Wow. This place really died, eh?

[Tatwi]

I haven't really played in eons, but I periodically read about the game here and there and I've played a few minutes a couple times in the last year or so. I thought that was just me, but given how few servers are in the game and the lack of activity here, I guess it's not just me.

It's really sad to come here and see the board and site is practically at a stand still compared to the year leading up to beta and year after release. I guess most folks have moved on. And moving on is fine, there's lots of stuff out there to do!

Personally, I stopped posting here when the ratio of trolling asshats to intelligent people took a massive turn for the worst. Who needs that in their life? And I gave up on playing the game, because every time I tried either my hits didn't register or people/vehicles teleported all over the screen, making it literally impossible to play. If ya can't play, why play, right?

Anyhow, thanks for all the time and effort you guys put in over the years, Hamma and the gang. It was some good times. :groovy:

[Baneblade]

The devs moved their attention to reddit and everything else kind of left with them.

I personally dislike Reddit.

[ringring]

The devs moved their attention to reddit and everything else kind of left with them.

I personally dislike Reddit.
Yea, reddit is pretty horrible for conversations. I think the reason is that there is nothing left to discuss.

I mean since the beginning the purpose of here was to influence the devs and it worked for a time and in part but now I think they're just going there own way. Perhaps rather I think they know what they want to do and don't particularly want the type of input that would interest me.

I think what we have in PS2 is what we're going to get, new weapons here and there or vehicles or camos but that's it, whether it be because that's what they want to do or they can't actually do more I don't know.

[CyclesMcHurtz]

The devs moved their attention to reddit

Not entirely true. Just sayin'

[Palerion]

Seems dead to me. Used to be you'd at least get a reply the day you post something. It did devolve a lot into critical trolls, though, that would have rather flamed and put people down for their ideas than suggest ideas that can actually improve the game.

[Tatwi]

Not entirely true. Just sayin'

/wave

Nice to see you around. Keeping yourself busy I would assume. The game plays about as good as it ever has for me, so thanks for that. I got some micro stuttering which made it feel like I was running in sand (and killed mouse movement), oddly only on the Emerald server, when I played the past couple days so... back to work for you! :rofl:

And yeah, I have to agree ringring, Reddit is the poster child for how not to make a threaded multi user bulletin board. :lol: Compared to PhpBB, VBulletin, Lithium, and even Wordpress, navigating Reddit comments leaves a lot to be desired. That said, the Reddit in Motion app I have for my Blackberry is well laid out and easy to use so I use it rather than the website now (for reading, I don't post there - I have/did, but I deleted it as it's not my cup of tea).

Anyhow, are Hamma and the Dragonwolves still around? And I wonder what Balti, Figment, SKYeXile, Mastachief, SuperMorto, Graywolves, EVILPIG... and so many other PSU folks are up to these days.

[Baneblade]

Not entirely true. Just sayin'

Just because PSU sends you a notification when Baneblade needs to be learnt a lesson in talking about the devs, doesn't make it false. :p

I need a better place to talk about H1Z1 than Reddit. :(

[KesTro]

Not a fan of Reddit either. Been forcing myself to go to the Official forums but we all know how big of a cluster that is. I refuse to touch reddit though so for the time being I'll just listen to all the server QQ. I wouldn't take forum standstill as an indicative of PS2 being dead though. Majority of players barely even touch the forums to begin with.

[Vanir]

I have no idea on how to use Reddit and so I don't even touch it. The few time that I do, I'll go to it and do a search for something like PlanetSide 2 and all it dose is list all the threads that are PS2 related leaving me sitting there thinking how the hell dose anyone keep track of threads with this??

[camycamera]

I have no idea on how to use Reddit and so I don't even touch it. The few time that I do, I'll go to it and do a search for something like PlanetSide 2 and all it dose is list all the threads that are PS2 related leaving me sitting there thinking how the hell dose anyone keep track of threads with this??

it's www.reddit.com/r/planetside for PS2 stuff.

[Babyfark McGeez]

After checking reddit out a bit i just find it to be an inferior way of communication as opposed to a traditional forum like this; No proper structure with subforums, circlejerk post-voting that makes entire postings that don't conform to the hivemind not show up, and an overall tone and style i just find displeasing. Not to mention all the nonsense (What are karma points and why would you need them for communication? Why are they constantly trying to sell me shit on there?) It really just looks like a fad to me with no benefit at all over traditional forums.

PSU on the other hand was the place where the PS1 vets went, and since PS2 still doesn't deliver anything beyond TDM/Domination on a couple of "maps" (I refuse to call those disconnected out-of-bounds things continents) i guess most of the PSU users moved on.

[DviddLeff]

Reddit is an interesting beast, but if you don't have any luck and get a thread seen by people who like it first you never get a reply.

[CyclesMcHurtz]

Just because PSU sends you a notification when Baneblade needs to be learnt a lesson in talking about the devs, doesn't make it false. :p

I need a better place to talk about H1Z1 than Reddit. :(

Hey, that's not how it works!

(that's exactly how it works)

[Calista]

Hey, that's not how it works!

(that's exactly how it works)

/salute Tom

How's it going in the land of zombies?

[CyclesMcHurtz]

/salute Tom

How's it going in the land of zombies?

It is going rather undeadly ... is that a word? Getting zombie hugs (https://twitter.com/SonyShock/status/517351250610765824/photo/1) and everything!

[Calista]

It is going rather undeadly ... is that a word? Getting zombie hugs (https://twitter.com/SonyShock/status/517351250610765824/photo/1) and everything!

LMAO. That's a little too CQ for me!

[Dougnifico]

Its sad to see traffic slow down so much. Reddit is basically a giant shouting match. PSU is a place of more civilized discussion where everyone can be heard.

http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/pulp/I%20say%20shark.jpg

[Fazed]

I discovered planetside-universe forums when I started playing planetside2 and I really liked how it was easier to keep up a good thread here since there was less people barging in the thread than on official forums.

It saddens me too that you quitted playing because of the game optimization, I often feel like the only reason I actually do great in planetside is because I have a good computer.

[OpolE]

I ranted about the game about a month ago and its still one of the active posts even tho I chat complete bullshit. Goes to show hahaha

[Shamrock]

Yes I find it particularly sad that reddit has had such an impact on this forum given the amount of work/time Hamma has sunk into PS.

[Calista]

Yes I find it particularly sad that reddit has had such an impact on this forum given the amount of work/time Hamma has sunk into PS.

JadeShamrock? How's Hunter, Hooves, Bobby, Wicky and Pods? All I can think of at the moment lol.

[synkrotron]

Hello again :)

Not entirely true.

Might not be entirely true, but even to be partly true is disappointing.

The "Devs" don't even use the official forums. And to get news on PS2 updates and hotfixes we are advised to visit Reddit or Twitter.

I, too, do not like the way Reddit works.


Sorry for moaning in my first post in here for ages, but the Reddit thing struck a nerve...

[Figment]

Anyhow, are Hamma and the Dragonwolves still around? And I wonder what Balti, Figment, SKYeXile, Mastachief, SuperMorto, Graywolves, EVILPIG... and so many other PSU folks are up to these days.

Graduated my master Industrial Design Engineering (SOE could attempt to hire me now :p) and went on holiday.

I log in here once a month to see my posts in Idea Lab are still the latest. I've said most I've had to say on PS2 design and the things I said in pre-launch in Alpha are still the things I'd say today, so I'm kinda burned out on repetition.

[Hamma]

Sadly it has slowed down quite significantly here. There's lots of reason though, Reddit is certainly a big one. Many games slow down after a couple of years of release as well.

