I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Sucks for people still limited to either of the two, but I don't think telling Cryptic you won't upgrade to Windows 10 because spyware or you can't afford a new graphics card (or notebook) or whatever isn't really going to change things.
When we discuss platform support on our company, we never assume that some of those hold-outs will upgrade their system. We assume they're lost to us. So we are - just as any company- conservative when dropping support, but when we do, we have a good idea what we're doing and how many customers that will cost us. Of course, we're not running an online game, so we can actually hold back old clients, we don't have to force upgrades as quickly as an MMO has to.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
Sucks for people still limited to either of the two, but I don't think telling Cryptic you won't upgrade to Windows 10 because spyware or you can't afford a new graphics card (or notebook) or whatever isn't really going to change things.
Just a heads up. Dx11 is available for win7 and win8 too. Not just win10. I don't think anyone plays this game on winxp.
Sucks for people still limited to either of the two, but I don't think telling Cryptic you won't upgrade to Windows 10 because spyware or you can't afford a new graphics card (or notebook) or whatever isn't really going to change things.
Just a heads up. Dx11 is available for win7 and win8 too. Not just win10. I don't think anyone plays this game on winxp.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Sucks for people still limited to either of the two, but I don't think telling Cryptic you won't upgrade to Windows 10 because spyware or you can't afford a new graphics card (or notebook) or whatever isn't really going to change things.
When we discuss platform support on our company, we never assume that some of those hold-outs will upgrade their system. We assume they're lost to us. So we are - just as any company- conservative when dropping support, but when we do, we have a good idea what we're doing and how many customers that will cost us. Of course, we're not running an online game, so we can actually hold back old clients, we don't have to force upgrades as quickly as an MMO has to.
I suspect this as well, and it's likely whatever percentage lost from dropping DX9 support is likely more than made up by the income from the console users they've gained recently.
Still doesn't feel nice if you're affected by the change, though.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
FFS mods please put this to bed. For all the whining over several months if folks just used layaway they'd already have hardware supported by everyone. If you can't set aside $20 a month for eighteen months you are not someone paying into this product. Go away already, go play facebook games.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
Obviously it's a non-zero amount, otherwise they likely would've ended support earlier.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
That sort of rationale may quickly turn on you, as another way of looking at this is: "They're not spending the money on their hardware, because they're spending their cash ingame." :P
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
also much of the dilithium that is purchased by zen buyers comes from FTP players, if there were no FTP players selling dilithium who are you going to buy it off, hardly other spending players who are probably also looking to buy dilithium themselves.
if the dilithium exchange dried up this would be a massive loss for cryptic.
Pales in comparison to what your *nix based smart phone is, and does.
I agree, most users who refuse to upgrade to windows 10 have smart phones or tablets that are far worse in the spyware department then windows 10 will ever be, this also applies to most of the apps you run on these devices.
besides who cares if windows 10 tracks you browsing or other internet activity, your internet service provider does this anyway.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
Which is probably at least a major part of why they dropped the Mac WINE-based "native" version. They would have had to pay a lot more to find a new porting scheme when the old one stopped working, much more than Mac users were paying in to the game.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
Which is probably at least a major part of why they dropped the Mac WINE-based "native" version. They would have had to pay a lot more to find a new porting scheme when the old one stopped working, much more than Mac users were paying in to the game.
i was referring to the loss of players, not the loss of income.
for what ever the reason its a shame to loose players even if it basically make sense to make these changes.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
It is too bad since more players make the game more alive. But I'd rather have Crytpic spend their money on bug fixes, modern graphics and new story content instead of losing that money to maintaining old tech for a few holdouts.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
Which is probably at least a major part of why they dropped the Mac WINE-based "native" version. They would have had to pay a lot more to find a new porting scheme when the old one stopped working, much more than Mac users were paying in to the game.
i was referring to the loss of players, not the loss of income.
for what ever the reason its a shame to loose players even if it basically make sense to make these changes.
I suspect some bean counters at Cryptic ran the numbers, and concluded losing Windows XP and DIrectX 9 support would be acceptable.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
The player might be thinking too short here, but I doubt Cryptic is. Their metrics will tell them who buys Zen ,who sells Dilithium and how much, and the can figure out whether it will affect the game notably or not.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
^^ Absolutely this!
Maintaining DX9 not only costs time, money, and man power, but in the long run also hinders the graphical process of STO. If they ever want to build a new Engine (still skeptical about that), DX9 will simply have to go. Best to just cut this dead wood right off the bat, and get it over with.
