Wildlife & Underwater & Space

[cellinaire]

Please note that all these 3 are for post-launch features to consider and not that important for now. ;)



1. They talked about implementing 'Wildlife' post-launch. My idea would be the multi-step approach :
(** in order of body size/release priority. Not that I want real world animals to be introduced in PS2. :D )

1) Insects / Bugs (if guys ever played Freerealms or EQ2, you know these two are shown as 'effects', not separate entities which are 3D models. However, there're several exceptions...err I mean big bugs in EQ2 that you can kill...)
2) Amphibian / Reptilian / Rodents
(maybe fishes, for naval warfare update?)
3) Sparrows and birdtypes that are tiny in body size.
4) Dogs, cats, etc..
5) Animals that have bigger body size than 4)

< I think 3), 4), 5) are easy to implement, but requires a lot of discussion >


2. Underwater aspect of PS2. I've heard they still have no plans regarding the underwater warfare, so I doubt if we will see this introduced within 10 years after launch, but I wanted to hear about your ideas anyway.



3. About seamless transition between space zone and continent zone. What about merging two zones(continent zone and adjacent space sector) instead of leaving them as two separate zones or rendering the whole planet like the 'Outerra engine' or 'I-Novae engine' ?

(just my simple idea for possible future expansion. Please don't mind much)

[Whalenator]

Arma III turned Insects into client-run events with the sole purpose of enhancing the impressiveness of the game. It worked. I would love to see a little bit of buzzing when outside in Planetside 2.

Birds as a similar event, sometimes seen flying from a distance (But never entities, just scenery) would be fine too.

Fish in the water? Count me in.
But anything you can interact with that would directly affect the flow of the game.
NO.

Inb4SirisianRaeg

[cellinaire]

Yeah I'm also very skeptic about 4) and 5) myself.

(and I also agree that all animals shouldn't even be attackable, but without doubt I think I maybe wrong on some things)

[Knocky]

Every NPC you add will reduce the number of people.

This is why there are no displayed holstered weapons.

Just say NO to NPCs

[cellinaire]

Every NPC you add will reduce the number of people.

This is why there are no displayed holstered weapons.

Just say NO to NPCs

Fret not. I'm not talking about NPCs, just non-attackable small animals. And this thread isn't even about suggestion. :cool:



(Believe me, Higby and dev team already mentioned they're somewhat fond of the idea of introducing alien wildlife in PS2. If you guys want the source material, then I think I can easily find an dev interview or two about it.)

[Sirisian]

Inb4SirisianRaeg
You should know by now that I only like hostile sci-fi creatures. Stuff like dogs and cats have no place on Auraxis. Be more creative.

Adding stuff like insects client-side that just fly around and can be turned off in the graphical options? I'm indifferent and could care less. Same goes for client-side fish.

My creatures thread focused on actual gameplay and threats to make neutral territories have a hostile element like base turrets in PS1 before players moved into a region. It would be like having an Auraxian water creature that launched electric bolts at people/Magriders that tried to cross a large river vs having a fish that did nothing.

If I sound defensive it's because I'm tired of people associating stuff like cats/dogs/cows with my creatures thread.

[cellinaire]

[QUOTE=Sirisian;646166] Adding stuff like insects client-side that just fly around and can be turned off in the graphical options? I'm indifferent and could care less. Same goes for client-side fish.

[QUOTE]

Bolded part. How come I didn't think about that :(


And yeah. I think these 3 sentences above reflect my thinking. Perhaps I should've never written 3), 4), and 5)

[Vash02]

It would be kind of cool if you blew up a ship in orbit and its wreckage either burns up in the atmosphere and gives the folks on the ground a pretty light show or hits the ground and ruin someones day.

[Bags]

If we can't have holstered guns then we can't have useless NPC.

[Sirisian]

If we can't have holstered guns then we can't have useless NPC.
In the case of client-side insects and fish they could easily fade away during combat if a player has the visual setting on.

(I'm not going to go into the whole holstered guns = no NPCs thing though since that argument was refuted in the other thread).

[Bags]

If dev time couldn't be better spent elseware, I don't care about clientside insects.

[Warborn]

Every NPC you add will reduce the number of people.

This is why there are no displayed holstered weapons.

Just say NO to NPCs

Just say NO to uncreative nonsense.

When player numbers in a hex reaches X amount, NPC spawns stop/are not displayed by clients. Pow, the issue is solved as crowded areas no longer have NPC animals present. Meanwhile, in smaller fights or when you're traveling you get to see animals running or flying around, which really helps to give the world a sense of life and realism.

We never would have gotten anywhere if at the first sign of a problem the answer to an issue immediately became NO.

[Bags]

Why would a world ravaged constantly by war be covered in life?

[DviddLeff]

https://sites.google.com/site/planetsideupgradeproject/_/rsrc/1262971526019/phase-3/shifters5.jpg?height=320&width=316

https://sites.google.com/site/planetsideupgradeproject/_/rsrc/1262971542456/phase-3/shifters9.jpg?height=240&width=320

Poor unwanted animals.