Other big pieces of it are that I've been really busy with work and the site hasn't received any new features to set it apart from other sites out there.

Either way we will always be here in one form or another. I thank all of you for continuing the conversation and Tom for continuing to lurk :)

[Gimpylung]

Reddit must be wiping out sites left, right and centre. Chin up Hamma, due to the fickle nature of the net, Reddit is probably just one potential corporate buyout away from a mass exodus.

So many eggs in one basket over on Reddit these days, I'd be amazed if it doesn't all come tumbling down at some point.

[Hamma]

Indeed. I wrote an article (http://www.planetside-universe.com/p-the-decline-of-fan-sites-123.htm) on my thoughts about this sort of thing a year or two ago.

[Rivenshield]

Loyalty and support is a one-way street. SOE takes. They don't give. It'd be easy for them to post updates and take questions *here*, and help resuscitate the site that kept the franchise on life support for years and years and is now their bread and butter. But that's not the nature of the corporate beast.

[Tatwi]

Indeed. I wrote an article (http://www.planetside-universe.com/p-the-decline-of-fan-sites-123.htm) on my thoughts about this sort of thing a year or two ago.

I remember that post. It was a good read back then and still is today. I wonder how well it applies to non-corporate websites in general, with so much of the web being consolidated into fewer hosting platforms and aggregating sites (such as Pintrest).

PSU really did keep the dream alive between PS1 and PS2 launch. I miss those days and discussions.

[OpolE]

Indeed. I wrote an article (http://www.planetside-universe.com/p-the-decline-of-fan-sites-123.htm) on my thoughts about this sort of thing a year or two ago.

I remember back in the day when the site was broken and I tried 10 times to make an account and I contacted the help email/form and heard nothing.

That was partly to do with the decline

[Hamma]

When was that? I highly doubt that has anything to do with it :P

[ringring]

When was that? I highly doubt that has anything to do with it :P
I recall I had problems getting registered and I believe you had to help me out.

But that was at least in beta if not before.

No, I don't believe an site issues have had anything to do with the drop off.


What it may be is that because PSU was the first site it has the the users are those that started playing first and so were the ones that stopped playing first, proportionally speaking.

New players tend to go straight to the official forums first, which would be natural and then to reddit which would be unnatural.

[Oty]

I remember back in early 2011 when the first photos of PS: next came, and the following 2 years of discussing, speculating and digging for more info about the game. That was absolutely amazing, to see the crowd here increase, even so much that it became laggy (which in this case was a good thing, it meant that people were getting their eyes up for the game) :D I used to check here several times a day just to read any new post or new thread.
Now I have somehow lost touch with the game (mostly because my computer is growing too old to handle it and it gets frustrating) and unfortunantley that has brought with it that I check in here more seldom, which is a shame.
I still hold it as one of my favourite websites though and it has the one of the best spots on my "favourite bar" (yes I use I.E :P )

dont really know why I wrote all this nostalgia, it just came when I read through the thread. Keep up the good work Hamma, this site has given me many good times! this feels like a real website, not just a wall of words like reddit!

[findus]

Well , i really do hope that the ps4 launch an wintertime will bring new players/older ones back here.

I appreciate Hamas work very much.

So much information here which helps me a lot (still) learning the game after nearly two years.

And mostly its more friendly here than on the official forum...

Keep up the good work...

[Baneblade]

Well, I'm not going anywhere.

[Dougnifico]

With so many high profile devs leaving, declining population, and the snails pace of important content, sadly, this leaves me not wanting to make any further investment in this game. I've put a lot of money in, and it looks like I should cut my losses. Its like stock trading. The future outlook isn't good and there is no track record that gives me comfort. Unfortunately, this means that I don't put more money in so I'm not helping to correct the problem. I'll keep playing planetside, but I'm cutting my losses and hedging my bets at this point.

[almalino]

With so many high profile devs leaving, declining population, and the snails pace of important content, sadly, this leaves me not wanting to make any further investment in this game. I've put a lot of money in, and it looks like I should cut my losses. Its like stock trading. The future outlook isn't good and there is no track record that gives me comfort. Unfortunately, this means that I don't put more money in so I'm not helping to correct the problem. I'll keep playing planetside, but I'm cutting my losses and hedging my bets at this point.

Is population declining? I invested may be 100+ Euros in 2 years. It is more then I invest in any other games. I play only few hours a week nowadays but on weekends there are always a lot of heavy fights on Miller. So I do not see declining population yet.

[findus]

the graphs say so ... or some interpret it that way....

In the official :rofl: Forums there still is much traffic...

i will stay, there is no other game around that interests me that much.

[robocpf1]

Lurker reporting, still around :D

Nice to see some other people around as well!

[Dougnifico]

I'm not leaving the game. I'm just putting a hold on any more financial investment, and I am what the free to play industry refers to as a "whale."

[Buggsy]

I'm waiting for the cloaking bubble for the Sunderer to spice up tactics for an otherwise bland camp the spawn game.

PS1 mines, PS1 spitfires, PS1 motion detectors would be nice too.



..........unimaginative you.

[Jaybonaut]

:( Where is everyone?

[findus]

Don't know! Other Forums?other games? Work?

[p0intman]

The devs moved their attention to reddit and everything else kind of left with them.

I personally dislike Reddit.
Doesn't help that most people here wanted CoD/BF2/3 on steroids. Maybe SOE will learn and pull a reverse NGE? Haha. That was a joke. Fat chance.

As for me, I finally learned how to win and found better games that require a level of skill, thought and planning.

[Ghoest9]

Doesn't help that most people here wanted CoD/BF2/3 on steroids. Maybe SOE will learn and pull a reverse .


I really never sensed that here other than a couple of players..


Its partly Reddit and partly just less people playing leading to a negative feed back loop.

Im guessing that more than a few players are like me and are waiting for the PS4 version in hopes that it has a bigger population.

[p0intman]

I really never sensed that here other than a couple of players..


Its partly Reddit and partly just less people playing leading to a negative feed back loop.

Im guessing that more than a few players are like me and are waiting for the PS4 version in hopes that it has a bigger population.

lolllllll

PS4 having a bigger population? Yeah, sure, maybe for a year til PS5 or whatever comes out and PS2 either doesn't follow it or loses all of its players.

[Ghoest9]

lolllllll

PS4 having a bigger population? Yeah, sure, maybe for a year til PS5 or whatever comes out and PS2 either doesn't follow it or loses all of its players.

You are extremely ill informed - or confused.

You basically just sound insane.

[ringring]

To be honest I think the official forums and reddit are becoming quieter too. The interesting discussions have happened several times over, this game as it is is pretty much set and there's little scope for the community to influence direction.

And at this point the threads that are created are 'I'm a newbie which gun should I buy to get a good k/d' or 'Maxes are waaaay underpowered' and so on.

Oh and there are the 'redeploymentside' threads but people are realising that the game now is pretty much where the devs want it to be so, blerggg.

[p0intman]

You are extremely ill informed - or confused.

You basically just sound insane.

yes, the many tens of people that will play the game on the PS4 with absolutely shitty graphics at 720p and running at sub-30 fps in 'big' fights will save the PS franchise.

[Ghoest9]

Actually its 1080 and it seems to be a flat 30.

[Belhade]

I thought that the "platformers" would be geared more towards the BF/CoD style gaming than PlanetSide.

[p0intman]

Actually its 1080 and it seems to be a flat 30.
with nobody around.

[bpostal]

2 years into the game and all I see is wasted potential. I play for a couple/few hours a week. That's about all I can stomach.

