Author Topic: New efforts!  (Read 7210691 times)

brothermutant

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28400 on: March 26, 2018, 04:37:30 PM »
While I agree that I don't believe all three (or more) of the successor projects will have viable alphas/betas to look at or test, I can hope that at least one gives me what I am hoping for, a true successor to CoH that makes me FEEL like a hero again. Having said that, the two (so far) that look promising are: Valiance Online and Ship of Heroes. Weird, as I assumed the City of Titans would be the one, but since they have yet to really show me anything I am interested in (powers, travel modes, in depth area design), I'll just have to reserve judgement on them until they do.

As for the other two, I recently stumbled across a few Youtube vids for both Valiance Online and SoH and they BOTH have put in some really nice preliminary work. SoH moreso, but I did like looking at Valiance's version of a MM- It was a main character who had three soldiers that had pretty nice detail in their models. SoH impressed me with their power set videos- I think I saw fire, dark, and electric power sets (10 power picks for each), and a RANGED tank set that used a rifle for some nice animations and sound effects. There was a katana wielder as well but I didn't see a vid showcasing their power picks. That and an already developing city and mission innurds make me happy for the future of at least SoH and what they may have to offer us by the end of 2018; PLUS, SoH seems to be taking updates extremely seriously, constantly showing us what they have been working on.

Let's hope that the other successors come with as much fervor as SoH is providing. I would really like to have at least one subscription by the end of the year. I would happily pay for the "best" two I think deserve my money until one proves to be the clear winner of my money.

Noyjitat

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28401 on: March 26, 2018, 10:43:39 PM »
The lore updates are a waste of time if you ask me.  Nothing more than undercooked and overblown short stories.  Written by wannabe writers who think that because they were moderately better than everyone else in their creative writing class that they can manage creating an encyclopedia of unnecessary background on NPCs no one knows or cares about yet.  I get the feeling they've got an overstuffed file folder full of these little stories that they pull out when they don't actually have a meaningful update to give the backers.

And people say I'm cold blooded  :) I get what you're saying mate but some people really do like having some stories or character lore when possible. If anything its better than complete and utter silence.

Taceus Jiwede

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28402 on: March 27, 2018, 01:53:12 AM »
The lore updates are a waste of time if you ask me.  Nothing more than undercooked and overblown short stories.  Written by wannabe writers who think that because they were moderately better than everyone else in their creative writing class that they can manage creating an encyclopedia of unnecessary background on NPCs no one knows or cares about yet.  I get the feeling they've got an overstuffed file folder full of these little stories that they pull out when they don't actually have a meaningful update to give the backers.

The devs are saying that the visual updates will come faster and more frequently now because they've crossed this invisible line of behind-the-scenes technical progress, but only time will tell.  It's coming up 5 years since they started, and yeah the team is working on this project "for free", but there comes a point in time when the good faith and leeway runs out.

You could have cut the part where you insult a person's creative work.  Something that, believes it or not, takes courage to release to people who, like yourself, might possibly shit all over it.  You make a good point that lore updates only satisfy so much, but you don't have to actively insult the person's creative attempts.  Especially because the only way to get better at writing and releasing lore, is to write and release lore.  If you want it to be good by release, it can't be the first draft.

You made good points but you could have cut all that personal attacks on developers who in actuality, owe you nothing.
« Last Edit: March 27, 2018, 02:00:24 AM by Taceus Jiwede »

ivanhedgehog

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28403 on: March 27, 2018, 06:10:43 AM »
And people say I'm cold blooded  :) I get what you're saying mate but some people really do like having some stories or character lore when possible. If anything its better than complete and utter silence.

I will learn the lore when I am in game, until then it doesnt make much sense to me. But that is my personal preference. There isnt anything wrong with having it and for the people that like it reading all about it, but I prefer to play it.

LateNights

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28404 on: March 27, 2018, 03:16:32 PM »
Lore is great - gives a chance to think of characters to make that fit within the game world...

MWRuger

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28405 on: March 27, 2018, 08:52:26 PM »
I was part of COT when it first started. CoH had just closed and they got tons of volunteers. 90% of them were people who wanted to write lore or maybe do art. Coders were much more rare. They wanted to be inclusive and anybody who wanted to work on was welcome. The ended up with a lot of groups and a lot of lore. Most of them left after a few months. I had to as well because my mom died and I just couldn't deal with both losses at once.

It took time to organize and get people on point. I don't know what has been going since I left, but I do know that those who were driving the project were committed to doing this. It's ridiculously tough thing to do and if they succeed it will actually be one for the record books.

What if it takes a while? How old will you be in two years if CoT comes out? (Hint: the same as if it doesn't)

Believe me, no one wants CoH back more than me. I'm a broken record when i say "I just want to play CoH before I die". But if that doesn't happen I will still applaud the effort that is being done.
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Arcana

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28406 on: March 27, 2018, 09:14:07 PM »
I seem to recall that it took Cryptic about 4 or 5 years, give or take, to create CoH, and that's what they were paid to do.

I'm not sure how much of the 1999 work ended up in the final release.  Based on my understanding, which comes mostly from at the time dev diaries and some knowledge of how the game worked I'd say there was probably about 60 man-years in the launched game between technology and content.

