There seem to be an awful lot of people playing this game that haven't the first clue about what it takes to run an MMO, successful or otherwise. So far I have seen people claim that "The only issue is the engine" and "It's probably just your hardware" and I won't even bother with the "its simple, just fix the bugs".
There are numerous factors that come in to play when developing, launching, running and updating an MMO. First and foremost is the hardware the game runs on; by that I mean the database servers and the other required hardware, not your PC's. Updating a graphics engine is not all that difficult in the grand scheme of things but what IS difficult however is keeping the movement of data from one part of the system to another flowing smoothly.
Desyncs, what we see as lag, are probably the biggest problem in online gaming, and can be extremely difficult to overcome both from a hardware standpoint as well as a software one. Depending on how STO's database servers operate and are interconnected with the rest of the system, this could be as simple as boosting existing hardware by adding RAMSANS, adding better load balancers to share out incoming connections to the proxy layer servers, upgrading the fiber channel backbone that connects the proxy servers or just adding more nodes.
Adding more horsepower to the system would remove a lot of problems, but it can be insanely expensive and time consuming. Then, when the hardware is optimised, you can start working on optimising and fixing all the bugs in your software without having to worry that your system is going to fall over every 5 minutes, or have to deal with a few thousand people complaining about lag when 2 million people are all logged in.
Games like STO are made to be played on a vast array of differently specced machines all with their own unique quirks. Expecting a company, in the space of 3 years, to build a fully fledged and bug free gaming environment shared by over 2 million people is comparable to expecting a 6 month old child to understand the philosophical fineries of Aristotle or Plato.
In short, if you think its "Simply a case of..." then the chances are it is a damn sight more complex than you are capable of understanding. Even thinking about making "STO MK II" is ridiculous in the extreme, and I would sincerely hope that Cryptic and PWE treat such suggestions with as much thought as the people suggesting it did when making their request in the first place.
None.
It should also be noted that Trek fans, like many other fan groups, can be insanely anal about "What Trek is and what it means". Attempting to please everyone is impossible, so stop asking for anyone to attempt it.
Yeah its a silly idea to expect gaming companys to release games that actually work and are finished, and its even more silly to expect a game that people subscribed to for nearly two year to have been fixed to at least a competent level, now here we are over 3 year later, and the game lurches from lockbox to lockbox with almost only all grind content being added and each patch adding its own set of new bugs while any profit made in game seems to simply go everywhere but into the game.
Yeah god damn you Trek fans , how dare you expect games you paid for to work. lol
Yeah its a silly idea to expect gaming companys to release games that actually work and are finished, and its even more silly to expect a game that people subscribed to for nearly two year to have been fixed to at least a competent level, now here we are over 3 year later, and the game lurches from lockbox to lockbox with almost only all grind content being added and each patch adding its own set of new bugs while any profit made in game seems to simply go everywhere but into the game.
Yeah god damn you Trek fans , how dare you expect games you paid for to work. lol
You not only missed the entire point of the post (No software is bug free, MMOs even less so) but also the entire history of STO and it's license.
Most MMOs are developed over a 5-6 year timeline, due to Perpetual Entertainments bungling of the Star Trek license, Cryptic had 2 years to make a Star Trek MMO, even taking into account they had an engine midbuilt at the time, that meant that they had 2 years to do 3-4 years of development. (Look at Neverwinter, that's taken 3 years to develop even with a prebuilt engine)
Even Dan Stahl has admitted openly that if he'd had his way, the game would be where it is now at launch rather than where it was 3 years ago. In fact, if done right the May Update could constitute a massive relaunching of the game.
Anybody who has ever designed software and knows the story of STO should be properly in awe of the game we have before us.
Cryptic has managed not only building a successful MMO in a 3rd of the time most are developed, they did it while dealing with an IP that is beyond complicated *AND* particular. They did it with a partner that then turned their back on them financially because they had no clue what they were signing up for when on a whim they decided to stick their feet in the MMO market. With no funding and a skeleton crew they managed to keep the game running and successful in one of the most cutthroat gaming markets there is. They managed not only to survive under those conditions, they managed to grow.
Now that the bad times are behind them and they are faced with opportunities instead of challenges, who knows what they can achieve?
Heh... MMO nubs... Think they know everything about games and gaming... The people at Cryptic have forgotten more about game design then these fools ever knew...
