E3 Gamespot hands-on demo & Higby Interview

[shortbushero]

http://e3.gamespot.com/video/6381290/the-growing-battlefield-in-planetside-2/index.html

also a look at the in game store, they are selling weapons too :/. makes me kind of uneasy, but I understand that these aren't direct upgrades. kind of like the mann co. store

[SpynEs]

this is the best informational video of ps2 from e3 so far.

[Bags]

You can buy them with cash or in game resources, and they aren't upgrades.

Dunno how that makes you uneven.

[Red Beard]

By far best summary vid...Awesome.

[Top Sgt]

did you see the "medic stream of life?" lol

looks like ghost busters.

[DirtyBird]

Agreed this was a good video for game information.

[BigBossMonkey]

You can buy them with cash or in game resources, and they aren't upgrades.

Dunno how that makes you uneven.

This.

The store is like the League of Legends store. Everything gameplay altering is available for money or ingame resources. Cosmetic stuff is purely real money.

Seems perfect to me.

[QuantumMechanic]

Woah.. the last 20 seconds of that interview BLEW MY MIND.

Closed beta starting withing a few weeks *and then open beta a couple of weeks later!*

So I'm guessing the main purpose of the closed beta is to make sure the servers can handle the ~2,000 players. And then the real balancing work will be done over an extended open beta period before release.

Sounds like a good plan to me. And this is good news for all the players who didn't get the chance to get a beta key.

[RSphil]

seems good to me. there is no pay to win in this game. its all stuff that you would get via playing anyway. everything has a trade off. the weapon might do more damage but the fire rate may be lower ect. so far i am very happy with the market. love the camo's i'll be getting the desert ones anf forest ect so i blend into the continents.

great vid aswell

[Brusi]

Woah.. the last 20 seconds of that interview BLEW MY MIND.

Closed beta starting withing a few weeks *and then open beta a couple of weeks later!*

So I'm guessing the main purpose of the closed beta is to make sure the servers can handle the ~2,000 players. And then the real balancing work will be done over an extended open beta period before release.

Sounds like a good plan to me. And this is good news for all the players who didn't get the chance to get a beta key.

couple of weeks of closed beta!

[Death2All]

Higby is getting better and better at being informative and covering every little bit of important details. Kudos to Matt.

Also really happy to see the return of the real time map that we can view before we even log on the game. I was really upset to see that go in the first one.

[RSphil]

loving the app. that will be prode of place on my iphone, would even get an ipad just for that for some real command center stuff lol

cant wait for beta and the game is going be the best of the year.

[OutlawDr]

gotta agree, good summary video. This is the video I'll show to friends.

[Bravic]

http://e3.gamespot.com/video/6381290/the-growing-battlefield-in-planetside-2

[Logri]

Closed beta within the next few weeks, open beta couple of weeks after that, launched within the year!

First time I heard anything concreet from Higby.
Nice :D

[Death2All]

I believe this has already been posted in another thread. Oh well.

[Logri]

Yeah, after browsing I just found a similar topic.

[SKYeXile]

Closed beta within the next few weeks, open beta couple of weeks after that, launched within the year!

First time I heard anything concreet from Higby.
Nice :D

when they say that...beta could be in the next few months...as closed beta should be several months.

[kaffis]

when they say that...beta could be in the next few months...as closed beta should be several months.
My guess is that "closed beta" will be inviting priority access people -- vets, PC Gamer keys, and E3 giveaways.

Then, inviting everybody else will be part of the open beta, perhaps with a dropped NDA.

In any event, they must be pretty happy with their capacity.

[Sabot]

Oh right.. I totally forgot I was going to bring this up... don't remember seeing it anywhere else, but just incase I'll post it here so not to make more threads...

Anyway. In this video Matt says you can equip a motor on tanks for instance, that provide better torque for getting over hills but with lower top speed. So.. on Esamir, for example... will things like deep snow cause vehicles to maybe move a tad slower, unless you have the motor with better torque?
I suppose the continents have roads leading to bigger installations and bases, but if you go "off road" on a continent like that, and drive (or indeed run) around in a meter deep snow... should it affect movement speed of some vehicles and infantry? Like... maybe the Flash and a Lightning (unless certed), and LA, HA and Infils as an example, move alittle slower out there?

Personally I'm torn... because I do love realism (hey, physics is the same in future ;) in comabat games like this, but on the other hand it does seem like it will do nothing but provide a really annoying source of grief... any thoughts on that? And if it has been discussed, link to the thread will do nicely ^^

[Red Ketchup]

I don't know why but the "Stop killing yourself" message at 10:43 really made me laugh.

