News: Smedley - "Planetside 2 2.0 in September"

[RykerStruvian]

I was speaking to a friend of mine who was in GOLD with me when pump actions came out for PS2. He said that the same thing is happening/happened in H1Z1? Or rather, he said it was worse because people can drive up to you, get out of their cars instantly, then OHK with a pump action?

Supposedly the same weapon dev who did the pump actions in PS2 did the same thing for H1Z1? Or at least, Smedley let it happen? At least in this instance, it seems the same things that happened in PS2 are repeating in H1Z1...that is what I'm getting at.

[Mordelicius]

Originally Posted by bpostal

Porting PS2 into FL2 would be a massive waste of time imo. It's his comment that annoys me because it sounds like I've heard that before...and here we are.

Console, PC, it doesn't matter. The average gamer in general isn't used to the absolute raping you'll get when you first hop into the game. If these new console players come in with the same mentality they have when they play the smaller, round based games then PS2 on PS4 is going to fail. In no other game can you throw balance out the window by dropping a platoon into the mix. Battlefield doesn't let you go from 64v64 to 64v128 at the drop of a hat.

PC players are more resilient due to longer history of PC players with MMO. Consoles are what, single player mostly and multiplayer at most.

ex: I hear GTA V Online is 20 players at most per map. PS2 is 2000 per map, 6000 per server initially.

MMO RvR PvP is fairly brutal too. One factor is the number of stackable players. It's not uncommon for 50-100+ players facing just 5 players. And those five will quit or switch.

I remember an old MMO where I literally just picked up like 3-4 players before an event and we got railroaded by 50+ high geared, high lvl players. Our faction was decimated because after closed beta, players sniffed out that the strongest players will be on one of the sides, so most players switch. The next week, I scraped about 8-10. After several months, we had equal numbers with rest of the other factions.

[bpostal]

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

PC players are more resilient due to longer history of PC players with MMO. Consoles are what, single player mostly and multiplayer at most.

ex: I hear GTA V Online is 20 players at most per map. PS2 is 2000 per map, 6000 per server initially.

MMO RvR PvP is fairly brutal too. One factor is the number of stackable players. It's not uncommon for 50-100+ players facing just 5 players. And those five will quit or switch.

I remember an old MMO where I literally just picked up like 3-4 players before an event and we got railroaded by 50+ high geared, high lvl players. Our faction was decimated because after closed beta, players sniffed out that the strongest players will be on one of the sides, so most players switch. The next week, I scraped about 8-10. After several months, we had equal numbers with rest of the other factions.

Sure, we've got a longer history (and more experience with) getting fucked but the new age (millennial) group of gamers has been spoon fed EZ wins since they've started. It's that same age group that PS2 is focusing on now that is adverse to getting their shit pushed in. My guess is that they'll give up on the game within their first hour because 'muh skillz should == immediate killstreak'

[Calista]

I don't know about dying too fast but what I was getting at was the duration of a typical play session. I feel they are on the right track with this conquest mode but they need to be running it on BI style/sized "maps". The core issue is persistence. A typical console player will have no appreciation or patience for it. If there is no win or lose banner in less than 30 minute intervals PS2 will not attract much of a lasting audience.

[Babyfark McGeez]

There you are hitting the core issue with this game and "professional" game development in general, Calista.
Due to several factors (Payment model, production costs, greed, idiocy) the vast majority of (non-indie) games are aimed at the "average joe", the lowest common denominator. That "attract the dudebro" mantra seems to have taken over every aspect, making games lose everything that made them unique in the process and turning companies and players alike into cynical adversaries.

With less producion costs and maybe a different monetization method PS2 could have been a profit making unique shooter that would have not been for everyone. But for a dedicated niche audience. But nope, it has to be "all the money" from "everyone", sacrificing creativity and yet another ip in the name of a narrow business view.

Gawd, i need to stop coming to here lol. I bet my post history makes me sound like a bitter twat by now.

ALL SMEDS FAULT!

[Calista]

There was no need for this game to attempt 2000 players per continent at launch. If they felt they had that capability then great, put it in the back pocket for a later day. Start the game off smaller with say like 512 on smaller maps would still have dwarfed any other FPS. How much resources have been applied to optimization fixes? A ton, of which could have been allocated elsewhere to improving core gameplay. I lost count of how many "all hands on deck" code freezes happened due to performance issues. Also being free to play it needed to reach as large an audience as possible but in the process of trying to push this 2000 player agenda alienated all but those with high performance PC's. They eventually backed down that pop number to 1200 or so I think but it seems too little too late.

I just hope that the dream of MMOFPS doesn't die with this game. It isn't easy to do but SOE/DGC had a great shot at it and just blew it on so many fronts. I hope by some miracle it takes off on the consoles because at this point that is the only hope.

[Mordelicius]

It's a matter of player retention.

