One world, no loading screens

[JreaperT]

This is my greatest wish for PS:N. I want to be able to fly out of the sanctuary over a small sea and onto cyssor. Then jum in a mossie and head over to Esamir.

Even better I want the whole world to be one giant world. If you add all the current cont's land masses together to make one giant continent maybe bigger. with every base connected in a giant lattice. With a Esamir style region, a Cyssor, Ishundar etc. I.e Snow, jungle, temperate and desert regions.

Those who've played WW2 online know what I mean. Think of the epic battles. Think of the grand campaign, one desperate push into enemy territory. A strategic assault behind enmy line that actually mean something. Basically I want WW2 online style map in the PS universe. I'd like the conquest of territory to actually mean something in PS:N, rather than a quick pop lock and cont roll in PS.

Discuss!

[Hamma]

We had talked about this a bit in other threads. I would love to see this as well but it all depends on the mechanics and server technology in PSN. As much as I would love to see it I am not so sure we will.

[Raymac]

This would be the dream. I hope the technology in there for it. If not now, then I'm sure it will be in Planetside 3.

[Bags]

I'd love it but I really doubt this would be feasible for a game like planetside at this point, if for any game.

[duck]

I think it would be nice idea. That way a group traveling on a galaxy, for instance, don't have to wait on the pilot who may still be loading the map. It will help add more flow to the gameplay.

If the technology exists, use it.

[Robert089]

I remember my first day in the game. I certed the galaxy, jumped in, checked the map to see what direction the nearest continent was, started flying towards it and then I lost control and crashed into the sea and died.

[CutterJohn]

Loading screens will get me to a fight faster than flying there, and FAR faster than driving or running. Just sayin...


I get that people like the concept of a totally open world, but you're going to pay for that, and unless the distances between continents are retardedly short, will definitely take more time than using gates.

Also with no zones you have to come up with some other, even more arbitrary method for limiting the number of combatants in an area.

[Grimster]

Loading screens will get me to a fight faster than flying there, and FAR faster than driving or running. Just sayin...


I get that people like the concept of a totally open world, but you're going to pay for that, and unless the distances between continents are retardedly short, will definitely take more time than using gates.

Also with no zones you have to come up with some other, even more arbitrary method for limiting the number of combatants in an area.

Yeah I can't really say I have any desire to one world with no loading screens. I see more drawbacks than advantages with having one world. I mean with old PS it was basically a server cluster where each server handled one continent if I remember correctly?

Sure we are 8 years later now but still. :)

[Baneblade]

Strategy > Killwhoring

[CutterJohn]

Wanting to get to the fight in a timely manner != Killwhoring

Long travel times != strategy.

[Gogita]

A large persistent world would probably mean that almost everyone online will be in the same area fighting, a breeding nest for lag. If SOE can manage to program PsN with one large world and no lag, it would be pretty cool yeah.

But then again, I wouldn't mind at all if it stayed as is it right now, continents on separate servers.

[Baneblade]

Wanting to get to the fight in a timely manner != Killwhoring

Long travel times != strategy.

Who says that one contiguous world is going to mandate long travel times? Or is five minutes or so a long time to go someplace?

Want to know about long travel times? Try PS with a thirty minute HART, no Broadcast gates, and the Gal pilot had to use 3 of his 14 cert pts to fly a squad of ***** around the hard way with no thanks, then has to sit in a warpgate to make sure the squad still has a Gal after the fight.

PlanetSide was more awesome before it was made more fast paced. Every little thing that sped up the pace of battle hurt the metagame that much more. Thousand papercuts type of thing.

[Grimster]

Holy crap you just gave me a flashback on before the broadcast gates when we had to fly the damn Galaxy half way across the world. :)

[CutterJohn]

That sounds like a bad game. I'm glad I didn't play it. Especially as the gal pilot. That just sounds awful.

And 5 minutes? Sure, if you had aircav. Everyone else would either be much longer, or infinite, since most land vehicles can't cross water. I predict mossie would be the most popular cert by far in that game.

If you are advocating flying/floating across the oceans as an alternate means of travel instead of warpgates, thats fine.

[Grimster]

Well this was a long time ago but if I remember correctly we would simply HART to the nearest Dropship Center and assemble our strike force there. :)

Was kind of lame though if you managed to get yourself whacked before you had time to do the drop at the designated target area. :)

[Baneblade]

That sounds like a bad game. I'm glad I didn't play it. Especially as the gal pilot. That just sounds awful.

The word is 'gritty'. I don't mean in the hygienic sense. You needed to rely on other people, the game wasn't about one man armies. And war is war.

And 5 minutes? Sure, if you had aircav. Everyone else would either be much longer, or infinite, since most land vehicles can't cross water. I predict mossie would be the most popular cert by far in that game.

