Originally posted by siresper

 

Originally posted by Baikal

 

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Originally posted by siresper
According to the devs the only reason for the delay was because the combat system was too hard to understand, and they needed the time to rework it. They said absolutely nothing about lag problems, sliding, incomplete systems, etc.
However as these videos prove quite clearly, there was a whole lot of problems that funcom neglected to tell the community. They leave out every truth that is inconvienant for them. Have to hide the truth to keep that hype up, of course.

 

 

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Uhhh, the truth was pretty much out there, you just had to pay attention to it, and realize it. (I fully admit in many cases, I had my blinders on) however no female avatars, the chat system, and plenty of other things indicated that it was not 100% ready for release. Now could those things have been taken care of in two to three months time? Probably, but the quality of the solutions? No idea.

I dont really think Funcom was hiding anything, those concerns were made abundantly evident in many previews written about the game.

I agree it was very clear to everyone that was open minded enough to see it. But its not the fact that it was clear that is the issue. More that Funcom said nothing of these things. And that made it very easy for the more extremist fans to always deny that there were problems.

 

If funcom had just come out and said 'we want to rework the combat to be easier to understand, but we also feel we have some big problems with lag, animations, etc before it lives up to the standards we have for release'... well than the fans couldn't deny these things, because it would have come straight from funcom. We wouldn't have seen all the insults against the people that were skeptical, because they didn't conform to the idea the game was flawless.

I just think it would have been more honest and avoided a lot of problems the AoC community has in regards to spin and misinformation.

I have/will of/given funcom the benefit of doubt that they could of fixed the issues seen 2 months ago before start of november. Critical people like yourself wouldn't. The point is its still in Beta now but with double the amount of beta time to go - deal with it. The delay upset alot of people including myself, but I wasn't disapointed to the point where insults have to be thrown around. Lag and animations have constanted been stated by the devs throughtout spring time that these are the last things to get tweaked up in beta.

Whatever your issues with AoC are (all negative) the fact remains you can be critical of the performance of the game engine during this "demoed" "simulation". You have flat out said before that funcom lied etc etc which is just not the case with the seige information. Fan and Forum hype done that and took me long for the ride too. People like Metal Dragon above don't conform to the game because they have no interest in it, just like half a dozen other beefcakes. Banding comments around like "unprofessional" is stock and stable of the insults that the AoC community have had to put up with the last few months.

Btw Funcom did come and say they wanted to rework to combat, just not for the reasons you insist it should be for. In their eyes there wasn't a need to include, animation and "lag" <- overly misued term (as previously said,last things to go into beta)

You see if you listen to the commentry as well as watch the video -

two people controlling 200 characters -

all the tracking for these characters are done thru these two -

50% load on CPU because of system resources which are drained -

They mention several times - demo and simulation -  they say they expect the client to crash "alot"

You harp on about an unfinished product, how bad, how lacking it is, how Funcom neglected to tell the community; Its BS, wake up, listen and realise its beta. Stop the SH*T stirring and take your hate blinders off for once, you don't like what you see then come back when the game is finished. -  re-read Alchemda's post above again too.

Today, 12:28:04

#11

Jayde vbmenu_register("postmenu_928753", true); Developer     Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Oslo, Norway

Considering the guys demoing at GC had to be giving short demos non-stop throughout the day, I think employing 100+ real people to sit there doing siege demos all day long would have been a bit difficult to coordinate. I will note that from a server/netcode perspective, there really isn't any difference between players and NPCs. In fact, it's generally harder on the server to have that many NPCs, as they all have brains/scripts/AI to run, rather than players that do not. __________________ System Designer Balance Team Lead

As long as people like you Avery are around to spread propaganda and misinformation to hype up the game, there will be people around to make sure a more balanced view exists on this forum. As long as you continue to be an extremist persona on this board, you will not have any rest. I will certainly not give you that luxury after seeing your behavior for the past few months.

Every criticism about any aspect of the game is met with a response from either you or Fion discrediting them. From the minor to the major. How hypocritical of you to ever use the words 'hate blinders'. You hate everyone that doesn't feel like you do about the game.

Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had. That is pretty sad. Since it was their choice to show the siege in this way, it is entirely their fault if 2 computers hosting a bunch of stationary npcs was too much for it to handle. They knew what they were getting into. 

If you don't like people telling things as they are... I suggest YOU take a leave the community and not come back until release. Because e-bullys do not have any power here im afraid.

Originally posted by siresper

As long as people like you Avery are around to spread propaganda and misinformation to hype up the game, there will be people around to make sure a more balanced view exists on this forum. As long as you continue to be an extremist persona on this board, you will not have any rest. I will certainly not give you that luxury after seeing your behavior for the past few months.

Every criticism about any aspect of the game is met with a response from either you or Fion discrediting them. From the minor to the major. How hypocritical of you to ever use the words 'hate blinders'. You hate everyone that doesn't feel like you do about the game.

Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had. That is pretty sad. Since it was their choice to show the siege in this way, it is entirely their fault if 2 computers hosting a bunch of stationary npcs was too much for it to handle. They knew what they were getting into. 

If you don't like people telling things as they are... I suggest YOU take a leave the community and not come back until release. Because e-bullys do not have any power here im afraid.

"Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had. That is pretty sad. Since it was their choice to show the siege in this way, it is entirely their fault if 2 computers hosting a bunch of stationary npcs was too much for it to handle. They knew what they were getting into"

Im sorry its obvious this was a big let down for you - it was a slight one for me, but I didn't make it my crusade to say Funcom "lied" "misguided" "misinformed" whatever terms you want to pull out of your...  You offer no luxury to me, so leave your serving at the door. Like I said before - you don't like AoC - why bother???

Originally posted by siresper

Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had. That is pretty sad. Since it was their choice to show the siege in this way, it is entirely their fault if 2 computers hosting a bunch of stationary npcs was too much for it to handle. They knew what they were getting into. 

 

Ok you do understand the logistics in doing something like that. Having limited space at the conference, as well as furnishing all those computers, tables, prepherials, chairs all those things. It just simply is smarter to do it that way, preface your demo that its going to be like that because of the stipulations. They could of not shown it all, but then the visual representation of what they have been saying is going to be in the game wouldent be able to drive the hype machine. See I think alot of people realize the stipulations of the demo, REALIZE that its not really going to be like that, and take the smarter road and look past it.

Originally posted by Alchemda

 

Originally posted by siresper

Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had. That is pretty sad. Since it was their choice to show the siege in this way, it is entirely their fault if 2 computers hosting a bunch of stationary npcs was too much for it to handle. They knew what they were getting into. 

 

 

Ok you do understand the logistics in doing something like that. Having limited space at the conference, as well as furnishing all those computers, tables, prepherials, chairs all those things. It just simply is smarter to do it that way, preface your demo that its going to be like that because of the stipulations. They could of not shown it all, but then the visual representation of what they have been saying is going to be in the game wouldent be able to drive the hype machine. See I think alot of people realize the stipulations of the demo, REALIZE that its not really going to be like that, and take the smarter road and look past it.

Some people can't let it go Im afraid.

I think the most PC's in one area was 24, from the photos on the mmorpg.com photo blog. AoC's showing was split into 3 different area's. I thought that the information that came out was most productive, intriguing and interesting, its a shame that no one wants to talk about it.

WoW.. That pvp looked impressive compared to other fantasy mmo . And I loved how building that camp worked. Gathering resources. There is actually meaning in this game other then killing monsters in dungeons.

I dont even like fantasy mmo, but I cant wait to try AoC.

Originally posted by Alchemda

Why do people always say the frikkin word lag....sigh. A lag is a byproduct of network latency.

And the graphic, sound etc... is computer perfomance, lag is for network, not computer resources itself.

other way, I like the video, seems it will be a great game! (or at least, hope so...)

I think it wa AWSOME!, If you look at other games with massive pvp thay usaly have lagg, after release. Even for me with top of the line comp i experience lagg in many games. USALY they optimize graphic at later stages, this making the game less hardware demaning, like SOE is doing for VG right now. At release VG was terrible peformance wise, now i can run it @ 80+fps, tryed yestorday, with high graph. This kind of things gets fixed, in time. I havent really cared much about AOC but if this game got this much allredy.. this much endgame 7!!! months befor release its far  content wise and much more serius than any game released so far. WOW for example dident have much endgame at all at release, LOTRO dident have ANY. Waiting with release is allways good, better safe than sorry. I think most companies will learn from VG

I can't believe the idiots in this thread trashing AoC because of this demo. The game is still technically in alpha, and they warned beforehand about the issues with the pvp siege demo.