[CraazyCanuck]

2 years into the game and all I see is wasted potential. I play for a couple/few hours a week. That's about all I can stomach.

Yeah it might not be where we would like it, but it is better then it was a year ago. I'm still plugging away as well and just introduced our SC org to PS2. We had our first event with about 36 people this past Saturday. I think for the most part people enjoyed it once they wrapped their heads around some of the basics. Hossin may not have been the best choice to start them off on :) They got a real taste of it when a continent lock surged the TR population on Hossin and they found ourselves in a couple 96+ vs.

Hopefully, some of you who haven't played in a long time, will give it another go to see if the changes are enough. I doubt it, but no harm in throwing it out there.

[Calista]

2 years into the game and all I see is wasted potential. I play for a couple/few hours a week. That's about all I can stomach.

You made it 2 years more than me. I could see where PS2 was headed back on August 6 2012. I still hang around on the forums in hopes things may turn around but they won't. Problem with this game is it's business model. Stupid F2P. I have hopes that the general public will awake from it's stupor and put this bullshit behind us.

[Ghost Runner]

Your missing out on a good game then Calista its not perfect but what game is, but it is a lot of fun regaurdless of the slow development of new maps and and vehicals, continetal warfare, also warpgates that work. I may not play whole ton, but when I do I have a lot of fun.

[Figment]

The problem Ghost Runner, is that a lot of players have much higher expectations. Has the game improved? Most definitely.

Is it "there yet"? Not really no.

[KesTro]

I think more than that is people want Planetside 1 out of PLanetside 2 and they're just not the same game.

[ringring]

I think more than that is people want Planetside 1 out of PLanetside 2 and they're just not the same game.
Well, getting Planetside would be a step forward.

[Ghost Runner]

The problem Ghost Runner, is that a lot of players have much higher expectations. Has the game improved? Most definitely.

Is it "there yet"? Not really no.

Yeah I get the problem I agree, but it really is a great fps and for that it should be enjoyed so that the devs see the clear interest in continuing to develop it.

[Figment]

But to players hope to have it developed in a very specific direction isn't why you would want to play a game you don't quite enjoy for years.

In fact, it kinda pains you to see the potential and not getting the obvious. When I played it with another PS1 vet, we would get constantly annoyed by the detail designs that were impacting in some way as a rather annoying side-effect that you either could or couldn't do, but were forced to camp or give up or not be able to use attrition as a weapon in fighting a group of people too large to kill all medics at once for instance (we could tackle such a group in PS1 by taking their supplies (destroying terms and AMS) and then removing the med juice from the medics over time). We would constantly rant "why didn't they do this this way? Oh wait that would be like some other game we once played, what was it called again?"

It is a constant source of minor aggravations to play the game and all taken together it just isn't fun anymore. And no, can't switch that off. Tried for half a year.

[Rolfski]

I used to prefer this forum for in-depth discussions about the game, although the disproportionate negativity and bitterness compared to other forums was off-putting at times. The decline in favour of reddit didn't help much either. I had a good discussion with my outfit mate ChipMHazzard about this a while ago. We both didn't have a real answer to what future there is for dedicated fan sites like this, but we hate to see them go.

[p0intman]

I think more than that is people want Planetside 1 out of PLanetside 2 and they're just not the same game.
having a game that is something more than planetside in just namesake would be nice.

edit: that will probably never happen with the current team at the helm. they drop the ball more than the bears do.

[Ghost Runner]

But to players hope to have it developed in a very specific direction isn't why you would want to play a game you don't quite enjoy for years.

In fact, it kinda pains you to see the potential and not getting the obvious. When I played it with another PS1 vet, we would get constantly annoyed by the detail designs that were impacting in some way as a rather annoying side-effect that you either could or couldn't do, but were forced to camp or give up or not be able to use attrition as a weapon in fighting a group of people too large to kill all medics at once for instance (we could tackle such a group in PS1 by taking their supplies (destroying terms and AMS) and then removing the med juice from the medics over time). We would constantly rant "why didn't they do this this way? Oh wait that would be like some other game we once played, what was it called again?"

It is a constant source of minor aggravations to play the game and all taken together it just isn't fun anymore. And no, can't switch that off. Tried for half a year.

Yeah mate I hear yah I actually after beta was quite discusted with the state of the game almost didnt come back for 6 months, but I said you know what it is a different game I will try looking at it as a new title rather then a sequal and when I started to do that it became a lot more fun to play.

But I do know exactly what you are saying.
__________________________________________________ _______
having a game that is something more than planetside in just namesake would be nice.

edit: that will probably never happen with the current team at the helm. they drop the ball more than the bears do.

LMAO :rofl: They have to try pretty hard to catch up to the bears :eek:

[Babyfark McGeez]

I will remember Planetside 2 for being a moderately fun shooter, but lacking everything that made Planetside 1 a unique FPS experience and thus managing to be one of the biggest disappointments i experienced with sequels.

A bit like the new bastardized star trek; Looks nice, lots of flashy stuff and if you switch your brain off you might have a good time. But it's oozing "michael bay" and "corporate" juices all over my carpet.

I dunno, maybe i'm just being mellow but in the end it's probably better to have this over nothing at all. Atleast it gives me a shooter fix now and then. Which sadly PS1 can't do because SOE managed to fuck that up too, ARGH. Ahh there we go, un-mellowed myself again.

Oh and PS2 is also mostly responsible for this place being dead. :p

[Buggsy]

At least we have 13 viewing this forum. The same 13 viewing for the last 3 years.

[Figment]

At least we have 13 viewing this forum. The same 13 viewing for the last 3 years.

It's a conspiracy! D:

[Buggsy]

Well you brats got what you wanted, one (singular) useless spitfire turret which changes absolutely nothing about the dynamic of player interaction: drive from one spawn camp to another.

[Figment]

Well you brats got what you wanted, one (singular) useless spitfire turret which changes absolutely nothing about the dynamic of player interaction: drive from one spawn camp to another.

1. "You brats"

Nice generalisation... Inaccurate cause of point 2 and insulting too. Good way to hold a discussion.

2. "A single Spitfire turret (everyone can place one of)" is actually something nobody asked for.

What was asked for, is being able to place a larger number, (~10) which would only be allowed as part of a certification system where you do not have access to all certifications, but where it is a long term character development choice between having this or some other character attribute. Meaning you cant have both. Let alone all.

If you can't see the massive impact difference between a PS1 Spitfire turret with accompanying cert balance system and this, maybe you're the brat who never actually listened to what was being said and asked for...

I'm also quite sure most people you call "brats" here - despite you being clueless to who and why you are talking to - want these to not deploy inside, while the spawns are deep inside. Meaning they don't want camping to be easy in the first place, let alone with Spitfire turrets in between the spawn room and the control console (think AMP station and AT/Redoubt/Module Cavebuilding camping in PS1 after the introduction of Spitfires that could be deployed in hostile territory: there were a lot of complaints about those then too...).

I can assure you that nobody here has asked for, nor is waiting for this particular implementation.

Now, be a good boy and admit you're wrong about us and apologise for your rash behaviour and insulting tone and direct your anger as constructive critique (see the conditions established above) towards those responsible for this particular implementation: namely the people that want to have access to all certs through all lives by being able to change to all classes and use all vehicles with permanent cert upgrades and endless cert point gain.

Blame Brewko for BR40 in PS1 and Black Ops design and "balancing". Blame the devs for still considering teleporters with(out) shields, which are undisableable (is that a word?) on either end. Blame the devs for doing a half arsed Spitfire turret design with inappropriate balancing and being as situational, limited to prevent massive numbers and therefore utterly useless for anything but camping and zergs of engis as are PS2 mines.

