Multiplayer??

[BumblingBasilisk]

Any news on maybe multiplayer in near future.

[Alcator]

Why? What would be the benefit of multiplayer?

Would it be competitive? If so, the winning strategy would be to just fill the "enemy" base with roads that they couldn't remove, blocking their progress.

Would it be cooperative? If so, what precisely could you accomplish with that that you cannot accomplish alone with multiple districts?

[Sellaetus]

You shouldn't answer a question with a question just FYI, and some people just enjoying playing with friends, I wouldn't mind playing with my brother. No need to be an ass

[Alcator]

Originally posted by Sellaetus:

You shouldn't answer a question with a question just FYI, and some people just enjoying playing with friends, I wouldn't mind playing with my brother. No need to be an ass

I have offered CMPREZ "food for thought" -- something to contemplate and to try to answer.

There are games that are not really suitable for multiplayer, so I asked him to explain why he thinks THIS GAME would make sense in multiplayer.

[Ghougle]

I think Factorio. Coop and not PVP. I personally like the idea, but when I have 159 building blueprints still waiting to be built, I wonder how long I would need to wait to build something. Sometimes those things are needed for surviving the next drought. But, an option to build in MP on Easy or something sounds fun to me.

[aaror]

Originally posted by Alcator:

Why? What would be the benefit of multiplayer?

Would it be competitive? If so, the winning strategy would be to just fill the "enemy" base with roads that they couldn't remove, blocking their progress.

Would it be cooperative? If so, what precisely could you accomplish with that that you cannot accomplish alone with multiple districts?

Definitely cooperative. As for what I could accomplish, I could play a fun relaxed game with my kids.

But if you don't have friends I can see why you would attack every suggestion of multiplayer.

[Alcator]

Originally posted by aaror:

Originally posted by Alcator:

Why? What would be the benefit of multiplayer?

Would it be competitive? If so, the winning strategy would be to just fill the "enemy" base with roads that they couldn't remove, blocking their progress.

Would it be cooperative? If so, what precisely could you accomplish with that that you cannot accomplish alone with multiple districts?

Definitely cooperative. As for what I could accomplish, I could play a fun relaxed game with my kids.

But if you don't have friends I can see why you would attack every suggestion of multiplayer.

1. Personal attacks are not necessary.
2. How would the game resolve accidental conflict between "cooperating" players? Would you be able to delete something placed by the other player? What if your kid accidentally clicks a road inside your town, and it prevents you from building something? What if your kid cannot find how to clear that obstacle from your town? If you could delete another player's stuff, what if your kid accidentally deleted your Level 3 Monument?

[aaror]

Originally posted by Alcator:

Originally posted by aaror:

Definitely cooperative. As for what I could accomplish, I could play a fun relaxed game with my kids.

But if you don't have friends I can see why you would attack every suggestion of multiplayer.

1. Personal attacks are not necessary.
2. How would the game resolve accidental conflict between "cooperating" players? Would you be able to delete something placed by the other player? What if your kid accidentally clicks a road inside your town, and it prevents you from building something? What if your kid cannot find how to clear that obstacle from your town? If you could delete another player's stuff, what if your kid accidentally deleted your Level 3 Monument?

I imagine a setting that remembers who placed an item that takes resources and lets you decide if folks can delete items other players built would be trivial. As for roads, since they are free to place I imagine letting anyone delete them would be fine. So no problems, good talk.

[crowtalker]

Yes this would be a cute game to play with family and friends. I see this request a lot with single player city builder games.

Most people do not realize the amount of time and resources this would take. There is no switch to pull or button to push to make it multiplayer. It would be like starting over, program wise.
This would also need servers to host games on, which opens a whole new universe of problems and bugs and performance issues.


If this was possible, I see competitive boiling down to who can flood out the other first. Both would have to start with access to water. Then of course the next step would be adding guns, then boats, then missiles, then thermonuclear devices. Which of course would lead to the next game because the beavers would end up just like the humans...extinct.