I feel lucky to have been able to get a glimpse on something that "is brand new" which they "are still working on".

Coding and testing takes a long time. If you prefer a game that pushed out code with little testing, play Vanguard.

Funcom choose the method for the siege pvp video. They could have easily done it with live people. Easily. I can call up a few people right this second and get more live players than funcom had.

Umm, just to jump in and make a point here.

Funcom, and everyone else that was demoing anything at the show behind-the-scenes, had to deal with a huge number of obstacles in terms of scheduling. Maybe a little bit of perspective on the way that things work at these shows would help you:

For me, I was moving from appointment to appointment, with no time in between. The same is true for the developers. These demos are scheduled in advance, often weeks in advance, and include a number of different press outlets. They didn't do just one presentation. They did half an hour presentations almost back to back for a number of days. As a press person covering this event, I don't have time to waste in a booth waiting while 200 live players are organized. Have you ever tried to organize 200 people online? It's possible, but it's exactly the kind of situation where things go wrong... a lot. Again, as a press person, I can't spend my entire day waiting while something like that is organized, and all of the planning beforehand in the world isn't going to help you.  It's an on-the-fly job.

On top of this, the internet connection in the hall (or in any large, open space) is not reliable 100% of the time.

I have never been involved in a demo like that, for any MMO, that had live beta players.

I should also point out that we visited their booth on the show floor where I watched people playing live without any lag that I noticed.

There are a number of technical issues as well. Remember, they are sharing internet with every other booth in the complex.

Now, I don't have any particular feelings about Age of Conan, but your statement was extremely harsh when you clearly did not have all of the information. I hope that this helps.

Originally posted by Alchemda

 

One thing you have to realize. Has your computer tried to render a start to finish keep being built in under 10 seconds, everything bump mapped and showing drop shadows? Not a keep but a mountan range yes. Has your computer spawned 200NPC's in under a minute on the screen running at full resolution at high settings never timed it . Cant forget their mounts too. They are also speeding up the siege engines as well, the trebuchets were firing faster than the fiery boulder could even reach its target, all the while speeding up all actions and calculations for the time restrictions of the demonstration.

I think most computers would Cry at the task the dev's tried to do in the demo. that was my whole point. Even if they had top of the line computers, which they didn't, to run that demo, its processing and doing more things than you would normally get on your screen when playing the game in a normal scenario. Obviously there are hardware and software issues, were they running DX10? dunno? Vista? dunno? Debug code? dunno? Non optimized code base? Dunno? Making assumptions that it should be that way with out knowing the ins and outs on WHY it was running that way is just.. well.. naive.

Why do people always say the frikkin word lag....sigh. A lag is a byproduct of network latency.

As futher evidence i remind you i said Hardware/software issues. Which meant that the computer needed better hardware to run that demostration.

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Originally posted by METALDRAG0N
I shall repeat it is unprofessional to show off high end graphics then to run it like they did...

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How is it unprofessional? The two devs giving the demo stated during the "flyby" scene that the player fort/keep was being built in super speed mode. It would take weeks or months to build one that size once the game goes live. So, super accelerated dev/god mode is no way to judge the performance of the game, since none of us will ever see that in beta or live.

Regarding the PVP demo, the two computers were running scripts that controlled ALL 200+ characters. Not just rendering them, but performing actions, reactions, etc. Again, they warned about the performance due to the load on the two PCs, and fact that the content was brand new.

I'm not sure what some people expect.

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Lets say you make some cookies.

You put in everything except the sugar and start mixing it, and your friend Bob walks in and wants a taste.

You warn Bob that its not done and it may not taste good, but Bob is persistent.

Bob tastes a spoonful, then spits it out in your face and tells you its crap.
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In a nutshell, thats what you're doing.