Basically, the last people you want to blame are the people here, because they actually think about the consequences of design and implement appropriate counter balancing systems to avoid spam, camping and abuse.

[ringring]

Well you brats got what you wanted, one (singular) useless spitfire turret which changes absolutely nothing about the dynamic of player interaction: drive from one spawn camp to another.

This is a bit random. Did you get the right forum or even the right game?

[Calista]

This is a bit random. Did you get the right forum or even the right game?

Clearly he thought this was Reddit. :lol:

[Figment]

This is a bit random. Did you get the right forum or even the right game?

IIRC Buggsy once made a post about why he rage-unsubbed from PS1: someone EMPed his carefully set up CE field, undoing all his hard work.


Probably not realising that without the EMP blast, some fortified positions wouldn't be taken.

Tbh, it wouldn't have been weird asking to review CR3-4-5 EMP blast balance as the number of CRs rises (as with the frequency of OS blasts as CR rises), but to have EMP blasts removed completely would have made it a bit too hard for tactical strikes. >.>


Speaking of which, since we're not doing anything at the moment... Anyone up for a round of CR ability discussions? Could it have been designed better?

[Buggsy]

If you understood the importance of CE/AMS for defense you would have asked for the CUD EMP blast and CUD Orbital Strike to be removed from the game 10 years ago.

You brats got exactly what you wanted so enjoy your rolling balls of zergs going from spawn camp to spawn camp with little to no resistance.

[ringring]

If you understood the importance of CE/AMS for defense you would have asked for the CUD EMP blast and CUD Orbital Strike to be removed from the game 10 years ago.

You brats got exactly what you wanted so enjoy your rolling balls of zergs going from spawn camp to spawn camp with little to no resistance.

again I think he's got the wrong folks. Still, it's sunny outside so not everything is bad.

[Calista]

Change the subject and since this is the only hot thread and only a few of us here I dont really feel like starting another. You guys know why Jimmy left the PS2 team? It wasn't for H1Z1 initially. They are/were working on a 256 player WW2 round based game. Think of BF1942 only much bigger. They had to stop while waiting on a technical deliverable so they started H1Z1 in the mean time. They are supposed to pick back up on the WW2 game at some future date and I for one cannot wait to see what they come up with. Enough of Zombie games already!

[ringring]

Change the subject and since this is the only hot thread and only a few of us here I dont really feel like starting another. You guys know why Jimmy left the PS2 team? It wasn't for H1Z1 initially. They are/were working on a 256 player WW2 round based game. Think of BF1942 only much bigger. They had to stop while waiting on a technical deliverable so they started H1Z1 in the mean time. They are supposed to pick back up on the WW2 game at some future date and I for one cannot wait to see what they come up with. Enough of Zombie games already!
Interesting, I'd picked up that H1Z1 was kind of an accidental project.

I wonder what they have in mind withe WW2 game.

Won't it trample on PS2 server smash?
And doesn't Server Smash and all those kind of scheduled matches prove that matches in themselves aren't enough and need to be backed by a game that is interesting in it's own right?

[Calista]

Interesting, I'd picked up that H1Z1 was kind of an accidental project.

I wonder what they have in mind withe WW2 game.

Won't it trample on PS2 server smash?
And doesn't Server Smash and all those kind of scheduled matches prove that matches in themselves aren't enough and need to be backed by a game that is interesting in it's own right?

Could be for MLG purposes. I don't know what kind of agreement they had with SOE but PS2 flopped pretty hard for MLG. Who knows? All I know is what I said prior and this was actually from Smed in an early H1Z1 stream :lol: His PR people probably wish he hadn't said all that but hey that was the best part of the stream!

[Figment]

If you understood the importance of CE/AMS for defense you would have asked for the CUD EMP blast and CUD Orbital Strike to be removed from the game 10 years ago.

You brats got exactly what you wanted so enjoy your rolling balls of zergs going from spawn camp to spawn camp with little to no resistance.

If you understood the importance of being able to counter zergs with swarms of CE you would have understood the importance of the existance of OSes and EMP blasts... Besides, an OS in the hands of a zerg is pretty useless since it only hastens what they will destroy anyway. A well placed OS in the hands of a handful of defenders can be absolutely crippling to zergs.


If you understood the importance of removing AMSes that are controlled by zergs engaging a handful of defenders, you would have understood the importance of OSes and EMPs.

You really don't see how you need a counter to zergs.


Shortsighted brats like you didn't get what you wanted in PS1, namely steamrolling zergs from base to base using CE and nigh invincible AMS positions.


If you gave PS2 classes far less limited CE, you would have created a complete monster Buggsy. Without an inventory system and certification system, massive CE, ESPECIALLY WITHOUT EMP BLASTS would simply be the ultimate steamroll zerg gift.

[Figment]

You guys know why Jimmy left the PS2 team? It wasn't for H1Z1 initially. They are/were working on a 256 player WW2 round based game. Think of BF1942 only much bigger.

Wonder why they never make a WWI shooter instead. Trench warfare, tunnel warfare and if you want an "exp grind game" like everyone makes these days... just throw in the battle at Verdun...

[/rude sarcasm]

That aside, it's probably easier to design this than a continuous large scale multiplayer. Only two sides and probably more linearity. And of course, no jumpjets. Surely they'll be able to make some reasonable maps. Most important thing at that population scale is to make the capture points and spawning system reasonable and create proper lines of defense.

Enough of Zombie games already!

Enough of the WWII and Vietnam games too, tbh. There were other wars that could be far more interesting...


At least if you made a game about the invasion of Zanzibar, you could actually have a 30 minute round and cover the entire war on a minute by minute basis.


Course... Nobody would pick the Zanzibar team... >.>

[Calista]

You must have been playing World of Tanks lately lol. I never really got into it.

Smed called the game Sturm und drang and said something about it being a first person moba. Interesting because I believe Project Bluestreak from Bosskey (where TRay went) is also an fps moba. I wonder how SOE will monetize a WWII game? When you make a period specific game like that the crazy cosmetics just won't work.

[Figment]

More a general remark, PlanetSide 2, BR40 in PS1, pretty much EVERY SINGLE RPG, War Thunder, World of Tanks, Warplanes and Battleships, all exp grind games. The gameplay itself... Yeah well... leveling first, gameplay second. Cause grind can be monetized.

When you make a period specific game like that the crazy cosmetics just won't work.

Battlefield Heroes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xchFVeorjHo

[p0intman]

But to players hope to have it developed in a very specific direction isn't why you would want to play a game you don't quite enjoy for years.

In fact, it kinda pains you to see the potential and not getting the obvious. When I played it with another PS1 vet, we would get constantly annoyed by the detail designs that were impacting in some way as a rather annoying side-effect that you either could or couldn't do, but were forced to camp or give up or not be able to use attrition as a weapon in fighting a group of people too large to kill all medics at once for instance (we could tackle such a group in PS1 by taking their supplies (destroying terms and AMS) and then removing the med juice from the medics over time). We would constantly rant "why didn't they do this this way? Oh wait that would be like some other game we once played, what was it called again?"

It is a constant source of minor aggravations to play the game and all taken together it just isn't fun anymore. And no, can't switch that off. Tried for half a year.

I look at this game, and all I manage to see are so many obvious fuckups that I'm left wondering why they chose what they did, and what they had hoped would come of it. I see base design and overall level design that just... is so obviously wrong that it hurts my head any time I see someone try to defend it.

