II proved we don't need a multiplayer aspect to enjoy a great game. It also proved by putting ALL the RESOURCES into a SINGLE SOLO playing game that an AI can FINALLY be produced that is challenging to MOST humaan players. I perfer this method of production and hope it continues out of Stardock et al.
Thats not the point, the point is how many people would enjoy multiplayer and for how many its very unimportant and what effort would it take for Stardock to make it multiplayer. From the type of game its rather likely that few people would play multiplayer, therefore it likely is a lower priority.
Yes I agree with Carnage it's low priority, very low in fact 13 levels of hell low.
Multiplayer is notoriously buggy unless it's coded by someone who knows what they're doing. You don't want to start getting into a game with some friends and then get the dreaded out of sync error.
Forget for the moment the actual market for multiplayer. That's something that can wax and wane depending on the alignment of the planets, never mind how good the multiplayer experience is. But if the multiplayer is enjoyable, you're guaranteed no end of Let's Play videos, articles, and so on. If the multiplayer makes people want to virtually snap their game disc, then you pretty much sunk that ship.
The publicity that a game receives has an effect on sales. Even if someone isn't interested in multiplayer, just seeing the game in action can push them towards the checkout.
Agreed and my parents always used to say "Let Sleeping DOGS lie".
please, let us play hotseat at least?
Want multiplayer.
Can't get it in. Need more network developers. We are hiring. But that's the limitation right now. We have the budget for it. We literally don't have the bodies here. We're actively recruiting more network developers. If you know anyone interested in getting into game development and knows how to write networking code tell them to send us their resume.
If multiplayer is ever included, will it sacrifice the quality of the single player AI in any way?
No.
I don't think FE would make a fun MP game in terms of competitive play. I think, however, it would probably be fun to play cooperatively.
Now that's an interesting idea.. co-op FE.
Yeah I am kinda glad its far down the line, it shouldn't be a priority.
Saying that, it would be loads of fun to play co-op with friends/family.
Concerning the tactical battles for the impatient among us, when the animation speed is turned up the battles don't take very long at all. This game would be far more multiplayer friendly than Civ or AoW imo. In addition the auto resolve feature seems extremely good in this game.
I can't see why (assuming it was ever implemented) it would affect single player in any way.
Besides, if someone wants competetive-ness they can always try and mod the numbers for they're desires I am happy that is Frogs thinking though, this game does have plenty of features I could desire when playing multiplayer or coop age of wonders, or mp Heroes, like 5 times speed in tactical battles.
Sincerely~ Kongdej
Well that is good to hear. I'll keep watching and waiting. Thanks for the responses!
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