Originally posted by johnnychangs

 

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Originally posted by METALDRAG0N
I shall repeat it is unprofessional to show off high end graphics then to run it like they did...

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How is it unprofessional?

Did you actually read my last post at all?

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Originally posted by skywisenight

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Originally posted by METALDRAG0N

I found the whole thing unprofessional when a game like that is demonstrated even in Beta it should run lag free. The fact it lags shows there are some Hardware/software issues still.

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I have to say this, knowing I probably shouldn't:
Have you ever been involved in game development before?  Serious question.  I have more than once, and I know there was absolutely nothing unprofessional about the demo or how it was handled.
I thought that the demo they ran worked very-very well, the stuff they wanted to show worked, and they were very cool about problems in the interview on and off camera.  The guys that work on this game are great to talk to and were very accomidating.
You got a peak into something not out yet... not even finished.  If everyone did it your apparent way, we wouldn't see anything until they were on store shelves.  I'll take buggy/laggy/crashy previews any day.

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I completely agree, I would prefer a preview.

Personally the whole C&C element to PVP I found amazing.

I thought the music sounded pretty nice, pluas the graphics and the exciting aspect of the mmo. to be honest though I only watched the pvp the most lol, didnt care about the first half much.

Let me start off by saying I have not followed AOC at all other then the occasional look at videos or screenshots here. So far everything I've seen about the game has looked fabulous, that is if you like that fantasy crap, just my personal opinion however.

As for the game demo they did, I have demo'd at shows and I can tell you, take heed to Jon's last post. There are many factors when demo'g a game at a show that most of you don't have a clue about and will and does impact demos and videos for that matter. I think they did a really great job of the demo and the game looks "somewhat" interesting to me, even if it is fantasy. They were certainly not unprofessional in anyway, more likely they were highly skilled and professional and very good at demo'g the product after many many interviews of the shows.

Some things that impact shows:

• Wireless internet, many don't have lan cable but wireless networks.
• Single shared networks.
• Demo's run on the demo show providers machines and not development machines, So they a probably sub-par to most gamer rigs you would have in your home.
• Demo's machines that don't have internet access may contain both the server code, the client code and any other databases (mysql) running simultaneously on 1 machine and trying to demo all of that data at once (This looks most like to me what happened in this case).
• Scripts and non-optimized code running on dev boxes (still tempermental code) trying to show off the latest and greatest builds can often result in crashed desktops, scripts failing, processes timing out of stopping in mid stream etc etc...

So long story short, I think they did a good job showing off this demo even advising the audience that it was expected to crash due to the amount of content they were working with (building complete fortresses in seconds, full 200 on 200 pvp simulated script battles, and still using high end graphics-it is a show after all). Like I said, I haven't followed AOC closely at all in the past but I think I might keep my eye on it a bit closer, i'm not a fantasy guy but it looks rather well done t me when I think of Conan, I think they got it right.

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Originally posted by METALDRAG0N
Sighs

Did you actually read my last post at all?

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Yep, I did and it made no sense. You are complaining about their hardware, when they clearly stated they were performing developer functions that would be slow and possibly crash.

Would you rather see nothing at all until the game is finished?

Thanx again for taking the time to film it.

Some people just like to look for the smallest insignificance to whinge about, half the haters openly admit they won't buy the game, maybe they just like to hear their own voices.

The mercenary system sounds like it will be most helpfull!

In his defense  Avery doesn't troll in the WAR forums. Never has to my knowledge. Maybe never even looked there.

But he makes up for it in other areas 

Originally posted by siresper

In his defense  Avery doesn't troll in the WAR forums. Never has to my knowledge. Maybe never even looked there.

But he makes up for it in other areas 

Thanks, I don't troll there. Its true im afriad kellanved, I think its great you created you account here today and decided your first post went down the way it did. Thanks for pointing out my true colours too kellanved, but from the looks of it you have been around a while, even though this is your first post, if so you will also have seen people like Metaldragon come out and say stupid things like he did. I was pointing out that AoC wasn't nearly as laggy as another games media from the show I had seen. If you can't deal with a comments / opinions like that from someone interested in the game, to someone proved no so in the past then im sorry. How about I won't even mention war anymore?