I see people wanting to love this game as I once did, and I admire that, but its frustrating to see them say that the game is -fun- because... to someone like me, or figment... its not. Its ... just... not. I can explain, in detail, how it worked and why it worked if someone has PLAYED the game... but I'm left wordless to someone that hasn't. I'd have to draw diagrams or show screenshots of it to explain it. Shrug. I kinda gave up on explaining it. Its one of those games that you'll never understand unless you go, load it up and actually look around, and look at the mechanics pretty close.

The cynic in me says to say 'fuck them' and that if they want their game to not suck, they can pay one of us that gets it for the privilege of overhauling it. But then they had that chance, and he left to go elsewhere, which is totally understandable.

If you understood the importance of CE/AMS for defense you would have asked for the CUD EMP blast and CUD Orbital Strike to be removed from the game 10 years ago.

You brats got exactly what you wanted so enjoy your rolling balls of zergs going from spawn camp to spawn camp with little to no resistance.
Fun fact: three or four times in my PS1 history, I petitioned SOE to demote me to CR4 because I got sick and tired of the bullshit that CR5s put up with. I didn't care about my OS and only rarely needed my EMP. It was a fucking burdensome mantle to carry at times, and was more like herding feral retarded cats than actual fun sometimes.

I think... you're mistakening us, because I and others most certainly did petition for orbitals to be removed many years ago, and I petitioned SOE to not put orbitals into PS2... ever.

As far as the WW2 game, I won't bother with it... they'll just fuck it up like PS1, PS2 and SWG.

MLG failed because SOE used it as forced marketing first.

[Figment]

The problem with anything powerful is not that it's powerful, but frequency and volume of use.

I was a major Sunderer user, but I thought the EMP blast, though a good addition in itself, was overpowered due to being available every 30s. I made a point of it driving around an enemy CY honking and blasting without gunners on board. Best was 9 laps in a full CY.


See, having a discussion about such features is easy. We could have had say longer OS timers related to the amount of CR5s online per day. But in PS2, we're talking of a potential of 2000 CR5s. But PS1 Devs were pretty much non-existent for most the period of its existence. We would be happy if we got one. Unless it was Brewko. Tbh. I know he meant well and I respect him for that, but he did more harm than good with his ideas. Especially things like giving aircraft more hitpoints late in the game, throwing away all other balance instead of simply adjusting the Wasp's gun/missiles as that was the reason to change, BR40 and Black Ops...

You could tell that completely different devs than the original set worked on it for most the time, cause the later devs (except for Beady) lacked vision and understanding. Beady came in late, was INCREDIBLY eager to learn and cooperate, had very creative ideas and realised you couldn't just put any idea in.


I think it's also important to realise that the original devs did have the option to put jetpacks on troops, but chose not to put jetpacks on any unit that could open doors, thereby evading basic defenses without help from others. In fact, the concept of doors already weighs heavily on what happened in PS2. We got shields now, but shields have a completely different dynamic. But as P0intman says, explaining the implications of one choice or a combination of choices over another requires so much explaining...

[p0intman]

The problem with anything powerful is not that it's powerful, but frequency and volume of use.

I was a major Sunderer user, but I thought the EMP blast, though a good addition in itself, was overpowered due to being available every 30s. I made a point of it driving around an enemy CY honking and blasting without gunners on board. Best was 9 laps in a full CY.


See, having a discussion about such features is easy. We could have had say longer OS timers related to the amount of CR5s online per day. But in PS2, we're talking of a potential of 2000 CR5s. But PS1 Devs were pretty much non-existent for most the period of its existence. We would be happy if we got one. Unless it was Brewko. Tbh. I know he meant well and I respect him for that, but he did more harm than good with his ideas. Especially things like giving aircraft more hitpoints late in the game, throwing away all other balance instead of simply adjusting the Wasp's gun/missiles as that was the reason to change, BR40 and Black Ops...

You could tell that completely different devs than the original set worked on it for most the time, cause the later devs (except for Beady) lacked vision and understanding. Beady came in late, was INCREDIBLY eager to learn and cooperate, had very creative ideas and realised you couldn't just put any idea in.


I think it's also important to realise that the original devs did have the option to put jetpacks on troops, but chose not to put jetpacks on any unit that could open doors, thereby evading basic defenses without help from others. In fact, the concept of doors already weighs heavily on what happened in PS2. We got shields now, but shields have a completely different dynamic. But as P0intman says, explaining the implications of one choice or a combination of choices over another requires so much explaining...
I and some others devised a lol worthy tactic late in PS1 where we'd load up in a sunderer of choice, in shock trooper gear, load the sunderer into a lodestar and then drop on a biolab on the roof so that we'd land the sunderer outside of the gen room door. The EMP would go off, we'd dismount and run in while the sunderer took hits, and we didn't.

It made quite a few people rage at us. I think I might indirectly be liable for there not being a lodestar in PS2. However, That could just be my ego mixing with cynicism and the fact I think most of the PS2 devs hate the creativity we had in PS1.

[Figment]

Pfft. Try old school Sundies. Three of them on the top of a 100% TR pop Seth including four outfits I got together. :)


Followed by a backdoor Hapi raid by water with five full Deliverers that ruined their entire hold.

First time that was done. ;)

[Brunitto]

iim alive

[EVILoHOMER]

PSU was for fans of the first PS, when PS2 came out and it turned out to be shit... everyone left. They should have made Planetside 2, instead they made Genericside Battlefield wannabe.

Even if they did that, they could have made a good game, but they didn't.


Like when they brought out the MCG, we could have had a different play style, instead they just made a rifle with spin up time. The reasoning from the devs was because you couldn't take cover with it.... that is the whole point of a MCG, you run and gun and shoot the hell out of everything! The HA should have been unique, but the Lasher feels like a rifle and even the Shotguns sounded and felt like rifles.

Why couldn't we have the unique weapons of Planetside which were more like UT or Quake? Instead we just got Battlefield weapons... fucking sucks.


Then you had the no meta game thanx to many things like not being able to lock conts due to only having three islands.

What about the terrible base designs? They were massive on the outside, yet they had no indoor floor plan what so ever. The game had no infantry combat, just vehicles camping doors and impossible to defend bases.


It was also P2W or grind for 20 years... which Planetside never was.


Now look at the shit show EQN and Landmark are, nothing even like EverQuest, they're just using the name to milk money out of people. What makes no sense about that though is EverQuest is a name that carries to weight but to a small group of hardcore players from 10+ years ago. They should have called it something else, but instead they want to piss all us fans off... though to be fair they done that a long time ago.


I say this time and timer again, Smedley needs to go, he has ran SOE into the ground and tbh when H1Z1 (the poor Dayz clone) fails and then EQN does too... he will be fired and I will feel like I have justice finally for all the money he has thrown down the drain of mine.

Remember SWG? Spent two years and a lot of money on that and then I was told by SOE and Lucas Arts to fuck off. They actually said that, they wanted a new player base and all us fans were meaningless to them.

That is exactly what they did with Planetside 2, all you fans of Planetside... you can go to hell because we're trying to get Battlefield fans now.

[p0intman]

Remember SWG? Spent two years and a lot of money on that and then I was told by SOE and Lucas Arts to fuck off. They actually said that, they wanted a new player base and all us fans were meaningless to them.

That is exactly what they did with Planetside 2, all you fans of Planetside... you can go to hell because we're trying to get Battlefield fans now.

Emphasis mine. That's EXACTLY how I feel with this. At least with SWG, people are trying to fix what SomeOne Else broke.

[Figment]

Tbh, I'm not sure if that was the intention or the effect.

