Planetside 2 @ Gamescom 2012

BNuts · 2012-08-18, 05:27 AM

-Disclaimer-

Everything is *subject to change* and what the developers told me and what the Pro7 guys said, may not be locked in concrete, so 6 months from now, don't go quoting this thread when the men-in-suits go in a different-direction-decision

- /end Disclaimer -

These are everywhere in Koln, and look great!

Brolly on the left, and Dirk on the right, 2 out of 3 of the PS2 Pro7 team.

Anyways.....

Went to the "Meet the Developers" at the brauhaus, talked for over an hour to Josh Hackney about everything from their global business model, and the Station-Cash shop, to the gameplay he expects at game-launch-day. He was also the only member on the developer-team to be reppin' TR

But here is a rundown of the events;

First things first. EU people worried about the ProSiebenSat.1Games taking the game-handling over for SOE in the EU...
I am not worried about the Pro7 guys. At all.. Whatsoever.
Brolly (Brollywood) is a cool Irish dude that can handle his beer, and speaks deustch like a champ. The guys there in Munich seem to have the marketing thing under control, as there were billboards, wall hangings, and bus-stop posters all over Koln.

They will have TV commercials, cardboard cut-out standings @ public events and places, all the way, slowly ramping up until release. They are pushing the beta sign-up HARD for the EU public.
There @ Gamescom I even was stopping people from exiting the PS2 booth until they took a look at the Beta sign-up kiosk-computer that was running near the exit.

Station Cash (SC) and Seven Cash (SC) will be initially transferred 1 to 1, and then be available to purchase online. If you use a European payment method, you will have to use the Pro7 cash-shop. If you use a US payment method, you use SOE’s Station-Cash shop.

The EU server is SOE's server, run by Sony employees. Tech support will be handled by Pro7.

Pro7 is here to put it's finger to the communities pulse and to listen to what we want, and deliver what they can, when they can.
They need to tailor the experience to suit the public view of each individual countries' personality, and that can vary quite a bit, as gamers in eastern Europe and gamers in Norway and gamers in Portugal will all have different and varying perceptions of "cool" and what they want, and it all has to be delivered to everyone, at the same time, on the same game, with different people.... Hard crowd to please.

I picked the brains of everyone I could, from Adam Clegg on level design, T-Ray on artistic implementation and his varying backgrounds in game design, to Candance, the senior global brand manager, this is her baby, she was really proud of the CGI, and the fact they broke the video renderer when they first tried to compile the video for the first time. And she laughed at me complaining that the entire video was nothing but the TR getting ass-whupped.
I also talked for the most time to Dirk Steiger and better known Peter Brolly; both are the face of Planetside2 from ProSiebenSat.1 and both played Planetside for a long, long time (VS).
Also Richard Lynch from Ireland, who designed the kick-ass jerseys, and there will be an epic shit-tonne of merchandise coming. I got a sneek-peak at some of the VS stuff rendered. I am in for a hoodie.

I wore around the Infil jersey with BRTD stenciled in black on the red TR logo, and had Higby sign it (Fu*k TR, NC-4-life)- nice Matt classy

. The others I didn't get to sign it right off, so it's boxed up and sent to the SOE offices in California.

As far as the cash-shop, they are very adamant about not selling pay-2-win products. Although I have seen Wargaming.net make the same claim. Those guys net around 3 million USDollars.. A day.. I hope SOE doesn't get pulled to the dark-side.
For now SOE is going to draw the line at XP boosters and maybe early-unlockable items with SC.

There was much much more discussed regarding the upcoming Open Beta and the model they were using at Gamescom. They want to try many things, and have the army of coders and modelers working overtime – literally. There will be so many things that will make it into launch, but even more that they want the community to try first, and may not be able to keep, or that we will veto outright.
They are listening to us, and they read the forums. All of them. All of it. So you are being seen, and heard. The Beta was released to appease us, even though it may have been premature. So when you do get in, and you will (patience!!!) don’t complain about the fruit being sour.
It’s not done yet, it hasn’t “ripened” to perfection yet. That can happen with the communities support and nurturing, but deliver constructive criticism, not flame-mail and hate-threads.
Invite your friends and tell everyone about the game.
Play the beta when you get invited. And play the –beta- for what it is, a test! Test –everything-, everywhere. And try to exploit everything you can, and then report the problems in-game and on the beta forums.
The one complaint the team had about what they don’t want to see is us all complaining about the Beta once they open it up, that it has issues and isn’t polished.. Its BETA! Not the final release for launch, lol.

I for one want the team to succeed in this, and please the community while delivering Planetside2 to the public with great success.

that was just the opening hall, near 11. I had to walk all the way to the other side to get to the ESL stage and the Planetside2 area.