[Hamma]

Posted as news and merged threads.

[meiam]

The one things that worry me is the fact that apparently you can buy in game resource with money, all fair game to me, but it kinda take away from the idea of denying empire certain resource. The more they show the less there seem to be any reason to target specific hex... in fact the more they show the less there even seems to be a reason to even capture hex.

[captainkapautz]

The one things that worry me is the fact that apparently you can buy in game resource with money

No, you can't.

Items in the shop can be bought for either Auraxium OR StationCash, but you can't buy Auraxium, or any of the other 3, for StationCash.

[meiam]

No, you can't.

Items in the shop can be bought for either Auraxium OR StationCash, but you can't buy Auraxium, or any of the other 3, for StationCash.



2:14 would like to disagree with you

[Higby]

2:14 would like to disagree with you

He's right. You can buy the other three resources using Auraxium, but there is no way to convert StationCash into resources.

[meiam]

Oh perfect thank you very much for the quick answer.

[kaffis]

couple of weeks of closed beta!
Matt's referring to a couple of *Auraxian* weeks. Each Auraxian week is approximately two "soons".

[Alderego]

I have but one thing to say to all this: Please don't launch the beta during my finals, please don't ><
(though "a few" weeks might just be enough time for me to be done with em :p)

[Shogun]

i have a question about the out of game data flow and apps!

how is this thing protected? can everybody access everybodys infos via this datastream? if not, do we have to provide our account and password to the app to be able to access what we are supposed to access?
how are we going to be sure not to give our info to an evil hacking pirate appwriter?

[GuyFawkes]

i have a question about the out of game data flow and apps!

how is this thing protected? can everybody access everybodys infos via this datastream? if not, do we have to provide our account and password to the app to be able to access what we are supposed to access?
how are we going to be sure not to give our info to an evil hacking pirate appwriter?

I think Matt pointed out in the interview, and elsewhere previously , that information can only be gathered about your character if you give permission for it to be done. Not account info or passwords, just char info .Even your outfit leader can't access anything about you unless you give permission first.

[Shogun]

so when you gave permission, everybody can access the info about you?
i don´t see how it will be possible to restrict who will access your info?

will it be possible to just give permission for your outfitmembers to view your position for instance? if so, how will this be managed?

[AgtPanda]

Jihad quadbike has been confirmed.

Aw yeah.

[Coreldan]

so when you gave permission, everybody can access the info about you?
i don´t see how it will be possible to restrict who will access your info?

will it be possible to just give permission for your outfitmembers to view your position for instance? if so, how will this be managed?

This was talked about earlier by Higgles (before E3). I got the image of basically a screen in your character settings or somewhere where you can select with like.. checkboxes or like facebook-style who you want to share your datas with.

If you select everyone, you will be "available" on the "WoW armory" kind of things for example. If you want to keep everything about yourself private, only you will be allowed to view such data. Or you can limit it to outfit, for example.

I hope you can choose to show different things. I don't mind having certain things about myself visible to all, but stuff like location is for my outfit only.

All the data about you comes through SOE anyways. So if you select that you don't want to share the data, SOE will simply not stream it outside for the API thingies.

[xXGumpXX]

I just wan't clarification on voice macro's and character chants , are they in ? or will we be able to buy them with station cash . I have noticed in all these gameplay vids no one uses them , after all that is one feature i love about planetside , some how i just don't think there is any as of yet but i may be wrong , at least i hope i am :(

[kaffis]

i have a question about the out of game data flow and apps!

how is this thing protected? can everybody access everybodys infos via this datastream? if not, do we have to provide our account and password to the app to be able to access what we are supposed to access?
how are we going to be sure not to give our info to an evil hacking pirate appwriter?
It's already been stated that the game (or perhaps PS2's own website, if that's the preferred interface for this) will allow you to either make your information public or private. We don't know how granular these options will be -- will it be all-or-nothing, or can you choose some things to be public info and others to be private?

However, if it's public, it'll be available for apps to access with the APIs Sony is building.

It hasn't been confirmed, but it's pretty doubtful that those public APIs will include any login widgets, because allowing 3rd party apps to legitimately accept login info opens the door for malicious apps to fake the interface and instead capture your info.

To this end, I'm glad to see the announced 1st party app, which will hopefully include all those things we want a mobile app to do which would require logging in. Things like the VOIP, managing cert spending while not in-game, etc.