I feel they had the will to make something grand, but lacked the experience to make it the way it'd been "perfect" in our minds, or even close to an upgrade because PlanetSide is not a type of game you learn to understand in a few short years, let alone in a couple months. Let alone in a period where the game was practically dead and you couldn't get experience of how it plays out of it.

This though, is the time they started working on it. So they kinda HAD to look at other games more than PS1, because basically, PS1 wasn't REALLY played anymore. Had they been there with the team in 2006? It'd been easy to see what would need to be done.

Had they been there with the team in 2008? It'd been possible. Hard, but possible. In 2010? Frankly, I had a hard time recognising the game at that point given the way it was being fought and given the BR40 destruction of cert balance. Let's not even think of the bugs.

By the time they moved it to the new server in San Diego, neither the game nor the company had much hope to do much with it. Let's face it, they put up a version with some of the units either missing or bugged, but ultimately one without players to show even a single campaign.

Yet PS2 started being developed well after its prime. The concept of planetary warfare did not exist anymore at that time. It was just threeways. If you were lucky. Otherwise it was ghosting.

PS2 developers should have seen command chat. ACTIVE command chat in 2005. They should have asked questions: "why do you chose that target, why not go there?" "Why do they respond?" "Why do they refuse to help?" "If you could fix this base layout, what would you do?"

etc. etc.

But they couldn't. SOE had given up on the concept in late 2004, after Aftershock failed.

[p0intman]

Tbh, I'm not sure if that was the intention or the effect.

I feel they had the will to make something grand, but lacked the experience to make it the way it'd been "perfect" in our minds, or even close to an upgrade because PlanetSide is not a type of game you learn to understand in a few short years, let alone in a couple months. Let alone in a period where the game was practically dead and you couldn't get experience of how it plays out of it.

This though, is the time they started working on it. So they kinda HAD to look at other games more than PS1, because basically, PS1 wasn't REALLY played anymore. Had they been there with the team in 2006? It'd been easy to see what would need to be done.

Had they been there with the team in 2008? It'd been possible. Hard, but possible. In 2010? Frankly, I had a hard time recognising the game at that point given the way it was being fought and given the BR40 destruction of cert balance. Let's not even think of the bugs.

By the time they moved it to the new server in San Diego, neither the game nor the company had much hope to do much with it. Let's face it, they put up a version with some of the units either missing or bugged, but ultimately one without players to show even a single campaign.

Yet PS2 started being developed well after its prime. The concept of planetary warfare did not exist anymore at that time. It was just threeways. If you were lucky. Otherwise it was ghosting.

PS2 developers should have seen command chat. ACTIVE command chat in 2005. They should have asked questions: "why do you chose that target, why not go there?" "Why do they respond?" "Why do they refuse to help?" "If you could fix this base layout, what would you do?"

etc. etc.

But they couldn't. SOE had given up on the concept in late 2004, after Aftershock failed.

the cynic in me says its a bit of both.
the optimist in me says its just the effect of ignorant design.

[Calista]

Funny they deemed PS1 as not being a financial success so with PS2 they opted for more of a pure shooter experience than the RPG-ish original. Both share a high barrier of entry with elevated system requirements and also now it appears both are not financially successful. If the sub model was still viable (and perhaps it is but with lower monthly cost) they could have focused their entire staffing budget on gameplay assets rather than silly hats and what not.

[Ghost Runner]

Need maps, ants, and an IC lattic and we would have a really great game too bad the maps take so long to get out the rest would be pretty easy to impliment.

Also this place hasent died it has plenty viewers come around on a daily basis just no one seem to want ot say anything anymore. Must be all the bitter cold floating around here fingers are frozen lol.

[Figment]

The maps wouldn't have needed to take so long tbh, too much focus on custom building early on without first knowing if it was a good design. All maps have been redone several times over. :(

[p0intman]

The maps wouldn't have needed to take so long tbh, too much focus on custom building early on without first knowing if it was a good design. All maps have been redone several times over. :(

of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these:

Figment was right again.

[ringring]

The maps wouldn't have needed to take so long tbh, too much focus on custom building early on without first knowing if it was a good design. All maps have been redone several times over. :(
and look how many bases/outposts there are on a continent - if they'd created another continent, not built half the bases on one and instead put them on the second then I'd doubt it would take that much longer.

so why did they decide to have fewer continent jam packed with bases? I don't know, maybe because they wanted to get 5000 people on each continent and to do that they reckoned they would have to spread out the players over a lot of different locations? I don't know.

[Figment]

of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these:

Figment was right again.

As if I'm ever wrong. ;)


:D





:(

[Figment]

I understand where they came from though, to them, when they first met "us" as a playerbase, we were random unknown, opionated people, with a huge touch of conservatism that could have been considered a strong bias. And who says bias is right? I personally think our argumentation had less to do with conservatism than functionality, (player) pragmatism and practical implementation, but then there were our forum opponents who accused us otherwise. (See driver-gunner debate et all).

They were relatively fresh and less "constrained" in their thinking. So why listen to people who "might just want a copy of a game with updated graphics", as some of the more fanboyish white knighting forum members suggested at times?

They had a huge question of trust and blind faith on who to listen to. And I will keep saying, they did listen to forum members on a lot of things. But they had to in some ways due to a lack of insight, experience and having a broad, vagueish vision of what the game should be, without much of the details filled in, which can't really be helped since they had little to fall back on and they themselves had not done something similar or so ambitious to learn from before. All in all they did a reasonable job given the circumstances and I'm sure if they would do it again, they would do many things differently from the start.

I don't really fault the devs in that respect.

The only thing I would have liked to have seen is have them come to me, Hayoo and Hamma when we were together in the Community Council (as was Raijinn's intention) as a soundboard for ideas, concepts and general design guidelines. In the three years I've been on board that community council, not once had we been asked to provide early pre-alpha feedback. Raijinn got us in that council for one reason and one reason only: to be there for the devs of PS2 (PS1 was to be considered dead at that point, even if we did transfer some feedback about it, it was never really used).

The only thing I think they might have picked up on was the marketing and monetization concepts I proposed for PS2, which was tremendously better than that of PS1 and I think in general a major success and turning point for SOE. Because Smedley pretty much echoed my words on that. All in all, I think SOE has improved itself and learned a lot these past few years. Maybe not as fast and as well as we would have liked them to and more often from own mistakes than past mistakes/successes of others, but it's a company. We're clients, but also outsiders. Changing our vision and creating our ideas is much easier than convincing a company's management and transfering specific knowledge (especially hard to attain experience based knowledge) to all its employees.

I do fault specific devs at times for "common sense" mistakes, like the teleporter == firing squad designs.

[Calista]

Would have been far better off to have smaller continents (less development time) with fewer facilities (allow for combined arms) and less players per continent (better performance) but hey "Size Always Matters" and indeed it does but in this case to the detriment of the game. I bet on PS4 version they had to cut continent player count in half what it is on the PC. Either that or bring back old hex cap system to make sure everyone is spread out to the max but then where are the big advertised fights?

[stargazer093]

so..... do any of you still have the faith, that PS2 will last longer and ever made to the level of PS1? Just wondering

[p0intman]

so..... do any of you still have the faith, that PS2 will last longer and ever made to the level of PS1? Just wondering

See the explosive gif in my sig? Thats about what SOE did to PS2. Its dead. Very dead. To the tune of 50 boomers.

V-S-A-M dead.

Its so dead that what SOE are currently doing to it might be considered necromancy.

Lately im playing Payday 2 for my shooter fix.

[ringring]

PS2 could do alright if they keep attracting new players all the time. I doubt very much that individual players will stick at it for the length of time people did with ps1, some people did anyway.