Anybody running STO on WINE 2.0 Release Candidate?
I've heard that people have STO running Direct3d 11 on 1.9.2 with copying over a missing file to fix the red X issue, but see that 2.0RC1 is up now as the testing build.
Yep, time has come, 2017 will change things. but while so many seem eager to say "Just Install Microsofts latest spy-in-a-box." I wonder, will those early gaming rebels who committed to trying the steam and linux route, made that hardware overkill build, a Multi Xenon or Operon all RAM Stacked. A perfect Linux Gaming\Space Heater. I seriously doubt any will do that. Why bother filling ram with a game that forces a obsolete slow janky DirectX compliant Virtual instance in 2017 when plenty of newer titles have the foresight to use Vulkan graphics for compatibility.
Not really -- wiki lists a grand total of 8 Windows games, with Doom, a Need for Speed and DOTA2 being the AAA titles.
Irony is I intentionally spotlighted Vulkan just released 16th of February 2016. It is truly cross platform over Computer, console, mobile... Something you would have thought a developer expanding into consoles this last year would have understood the value of. But, there is no shortage of OpenGL and Steam titles to distract until more adopt it. ;-)
[...] But, there is no shortage of OpenGL and Steam titles to distract until more adopt it. ;-)
And still, STO is the only game of its kind on the market...
indeed, without sto there are no star trek games worth my time, its quite unique in its gameplay style and execution, even other non trek online games fail to be its equal or better.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Microsoft dropped XP support back in April of 2014 so by then it will have gone three years without updates and security fixes. Google Chrome will have ended support a year before then and Firefox is about to end XP support.
Anyone still using XP should see the writing on the wall.
It's a pain to support XP since there are Win32 API calls missing from it, and Microsoft has stripped XP notes from much of their technical docs. So you need to do extra testing and sometimes jump through hoops to work around the lack of features.
For Cryptic, they'll be able to stop maintaining two sets of graphics code for old and new versions of DirectX. Having less code generally means more time to fix bugs and add new features.
not only this, but Google Chrome, itself, is defunct as a web browser, having been replaced by Microsoft's new one. Chrome, too, is no longer supported.
Had the argument last summer about xp being a dead os for STO by next summer - long before they made it offical. But no one agreed with me that the trend was heading that way.
And still, STO is the only game of its kind on the market...
uh. This is an incorrect statement. a little research will show that STO isn't the only game of it's kind. Just one of the more popular for this genre - at this point in time. Don't know how often people post this, but it isn't accurate.
Windows 7 was officially no longer supported by Microsoft 13 January, 2015.
So how long before STO gives it the boot?
Windows XP was officially no longer supported by Microsoft 8 April, 2014.
So... around December next year, STO might ditch Win7 users? Just a thought...
No, 2014 was end of life for XP - no more security fixes or other patches.
Windows 7 just ended "mainstream support" (free phone support) in 2015. End of life is currently not scheduled until 2020 and is likely to be pushed back to later than that since Microsoft is still allowing companies like Dell to sell 7:
Pales in comparison to what your *nix based smart phone is, and does.
Gotta love that Linux to Android analogy.. It's like taking a armored truck then "Pimping it out" by removing all the armor, doors, windows, and roof then adding flashy paint job, sound system before selling everyone on it being hipper but just as secure.
[...] But, there is no shortage of OpenGL and Steam titles to distract until more adopt it. ;-)
And still, STO is the only game of its kind on the market...
For a Trek based game, yea, right now,, But after March 1st.. will it even still function on Steam?
STO has ZERO say in Microsoft roping off newer DirectX versions in it's own OS.
Building new versions without a alternative graphics system in place allows Microsoft to forever decide who will or will not play your game..
Comments
Sucks for people still limited to either of the two, but I don't think telling Cryptic you won't upgrade to Windows 10 because spyware or you can't afford a new graphics card (or notebook) or whatever isn't really going to change things.
When we discuss platform support on our company, we never assume that some of those hold-outs will upgrade their system. We assume they're lost to us. So we are - just as any company- conservative when dropping support, but when we do, we have a good idea what we're doing and how many customers that will cost us. Of course, we're not running an online game, so we can actually hold back old clients, we don't have to force upgrades as quickly as an MMO has to.
Just a heads up. Dx11 is available for win7 and win8 too. Not just win10. I don't think anyone plays this game on winxp.