Assuming Aircraft are still far too cheap in cert points, yes. As for vehicles not being able to cross water, well that is life. Deliverers ftw.

I have always thought Aircraft in general and Air Cav is particular were far too easy on the cert points. I think doubling all of them is a good idea.

If you are advocating flying/floating across the oceans as an alternate means of travel instead of warpgates, thats fine.

Clearly I am not. Warpgates add too much predictability and throttle the flow of battle too much.

[Nephilimuk]

It would be nice but even single shard games like EVE have nodes and travel between those nodes is not seemless depending on the server loads.

It will be interesting to see if they have European, US and Asian servers or keep it on one server to maximise the number of players. I think I would would like to see single shard but the mechanics of delivering a consistant experience to all players would be an absolute nightmare. Also SOE would not be in contol of many of the variables so are likely to get there fingers burnt

[basti]

That sounds like a bad game. I'm glad I didn't play it. Especially as the gal pilot. That just sounds awful.

And 5 minutes? Sure, if you had aircav. Everyone else would either be much longer, or infinite, since most land vehicles can't cross water. I predict mossie would be the most popular cert by far in that game.

If you are advocating flying/floating across the oceans as an alternate means of travel instead of warpgates, thats fine.

Its called Hart...

[Baneblade]

It would be nice but even single shard games like EVE have nodes and travel between those nodes is not seemless depending on the server loads.

It will be interesting to see if they have European, US and Asian servers or keep it on one server to maximise the number of players. I think I would would like to see single shard but the mechanics of delivering a consistant experience to all players would be an absolute nightmare. Also SOE would not be in contol of many of the variables so are likely to get there fingers burnt

EvE didn't have to be the way it is. It could have implemented loading screen less travel between nodes easily. Like I said, it is more what you show the client not necessarily what is actually happening.

[Hamma]

Hah wow Sobekus it's amazing how easy it is to forgot those things. The world before broadcast warp gates and long harts.. the good old days I loved those times.

[Rbstr]

It was better w/ the long times and static gates IMO, too.

[Bags]

I prefer a game with obvious distinctions to continents and less "wtf" inducing zone limitations.

If I'm going to be locked out of a zone regardless if it's one world or 10 instances, I'd much rather be stuck at warpgate than at an invisible line. The latter just feels so immersion shattering.

[Baneblade]

I prefer a game with obvious distinctions to continents and less "wtf" inducing zone limitations.

If I'm going to be locked out of a zone regardless if it's one world or 10 instances, I'd much rather be stuck at warpgate than at an invisible line. The latter just feels so immersion shattering.

There is no reason to have zone limitations really. At least not the way it is currently done. THAT is immersion breaking in ANY form it takes.

[Bags]

There is no reason to have zone limitations really. At least not the way it is currently done. THAT is immersion breaking in ANY form it takes.

How is being stuck at an invisible line any better?

[Baneblade]

How is being stuck at an invisible line any better?

I'm not saying it is, I'm saying that it isn't necessary in any form. The idea of population limiting is archaic and should be server based if it exists at all.

[Bags]

Population limiting isn't archaic; it's necessary to ensure playable performance.

[DviddLeff]

Yeah, when they didn't have the locks you had the continents crashing; back in beta we had much higher limits if I remember right, but performance was shitty when too many people were on the same continent.

[lostabyss]

if it was one big world with 10 continents, then perhaps some kind of naval warfare could be possible. have aircraft carriers in the middle of the ocean as additional spawn points where groups could gear up then organize their gal drops or aircav. and then of course surrounded by a few battle ships with AA machine guns and anti-ship cannons. maybe even act as offshore artillery?
these could either be capturable like bases, be an outfit thing, or just like any other support vehicle. simply a maneuverable support facility that could assist multiple continents as long as they are within their waters.

[Baneblade]

Population limiting isn't archaic; it's necessary to ensure playable performance.

The server is the choke point in PS, but it doesn't have to be. We could have battles with as high as ten times as many as a poplocked continent has now with no real loss of performance.

[Nephilimuk]

I agree the threshold for a pop lock used to be much higher then was lowered. I think this was because it was used a benchmark on the overall health of the game. No poplock = shitty so people would unsub and not come back.

[Miir]

I like the idea of one open world. Actually I would prefer it if it's possible to make it work with the gameplay and population.

It would seem it doesn't matter what MMO game you play. As soon as you get a couple hundred players in one area of focus (city/base) the game lags up and turns to shit. In a RPG style MMO it's likely not a big deal because most cities are safe areas for trade etc. But in a game like Planetside when everyone is battling over that final base and things start to lag up it means you can no longer function correctly.

Mind you John has already commented that the technology is there to minimize lag. So this may no even be a concern anymore.

[Hamma]

Indeed good point on that, forgot about his post.