[Philtre]

Originally posted by aaror:

Definitely cooperative. As for what I could accomplish, I could play a fun relaxed game with my kids.

Considering that it interaction with the game is fairly sporadic and simple, can't you both just be in the same room, talk over your decisions, and share the keyboard where necessary?

If you mean each player having separate settlements that they each individually and separately control, that would require completely rewriting the game. You're not asking the devs to add a feature, you're asking them to start over and make a different game with the same art assets.

[aaror]

Originally posted by Philtre:

Originally posted by aaror:

Definitely cooperative. As for what I could accomplish, I could play a fun relaxed game with my kids.

Considering that it interaction with the game is fairly sporadic and simple, can't you both just be in the same room, talk over your decisions, and share the keyboard where necessary?

If you mean each player having separate settlements that they each individually and separately control, that would require completely rewriting the game. You're not asking the devs to add a feature, you're asking them to start over and make a different game with the same art assets.

Well, lets split the difference. Since you generally need multiple districts and it is a pain to manage several, let my kid run one of my districts from a different computer.

[Philtre]

Originally posted by aaror:

Well, lets split the difference. Since you generally need multiple districts and it is a pain to manage several, let my kid run one of my districts from a different computer.

The "different computer" part is what brings up all the underlying infrastructure that has to be fundamentally overhauled to allow syncing the game world between multiple simultaneous instances; like I said, it would be close to writing a whole new game with the same art. It's a big ask for a small dev team; not saying it will never happen, but I wouldn't hold my breath. I don't know if that's where they want to put their effort, considering that the single-player game isn't even finished.

[Rudolf Fischer]

Wouldn´t it be easier to do it prison architect like. All controlling the same team at the same time. So their have just to be a stream which is controllable - so mapping the mouse position an grabbing the keayboard.

So just coop-multiplayer and same team. But that would be great enough with 3 or 4 players.

[mikeydsc]

1 - MP takes lots and lots or resources and money.
2 - Lag or rubber banding
3 - Whos paying for these servers in the long run? (matchmaking/lobby)
4 - PC security - how do you stop nefarious acts when the game doesnt account of this?
5 - Syncing/desyning issues - how to resolve?
6 - Map size and lag - it already lags around 200 to 300 population for different folks.
7 - Your neighbor blocks/diverts your water - what then?
8 - Mixing IT with FT tribes?

These are just a few of the things that take away from the development and can compromise your system if someone hacks it because the game doesnt know how to protect against it. This means hiring a body that specializes in net code - costly.

[Rudolf Fischer]

Originally posted by mikeydsc:

3 - Whos paying for these servers in the long run? (matchmaking/lobby)
4 - PC security - how do you stop nefarious acts when the game doesnt account of this?
5 - Syncing/desyning issues - how to resolve?

I don´t like to play on 3rdpartyservers. I am a peer, my friend too - or one hosts and joins on his own host and the friend on the host. I usually don´t buy games with 3rd-party server force. After a few years the servers go down and you can´t play the game anymore.

[mikeydsc]

Originally posted by Rudolf Fischer:

Originally posted by mikeydsc:

3 - Whos paying for these servers in the long run? (matchmaking/lobby)
4 - PC security - how do you stop nefarious acts when the game doesnt account of this?
5 - Syncing/desyning issues - how to resolve?

I don´t like to play on 3rdpartyservers. I am a peer, my friend too - or one hosts and joins on his own host and the friend on the host. I usually don´t buy games with 3rd-party server force. After a few years the servers go down and you can´t play the game anymore.

Yes, P2P might work, but still, once you open those ports, its still an avenue of attack that the game does not secure against. MP opens your system to unwanted guests, and if no protection is built in, then what? Cheaters can hack the bleep out of you without you knowing by setting a script to activate say 2 weeks later.

This is an easy way to get a bot network going.