I once again match my character. Behold the power of PINK!
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
With no funding and a skeleton crew they managed to keep the game running and successful in one of the most cutthroat gaming markets there is. They managed not only to survive under those conditions, they managed to grow.
They didn't keep the game successful. The "No cups in the kitchen" era almost killed the game, did kill the company and force its sale, and they certainly didn't grow until after they were sold.
Heh... MMO nubs... Think they know everything about games and gaming... The people at Cryptic have forgotten more about game design then these fools ever knew...
Which people at Cryptic? Jaguars? Oh, he's gone. Gozer? He's gone, again. DStahl? Before or after he left for Zynga? Jack Emmert, who's busy with Neverwinter?
All I know is this. Everquest is still running. And yet, so is Everquest 2. And a third game with the same world is rumored to be in the works.
Games like STO are made to be played on a vast array of differently specced machines all with their own unique quirks. Expecting a company, in the space of 3 years, to build a fully fledged and bug free gaming environment shared by over 2 million people is comparable to expecting a 6 month old child to understand the philosophical fineries of Aristotle or Plato.
When this game launched, oh so many years ago, text alerts/boxes would not decloak you.
These days?
But yeah, that's a reproducable bug, that can be identified and singled out. And is totally unfixable because "games like STO are made to be played on a vast array of differently specced machines" even though on launch day cloaks were unaffected by text.
Uh-huh. It's the players expecting too much. It has to be. Because if it was the developers working on code they don't understand because most of the team that developed the game doesn't even work at Cryptic anymore ... it'd be too insane to realize what it going on at the company.
Snoggy, I'm sure with your level of pessimism you would have either decided to shut the game down ages ago or wouldn't have even been able to manage the effort to try and build it in the first place.
I once again match my character. Behold the power of PINK!
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
Snoggy, I'm sure with your level of pessimism you would have either decided to shut the game down ages ago or wouldn't have even been able to manage the effort to try and build it in the first place.
We were all told to judge them on their track record. And that's all I do. It's not pessimism. It's just experience. I've been playing MMOs since 1999. I beta tested all three Cryptic games prior to release, City of Heroes, Champions and this one. I've been around this game for a long time. I actually know that EPS Flow Regulators don't improve weapon energy drain, for example.
I'm not pessimistic at all. I just know what can and can't be accomplished with this game.
The game is fun for what it is. But I don't kid myself into thinking that:
1- It can't be more.
2- The PR/spin given about what is coming for this game is filled with hyperbole.
3- Sequels do exist for MMOs.
4- For Star Trek to get a Sequel, it will most likely have to be done by another company simply because of this one's resources.
They made a fun game. But they have a terrible QA process that lets bugs go live with no way to recall a patch from Tribble. They don't get around to fixing those bugs in a timely manner even when they are easy to find and reproduce (I think the best example of that is the invulnerable zombies in Canada bug over in Champions and how long that took to fix). And they leave a ton of their work half-done. Exploration, Diplomacy, DOFFs, it's all in need of completion. I can't even vote on DS9 after doing my Diplomat grind on three separate characters.
Add into that a huge turnover in staff, and you've got a game with layers of unfinished product all connected into a code that even DStahl himself said, back in beta when he was working with the genesis system to make exploration, really difficult to develop with.
So yeah, I can sit back and admit that everytime I log into the game, hearing the music for Trek while the character selection screen comes up pushes all the right Trek buttons for me. Calling up my duty roster to assign a maintenance engineer to run a diagnostic on my EPS system feels like Trek to me. Even if I squint, I can convince myself the explore strange new worlds daily IS almost trek exploration.
But I'm also keenly aware of the limitations that this game has, and am experienced enough with the past three years to realize that as the game moves forward it will be more of the same. Bold, ambitious new ideas, and only a few of them go live and all of that will end up half finished.
If this game were to get a sequel, it'd be good for Trek and Trek fans that a different company give it a try.
And this game doesn't have to go anywhere if there's a sequel.
They didn't keep the game successful. The "No cups in the kitchen" era almost killed the game, did kill the company and force its sale, and they certainly didn't grow until after they were sold.
Which people at Cryptic? Jaguars? Oh, he's gone. Gozer? He's gone, again. DStahl? Before or after he left for Zynga? Jack Emmert, who's busy with Neverwinter?