PvE and small scale Multiplayer is designed like a race. The reward is at the end. Most of the time is all about killing.

PvP MMO, as PS2 should have been, is designed like a dance. The reward is in the middle and all over.

But as it is, PS2 is all about farming and killing. These new console players are used to PvE and Multiplayer shooter and they won't get their reward because they will just keep dying.

As opposed to a true PvP where it's all about player interaction (the dance), and not necessarily about just about the result.

ex:

- Liberators swooping riskily and dangerously to tank bust a Sundy spawn.
- Infiltrator sneaking out of spawn to kill 1 or 2 players to get to the capture point. As the point is flipping, get flanked by a heavy assault.

or in my case
- Rushing a Sunderer to the front amid the crossfiring to break a stalemate, to establish a forward spawn point for attacker (one of the reasons why I dislike the No Deploy Zone immensely; it's implemented by devs who don't even play the game. They don't understand this. Here I am, rushing and risking my Sundy with low probability of survival. If I succeed, there's this stupid circle blocking my deploy button. What's their 'official' reason? Equidistance between offense/defense. Inane reason. Impractical and concocted from graphs and ether imagination not actual gameplay and analysis.)

As it is, at the current PS2 version, none of these examples matter because there's no rewards/consequences. It's all about the killing and farming for the Directives.

Does it matter if that Sundy spawn dies to the Liberator?
Does it matter if that Capture point flipped
Does it matter if my Sundy sticks and I manage to spawn players close to the capture point?

Atm, no. That's the gameplay they promote. One has to wait 'til September for the PS2 2.0 and that 3 months detached from the PS4 launch.

A PvPer would enjoy the dance as is, but these console players conditioned to enjoy just the result, won't get it. Hence, they will be the first to leave.

[Vashyo]

Good post from Smed there, just hope he can make it happen.

if we could finally get some longer lasting effects on capturing/losing bases and get rid of the constant 3way randomness on every continent I'm gonna be happy.

PS1 you got to fight 1vs1 on a continent in many cases where the battle moved in more predictable strategic/tactical patterns. Here it still is just one side getting the shortest stick randomly and the progress is random, there just isn't that epic feel when the map has only changed slightly or even not at all after coming back to play the next day. PS2 there is no major sense of victory since everything happens fast and easy, nobody is going to be excited capturing the same base for the third time during the same day. It's just a grind to get better gear so you can keep grinding.

[Mordelicius]

Originally Posted by Vashyo

Good post from Smed there, just hope he can make it happen.
.

First, they have to postpone the erroneous new Gamemode. It will separate off 600 players away from the main game, making it even worse than the 2 WDS debacles . The WDS events were essentially a gamemode within the game.

Not to mention the gamemode itself is so lackluster in inspiration and enthusiasm. They could have at least release a vehicle-only gamemode/continent instead: http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=58451

They can sell a lot of vehicle cosmetics and weapons and market it as a Mad Max-like fights.

[Canaris]

..... I'll believe it when I see it until then I'm betting on a PS-CU or PS-NGE

[Rivenshield]

Originally Posted by Canaris

PS-NGE

/retch

[p0intman]

Originally Posted by bpostal

Porting PS2 into FL2 would be a massive waste of time imo. It's his comment that annoys me because it sounds like I've heard that before...and here we are.

Console, PC, it doesn't matter. The average gamer in general isn't used to the absolute raping you'll get when you first hop into the game. If these new console players come in with the same mentality they have when they play the smaller, round based games then PS2 on PS4 is going to fail. In no other game can you throw balance out the window by dropping a platoon into the mix. Battlefield doesn't let you go from 64v64 to 64v128 at the drop of a hat.

What I find funny as shit is that PS1 was better balanced, and it mattered infinitely more if your outfit and platoon could adapt to situations and come up with creative solutions with the tools given to you. PS2 has so few of those tools and options available and it creates so many more problems for the game. The learning curve for ps1 wasn't as bad because it had a decent tutorial and generally pointed you in the right direction. You'd still get buttfucked to hell by a decent group of players but it wasn't nearly as harsh. At the same time, it counted more on your personal skill level than your battle rank.

Battle rank and gear available matters more in PS2 than it does in PS1.

Sad.

[Warborn]

PS1 was an abomination of bad balance and worthless ideas. Many of the vehicles were useless, many weapons were essentially worthless, and everyone gravitated to cookie-cutter loadouts. Reavers/mossies in particular were hilariously imbalanced, being one-man murder machines in a game where tanks had a dedicated driver, plus they doubled as the ideal form of transport, and made galaxies next to worthless. As a game, PS2 is far better designed than PS1 ever was.

And the notion that skill mattered more in PS1 is similarly a laugh. The game didn't even have headshots, and weapons were amazingly primitive. It takes far more FPS skill to be successful in PS2 than in PS1. You do not know what you're talking about if you think BR and gear are what matters in PS2.

