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Would Cryptic let 'us' help 'them'?
flash525
Member Posts: 5,441 Arc User
Everyone is always going to want different things from a game like this, to say otherwise is simply false, yet a game to please the millions is always going to have to make sacrifices to the minority. Then comes the business that must (for the most part) push forward instead of revisiting the past.
How do people imagine Cryptic would feel about letting us help them? Lets take the Caitian/Ferasan as an example for the moment; there's a whole topic dedicated to them getting a revamp in the Art Section, and there's some damn good ideas there, some of which would require reworking the Caitian/Ferasan skeleton for the game; would Cryptic ever allow an outsourced person (a fan/group of fans) to fix the Caitian/Ferasan model (free of charge) and then provide them with it?
In instances like these, Cryptic would provide a base guideline (ie; said mesh/skeleton cannot consist of more than x number of parts, and can't be any bigger file size than xmb/xkb etc, but allowing for the creative licensing to get them looking right.
This (potentially) opens up a lot of opportunity for ship texture fixes too. There's numerous ships with a variety of ongoing bugs that could be fixed by (respectfully) people that know what they're doing and have the time to do it.
* Would Cryptic ever allow us to help them?
* Would anyone offer to help, knowing that they'll get nothing in return (except maybe, community gratification?)
How do people imagine Cryptic would feel about letting us help them? Lets take the Caitian/Ferasan as an example for the moment; there's a whole topic dedicated to them getting a revamp in the Art Section, and there's some damn good ideas there, some of which would require reworking the Caitian/Ferasan skeleton for the game; would Cryptic ever allow an outsourced person (a fan/group of fans) to fix the Caitian/Ferasan model (free of charge) and then provide them with it?
In instances like these, Cryptic would provide a base guideline (ie; said mesh/skeleton cannot consist of more than x number of parts, and can't be any bigger file size than xmb/xkb etc, but allowing for the creative licensing to get them looking right.
This (potentially) opens up a lot of opportunity for ship texture fixes too. There's numerous ships with a variety of ongoing bugs that could be fixed by (respectfully) people that know what they're doing and have the time to do it.
* Would Cryptic ever allow us to help them?
* Would anyone offer to help, knowing that they'll get nothing in return (except maybe, community gratification?)
Post edited by flash525 on
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Doubtful, though it would speed up certain things.
There is potenital legal overhead - What are the legal requirements to let someone contribute to the game for free?
Contractual overhead - what does the contract with CBS state, for example? How is ensured that the CBS requirements are met?
Technical overhead - once some model has been made, how is it imported into the game's format and added to the patching process? How are quality issues resolved that crop up later? Hoiw much work would need to be thrown out after some effort has been already taking into making it work if the fan becomes unavailable?
If you want to contribute more directly to the development of the game, there are basically two things you can do:
My company has some stuff done by paid external agencies, for example design templates that are basically svg files (and often don't boil down to more than a fancy texture). They deliver Hundreds of those each year, and making them work and look right in our software and for printing requires approximately 3 full time jobs (between the people that work out the contracts, describing the requirements and the people that test, catalogue and what not them). And this is by people that we actually hire and due to the contact have a guaranteed way of contacting and discussing problems with them.
the only legal help they need is a legal documents a player has to sign before they donate there work
That's it
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
If you want to help them...get hired by the company.
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
Then there would be the inevitable, and endless, whining about something getting picked over something else.
If Cryptic produced a document to an assistant along the lines of "I accept that I am helping in my own time, and am not expecting any pay/reward for my efforts" or something then there's no problem?
Ever heard of Charity work? Yeah! :rolleyes:
I don't have the skills.
I'm specifically stating here things that can be fixed by us. I'm not suggesting anyone/everyone submit their wonderful designs, only that people (could) help fix up the current ones.
Charity work is usually for non profit organizations...why would someone work for free for a company that is making serious money???
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
But unfortunately, no company will probably ever allow that, at least in this field.
star trek fans made better Ai's/mods and ships than star trek armada made with the game
And they did it for free
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
Star Trek fans made free ships for a game and then didn't get paid?
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
yes and they still do and its still played as well
just recently some players made a star trek Mod for it that is very good look it up on u tube
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
Both ST:Armada (inc Armada II) and ST:Bridge Commander had quite a large fanbase; I believe ST:Bridge Commander still does.