I wouldn't mind them, although I wouldn't want them to attack players (except perhaps on event days) but I do feel it would add to the game, especially when they could be used for immersion or even warning signs (ie a herd is spooked by the enemy and you see them running before you see the enemy).

[Sirisian]

If dev time couldn't be better spent elseware, I don't care about clientside insects.
Precisely. It's why I've never cared much for supporting the idea of non-gameplay features.

Why would a world ravaged constantly by war be covered in life?
Oh sweet. I can say the statement I like to make. "Why would a world ravaged constantly by war be covered in soldiers". Auraxis is an interesting continent. It was actually the reason I originally thought of hostile creatures. "Why would a creature attack a soldier with a gun?" and the answer was the creatures had lived thousands of years without dying and didn't know/fear an actual death. That an NTU evolution making cool things. I digress. This thread should probably focus on client-side insects and fish that can't be attacked. We have two other threads that went very in depth into NPCs/creatures.

[Magpie]

Bugs!?!?! Starship trooper woo!!!

O wait that's the tr

[Bags]

Precisely. It's why I've never cared much for supporting the idea of non-gameplay features.


Oh sweet. I can say the statement I like to make. "Why would a world ravaged constantly by war be covered in soldiers". Auraxis is an interesting continent. It was actually the reason I originally thought of hostile creatures. "Why would a creature attack a soldier with a gun?" and the answer was the creatures had lived thousands of years without dying and didn't know/fear an actual death. That an NTU evolution making cool things. I digress. This thread should probably focus on client-side insects and fish that can't be attacked. We have two other threads that went very in depth into NPCs/creatures.

Because they have a way to resurrect soldiers. Not much point in resurrecting the widllife if they don't need food.

[Warborn]

Precisely. It's why I've never cared much for supporting the idea of non-gameplay features.

I honestly laughed out loud when I read this. Yeah, fuck all those non-gameplay features. Great looking, modern graphics with dynamic lighting and stuff? Realistic sound effects? Stop wasting time, SOE, we don't need that non-gameplay stuff 'round these parts! If it doesn't look and sound like something from the Commodore 64 days you guys are just screwing around.

Does anyone really need for someone to say that people like games that look good? That adding wildlife to games, whether bugs or birds or space-deer frolicking in the fields, adds a lot of vibrancy to a game and "brings the world alive"? Are these new concepts? I feel like we're probably people who've played games before and appreciate worlds which are not just totally barren save for other players.

Because they have a way to resurrect soldiers. Not much point in resurrecting the widllife if they don't need food.

Whether there's a "point" is completely irrelevant. It's science fiction. But if you must have a point, consider the ecosystem of this imaginary world. Animals are an extremely important part of some plants' ecology. From insects and animals which cross-pollinate flowering plants, to seeds which need to pass through an animal's digestive tract to have their seed coat weakened enough to grow, to animals eating fruit and shitting the seeds all over the place, many species depend on animals to reproduce. Any world which has flowering plants (like the world of Auraxis does) would only have them because they depend on animals in their reproductive process.

So there you go, your perfectly unnecessary but totally logical justification for insects and animals in your made-up world of space mans and lasers.

[Shogun]

i´m totally for cosmetic wildlife.

make it scaling to playercount so all animals fade away when the zerg comes along to free up the ressources needed to show all soldiers.

and give an option to deactivate them for the whiners who don´t like their game to look good ;-)

just let the animals flee when anything comes near. hostile creatures are a nogo (the devs think our beloved spitfires are harming the pure pvp feeling, so animals would even be worse)

and i would like to know if the leafs in the trees actually show a little movement, or if they are stuck totally frozen?

[BlazingSun]

I'd rather see the dev time to be invested in important things.

[Firefly]

Do not want wildlife. NPCs (which is what they are) require computational power that could be given over to something more relevant and game-worthy. Like having more people per continent without lagging the shit out of our rigs.

[Vash02]

Do not want wildlife. NPCs (which is what they are) require computational power that could be given over to something more relevant and game-worthy. Like having more people per continent without lagging the shit out of our rigs.

They can always buy bigger servers, and the lag comes with trying to render too much on your computer. I doubt if they do do animals they wont be wondering around a full on battle.

[DayOne]

Do not want wildlife. NPCs (which is what they are) require computational power that could be given over to something more relevant and game-worthy. Like having more people per continent without lagging the shit out of our rigs.

Just have small bugs and flies rendered client side. That way they can be switched off if you really don't want them.

Personally I just want those swampy areas to feel like actual swamps, with tons of flies and such, rather then water logged forests.

[Whalenator]

I honestly laughed out loud when I read this. Yeah, fuck all those non-gameplay features. Great looking, modern graphics with dynamic lighting and stuff? Realistic sound effects? Stop wasting time, SOE, we don't need that non-gameplay stuff 'round these parts! If it doesn't look and sound like something from the Commodore 64 days you guys are just screwing around.