I suspect this as well, and it's likely whatever percentage lost from dropping DX9 support is likely more than made up by the income from the console users they've gained recently.
Still doesn't feel nice if you're affected by the change, though.
Its not exactly a complex piece of math: if you're not spending the money to update you machine for over 5 years, how much money can you be expected to throw at a game?
Obviously it's a non-zero amount, otherwise they likely would've ended support earlier.
That sort of rationale may quickly turn on you, as another way of looking at this is: "They're not spending the money on their hardware, because they're spending their cash ingame." :P
yet another who fails to realise what money even FTP bring to the game, less players overall = less chance that someone who would spend money will spend money, players who can afford to spend money on an online game are much more likely to do so if they see loads and loads of players then if they see very few.
also much of the dilithium that is purchased by zen buyers comes from FTP players, if there were no FTP players selling dilithium who are you going to buy it off, hardly other spending players who are probably also looking to buy dilithium themselves.
if the dilithium exchange dried up this would be a massive loss for cryptic.
I agree, most users who refuse to upgrade to windows 10 have smart phones or tablets that are far worse in the spyware department then windows 10 will ever be, this also applies to most of the apps you run on these devices.
besides who cares if windows 10 tracks you browsing or other internet activity, your internet service provider does this anyway.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
I dare say they have crunched the numbers and deemed it to be an acceptable loss, only thing is even an acceptable loss is still a loss.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
Not necessarily. Continuing DX9 development costs money, so if the loss of income from dropping it is less than the cost of continuing it, it is a net profit overall.
Which is probably at least a major part of why they dropped the Mac WINE-based "native" version. They would have had to pay a lot more to find a new porting scheme when the old one stopped working, much more than Mac users were paying in to the game.
i was referring to the loss of players, not the loss of income.
for what ever the reason its a shame to loose players even if it basically make sense to make these changes.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
True.
Just try telling that to the bean counters.
^^ Absolutely this!
Maintaining DX9 not only costs time, money, and man power, but in the long run also hinders the graphical process of STO. If they ever want to build a new Engine (still skeptical about that), DX9 will simply have to go. Best to just cut this dead wood right off the bat, and get it over with.
I've heard that people have STO running Direct3d 11 on 1.9.2 with copying over a missing file to fix the red X issue, but see that 2.0RC1 is up now as the testing build.
Irony is I intentionally spotlighted Vulkan just released 16th of February 2016. It is truly cross platform over Computer, console, mobile... Something you would have thought a developer expanding into consoles this last year would have understood the value of. But, there is no shortage of OpenGL and Steam titles to distract until more adopt it. ;-)
indeed, without sto there are no star trek games worth my time, its quite unique in its gameplay style and execution, even other non trek online games fail to be its equal or better.
When I think about everything we've been through together,
maybe it's not the destination that matters, maybe it's the journey,
and if that journey takes a little longer,
so we can do something we all believe in,
I can't think of any place I'd rather be or any people I'd rather be with.
not only this, but Google Chrome, itself, is defunct as a web browser, having been replaced by Microsoft's new one. Chrome, too, is no longer supported.
Had the argument last summer about xp being a dead os for STO by next summer - long before they made it offical. But no one agreed with me that the trend was heading that way.
Feel sorry for Win7 guys soon..
So how long before STO gives it the boot?
Windows XP was officially no longer supported by Microsoft 8 April, 2014.
So... around December next year, STO might ditch Win7 users? Just a thought...
uh. This is an incorrect statement. a little research will show that STO isn't the only game of it's kind. Just one of the more popular for this genre - at this point in time. Don't know how often people post this, but it isn't accurate.
sorry.
No, 2014 was end of life for XP - no more security fixes or other patches.
Windows 7 just ended "mainstream support" (free phone support) in 2015. End of life is currently not scheduled until 2020 and is likely to be pushed back to later than that since Microsoft is still allowing companies like Dell to sell 7:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2475079,00.asp
Gotta love that Linux to Android analogy.. It's like taking a armored truck then "Pimping it out" by removing all the armor, doors, windows, and roof then adding flashy paint job, sound system before selling everyone on it being hipper but just as secure.
For a Trek based game, yea, right now,, But after March 1st.. will it even still function on Steam?
STO has ZERO say in Microsoft roping off newer DirectX versions in it's own OS.
Building new versions without a alternative graphics system in place allows Microsoft to forever decide who will or will not play your game..