PC Developer Discussions: Alpha 17

Developer Discussions: Alpha 17

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8 is what they recommend. Technically 8 doesn't have to be the max if you don't want it to be.
Have seen servers with max set to 60 or higher...I would dread being on one with that many on at once on a horde night

 
I would like TFP to attempt a planet 7d2d. Nothing as big as the Earth or anything, just enough so the player can't realize the curve while traveling that much.

Eventually the planet would be fully generated, unlike how it is in A16.4(b8), where it basically can continue to gen as long as you have enough space to do so, gobbling up more and more resources till eventually it crashes.
+1 to this

I also believe what makes us under-estimate RGW as small is the world end border.

Every time I get radiated, I get small disappointed.

 
Have seen servers with max set to 60 or higher...I would dread being on one with that many on at once on a horde night
? Sorry a little confused what you are saying. As far as horde night goes if 60 are on it still is based on what level you are and how many deaths you have with the ones that come around you. Don't play with that many so someone else can be more specific as to if someone else is near you that is higher level and less deaths/ not died in awhile.

As far as the new map goes for hordes, if a server has that many players on at once I would hope they went in and made the map bigger for this many players.

 
Have seen servers with max set to 60 or higher...I would dread being on one with that many on at once on a horde night
Well you can always set player count higher but TFP is developing the game for max 8.

I wonder if that wouldn’t lag

 
Based on what people have talked about most people log off during hordes. I have seen some on twitch have sub servers going and several people be playing and right at horde only 6 people was on everyone else logged off.

 
I hope they change both their "minimum hardware" and "recommended hardware" to slightly higher specifications, it's better to error on the high side than to miss and have disappointed customers.

 
In A16 you can go away from (0,0) approximately 10km in any direction. This is what is called a radius. The map has a diameter of 20km. This is how an approximate size of 314 sq km was calculated. 10x10 = 100 --> 100 x 3.14 = 314
Kinyajuu has confirmed that the new size is a square map that is 8km x 8km which means a total size of 64 sq. km. 8 x 8 = 64.

So the map will be considerably smaller but more densely filled with POI's. This is better for some playstyles and worse for others. So that is how some people can talk about how it is better and how others can talk about it is worse and nobody has to be deep in anyone's ass. Although, there may be a problem with at least one person who thinks everyone plays the game the same way as them....
I'll withhold most of my judgment until I actually play it for myself. But, I can't help but to make a few assumptions. It sure seems like a step backwards not forwards to reduce the size of the playfield while simultaneously adding vehicles that transverse that playfield even faster. A Gyrocopter would make a square map 8 KM across feel quite small relative to what we are used to with this game. If you're at 0 - you can only go 4 KM in any direction and you're at the edge. I have routinely traveled further than 4 KM from 0 on this game.

I doubt we will get much performance improvement from this anyway. Whenever an optimization enters the game, they seem to just use that padding to add something else that takes what you got in return. Despite promises of the contrary, the performance of the game has continually (for the most part) went down with each Alpha release (which is actually expected and understandable). But, don't say it's for performance and then just steal that boosted performance for a lesser similarly intensive feature. I played A10 a couple months ago and it was running at several hundred frames per second most of the time compared to latest version where I had continually hit severe drops in various scenes. If all they're doing is just shifting around resources, I'd say there's very little you could add to the game that could take the place of taking 75-80% of the map size away. About the only thing worth trading map size for is zombie counts. However, I never found map size to ever translate to raw FPS performance on CPU or GPU in past Alphas. Memory usage and loading times are about the only things that were affected.

Unless they completely changed how the map loads, the biggest difference I ever saw in map size was the size of the save files on servers and the memory usage on that first load. If you increased the map size - the pregeneration took exponentially longer and the amount of space taken up by the files was larger.

 
Please Tell me When the Patch out,I can not handle it anymore
:apathy:
First, welcome to the forum.

Second, I know a guy who tried the patch, didn't like it. Gave him a rash something terrible. Tried the gum and it gave him a sore throat.

Later, many a method and many a tear later, he just stayed with the smokes. Good choice.

Alpha 17 sometime around September. Tell yourself October that way anything sooner will be a nice surprise.

 
The console version has always had a much smaller map than PC. Running into the radiated end was common and always a nuisance. Though, I trust the developments vision for this game so I reserve criticism until I play a17 myself.

 
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I would like TFP to attempt a planet 7d2d. Nothing as big as the Earth or anything, just enough so the player can't realize the curve while traveling that much.

Eventually the planet would be fully generated, unlike how it is in A16.4(b8), where it basically can continue to gen as long as you have enough space to do so, gobbling up more and more resources till eventually it crashes.
+1 to this

There are several games out there with voxel worlds, the first that comes to mind for me is space engineers. I accept that for now making the game work right is a more valid goal, it is something that isn't an unreasonable expectation in the final product, and I for one would buy the game all over again at twice the price for such a world that would run on my potatoe.