All I know is this. Everquest is still running. And yet, so is Everquest 2. And a third game with the same world is rumored to be in the works.
Hmmmm.
Wait... The company that created and continues to create STO was killed...???
I too, have been playing since day one..., when exactly did Cryptic die and get reborn from the ashes?
I remember a company called ATARI that barely survived for several years by using it's substantial profits from a Star Trek game and then it's sale..., to try to eck out a measly existence... (which has pretty much failed)
Seems your information is a bit flawed.
STO Member since February 2009. I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born! Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
Wait... The company that created and continues to create STO was killed...???
I too, have been playing since day one..., when exactly did Cryptic die and get reborn from the ashes?
During the content drought. Or the NO CUPS IN THE KITCHEN era. Essentially they were on life support, as DStahl described. They had no cups in the kitchen. They lost a lot of staff. They had broken equipment, that hindered their ability to do basic upkeep on the game. The company was essentially frozen, with no new development being done on any of their two games and one game in the works.
That was when they were up for sale. The company was indeed dead. STO's team even lost their content guy (Gozer) and then after the sale was finally OK'd, their head honcho (DStahl) went to Zynga to get away from it all.
We all know of the bug problems this game has as well as the limitations that the devs have run into as far as the engine goes etc etc. I mean for those that follow guild wars it was a game that had a huge following and while ok it had flaws so they decided scrap it take what worked used better systems and of course they had more time as this was the sequel rolled it all up into a big ball added some pepper and wala Guild Wars 2 whichas I said the original game was good or ok but the second iteration was and is vastly superior so I ask would you support and is it time for Star Trek Online 2???
Nice thinking STO 2 but how you think Cryptic would answer to all LTS people ?
Sorry guys you have to buy a New LTS for STO2 ?
Hell no I think Cryptic has a response ability to maintain.
And how would they answer to all the people who bought from the C-Store ?
Sorry guys but STO will be off the air once STO 2 comes on .... O and sorry for spending your earned cash but that will be lost too.
Do you even think someone from STO would join STO 2, I would never except that because I put a lot off money to this game to keep it alive ...
I hope they never will do this, plus the fact they would go bankrupt from all the lawsuits people would fire at them...
PWE would never allow that.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
"Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."
Well whatever you say but NO THANKS on a STO 2 platform
Why? Because you'd have to start over?
People do that all the time. Like say, when they buy a brand new video game to play. Video games are consumable entertainment. You will eventually move on from this game. It happens to everyone. Even the guy in charge of the game left it and came back to it.
When this game launched, oh so many years ago, text alerts/boxes would not decloak you.
These days?
But yeah, that's a reproducable bug, that can be identified and singled out. And is totally unfixable because "games like STO are made to be played on a vast array of differently specced machines" even though on launch day cloaks were unaffected by text.
Uh-huh. It's the players expecting too much. It has to be. Because if it was the developers working on code they don't understand because most of the team that developed the game doesn't even work at Cryptic anymore ... it'd be too insane to realize what it going on at the company.
Least they have cups in the kitchen these days.
Let me make sure I understand you correctly. These people, in whom you clearly have no faith, are the people YOU think should go off and make an entirely new STO game? What exactly do you think this would achieve?
And as for taking one very specific bug (albeit a good example of something easily fixable) and using that to attempt to discredit my comment regarding bugs that occur due to coding that has to be designed to somehow work with countless thousands of variations of hardware and software, well... could try harder there sir/madam.
It is also worth noting that you have managed to nullify your own argument a mere paragraph later. You rightly state that the people who are most likely responsible for the bugs in the code are no longer working for the company, and that the new people have not fixed those errors yet. I wonder why that might be? Is it because they are incompetent, or could it possibly be (shock horror!!!) because they do not yet know the ins and outs of the entire database from back to front?
A leads to B leads to C, since you appear to have trouble following logical progression.
Which people at Cryptic? Jaguars? Oh, he's gone. Gozer? He's gone, again. DStahl? Before or after he left for Zynga? Jack Emmert, who's busy with Neverwinter?
All of those people you named have one thing in common:
They didn't write the code. Their presence or absence doesn't affect the code.