But you can already see that many current players never experienced what was possible as demonstrated in the original and therefore don't really notice the lack, until they get bored.

[Calista]

so..... do any of you still have the faith, that PS2 will last longer and ever made to the level of PS1? Just wondering

I think if it doesn't do well on the PS4 you can stick a fork in it. It's done.

[Ghost Runner]

I think its doing well enough still some times see wait ques for continents also never seem to run out of people to shoot me lol.

They really should create free expansions once or twice a year to bring in newer players through advertising like other MMOs do though would help alot.

[Vancha]

Well hi... (http://i.imgur.com/ZcA8Sv0.gif)

I decided to drop by to see if PS2 had improved any since I tried it back in April '13, but since this forum has the tone of a post-mortem, it doesn't seem like it.

Reading this thread reminded me of two things...

1: Arguing with Figment pre-beta about the decision to remove the AMS, shift its respawn function to the Galaxy and the effect on black-ops outfits from PS1. As it turned out the game didn't end up having the structure for most of it to be applicable.

2: "We got this!" The mantra of the devs in response to the problems people foresaw occurring. This thread reads identically to a lot of threads before the game's release, only in the past-tense as opposed to predictions. It's a little sickening how many problems people saw coming from a mile off that were allowed to occur regardless.

Still, this forum's still using my little buttons and envelopes, so there's that at least. :D

[p0intman]

Well hi... (http://i.imgur.com/ZcA8Sv0.gif)

I decided to drop by to see if PS2 had improved any since I tried it back in April '13, but since this forum has the tone of a post-mortem, it doesn't seem like it.

Reading this thread reminded me of two things...

1: Arguing with Figment pre-beta about the decision to remove the AMS, shift its respawn function to the Galaxy and the effect on black-ops outfits from PS1. As it turned out the game didn't end up having the structure for most of it to be applicable.

2: "We got this!" The mantra of the devs in response to the problems people foresaw occurring. This thread reads identically to a lot of threads before the game's release, only in the past-tense as opposed to predictions. It's a little sickening how many problems people saw coming from a mile off that were allowed to occur regardless.

Still, this forum's still using my little buttons and envelopes, so there's that at least. :D
hey man, how have you been? it has been a little bit.

[Figment]

1: Arguing with Figment pre-beta about the decision to remove the AMS, shift its respawn function to the Galaxy and the effect on black-ops outfits from PS1. As it turned out the game didn't end up having the structure for most of it to be applicable.

"Told you so."

;)

2: "We got this!" The mantra of the devs in response to the problems people foresaw occurring. This thread reads identically to a lot of threads before the game's release, only in the past-tense as opposed to predictions. It's a little sickening how many problems people saw coming from a mile off that were allowed to occur regardless.

"Told you so."

:(

[Figment]

so..... do any of you still have the faith, that PS2 will last longer and ever made to the level of PS1? Just wondering

Honestly I'm not sure if that's a fair comparison. Circumstances for both games vary tremendously and the reasons for a decline are very different.

The speed of decline really depends on the social cohesion of outfits IMO.

I found it a lot harder to "connect" with people in PS2 outside of my own outfit.

[Canaris]

You know the most interesting part of this is, a thread called "Wow. This place really died, eh?" has garnered a lot of post from people who love Planetside yet left PS2 due to many gameplay issues, tells us that we all still love the concept that was Planetside and if what is now DB are able and willing to actually give this game the attention, redesigns and updates it deserves. The player base is still here lurking ;)

[Vancha]

hey man, how have you been? it has been a little bit.

Life hasn't changed much. Still looking for my next MMO and catching up on all the games my old computer couldn't play. I miss my bolt driver.

"Told you so."

;)

If you'd told me the whole thing would be inapplicable, it wouldn't've dragged on so damn long.

"Told you so."

:(

Yeah. I don't think many people were particularly reassured by it. It felt more like they were saying "okay we've stopped listening now".

You know the most interesting part of this is, a thread called "Wow. This place really died, eh?" has garnered a lot of post from people who love Planetside yet left PS2 due to many gameplay issues, tells us that we all still love the concept that was Planetside and if what is now DB are able and willing to actually give this game the attention, redesigns and updates it deserves. The player base is still here lurking ;)

I'll always check on Planetside occasionally, at least until someone else finally manages to deliver that same "rolling war" experience.

[p0intman]

Life hasn't changed much. Still looking for my next MMO and catching up on all the games my old computer couldn't play. I miss my bolt driver.



If you'd told me the whole thing would be inapplicable, it wouldn't've dragged on so damn long.



Yeah. I don't think many people were particularly reassured by it. It felt more like they were saying "okay we've stopped listening now".



I'll always check on Planetside occasionally, at least until someone else finally manages to deliver that same "rolling war" experience.

I think for now that concept is dead in the water until someone decides to get really ambitious and tries to recreate what PS2 delivered. the thing is, it isn't easy to do, nobody really understands the formula like we do, unfortunately.

[Figment]

If you'd told me the whole thing would be inapplicable, it wouldn't've dragged on so damn long.

"The whole thing"?

Regarding AMS, there indeed proved to be no frontline when aircraft were simply going to ignore the ground fight and hop over the enemy. As predicted prior to beta. Introduction of the AMS made frontlines possible.

Regarding Galaxy squad spawning, they put it in now apparently (I've got no personal experience with it as my outfit is dead in PS2 and I don't get into random squads these days: if I log in at all it is to inspect new outpost level designs). From what I gather though, it's pretty much disintegrating the already minor logistical challenges and barriers further, adding reason for calling it "redeployside" on top of the rather easy redeploying. As predicted prior to beta it would give large squads, particularly organised platoons and zergfits a lot of power. Too much power cause the easier it is to redeploy, the easier it is to counter small groups. (I already took issues with HART drop on squad leader and the lack of a SOI anti-dropzone for similar reasons and recall making a thread in beta about reaction times against squads behind front lines, spawn hopping squads and some more things).

Regarding black ops: always said it was pointless with the capture mechanics and inventory systems: no one strike resecures have been in at all, unless they were one strike capture the base too, but always with points in other buildings, so you couldn't protect both the point and the spawn and try getting somewhere. Small crowds never stood a chance to hold with the base design (only offensively ironically if they got to spawncamp). Without attritition being applicable to medics and engineers, larger groups will always win. Pointed that out prior to beta based on early footage and comments.

And infiltration as infiltrator has never had much of a point due to jet packs. Pointed that out prior to beta based on simply knowing there was a jetpack and seeing some of the buildings: the circumference of walls, wall design being easily hopped on to and capture points.

And I could go on and on about what was missing to make certain playstyles and player and outfit uniqueness viable.

I mean it was all kinda obvious and straightforward consequences. I can't really recall ever being far off with a prediction. And yes... I did predict that with all those mechanisms in place, Black Ops outfits were going to be dead soon enough, as they would likely not beat sheer numbers very often unless those numbers were reliant on few destructable spawnpoints. Where an AMS could be taken out with more ease than a Galaxy due to hp... Among other arguments...

For one, I've always harped on number mitigation. Whether it was about engi glue or medic juice running out, or tanks being driven by multiple people or seat switching being impossible or at least delayed, it is all about creating inter-dependency on other players to create advantages, while reducing the amount of targets so it strengthens solo players in other ways than through mere firepower or personal capacity. It's about setting the right player limitations.

I dunno Vancha. I was extremely skeptic of PS2 design decisions from pre-alpha as it would never make the things we liked PS1 for even remotely viable in PS2. :/ So yeah.

