So now that the first half of what was planned is done when can we expect multiplayer? As expected now that this game is actually good I want to play it with friends (hotseat, co-op, whatever... SOMETHING) and we can't. It's keeping them away.
Single player games are good for consoles, not nearly as much for PCs. FE:LH is doing well but I believe it could be doing so much better with some multiplayer support. So what's the official word, Stardock?
Edit:
I do want to point out that I think FE:LH is a great game. I haven't been able to put it down for the last several days. It has come a long way since WOM and I'm pretty happy to see it where it is. Thank you for spending so much time and resources to essentially fix WOM
Hi Fistalis,
I noticed in this thread you voted Yes for multiplayer https://forums.elementalgame.com/405947/page/1/#replies
interesting thread I have to admit... seems roughly half want multiplayer out of 8 pages of votes, and thats after the "multiplayer crowd abandoned the forums"
also, if you read the replies theres *gasp* even more people pointing out they cant get friends to buy FE unless it has multiplayer! imagine that
Lord Xia's reply in this thread is interesting too. voting no with the reasoning he didnt want SP compromised in order to have MP in the game. Is that really all that people worry about? I think thats a bit silly tbh as they wouldnt have to touch anything balance/feature wise
Different people doing different tasks doesn't mean you can afford to pay both of them at the same time, for the entire length of the project, longer to avoid cutting other work, or sometimes even at all. Everything costs part of a finite money supply (unless you're Gabe)... and that means that there will always be a trade off of some kind.
Brad has said he wants multiplayer... but he's not in charge of the project. That is Derek's job, and anyone would have a hard time arguing convincingly that he hasn't done a damn fine job of making those hard calls.
fair enough, but if this was a true concern then its surely over by now. i cant see how adding multiplayer to it in the future would still create this issue
OOOHHH OOOOHHHH!!! I have a question, my hand is so high up in the air right now!!!!!\
Why can't we all have a civil discussion about mutliplayer without sarcastically putting down others legitimate arguments for something? Just because some of you don't want to see MP in this game doesn't mean you have the right to tell others it will never happen. Stardock will most likely at some point put MP in, or will release it with the next iteration of Elemental.
MP is fine for many people, and single player is just as fine. Stardock is a huge supporter of modding, and honestly to find a good balance here, why not release the someway for the mod community to do the MP. That way, those of us who want MP will get it, and the single player fanboys will still have their precious "balance".
Honestly folks, just because someone has a differing opinion doesn't make them "wrong" or "stupid". Those that go down that road here, well you're acting like Bill O'Reilly, AND WE ALL KNOW HOW STUPID THAT GUY TRULY IS!
you. I like you.
Post-release support budgets are limited too (very much so, in most cases).
I can't speak for how we may be staffing FE/LH at the moment, but the norm is that you only keep a handful of people on while the rest roll over to new projects. So you have to be even more careful with where their time (and your money) goes.
If a convincing case can be made as to the returns on the investment it would require, it's not impossible. But I expect it'd have to happen as a separate effort unto itself, drawing resources from other in-flight projects that are still in their earlier stages (and doing so will mean delays or cuts to them). And that assumes that those other projects even have the right resources; if I recall comments Brad has made correctly, they don't at present because there simply isn't anyone talented and experienced in realtime netcode that is willing to live near Detroit.
A portion of (or most of in my case) the reason why people don't want MP because it will "compromise" SP has nothing to do with features/balance changes. They could simply release the multi-player with the games single player rules and say that the game isn't balanced for multi-player.
The "compromising" of the single player game comes in from the fact that any game has a budget. Adding multi-player subtracts from that budget, pretty significantly. Multi-player coding (network coding) is expensive. That expensive feature, by the very nature of budgeting, subtracts from the funds available for other features. And since multi-player will almost certainly need some robust support, it subtracts from the post release development/support budget that would otherwise go to single-player as well.
Multi-player compromises single player by taking away resources that would otherwise have further enhanced the single player game. And given the number of TBS players that really want multi-player, which is an extremely low percentage of the total player base (based on numbers released in the past by SD and Firaxis), that's a lot of potential single player resources lost for very little gain.
It's not silly at all. It's basic accounting.
Post of the day right there.
It always comes down to dollars.
Just to chime in, count me amongst those who'd rather see any remaining resources focused on adding content; adding multi player would be a waste of those resources imo.
I agree with both of these posts. These games are a single-player experience for me. I happen to believe that TBS games are peculiarly unsuited for MP and I'm just as happy to have it single-player. If you want multiplayer, there are tons of FPS and RTS titles out there that are fantastic MP games.
I know it's too early to think about a Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes II (or whatever title they would give it), but with the popularity of Kickstarter these days, I think they would get a LOT of support and additional funding from their fans if they went that route. Heck, Torment received over 4 million in extra funding. Not sure how many additional features that will help pay for, but I think it's worth a shot
I think this isn't really true. Ever since KickStarter got popular fans see it as the solution to everything. It's absolutely NOT additional funding from their fans for Stardock. It's EARLIER access to the same funding. Anyone who funds a Kickstarter would have bought the game too. You're not getting extra funding, you are just moving up the point at which you get the money into your account.
Further, Kickstarter generally offers the game for less than full price for early backers (usually scaling closer to full price the later in the campaign you get). It may be similar to a pre-order discount, but for a big budget game that will sell for $40 or $50 at release, the normal Kickstarter campaign (the price of most games during the campaign) is a pretty significant discount meaning less money for SD ultimately.
Kickstarter is ideal for new companies, upstart companies, who are looking for early funding without going to investors (and losing some control or ownership of their company). For companies like SD, Kickstarter only really offers a benefit if they don't have enough cash to get themselves through the next development cycle (for whatever reason). Basically, it's a last resort.
I just want to state for the record that I am not particularly interested in multiplayer for this game. I suspect I am in the majority in this regard, however if anyone has any evidence one way or the other it would be interesting to see it. Regardless, I don't really begrudge developing multiplayer features for the players like the OP that enjoy them, but I think we should all acknowledge the reality that developing these features requires resources, sometimes quite a lot of resources, that could have otherwise gone to improving the single-player experience. If I am correct in my assumption that the multiplayer interest in this particular game is fairly limited, it seems reasonable to ask the question of whether multiplayer features are really the best place to be investing limited resources?
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