Then, we can include the community in all the purely informational stuff, allowing them to come up with customized UIs to present the information or innovative new ways to process and collate it.

[Hyncharas]

I did personally estimate the Beta would be July/August, so that's about as much clarification as I think people will ever get :)

[Baron]

Towards the end of the night battle footage you see an AWESOME could of debris and fire rain down on those below...


seriously ....got ½ a bonner from that

[Coreldan]

The burning debris is indeed fucking incredible.

[Bags]

Where are you getting this privacy information from? I read every bit of PS2 news posted here and I can't recall any article about that.

[Coreldan]

Where are you getting this privacy information from? I read every bit of PS2 news posted here and I can't recall any article about that.

It was one of the video interviews with at least Higby sometime before E3. Sadly don't have the link at hand and no time to search it either, maybe someone else does :D

[starshine]

release within the year

release within the year

release within the year



all I wanted to hear.

[infy]

Man, xani and darkhiren can't wait for this game to come out! I'm all meh, but i'll give it a try.

[Dreamcast]

Who cares if they sell weapons....



The only way that will be a problem is if it takes like 30 hours of gameplay to unlock 1 weapon.


Is better not be some BS like....I say it should take like 6-7 hours to get enough money to unlock weapons IMO.

[infy]

Without boost i can see it taking some time to unlock certain weapons, i know i didn't have the patience to unlock the heroes in LoL by playing without boost and what not. Support the game. Don't be like this player "TITICO", he's what you would call a true f2p warrior. Only paid for one game these last 3-4 years?

[WNxThentar]

The one things that worry me is the fact that apparently you can buy in game resource with money, all fair game to me, but it kinda take away from the idea of denying empire certain resource. The more they show the less there seem to be any reason to target specific hex... in fact the more they show the less there even seems to be a reason to even capture hex.

Didn't see where you could buy in game resources. Side grades can be bought with in game resources or station cash but I think you still need certs for some of that stuff too.

So things like grenades, maybe maxes, vehicle modifications will still require specific resources from in game and those 4 types of in game resources are not purchasable.

Consumables, like grenades, possibly maxes, certain mods on vehicles will use these in game resources after you have done the one time unlock/character.

I'd be surprised if they let us buy in game resources for money. I hope there isn't a way to trade these resources as that just promotes the farmers...being free to play you'd probably see account logging on all over the place just to collect resources to then on sell. This would be very sad in deed.

[WNxThentar]

2:14 would like to disagree with you

No it doesn't disagree with him/her. What he said is araxium (spelling) is the in game resource that can be used to purchase the side grades which is a one of cost or station cash can be used instead. Where araxium and the other 3 in game resources are important is for consumables which includes grenades, probably maxes, vehicle upgrades.

So for like a laser sight on your rifle you can buy it once for your character using araxium or station cash. From then on you never pay anything to use that laser sight.

For grenades you'll have to use in game resources which are only obtainable from in game every time you buy them. Every time you what a special turret you've unlocked for your tank you'll also have to spend the in game resources and if you don't have enough of them then you can apply that turret to your tank.

I'm pretty sure araxium is the generic resource for all 3 factions. Then there will be 1 resource for each faction which is used for faction specific upgraded consumables. So a upgraded turrent might cost you something like 50 units of resource x to put on a tank you are spawning. If you don't have 50 of those resources you don't get to spawn the tank with that turret and you have to just use the stock turrets.

This will promote people not just chain calling fully upgraded tanks and not taking care of them. You'll probably see a lot more tactics like running in and attacking then retreating to repair because it makes more sense resource wise.

To reiterate Matt doesn't say anywhere in there that you'll be able to buy in game resources. Just that some things can be bought with in game resources or station cash. Some people will buy all their stuff with station cash to leave as much resources for the consumables as possible. Others will spend araxium and save their real world money, others won't even bother getting things like cosmetic upgrades at all.

[WNxThentar]

i have a question about the out of game data flow and apps!

how is this thing protected? can everybody access everybodys infos via this datastream? if not, do we have to provide our account and password to the app to be able to access what we are supposed to access?
how are we going to be sure not to give our info to an evil hacking pirate appwriter?

They'll probably do a similar thing to EVE. For character specific data that is deemed not public you'll probably either be able to generate a key that others can use to see that data, which you can delete at any time. This means you could generate 1 key and anyone using that key could look at your info that you've given that key access too.

I'd be very surprised if any of this data is anything but read only. Like what certs you have, what upgrades you've bought, access to K/D information.