Jaguars was in QA. Gozer, Stahl, and Emmert were content designers from the beginning of their Cryptic employment; the latter two didn't even start out in computer games, they came from the boardgame and pen and paper RPG worlds, respectively.
I imagine Jack would be the first to tell you he shouldn't be allowed to touch the code.
Most of the folks who wrote the core code are still around. There are a couple of notable exceptions, but there are also people still around who don't communicate on the forums anymore, and just seem gone.
Former moderator of these forums. Lifetime sub since before launch. Been here since before public betas. Foundry author of "Franklin Drake Must Die".
All of those people you named have one thing in common:
They didn't write the code. Their presence or absence doesn't affect the code.
Jaguars was in QA. Gozer, Stahl, and Emmert were content designers from the beginning of their Cryptic employment; the latter two didn't even start out in computer games, they came from the boardgame and pen and paper RPG worlds, respectively.
I imagine Jack would be the first to tell you he shouldn't be allowed to touch the code.
Most of the folks who wrote the core code are still around. There are a couple of notable exceptions, but there are also people still around who don't communicate on the forums anymore, and just seem gone.
As a newcomer to STO, its nice to know some actual facts regarding who does what and where they are. Its also interesting to know that some of these people started off literally with good old paper and pen stuff.
Gozer, Stahl, and Emmert were content designers from the beginning of their Cryptic employment;
Stahl used to blog about the genesis system. The thing that creates all those exploration missions. You know the ones. The buggy ones where your BOFFs fall through the maps. Or your enemies do. Or both.
I don't think you've really countered my points.
And then there's Gozer. Heh. What are his most notable projects?
EDIT: Also I disagree with your assessment of Emmert. His presence or absence absolutely would have affected the code in this game.
Let me make sure I understand you correctly. These people, in whom you clearly have no faith, are the people YOU think should go off and make an entirely new STO game?
Nope. I've consistently posted that a new or second Star Trek MMO would need to be made by a different company. This one doesn't have the resources to do it.
And as for taking one very specific bug (albeit a good example of something easily fixable) and using that to attempt to discredit my comment regarding bugs that occur due to coding that has to be designed to somehow work with countless thousands of variations of hardware and software, well... could try harder there sir/madam.
I'm willing to try as hard as they did in fixing that bug. So we'll reconvene in two years.
This game has so much potential why the hell would you lot ask for a second one that really makes no sense.
They have over 40years of history to make content out of not to mention fresh ideas, it's simple what they need to do is revamp things over time you don't see a totally new type of Windows say it's all basically the same with added stuff so that's what this game needs not scrapping and starting over.
Nope. I've consistently posted that a new or second Star Trek MMO would need to be made by a different company. This one doesn't have the resources to do it.
I'm willing to try as hard as they did in fixing that bug. So we'll reconvene in two years.
OK, you make a fair point. Now tell me why you think any other company would do it better. Lets look at some examples of big name game producers shall we?
Blizzard first of all, since they are probably the most well known of them all. Remember the Diablo 3 release?, that went real well. How about the Corrupted Blood incident in WoW? Or more recently the "Oh you're a level 1? How cute! OMG HOW ARE YOU KILLING ME????!" bug, they went down real well too. And Blizzard is very well established company.
How about Bethesda? Pretty big right? Heard the one about the Skyrim patch that permanently killed peoples PS3's?
Lets try DICE. They've been at the game making thing for a while so perhaps they would do a good job. Except then there was the BF3 bug that stopped you from ever completing the game. Or how about the bug that meant you couldn't leave a match without switching off the whole system?
Those are some very big, very well established games companies with hundreds of millions of dollars and hundreds of staff behind them who regularly put out half finished, broken, system killing products. So tell me again why you think Cryptic are so bad, or why you think anyone else could do a better job.
Stahl used to blog about the genesis system. The thing that creates all those exploration missions. You know the ones. The buggy ones where your BOFFs fall through the maps. Or your enemies do. Or both.
People keep forgetting that the Genesis System was created in less that 4-5 months, and hasn't been updated since. Getting a stable randomized mission generator that works in a single player game is hard, getting one working in an MMO is an exercise in futility. It's miracle it works at all.
Maybe we could split the difference. How about a huge expansion that resets the end game, adds tons of content and throws in some new mini games and/or progression "hamster wheels".
