1. #61
    Registered User eNTi's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Drachenpaladin View Post
    The community was always of differing oppinions on what Needs to be done and fixed how quickly and what has or hasn't this or that priority... as Long as I can remember.

    So is anybody really surprised if the Team is doing Things just their own way instead of trying to please everyon at the same time? Not even paid full-time developers do that... because they simply know better what they are dealign with than anyone could who isn't in the loop.

    Listening to the commuity means to change focus on a weekly basis...
    so the solution is doing random stuff? i mean... it's not as if the game was going anywhere or was dependent on actual people playing. at the life support level neocron will probably survive just about another 10 years. who knows... but i would like to actually play it. at its current state its just not fun for me.

  2. #62
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    What's going on in this threa-

    oh...

    I have to share the sentiments of other posters here that this is not really a priority and actually a slight waste - kind of. Let me elaborate:

    Neocron already features a pretty in-depth tutorial that you suggest to new players when they create a character and it covers a lot of info. The starting area is a bit crap, but it's more where new people go afterwards that is an issue. You enter Neocron and you are lost. Where do you level? The missions aren't great for a new player. Kill 5 small sewer rats. Where are they? Why is my gun so weak?

    Static NPC's are good for teaching new stuff but an even better resource is the current player-base. Getting new players is good but you need to keep them. Many people get frustrated or overwhelmed and will run off and play the newest online game.

    If you want more players you need to look past the newbie starting area. Why would anyone play a game that has severe balance issues? There are core parts of the game that need fixing to keep people playing. Why throw new players into a game that you are, by your own admission, struggling to balance and work on?

    If you want more players just up your advertising. Your tweets and facebook just are not cutting it and you also should set up a dedicated youtube. The volunteer team need an official channel.

    But the massive elephant in the room is the test server and balance. Cool that the newbie area is getting revamped, great we are going to have a nicer looking terminal and some crates BUT what we're not getting is more players and old ones coming to this game because it has so many problems.
    Last edited by Hell-demon; 21-04-16 at 16:28. Reason: typos
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  3. #63
    Guest Xortag's Avatar
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    I wonder why that questions are still asked. Do you think we increased by 50 developers?

    We don't need another platform for features or bugs, it will not change any feedback. You also got a ingame bug report function directly connected to the bug tracker. It's either in the Bug & Feature Tracker and will be adressed if there is a need or ressources, or not.

    We also told you very often that thing struggle due to internal tools that have to be devloped or fixed. We don't say it for fun or because we like to do the opposite of player feedback. We don't work with AAA engine with drag & drop support, please get that.

    We could publish more specific roadmaps to be more open, but we will have to discuss about thing getting not forward as they are announced, because some fubar happend. The past has teached us a lot and we are way more concerned about announcing big changes that can't be developed, because someone left the team.

    For the graphical side, i don't post any progress or previews on things that are made the old way, simply because i don't and will not do assets and new features the old way. You don't want it either, as a lot of things can't be done and would take more time and limits. I would like to give you a huge amount of PA and Vehicle skins utilizing a improved outfitter system. But i want to do it right and within a way we can active develop, add and change things.

  4. #64
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    We appreciate the work your small team does but we are trying to give you feedback, which ultimatley, we feel is going ignored.
    It's really hard to guage what is going on with the game and development. We're being told one moment that theres a big push to get a much needed tool in place and then we are told that new player experience is the main priority. What's going on?

    As for bug fixing and player feedback, that is the whole point of this thread. There is no detailed road map, a list for test server changes in its entirety to comapre to, let alone a test server that's playable, and many players feel that any bug reports they file are added to a pile and get no feedback as to whether they are fixed or being fixed. It creates a feedback loop that hurts us all.

    We need clear cut ideas and goals. We are suppose to colaborate, yes? Some of these changes are going to be implemented and when is that going to happen?

    And when they happen we will need to test them out.

    As said before we appreciate your hard work, but this is an MMO, not a charity soup kitchen, and mmo's need development and they need a growing community. At the moment it's all stagnating.