It's never been about one mechanism being in or out. It's always about how all the mechanisms interact with one another to create "the whole thing"... The structure of PS2 as a whole has been... Underwhelming to me.



I think one of the biggest issues in the end is that a lot of important game design decisions were based on "player convenience". Too much convenience removes the opportunity of creating a challenge or exploit an enemy's weakness. Take the class system and everyone getting access to all classes, rather than having to make due with a select few. :/

Yeah. I don't think many people were particularly reassured by it. It felt more like they were saying "okay we've stopped listening now".

Think the exact words were probably more like: "too many voices in my head aaaaargh make it stop". Or something. :p

[ringring]

Yea, 'player convenience' is evil.

[Vancha]

I think for now that concept is dead in the water until someone decides to get really ambitious and tries to recreate what PS2 delivered. the thing is, it isn't easy to do, nobody really understands the formula like we do, unfortunately.

As far as I can tell it's still a technical nightmare too. I visited the PS subreddit the same day I checked up on here and still saw people complaining about framerates and bullets registering. Maybe when the basic mechanics aren't such a challenge we'll see people start to tackle the gameplay structure more.

Stuff

Oh hell no. I'm not continuing an argument from 3 years ago. You can be right this time. :p

[Figment]

As far as I can tell it's still a technical nightmare too. I visited the PS subreddit the same day I checked up on here and still saw people complaining about framerates and bullets registering. Maybe when the basic mechanics aren't such a challenge we'll see people start to tackle the gameplay structure more.

I doubt many people upgraded their systems since 3 years ago... :/ Economic crisis and pc's generally long term investments and all...

Oh hell no. I'm not continuing an argument from 3 years ago. You can be right this time. :p

I've always been right... :( That's why I'm sad.

[ringring]

I doubt many people upgraded their systems since 3 years ago... :/ Economic crisis and pc's generally long term investments and all...



I've always been right... :( That's why I'm sad.
Oh I don't know, when I see people posting their specs there does seems to be an uplift.

But I think the tech problems being experienced now are not due to PC issues, they seem to be network problems and bugs being created after every patch. If SOE/DBG were a professional software company they would get slaughtered over the quality control in their product. (actually, they'd be having to explain it in front of a Judge)

[Figment]

Tbh I've always seen more issues being reported by people that I would relate to personal hardware, internet providers and geographic location of the client than to SOE server and network maintenance.

Server and network issues are always going to happen in any company, let alone a MMO company.



New bugs that didn't appear in patch testing are also to be expected since the scope of the implementation and potentially affected things tend to be hard to foresee and oversee in advance, with many complications not being reproducable on small scale testing or easily overlooked.

[Hamma]

Cool to see all the old faces around here having a discussion despite the past some of us have had. Great discussion guys. I need to conjure up some thoughts on this and make a post when I get some time.

[Hamma]

So my thoughts on this relate to support of the community and SOE itself. I feel like you guys dug into the game mechanics a bunch.

First off let me say this - the game isn't dead. It was dead for a ton of people before they even gave it a chance. And most of those people were... here on PSU. :) It's certainly not as successful as it could or should have been. Which brings me to my first thought.

SOE started to drift away from this website I'd say after the first six months or so. It appeared they got most of the feedback they wanted from the original PS1 vets and moved on to another method of feedback. It's not a mystery that the majority of users of this forum are PlanetSide 1 vets and honestly (my opinion) would probably never be convinced PlanetSide 2 was any good unless it was a prettier reskinned version of PlanetSide 1.

I continued to reach out to the devs and Jen and I were lucky enough to be able to participate in a variety of promotional things for the game. Which brings me to my next point..

SOE and the team wasted entirely too many cycles on MLG and promoting it. I was at the various events where PlanetSide 2 was promoted and it largely felt like somewhat of an afterthought. Sure I think it brought some players to the game.. but no real effort was ever put in to making the game actually work for any sort of competition (despite whether you think it should have had a competitive side or not) it felt like they only went half way. A variety of community driven events were largely hamstrung by the fact they had to find 300 workarounds to broadcast the game and do a competition.

I think that some of the cardinal mistakes that have been made by SOE continue to be made to this day on other games. And that is continuing to take feedback from communities that may not actually be playing their games. The constant reliance on Reddit, Twitter, etc I believe is a mistake and I also believe only relying on a fan website is a mistake. I think some of the failures we have seen are due to people giving feedback who are either negative or just simply not playing.

That's about all I have on my brain right now. I believe with this last round of layoffs the team has truly been gutted of its heart and soul. The game as you see it now is what it will remain until the servers are turned off someday. We will only see performance improvements, optimizations, occasional balance. I doubt we will see new features, or continents.

SOE/DBG suffer from a massive "ooohhhh shiny" complex. Most of the games they are making require real long term investment but they are treated more like short term projects. This wasn't really a mystery to any of us here.

[Figment]

I think the main problem with SOE is the long term vision (you touched on that in the last point). I think that includes taking on too many projects and assigning inexperienced (though motivated) people to work in game genres they're not really familiar with.

And I've heard from many sources they don't have a good coding standard. Remember how messy the code was of PS1? Remember Beady commenting on how the code came without any notes about what parts of the code did?


PS2 often felt to me like RPG designers creating a FPS. The bases were designed around fitting in the landscape, but not to function defensively. Lots and lots of time has been wasted on creating then recreating and recreating the same continents.

They should have looked for experience they didn't have on the team. Personally I would have advised bringing in a military engineer as advisor for base design.

I also think that there's a big issue in knowledge transfer within the company. Where Arclegger was starting to create better bases (as I think we all agree), other devs were still making open boxes. There should have been a core principle on base design. Where all PS2 bases went out of their way to be different and nifty scenery (nice in itself for lore), there was no structure to it. In contrast, PS1 bases all shared the same principles through all base types, making it easier for players to "learn" how a base functioned and should be controlled in defense or attack due to its multi-linear battle flow, even if the layouts differed.

With PS2, not only did you have to learn each base lay-out and environment, each base would have different principles to capture, there were few ways to control a base as there was no linear flow at all. And jetpacks. I think one of the biggest flaws was adding jetpacks for regular infantry. Jetpacks in PS1 had limited impact due to being VS only and MAX only. Mossiedroppers were frequently hated and feared for very good reason: for taking the height advantage from the defenders and bringing the fight from just ONE new direction in a tower fight: above. Same goes for HARTing in on squad leaders (and overlooking the ease of switching squad leader).

I really don't think they had a thorough idea what impact jetpacks would have on every aspect of the game by handing over the height advantage to people (particularly taking it from the defenders) so easily, but just thought "it's the future and it's cool, let's do it". I'm quite sure they trivialised the impact it would have.

[NCLynx]

Hey cool my password worked.

Don't leave home without a REK.

[p0intman]

Hey cool my password worked.

Don't leave home without a REK.
REK CHECK!

[Calista]

Just from my own unscientific observation I can see that forum activity has dropped off substantially across the board and yes even the hallowed Reddit. Reflective of the game population I suppose but things have definitely quieted down from even just a few months ago.

[Baneblade]

The game itself seems to be doing alright. I think it is just the development cycle that has been somewhat obfuscated.

Like... weren't we three months away from heavy buggies nine months ago?

[Figment]

The game itself seems to be doing alright. I think it is just the development cycle that has been somewhat obfuscated.

Like... weren't we three months away from heavy buggies nine months ago?

PS4 implementation has simply put everything else on the backburner. That was to be expected since the game had to be retrofitted for cross-platform design.

[Baneblade]

True enough, but even so, they could still be a little more forthcoming with that sort of information.