The devs mentioned having Admirals command fleets of ships. I would love it if we could start using some of the other ships in our collections to run our own squadrons like in Starfleet Command. Also for PWE this could lead to tons of new ships sales and more lockboxes!
It is an all-win scenario. No need to thank me. The check is in the mail ...
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
- They think that making a new MMO is as easy as making a new PS3 game ?
- Because they are bored with what we have and want something new ... ?
(that will probably look very much like the 'old STO' )
- Because they think that a new STO would get a new game engine ?
- Because they think that a new STO would be a bug-free game ... made by the same company ? :rolleyes:
I can't believe that this thread is still going .
The only reason Cryptic would ever bother with an STO:2 is if they felt there was even more potential return on investment and even more of an opportunity to bleed gullible Star Trek fans dry.
There is no need for STO2, and franky, i cannot imagine how an another company could do this better, without the game being a single player.
Yes, there are improvements to be made, PVP revamp, exploration and crafting revamp, but overall, the missions are FUN, the multiplayer aspect is working, the game is evolving..
There are 3 issues I have with the game:
- Romulan faction need
- the decloaking bug
- server stability
yeah, and not to forget the missing Romulan Embassy costume for the KDF which our fleet paid for.
Comments
Yeah its a silly idea to expect gaming companys to release games that actually work and are finished, and its even more silly to expect a game that people subscribed to for nearly two year to have been fixed to at least a competent level, now here we are over 3 year later, and the game lurches from lockbox to lockbox with almost only all grind content being added and each patch adding its own set of new bugs while any profit made in game seems to simply go everywhere but into the game.
Yeah god damn you Trek fans , how dare you expect games you paid for to work. lol
You not only missed the entire point of the post (No software is bug free, MMOs even less so) but also the entire history of STO and it's license.
Most MMOs are developed over a 5-6 year timeline, due to Perpetual Entertainments bungling of the Star Trek license, Cryptic had 2 years to make a Star Trek MMO, even taking into account they had an engine midbuilt at the time, that meant that they had 2 years to do 3-4 years of development. (Look at Neverwinter, that's taken 3 years to develop even with a prebuilt engine)
Even Dan Stahl has admitted openly that if he'd had his way, the game would be where it is now at launch rather than where it was 3 years ago. In fact, if done right the May Update could constitute a massive relaunching of the game.
Would not expect STO 2 anytime soon.
Cryptic has managed not only building a successful MMO in a 3rd of the time most are developed, they did it while dealing with an IP that is beyond complicated *AND* particular. They did it with a partner that then turned their back on them financially because they had no clue what they were signing up for when on a whim they decided to stick their feet in the MMO market. With no funding and a skeleton crew they managed to keep the game running and successful in one of the most cutthroat gaming markets there is. They managed not only to survive under those conditions, they managed to grow.
Now that the bad times are behind them and they are faced with opportunities instead of challenges, who knows what they can achieve?
Heh... MMO nubs... Think they know everything about games and gaming... The people at Cryptic have forgotten more about game design then these fools ever knew...
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
They didn't keep the game successful. The "No cups in the kitchen" era almost killed the game, did kill the company and force its sale, and they certainly didn't grow until after they were sold.
Which people at Cryptic? Jaguars? Oh, he's gone. Gozer? He's gone, again. DStahl? Before or after he left for Zynga? Jack Emmert, who's busy with Neverwinter?
All I know is this. Everquest is still running. And yet, so is Everquest 2. And a third game with the same world is rumored to be in the works.
Hmmmm.
When this game launched, oh so many years ago, text alerts/boxes would not decloak you.
These days?
But yeah, that's a reproducable bug, that can be identified and singled out. And is totally unfixable because "games like STO are made to be played on a vast array of differently specced machines" even though on launch day cloaks were unaffected by text.
Uh-huh. It's the players expecting too much. It has to be. Because if it was the developers working on code they don't understand because most of the team that developed the game doesn't even work at Cryptic anymore ... it'd be too insane to realize what it going on at the company.
Least they have cups in the kitchen these days.
Fleet Admiral Space Orphidian Possiblities Wizard
I'm not pessimistic at all. I just know what can and can't be accomplished with this game.
The game is fun for what it is. But I don't kid myself into thinking that:
1- It can't be more.
2- The PR/spin given about what is coming for this game is filled with hyperbole.