 
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+1 to thisThere are several games out there with voxel worlds, the first that comes to mind for me is space engineers. I accept that for now making the game work right is a more valid goal, it is something that isn't an unreasonable expectation in the final product, and I for one would buy the game all over again at twice the price for such a world that would run on my potatoe.
Do you want a three year wait for the next update? Because that's how you get a three year wait for the next update. :-)

In all seriousness... I'd like that for their next game but spherical terrain is a whole new kettle of worms. I'd like to see something the size of a real planet myself, no game has achieved that so far. It's definitely on my wishlist of things to do although I doubt I'll go so far as doing it voxel. Where would you store all of the data?

 
@Doc: You must see the error in what you typed seeing as we are in the Alpha phase of the game where the main point is to add in all the features. What other purpose could there be right now for optimization than to be able to have the “currency” needed to fit in the next feature desired?

If you’re wanting optimizations to yield you a final state best running game instead of a good enough for testing indev project then perhaps you should wait until the phase that best fits what you’re looking for.

I get that some of you are feeling alpha fatigue. If so, play something that feels finished and polished and.....released. Constructive feedback is always welcome but the complaints that essentially are: “I’m treating this as a finished product so why don’t the developers?” Is not constructive.

Stop using optimizations to make room for the next feature during the Alpha phase? Did you miss your coffee this morning Doc?

 
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things I want to see in A18: KSP-style space flight, moon bases, zombies in space suits, Mars bases, kinetic orbital bombardment, zombie sharks with jet packs and laser beams

But seriously though I'm just hanging out here hoping the topic of map sizes is exhausted soon. I almost wish we were discussing backpack sizes again.

 
My wife doesn't like me looking at those sort of files.Wait, what?
That must be from when you spent so much time checking out Paris and your wife was happy until she discovered which Hilton you were staring at.

Map size is going to be ok, except for people that want more than eight people playing PVP. This all reminds me of the time they got rid of insta-loot and added timers. It didn't ruin the game but made it better.

 
Do you want a three year wait for the next update? Because that's how you get a three year wait for the next update. :-)
In all seriousness... I'd like that for their next game but spherical terrain is a whole new kettle of worms. I'd like to see something the size of a real planet myself, no game has achieved that so far. It's definitely on my wishlist of things to do although I doubt I'll go so far as doing it voxel. Where would you store all of the data?
Do I want a 3 year wait...no. But then again 1 hasn't killed me yet, and I am not demanding a voxel world but a man can dream.

As far as storing the data, the worlds in space engineers are large enough so that at least from the surface of the world it seems endless. I have headed off walking/running west for hours IRL and never hit world wrap; and those worlds don't take up a lot of resources. True these aren't world sized worlds, but they offer a mind mindbogglingly large but finite map. I haven't checked the actual numbers but at a "wild" guess an area of around 30k Km^2

 
RE: Being unable to tell if a zombie is dead-dead.

You don't need a health bar. You simply need to pay attention. They might or might not make a sound when you hit them. That doesn't matter.

The true indicator of whether a zombie is dead or not is this - They, invariably and without fail, turn into loot containers.

So... That means you watch for the "Press E to search " type dialogue to pop up. That will confirm if it's dead or not. And depending on various factors, this pops up as soon as your weapon hits in melee, and they start to fall. - If they're on the ground you don't have that, but it should still pop up before you look away.

Or if you're worried about it, pick a position that puts them in front of you. Never leave a potential enemy at your back.

 
RE: Being unable to tell if a zombie is dead-dead.
You don't need a health bar. You simply need to pay attention. They might or might not make a sound when you hit them. That doesn't matter.

The true indicator of whether a zombie is dead or not is this - They, invariably and without fail, turn into loot containers.

So... That means you watch for the "Press E to search " type dialogue to pop up. That will confirm if it's dead or not. And depending on various factors, this pops up as soon as your weapon hits in melee, and they start to fall. - If they're on the ground you don't have that, but it should still pop up before you look away.

Or if you're worried about it, pick a position that puts them in front of you. Never leave a potential enemy at your back.
Rule #2: double tap.

If a zombie is down, whack it again to be sure.

 
? Sorry a little confused what you are saying. As far as horde night goes if 60 are on it still is based on what level you are and how many deaths you have with the ones that come around you. Don't play with that many so someone else can be more specific as to if someone else is near you that is higher level and less deaths/ not died in awhile.
As far as the new map goes for hordes, if a server has that many players on at once I would hope they went in and made the map bigger for this many players.

Well you can always set player count higher but TFP is developing the game for max 8.
I wonder if that wouldn’t lag
Was talking about servers having 60 players on at once. Now all of them are looting everywhere on a smaller map. Even if those 60 weren't on at that time there could be 60 different players on. Now they are looting...and there could be a 3rd or even 4th lot that comes on at a different time. Now all of them have started a base and put down their land claim blocks. The amount of livable and lootable space for each server player gets smaller and smaller and is made even more so with a smaller map.

And (although nothing to do with map size, just mentioned it as an after thought) add to that the horde night chaos of 60 players on with the max amount of zombies on also. The lag I imagaine would be terrible.

 
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