Smart app writers might be able to write apps that can track players if those players have given out keys that allow access to location information but that is easily mitigated by either not giving out your access keys, knowing where your app you are using came from, changing your access keys periodically, etc.

Key point will be things like:

Never install an application on any device that you don't trust the producer of the application.
Change your access keys periodically if you give the key out incase the key has made its way to the wild internet some how.
Limit what information you allow the key to see.

[WNxThentar]

It's already been stated that the game (or perhaps PS2's own website, if that's the preferred interface for this) will allow you to either make your information public or private. We don't know how granular these options will be -- will it be all-or-nothing, or can you choose some things to be public info and others to be private?

However, if it's public, it'll be available for apps to access with the APIs Sony is building.

It hasn't been confirmed, but it's pretty doubtful that those public APIs will include any login widgets, because allowing 3rd party apps to legitimately accept login info opens the door for malicious apps to fake the interface and instead capture your info.

To this end, I'm glad to see the announced 1st party app, which will hopefully include all those things we want a mobile app to do which would require logging in. Things like the VOIP, managing cert spending while not in-game, etc.

Then, we can include the community in all the purely informational stuff, allowing them to come up with customized UIs to present the information or innovative new ways to process and collate it.


This is exactly why the "EVE" approach of using access keys is most likely.

IE You generate a key using PS2 web site that has access to different info on your character. You then provide that access key to anyone you want to be able to see that data. If that key makes it out into the wild then you can always delete the key, making any attempt to use it fail.

as compared with giving specific people in game access to your data. This is because this approach would mean those players would have to log in via the app using their in game credentials which is a security nightmare.

EVE's method is very flexible and doesn't allow any account security problems. But again you have to remember that even if PS2 uses this method that you never install an app that you don't trust the source of. This is because even though the data is accessed using a key and the data doesn't expose any userid/passwords it doesn't mean that the app, besides doing what it says it will do, isn't doing something like keystroke logging and waiting for you to log into PS2 or even the SOE forums and transmit that to the writer of the app.

[DEA]

Lots of UN-answered questions for sure. Regardless the stuff looks promising.

[WNxThentar]

It was one of the video interviews with at least Higby sometime before E3. Sadly don't have the link at hand and no time to search it either, maybe someone else does :D

I remember him saying the same type of thing. He also said that while the API could give a strategic advantage to inventive programmers he believed that since everyone has access to this info that it would so make its way out into the wild and everyone could use it if they wanted to.

This would be things like now in PS1 where if you watched the map closely you'd see the signs of people back hacking, draining bases, cloaker killing behind the lines, etc.

If a programmer was really cleaver they might be able to track other players in a limited fashion by watching where they are killing others. But this all depends on if location information is provided with the kill stats. Even so if you are a sniper and head shot someone your position won't be given away...just where the player you killed was when they died.

[WNxThentar]

Without boost i can see it taking some time to unlock certain weapons, i know i didn't have the patience to unlock the heroes in LoL by playing without boost and what not. Support the game. Don't be like this player "TITICO", he's what you would call a true f2p warrior. Only paid for one game these last 3-4 years?

You have 2 parts to this. First is some side grades will require certain certifications to be able to purchase. Second is you'll have to spend some station cash or in game resources to make the one off purchase.

The amount of in game resources you accumulate is based of a few things.

Combat, by being involved with capturing points, killing players, etc you gain resources
Terriorty held gives you resources over time. So the longer your empire holds a piece of land the more of what ever resource that land produces you will get.


Certification points Matt thinks will typically amount to about 10 minutes of game play time. More if you are off line. Less if you are really good at the role you are playing. This is, of course, subject to being tweaked.

This might seem a lot but while some low level certifications will only cost 1 cert point. Some of the higher ones may cost hundreds and as an MMO they'll be introducing new stuff that will have new certification trees. So adding in 1 vehicle to the game could cost potentially thousands of cert points to fully master.

I imagine that Araxium isn't going to be much of an issue for most players. If you are very active you'll probably be earning it at a pretty quick rate. If you don't play much then you'll probably not be using much of it but still accumulating it while off line because of the lands your empire controls.

I imagine that it is the faction specific resources that will be the ones you'll be trying to manage more by either controlling or denying other empires from getting.

Remember you don't need all the side grades for a weapon. There might be a dozen different type of sights but many of them might not work with your play style so you won't be buying everything.

I think they have a good balance going here so far.

[Noivad]

Best Info about PS3 ever. Would have liked more info on Time to Train Vehicles Skills up all the way, Eve online can take months Real Time to train, but other then that excellent cross section on everything and very good comments well.