3- Sequels do exist for MMOs.
4- For Star Trek to get a Sequel, it will most likely have to be done by another company simply because of this one's resources.
They made a fun game. But they have a terrible QA process that lets bugs go live with no way to recall a patch from Tribble. They don't get around to fixing those bugs in a timely manner even when they are easy to find and reproduce (I think the best example of that is the invulnerable zombies in Canada bug over in Champions and how long that took to fix). And they leave a ton of their work half-done. Exploration, Diplomacy, DOFFs, it's all in need of completion. I can't even vote on DS9 after doing my Diplomat grind on three separate characters.
Add into that a huge turnover in staff, and you've got a game with layers of unfinished product all connected into a code that even DStahl himself said, back in beta when he was working with the genesis system to make exploration, really difficult to develop with.
So yeah, I can sit back and admit that everytime I log into the game, hearing the music for Trek while the character selection screen comes up pushes all the right Trek buttons for me. Calling up my duty roster to assign a maintenance engineer to run a diagnostic on my EPS system feels like Trek to me. Even if I squint, I can convince myself the explore strange new worlds daily IS almost trek exploration.
But I'm also keenly aware of the limitations that this game has, and am experienced enough with the past three years to realize that as the game moves forward it will be more of the same. Bold, ambitious new ideas, and only a few of them go live and all of that will end up half finished.
If this game were to get a sequel, it'd be good for Trek and Trek fans that a different company give it a try.
And this game doesn't have to go anywhere if there's a sequel.
Whose "CANON"... Yours?
No thanks..., it doesn't measure up to Mine... :P
(and therein lies the problem with every one who uses this, as a starting point for their argument)
Wait... The company that created and continues to create STO was killed...???
I too, have been playing since day one..., when exactly did Cryptic die and get reborn from the ashes?
I remember a company called ATARI that barely survived for several years by using it's substantial profits from a Star Trek game and then it's sale..., to try to eck out a measly existence... (which has pretty much failed)
Seems your information is a bit flawed.
I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born!
Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
During the content drought. Or the NO CUPS IN THE KITCHEN era. Essentially they were on life support, as DStahl described. They had no cups in the kitchen. They lost a lot of staff. They had broken equipment, that hindered their ability to do basic upkeep on the game. The company was essentially frozen, with no new development being done on any of their two games and one game in the works.
That was when they were up for sale. The company was indeed dead. STO's team even lost their content guy (Gozer) and then after the sale was finally OK'd, their head honcho (DStahl) went to Zynga to get away from it all.
You don't remember those days? I do.
Nice thinking STO 2 but how you think Cryptic would answer to all LTS people ?
Sorry guys you have to buy a New LTS for STO2 ?
Hell no I think Cryptic has a response ability to maintain.
And how would they answer to all the people who bought from the C-Store ?
Sorry guys but STO will be off the air once STO 2 comes on .... O and sorry for spending your earned cash but that will be lost too.
Do you even think someone from STO would join STO 2, I would never except that because I put a lot off money to this game to keep it alive ...
I hope they never will do this, plus the fact they would go bankrupt from all the lawsuits people would fire at them...
PWE would never allow that.
"Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."
The lifetime sub is for STO. And is valid as long as the game exists. What's there to answer? A sequel has nothing to do with STO.
Everquest is still around, even with Everquest 2 being around for years as well.
Well whatever you say but NO THANKS on a STO 2 platform
"Coffee: the finest organic suspension ever devised. It's got me through the worst of the last three years. I beat the Borg with it."
Why? Because you'd have to start over?
People do that all the time. Like say, when they buy a brand new video game to play. Video games are consumable entertainment. You will eventually move on from this game. It happens to everyone. Even the guy in charge of the game left it and came back to it.
Let me make sure I understand you correctly. These people, in whom you clearly have no faith, are the people YOU think should go off and make an entirely new STO game? What exactly do you think this would achieve?
And as for taking one very specific bug (albeit a good example of something easily fixable) and using that to attempt to discredit my comment regarding bugs that occur due to coding that has to be designed to somehow work with countless thousands of variations of hardware and software, well... could try harder there sir/madam.