    What we need is dates. We need to know that something is coming along or a particular time when something is being released. We need to know what we can do as a community. Direct us. Guide us. We need to be kept in the loop about the team and progress. We also need swift responses on things.

    Last patch was over 4 months ago. There must be something, however small, or trivial that can be implemented now before something big. At least to placate us.
    Last edited by Hell-demon; 21-04-16 at 19:40.
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  5. #65
    Registered User eNTi's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hell-demon View Post
    What we need is dates. We need to know that something is coming along or a particualr time when something is being released. We need to know what we can do as a community. Direct us. Guide us. We need to be kept in the loop about the team and progress. We also need swift responses on things.

    Last patch was over 4 months ago. There must be something, however small, or trivial that can be implemented now before something big. At least to placate us.
    I am not sure dates will help much. As a developer myself I usually only give estimates because someone asked me to. I keep telling them that it's not feasible but they keep asking. Deadlines will always be broken even with dedicated paid developers. It's entirely unrealistic to expect any concrete road maps from the volunteer team. It might be interesting at what point you would like to do what... and at what point you plan to implement what (X after Y after Z) and not specific dates. Concrete dates would lead to unnecessary pressure and expectations.

    What gets me is the lack of feedback and the constant excuses. Something Hell-demon has stated too. There is none. We do not know if something is being considered or not. The Brainport is miles deep with endless feedback and dare I say almost nothing has made it into the game?

    Not sure about the bugs... but judging from how buggy the game still is many fixes must have lead to even more issues. It's quite a common thing especially in legacy code bases, so I'm not really surprised by that.

    I don't even know how many people are in the volunteer team or how active certain people are. I don't know about people joining or leaving. It's all shrouded in mystery and we can't do much but speculate.

    What gets me the most is the fact that you are revamping the core of the game with a very small team that isn't even fully committed. I mean... didn't you think that through when you started all this? It SEEMS (only guessing) you opened Pandora's box there.

  6. #66
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    Shots fired.

    My concern is that a small team is now endevoruing to revamp and add new content that is quite large in scale. From what we have gleamed it takes a long time to implement things and you are burdened with myriad of other large scale overhauls. You seem to essentially be creating another workload. Finish one chocolate bar before moving onto another.

    Core mechanics still need work and those new items to help new players will also need balancing. The balancing project helps new players and veterans alike.

    We still have had no word on balancing and bug fixes. We have people ready to go and give feedback. You say you need to develop a tool. Can we help? We are a resource so use us. We got smart motherfuckers on this board. Coders and team players. Use us.
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  7. #67
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    Quote Originally Posted by eNTi View Post
    What gets me the most is the fact that you are revamping the core of the game with a very small team that isn't even fully committed.
    Everyone is committed and motivated in the start, but then things get worse, break or the motivation goes because:
    Quote Originally Posted by eNTi View Post
    [...]you opened Pandora's box there.
    All you can say is, welcome to game development like it's 1999. To change a damn text, sometimes it require 2h of work. It's nerve wrecking, but the ugly stuff has to be done too and no one may even see it.

    And you will also admit, that pasting a piece of server code for some engine change in a forum is not the way things develop. Many changes require work of other departments to be done too, for example icons are textures for the content team for some sector revamp. Or a new mission requires a new function that has to be done by Zoltan. Something always break your plan, thats the only loyal constant. I could have done the whole Viarosso re-design, but the compiler just had something else to do. Ok, Maxjagg is about to fix it, to bad he need to develop a new actor tool too, because the recent 8bit switch and introduced alpha change now blocks further patching due to the lack of DXT3 support in the old actor tools. I could write the next 5 pages with stuff like that.

    Now i got that nice modelling guy doing new meshes but have to tell him he have to wait until the export plugin for 3dsmax7 is worked on. How many animations can be done? to be honest, i dont know, because it's not documented, we have to figure it out or dig through the code to find a hint or comment...

    As you already stated, giving dates leads to nothing. What we can do is more frequent updates of development updates we introduced a year ago. But you you will see a lot of "in progress" changes. Even if we state the mission editor is broken due to X, does it help? Sometimes it's just about someone is on holidays or has health issues, now you know it, but i dont speed things up.