Arcana

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28407 on: March 27, 2018, 09:26:36 PM »
I was part of COT when it first started. CoH had just closed and they got tons of volunteers. 90% of them were people who wanted to write lore or maybe do art. Coders were much more rare. They wanted to be inclusive and anybody who wanted to work on was welcome. The ended up with a lot of groups and a lot of lore. Most of them left after a few months. I had to as well because my mom died and I just couldn't deal with both losses at once.

It took time to organize and get people on point. I don't know what has been going since I left, but I do know that those who were driving the project were committed to doing this. It's ridiculously tough thing to do and if they succeed it will actually be one for the record books.

A lot of people assume the biggest difference between a professional game developer and a volunteer is that the professional has more experience.  That's actually not true.  The biggest difference between a professional game developer and a volunteer that is very significant for projects like this is a professional is used to doing what needs to be done.  A volunteer does what they think they do best.  Five professionals can make a game in a year, easy.  Fifty volunteers will take twenty times longer unless you get extraordinarily lucky about the composition of those fifty people, and no one is that lucky.

duane

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28408 on: March 28, 2018, 02:47:31 PM »
Re:  organizing 50 human volunteers....

Humans are far easier to organize when a starfish is on their face and centrally controlled....

Azrael

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28409 on: March 28, 2018, 05:16:22 PM »
I seem to remember an interview where Jack Emmert said that City of Heroes took about 19 months to make..?

Azrael.

Twisted Toon

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28410 on: March 28, 2018, 05:45:54 PM »
I'm not sure how much of the 1999 work ended up in the final release.  Based on my understanding, which comes mostly from at the time dev diaries and some knowledge of how the game worked I'd say there was probably about 60 man-years in the launched game between technology and content.

Probably not much ended up in the final release. however, they did work on it, and decided what would fit and what wouldn't fit in the final release. In my, albeit, little experience, of coding, I have written a lot of code (relatively) that was erased and replaced by something else that was a better fit for what I was wanting. Granted, I know some coders get paid by the line of code. So, the stuff they write is bloated and cumbersome to read and/or edit. At least, that's what my programming teachers told me in college.

I do consider the brainstorming and early drafts part of the creation process of working on a project. Even if the early drafts don't work out. all of that still takes time.

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GoodGirl

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28411 on: March 31, 2018, 04:34:41 AM »
Sorry if someone has already brought this up, there's... A LOT of pages to go through. I only found out recently a new law passed that affects the US and UK says that a game that has been shut down for 5 years means the license holder loses exclusivity rights. That means CoH could be launched right now, and NCSoft can't do anything. If the resources, assets, etc. are available, there is no longer any requirement to even bother with NCSoft. Is everyone aware of this already?

Angel Phoenix77

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28412 on: March 31, 2018, 06:45:33 AM »
Sorry if someone has already brought this up, there's... A LOT of pages to go through. I only found out recently a new law passed that affects the US and UK says that a game that has been shut down for 5 years means the license holder loses exclusivity rights. That means CoH could be launched right now, and NCSoft can't do anything. If the resources, assets, etc. are available, there is no longer any requirement to even bother with NCSoft. Is everyone aware of this already?
While that is good news. There is also bad news. Someone cant relaunch City of. The reason being is that ncsoft used Statesman and Black Widow in their ill-conceived moba.
One day the Phoenix will rise again.

Sinistar

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28413 on: March 31, 2018, 06:07:19 PM »
Ah good to be back home from the hospital.

As to using States and GW in their moba,  could COH not be modified in some capacity to alter or remove GW?  Statesman was already killed off.


As to the law, that is great however to my knowledge only NCSoft has the code/resources for a relaunch.......unless Positron kept secret off site backups.....just speculating.
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Brigadine

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28414 on: March 31, 2018, 09:46:27 PM »
Nate has basically disappeared it seems lately...

ivanhedgehog

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28415 on: March 31, 2018, 11:49:03 PM »
Nate has basically disappeared it seems lately...
he is busy with MWM and life has slapped him around for a bit...things happen. Hope he is doing well now though.

Brigadine

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28416 on: April 01, 2018, 02:47:20 AM »
he is busy with MWM and life has slapped him around for a bit...things happen. Hope he is doing well now though.
Ah ok :)

Azrael

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28417 on: April 01, 2018, 12:56:43 PM »
Sorry if someone has already brought this up, there's... A LOT of pages to go through. I only found out recently a new law passed that affects the US and UK says that a game that has been shut down for 5 years means the license holder loses exclusivity rights. That means CoH could be launched right now, and NCSoft can't do anything. If the resources, assets, etc. are available, there is no longer any requirement to even bother with NCSoft. Is everyone aware of this already?

Intrigue.

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Dev7on

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28418 on: April 01, 2018, 03:25:17 PM »
Sorry if someone has already brought this up, there's... A LOT of pages to go through. I only found out recently a new law passed that affects the US and UK says that a game that has been shut down for 5 years means the license holder loses exclusivity rights. That means CoH could be launched right now, and NCSoft can't do anything. If the resources, assets, etc. are available, there is no longer any requirement to even bother with NCSoft. Is everyone aware of this already?

Are you talking about the DMCA rule thing?

duane

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Re: New efforts!
« Reply #28419 on: April 01, 2018, 09:27:34 PM »
Are you talking about the DMCA rule thing?

pretty much non-event.