It is also worth noting that you have managed to nullify your own argument a mere paragraph later. You rightly state that the people who are most likely responsible for the bugs in the code are no longer working for the company, and that the new people have not fixed those errors yet. I wonder why that might be? Is it because they are incompetent, or could it possibly be (shock horror!!!) because they do not yet know the ins and outs of the entire database from back to front?
A leads to B leads to C, since you appear to have trouble following logical progression.
Sig by my better half.
All of those people you named have one thing in common:
They didn't write the code. Their presence or absence doesn't affect the code.
Jaguars was in QA. Gozer, Stahl, and Emmert were content designers from the beginning of their Cryptic employment; the latter two didn't even start out in computer games, they came from the boardgame and pen and paper RPG worlds, respectively.
I imagine Jack would be the first to tell you he shouldn't be allowed to touch the code.
Most of the folks who wrote the core code are still around. There are a couple of notable exceptions, but there are also people still around who don't communicate on the forums anymore, and just seem gone.
As a newcomer to STO, its nice to know some actual facts regarding who does what and where they are. Its also interesting to know that some of these people started off literally with good old paper and pen stuff.
Sig by my better half.
One of the biggest problem areas in the company.
Stahl used to blog about the genesis system. The thing that creates all those exploration missions. You know the ones. The buggy ones where your BOFFs fall through the maps. Or your enemies do. Or both.
I don't think you've really countered my points.
And then there's Gozer. Heh. What are his most notable projects?
EDIT: Also I disagree with your assessment of Emmert. His presence or absence absolutely would have affected the code in this game.
Nope. I've consistently posted that a new or second Star Trek MMO would need to be made by a different company. This one doesn't have the resources to do it.
I'm willing to try as hard as they did in fixing that bug. So we'll reconvene in two years.
They have over 40years of history to make content out of not to mention fresh ideas, it's simple what they need to do is revamp things over time you don't see a totally new type of Windows say it's all basically the same with added stuff so that's what this game needs not scrapping and starting over.
OK, you make a fair point. Now tell me why you think any other company would do it better. Lets look at some examples of big name game producers shall we?
Blizzard first of all, since they are probably the most well known of them all. Remember the Diablo 3 release?, that went real well. How about the Corrupted Blood incident in WoW? Or more recently the "Oh you're a level 1? How cute! OMG HOW ARE YOU KILLING ME????!" bug, they went down real well too. And Blizzard is very well established company.
How about Bethesda? Pretty big right? Heard the one about the Skyrim patch that permanently killed peoples PS3's?
Lets try DICE. They've been at the game making thing for a while so perhaps they would do a good job. Except then there was the BF3 bug that stopped you from ever completing the game. Or how about the bug that meant you couldn't leave a match without switching off the whole system?
Those are some very big, very well established games companies with hundreds of millions of dollars and hundreds of staff behind them who regularly put out half finished, broken, system killing products. So tell me again why you think Cryptic are so bad, or why you think anyone else could do a better job.
Sig by my better half.
People keep forgetting that the Genesis System was created in less that 4-5 months, and hasn't been updated since. Getting a stable randomized mission generator that works in a single player game is hard, getting one working in an MMO is an exercise in futility. It's miracle it works at all.
The compounding respawn timer. I hate him so much for that. :mad:
The devs mentioned having Admirals command fleets of ships. I would love it if we could start using some of the other ships in our collections to run our own squadrons like in Starfleet Command. Also for PWE this could lead to tons of new ships sales and more lockboxes!
It is an all-win scenario. No need to thank me. The check is in the mail ...
- Judge Aaron Satie
Because :
- They think that making a new MMO is as easy as making a new PS3 game ?
- Because they are bored with what we have and want something new ... ?
(that will probably look very much like the 'old STO' )
- Because they think that a new STO would get a new game engine ?
- Because they think that a new STO would be a bug-free game ... made by the same company ? :rolleyes:
I can't believe that this thread is still going .
The only reason Cryptic would ever bother with an STO:2 is if they felt there was even more potential return on investment and even more of an opportunity to bleed gullible Star Trek fans dry.
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Yes, there are improvements to be made, PVP revamp, exploration and crafting revamp, but overall, the missions are FUN, the multiplayer aspect is working, the game is evolving..
There are 3 issues I have with the game:
- Romulan faction need
- the decloaking bug
- server stability
yeah, and not to forget the missing Romulan Embassy costume for the KDF which our fleet paid for.
I can. :cool:
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