  8. #68
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    Just tell us what your doing. Don't tell us why you can't do stuff but frequent updates on what is working and what is feasible.

    We know you are burdened but we also want a clear idea of where you're going. Also what can we do to help with these problems? If we can help then post a list of jobs. We are a resource. We are a community.
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  9. #69
    Guest Xortag's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hell-demon View Post
    Just tell us what your doing. Don't tell us why you can't do stuff but frequent updates on what is working and what is feasible.

    We know you are burdened but we also want a clear idea of where you're going. Also what can we do to help with these problems? If we can help then post a list of jobs. We are a resource. We are a community.
    Well, here is the task:

    > Take the attached NFO Exporter orignally written by Greywolf for RF.
    > ReWrite it to work with at least Blender 2.76 instead of 2.4
    > Feel free to bring it in line with all the features of the original 3dsmax7 exporter for genesis (grab it here: http://www.realityfactory.info/cms/d...exporters.html)
    > Get a copy of http://www.realityfactory.info/cms/d...installer.html RF and test your exported model (if it works there, chances are high it works for NC too).
    > Report back.


    GenBlender-0.2.zip

  10. #70
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    Wow. How rude and passive aggressive is that.
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  11. #71
    God of the Crahnsect LeoPump's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hell-demon View Post
    Wow. How rude and passive aggressive is that.
    Rude and aggressive, maybe - but now you have a task ;o
    "Ich bin für klare Hierarchien. Gott hat ja auch nicht zu Moses gesagt: "Hier Moses, ich hab' da mal was aufgeschrieben, was mir nicht so gefällt. Falls du Lust hast schau' doch da mal drüber." Nein, da hieß es: Zack, 10 Gebote! Und wer nicht pariert kommt in die Hölle. Bums, aus, Nikolaus." (Stromberg)

  12. #72
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    Could do but the instructions are still vague, as I'm not sure what asset it is going to and the prefered coding langauge.

    No. What we've got here is someone pissed off and wanting to vent at someone.

    http://www.neocron-game.com/

    What does it say at the top?

    Community Edition.

    We are also on Brainport, home of suggestions. We are trying to make suggestions and guage how to improve the game so all the hard work the team does isn't in vain.

    No wonder morale in the team is low when there are members with such a shitty attitude.
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  13. #73
    Guest Xortag's Avatar
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    It wan't meant to be rude in any way. A lot "community" contributed things are not easy to handle because it require a lot of tools and also a way to test for you. We can't just hand-over a Development Client, Editor, Test Server files, etc. We have to look what parts of the game can be outsourced to the community that are easy to handle for all involved partys. It's often reduced to the easy parts like translation, spelling checks, textual parts or missions. I could think of mapping too, as the basics don't require a programmer and can be tested more easy.

    What we could do is a sticky thread where only team members can post their updates instead of have them spread over different threads and answers.

  14. #74
    Bitter Veteran Hell-demon's Avatar
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    Completly disregarding what we're saying. We are not asking for you to give us developing tools, or even the bloody source code. We want to know what you're doing and where you are going with it? Balancing is a massive issue and we are left in the dark.

    We the community probably can't code assets, but we can give ideas like the brain port and work on tasks that don't require being coding monkeys or beyond development remit (i.e giving us tools and things that might breach contracts and shit).

    We feel like we are not being heard or ignored.

    Also we are getting a very bleak view of behind the scenes. Are you working a dev team or a cancer ward? Seems like everyone is fucking miserable and has a tumour and is screaming " I just want this over with!"
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  15. #75
    Guest Xortag's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Hell-demon View Post
    We feel like we are not being heard or ignored.
    But thats not the case and we have stated that very often. We have Trivaldi to aggregate some of the feedback for all of us in the team, so thats why he post a lot of general infos in the board. For the graphical side of NC i started this thread. I reply where i can and give answers there, it may lack frequency because we have the development updates that should aggregate all this, honestly they lacking frequent updates too and thats of course a thing on our side.

    For the brainport section, most of us can only reply for the special task / department. So what is your suggestion for a more agile way on thoose updates?

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