Truthfully I could not care less.
People play Minecraft.
People still use PS2s and N64s.
Graphics are overrated. Gameplay is where it's at.

[Sirisian]

I honestly laughed out loud when I read this. Yeah, fuck all those non-gameplay features. Great looking, modern graphics with dynamic lighting and stuff? Realistic sound effects? Stop wasting time, SOE, we don't need that non-gameplay stuff 'round these parts! If it doesn't look and sound like something from the Commodore 64 days you guys are just screwing around.
I think you took what I said to the extreme, but in a good a way. There is a balance. My point was mostly that if they're going to add in something I'd prefer that it effect gameplay which is the point Bags was making. Though it is an overused argument that can apply to anything. I mean everything the devs do has an assumed time so a priority of features and weighing the cost of each feature is something that would ultimately need to be done, but could go without saying.

Because they have a way to resurrect soldiers. Not much point in resurrecting the widllife if they don't need food.
Go read the lore again. I know it's not a big part of the Planetside game, but it was created (http://planetside.station.sony.com/howto/manual_detail.vm?chapter=0).

[Bags]

Truthfully I could not care less.
People play Minecraft.
People still use PS2s and N64s.
Graphics are overrated. Gameplay is where it's at.

This, I'm all for immersion but gameplay comes first.

[Aaron]

Why would the wildlife (if any would be implemented) be of any "alien" type? Wouldn't have the people introduced earth wildlife to Auraxis when they made the place liveable? Surely someone brought along some dogs. Am I wrong?

[texico]

What was it about Weapon holstering that meant they decided to drop it again?


To be honest, at the stage we're at now in computational power, I'd rather see energy going in to adding immersion, like this kind of thing (ambient animals that don't affect gameplay), rather than game play. I don't know how much PS2's gameplay could honestly be improved with the energy you'd gain from not having something like this anyway. Do we need even bigger fights than we're getting? There's a point when the capacity for bigger fights becomes limited by how many players will actually be available to play and how many people would be able to fit into the range of space you're playing in at any given moment anyway.

[Sirisian]

What was it about Weapon holstering that meant they decided to drop it again?
Performance when a lot of players are in a region. They said having weapons on the player cost them rendering 60 players.

If you read the other threads you'll see that people falsely assumed that there would be creatures alive in the middle of a battle thus dropping the player count. Fun debate.

[Bags]

What was it about Weapon holstering that meant they decided to drop it again?

More weapons rendered = less players.

[texico]

But aren't the weapons going to be there anyway... when they're held in the player's hands? Wouldn't having them holstered on the player's back just be a change in spatial location, or am I missing something -.-

[Sirisian]

But aren't the weapons going to be there anyway... when they're held in the player's hands? Wouldn't having them holstered on the player's back just be a change in spatial location, or am I missing something -.-
In the original you could have 2 guns and 2 side smaller guns. That would mean possibly 3 extra items per person in a battle where you may be rendering 100 other players

[texico]

Oh yeah, that didn't click in my mind for some reason :p

Well, they could at least let you holster the weapon you're "using" at the time, it looks a lot cooler than having everybody running around with guns in their hands at all times.


I wonder if we would see wildlife though. I doubt fish, simply because there aren't underwater elements to the game, so they'd probably see that idea as effort for not much reason.

It does bring up some questions though, like what the animals would look like (alien planet remember...).

[Warborn]

It isn't like they either create X vehicle, or they add in birds. People acting like adding in animals would mean sacrificing some major additions to the game. Pretty bizarre. Nobody is suggesting this would be a top tier feature they'd have to get done ASAP. Only that whenever they could add it, everyone would appreciate it if they did. Yes, everyone. Even the people who're full of shit and are saying they don't want it, if it was in the game and looked good and didn't make their computer explode or whatever the irrational technical fear is, they'd be happy about it.

I think you took what I said to the extreme, but in a good a way. There is a balance. My point was mostly that if they're going to add in something I'd prefer that it effect gameplay which is the point Bags was making. Though it is an overused argument that can apply to anything. I mean everything the devs do has an assumed time so a priority of features and weighing the cost of each feature is something that would ultimately need to be done, but could go without saying.

I did take it to the extreme, but it was to prove a point. There are all sorts of non-gameplay features which modern games are loaded up with in order to make them a richer, more full experience. Acting as if good looking character design or game environments isn't important because it's not a gameplay feature is a silly way of looking at it. Having good graphics, vibrant game worlds and other such purely cosmetic features is incredibly important for modern games. This game would be dead in the water if it released in 2013 looking like PS1 did.

[Whalenator]

Warborn, please.
Calm down.

[Warborn]

It's just text. Stop reading it angry.

[cellinaire]

What about only flys and mosquitoes then. Do you guys even think these would be so time-consuming for the programmers and coders? Will these also be proven as gameplay affecting insects? I mean seriously..... ;)