The ESL guys did a great job setting up the PS2 booth.

ESL Stage, where Matt did his appearances, got a pretty large crowd at the 11:30 and 15:00 showings.

On the left with his back to me is Brollywood, in the sweet TR jersey is Fara from PSU, and on the right is Clegg in the NC jersey

EvilNinjadude · 2012-08-18, 05:30 AM

I spoke to T-Ray and Higby. I can't see your face from here, but i can safely assume that it's green right now.

BNuts · 2012-08-18, 05:37 AM

Adam, loggin in to the game. We got to play with all the Dev's and the Pro7 guys all day

top-section of the booth

bottom

Originally Posted by EvilNinjadude

I spoke to T-Ray and Higby. I can't see your face from here, but i can safely assume that it's green right now.

??

I didnt get any pics with them because my phone was dead on the first day. I emailed Jeff and Josh to get the pics sent to me, and from the PS7Games guys too. I used their phones allot the first day

I talked to T-ray for a while about his background in artwork and game design, as well as his love of cinnamon as he devoured an apple-strudel

I also have a write-up, but sent it to SOE/Pro7 to ve vetted. Want to make sure I don't let any cats out of the bag or whatnot and rock the boat.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?...2400434&type=1

Gamescom Planetside2's Facebook Photos

http://uk-microsites.ign.com/ign-pca/

IGN Best of show for Gamescom 2012!!!!! Vote now!

EvilNinjadude · 2012-08-18, 06:03 AM

Oh, you were up there on the upper level? If you were there on Thursday, you might have seen me. The camera guys asked me over for an interview after my lengthy chat with T-Ray.

Glad to hear that other people got to talk to them too.

Shogun · 2012-08-18, 05:59 AM

i was there on
day 1 (press and trade only day) and it was awesome!
the only problem was, that without the masses roaming the convention now, the booth and therefore the game was too empty.

but watching arclegger play the game and talking to him all day was a blast!
man working as a dev in this team for this game must be the ultimate job!

i talked to a lot of people who didn´t know a thing about planetside and tried ps2 at the booth for the first time. when i told them that the final game will feature 2000 players on a map and be free to play, most of them were unbelieving. they liked what they saw for sure!

BNuts · 2012-08-18, 10:12 AM

Looopy · 2012-08-18, 10:28 AM

This post made my day...

If your reading this Higby, Fuck NC

Diehard · 2012-08-18, 10:32 AM

I hope you can clean those texts

Reizod · 2012-08-18, 10:59 AM

Nice post, thanks man! I bit down and now regretting I didn't go to Gamescom this year.

Sound like it was awesome.

Well I hope all goes well for the next wave, I'm looking forward to more meatbags to shoot down.

BNuts · 2012-08-18, 12:37 PM

I got about 20 or so people to sign up for beta with my schlecht deustch.

Just stood in front of the door, and pretended I didn't notice them trying to leave.. Then gestured to the Beta signup computer..

**Rwyn** · 2012-08-20, 08:04 AM

Originally Posted by BNuts

Brolly on the left, and Dirk on the right, 2 out of 3 of the PS2 Pro7 team.

Heya,

just to make this sure: On the right: That's not Dirk ^.^ But it was great to meet you

Best,
Rwy'n

Shogun · 2012-08-20, 08:26 AM

Originally Posted by BNuts

The one complaint the team had about what they don’t want to see is us all complaining about the Beta once they open it up, that it has issues and isn’t polished.. Its BETA! Not the final release for launch, lol.

I for one want the team to succeed in this, and please the community while delivering Planetside2 to the public with great success.

i am kind of sure that the majority of psu folks that made it into the beta are totally aware of what this beta is about. and every psu member that rants about the game not being polished on the beta forums should get spanked to oblivion

but there are also a lot of magazine buyers who got beta keys without knowing much about this game or its state. i guess the majority of ranting idiots will come from their ranks and there is no way of stopping them.

DaClabe · 2012-08-20, 02:09 PM

That Terran jersey is SICK!!!!! Is there a place to buy one?

Mandor · 2012-08-20, 02:26 PM

Originally Posted by DaClabe

That Terran jersey is SICK!!!!! Is there a place to buy one?

I was lucky enough to get one from Higby at GamesCom on Friday. But I asked Arclegger an hour before that if I could buy it anywhere at the show. He said that for the moment, the only way to get one was through one of those giveaways.

TermiGR · 2012-08-21, 05:45 AM

Thanks for writing this down!
The Community-Event @ Früh was just great! It would be great to get the Pictures from the Event! Wasnt it Rwy'n who took them?

Sadly i forgot to get my Jersey signed by the Team... but i got only 8 hours of sleep during the 5 gamescom days... so i forgot...