As for the blops criticisms, there's nothing about allowing players to switch on a whim in the roadmap description. It says that if pop becomes "heavily skewed" you may be prompted to temporarily switch to the underdog side. It will likely be random, and it will be contingent upon population imbalance. People won't be able to simply hop around sides as it suits them. I also don't believe you're correct in assuming that people will somehow leave the game if they play more than one side. Plenty of people have characters on two or three factions. Many outfits do cross-faction ops, where they play another empire for a day or a weekend every so often. This doesn't break down some hypothetical tribal affiliation (I expect most people don't really give a shit about their empire as a coherent team, only their outfit) but rather keeps the game fresh for longer.

[ringring]

Originally Posted by Warborn

PS1 was an abomination of bad balance and worthless ideas. Many of the vehicles were useless, many weapons were essentially worthless, and everyone gravitated to cookie-cutter loadouts. Reavers/mossies in particular were hilariously imbalanced, being one-man murder machines in a game where tanks had a dedicated driver, plus they doubled as the ideal form of transport, and made galaxies next to worthless. As a game, PS2 is far better designed than PS1 ever was.

And the notion that skill mattered more in PS1 is similarly a laugh. The game didn't even have headshots, and weapons were amazingly primitive. It takes far more FPS skill to be successful in PS2 than in PS1. You do not know what you're talking about if you think BR and gear are what matters in PS2.

As for the blops criticisms, there's nothing about allowing players to switch on a whim in the roadmap description. It says that if pop becomes "heavily skewed" you may be prompted to temporarily switch to the underdog side. It will likely be random, and it will be contingent upon population imbalance. People won't be able to simply hop around sides as it suits them. I also don't believe you're correct in assuming that people will somehow leave the game if they play more than one side. Plenty of people have characters on two or three factions. Many outfits do cross-faction ops, where they play another empire for a day or a weekend every so often. This doesn't break down some hypothetical tribal affiliation (I expect most people don't really give a shit about their empire as a coherent team, only their outfit) but rather keeps the game fresh for longer.

I think you very wrong about skill in ps2, certainly I found it very much easier to get kills in PS2 than I did in ps1. And I got many kill streaks both as infantry, max and as a tank driver that were greater than any I got in Ps1. When I got 64 kills as a max in 20 minutes I realised it was stupid.

There were quite a few people in ps1 that I could just not kill, not so in ps2.

There are features in ps2 that flatten out the skill gradient put there purposely in order to encourage the greater number.
base design, headshots, quick ttk all flatten out the gradient
Base design - open with few chokepoints, easy to for vehicles to spam
Headshots and ttk - run around like a blue arsed fly and sooner or later you'll come up behind someone, aim shoot and that's a kill, start running again.

[p0intman]

Originally Posted by Warborn

PS1 was an abomination of bad balance and worthless ideas. Many of the vehicles were useless, many weapons were essentially worthless, and everyone gravitated to cookie-cutter loadouts. Reavers/mossies in particular were hilariously imbalanced, being one-man murder machines in a game where tanks had a dedicated driver, plus they doubled as the ideal form of transport, and made galaxies next to worthless. As a game, PS2 is far better designed than PS1 ever was.

And the notion that skill mattered more in PS1 is similarly a laugh. The game didn't even have headshots, and weapons were amazingly primitive. It takes far more FPS skill to be successful in PS2 than in PS1. You do not know what you're talking about if you think BR and gear are what matters in PS2.

No, you're just bad at PS1 it appears. Personal skill mattered far more in 1 than it does in 2. Sure, there are some setups in PS2 that take far more skill than they did in PS1, but those are the exception and not the rule. What weapons were useless in PS1? They all had their uses if you knew what you were doing and planned/played accordingly.

Pound for pound, setups in PS1 were far more situational and usually could be tailored to every specific fight if you wanted to go that far. PS2 relies far more on large numbers to accomplish anything than it does the personal skill and teamwork of any given unit.

Again, if you knew what you were doing, armor was HIGHLY useful in PS1 even and especially with the dedicated driver and dedicated gunner. Organization - actual organization, not just hopping into a platoon - mattered infinitely more than it ever will in PS2. I should know that, given the company I've kept and the types of shit I've pulled off with others.

Lastly, once more pound for pound in comparison, BR matters more in PS2 than it does in PS1. You take one newbie to PS2 and put them into a training squad and they might be fit for moving into more tactical gameplay after a month of grinding and getting familiar with the game. Minimum of a month, at best. Take that same newbie, put them into a squad in PS1 that wanted to train people and I could have them effectively contributing in a meaningful way to every single fight after a week on average. The barrier to being useful in PS2 is higher due to how weapon unlocks work and how BR grinds work. The barrier to being useful in PS1 was lower simply because there were more ways to meaningfully contribute to an empire's wider tactical work at a lower level, that would meaningfully help someone advance in BR and unlock more certs.