Many people made some quite fantastic models for both games, and never got paid a dime. They did this in their own time, and for free. Why? Because they saw an opportunity to make a loved game even better.
As a matter of fact, there's a mod for ST:Armada II called Fleet Operations; it's pretty much an entire overhaul of the game, and the team behind that have done an awesome job (again, free of charge).
Is the game in active development?
Let us explore it... together. Each man hides a secret pain. It must be exposed and reckoned with. It must be dragged from the darkness and forced into the light. Share your pain. Share your pain with me... and gain strength from the sharing.
I've done a lot of modding work and I can't visualize an actual developer doing it the way I do.
My character Tsin'xing
This is a Stock Screenshot of Star Trek: Armada II
This is a Screenshot of Star Trek: Armada II - Fleet Operations
no
just by the players now but most of the best ships were made while it was
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
But I'm not here suggesting that we/people gut and revamp STO, no. I'm merely stating that various people with the know-how could work on individual models; be them ship or alien.
A long time I sopose for most people
I made a Fed destroyer took me a month to finish it but I thought it was one of the best looking ships out there ..It had a excelsior type of look
I didn't make the skin another player donated that
getting the pixel count to meet the specs was the hardest part for me
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
On the one hand I have a workforce of professionals I have employed. I know their skill set, their experience and from them being here they know the development process, the industry standard tools and what specifications go into assets to make them game compatible.
They are also contractually obligated to produce work and perform further duties as needed, and said contract will contain a signed NDA since they develop new content.
And...on the other hand I have some total stranger. Someone with experience perhaps gained from modding but no professional certifications or recognised industry experience. Someone I have no control over since they are not an employee, and someone who may not be able to get the job done at all.
Not worth the risk in my opinion.
Fixing is even worse - they would need to export their work in a format that you could read and edit meaningful and import it back without losing anything. It's even questionable you could find the real errors that way.
They could of course give a fan access and training* to their propriety software so they could work with it, but that means giving something out-of-house they probably never intended to give out.
*) also completely underestimated - the amount of time it takes to learn the systems Cryptic uses to make the game and produce something they could meaningfully include.
They are pretty adamant about not wanting anyone doing ANY Mods to this game.
<shrug>
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
If a Mod for Star Trek Armda II sucks, that's a problem of the guy that installed the mod and the creators of that mod, not for the creators of Star Trek Armada II.
"Hey, this mod sucks and broke the game for me! Do something about it, Activision!" Uninstall the Mod or contact the mod creators for help. We are not responsible for the contents of effects of mods."
If something gets into the game and sucks, the entire playing community is affected. We all know that very well from all the cries when a bug gets into the game, or when something is nerfed. It can have a direct financial impact on Cryptic if something "bad" gets into the game.
Star Trek Online is not a game with mod support that you could deploy on your private server for a few people to join. It's an MMO with one public server (plus a few test servers), and everyone uses the same game. And the game is dependent on money spend by players for the game on that server.
This; exactly this.
The-Grand-Nagus
Join Date: Sep 2008
Ok, let's get into details. First, if they start taking volunteers, there's the risk investors will see this as a bad sign and jump ship.
Second, for you to help they need to make sure you have a legal, non pirated copy of whatever software they use.
And finally, you helping them would put internal assets in the hands of outsiders, making attacks and private servers easier, among other things.
As you can see, the risks far outweigh the benefits, at least when the game is already established. A start up company using Kickstarter to make their first game could potentially use volunteers, but not an established company working on a game that's been out for five years.
If so, that could be a major obstacle also.
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
I call you wrong on all accounts
Is being done right now in other games
It has been done in the past
Having a legal copy of whatever programs there using would be part of the legal agreement
they don't have to open up assets to there internal game that would be crazy
The only thing they would and do need is art work
Ships
planets
buildings
plants
animals
maps
Items of this nature players would never be given access to the internal working of the game
period
Also and this is big The foundry
There doing it right now with the foundry for crying out loud
Saphire.. Science ground......Ko'el Romulan space Tac
Leva........Tactical ground.....Koj Romulan space Eng
JJ-Verse will never be Canon or considered Lore...It will always be JJ-Verse
There are numerous MMOs that allow mod support, but it always affect your computer not the MMO's servers. So you might be able to make gathering locations easier to see, but that boss with 5 million HP will always have 5 million HP until the devs decide to change it.