AMAZING WORK! But, missed potential.

[Naughty Ram]

So after combing through his twitter and posts to commonly asked questions, I understand that the game will have a couple different modes of gameplay, "prepare/run/modify loop to be the core mechanism of the game", but none of these will truly show the power of what he has created....

I understand that from a design standpoint, that the game was made from the ground up with single player in mind. And that retrofitting the game to support it would just take too long and break too much. So that is understandable.

But what perks my pickle in the wrong way is that he has showed various AI showcases! Ranging from simple spiders that just move at you to npc soldiers that can walk up stairs and through paths made by the player all the way to helicopters that can hunt you down! Its insane! But he is going to squander all of that work on a puzzle game? Thats just...... wrong..... Its like watching some one paint the Monolisa and then just spray paint red over it after it was all finished! Just.... baffling!

If he took a little extra time and started a kickstarter, go fund me, patreon etc.... I know for a fact of life that he could get funding to help him finish the game.

And by finish, I mean making it actually fun. The destruction alone will sell this game hands down. Regardless of the gameplay. But if he wants to make a game that truly shines, he will need to make the game more appealing to the audience that would best fit his creation........!

An FPS game of one sort or another!

Yes I know that sounds boring and un-original, but what better game to exploit such destruction? Battlefield is world renowned for its mediocre environment destruction, could you imagine how much fun an actually destructible warzone would be? I do! And the game was called "Ace of spades" Now known as Open spades, (Before Jagex bought and ruined the game.).

Open Spades is a terrifically fun, if super basic game. And the sole reason people play it is the destruction! Throwing a grenade at a wall to blow it up and breach clear the room is just pure fun! Shooting holes through walls to get that sneaky kill in Rainbow Six Siege is what makes that game so unique and exciting!

But.... Hitting switches and levers...... Running away from a helicopter as the only aspect of gameplay....? Thats just.... boring and a waste of the largest amount of potential I have ever seen. Not to be insulting, truly! Just.... Honest.

I really REALLY really hope the creator reconsiders his path of the game and focus's it more to fit its strengths! The destruction! The chaos! The creativity of an ever changing battlefield! I can only hope he adds something akin the Epic Battle Simulator, where you can fight your way through created missions, or make your own battles to mess around in! Now THAT would be a fun game to play!

[TwentyOne]

the problem here would be that switching it to a multiplayer would most likely ruin the physics component of the game, as it would require a more deterministic physics engine, otherwise you'd have different results on the different clients, and the server would most likely get way too confused.

Also Ace of Spades had a destructible battlefield, but not in this caliber. You saw things cumble down, but those were just effects, basically, from a game standpoint, the thing stopped existing as soon as you cut the structure down, it had no collision box whatsoever.

Making this an FPS would take away the uniqueness that comes with the physics engine. Furthermore, the concept of the game would be entirely gone with it, namely the puzzle mechanic, which is on its own, very unique in its design.

[bakanisan]

Originally posted by TwentyOne:

the problem here would be that switching it to a multiplayer would most likely ruin the physics component of the game, as it would require a more deterministic physics engine, otherwise you'd have different results on the different clients, and the server would most likely get way too confused.

Totally agree. IMO a leaderboard could work.

[TwentyOne]

Originally posted by bakanisan:

Totally agree. IMO a leaderboard could work.

A leaderboard would be an amazing feature aswell, I agree, especially since efficiency would be one of the big reasons to retry a level.

[Torx]

Originally posted by TwentyOne:

the problem here would be that switching it to a multiplayer would most likely ruin the physics component of the game, as it would require a more deterministic physics engine, otherwise you'd have different results on the different clients, and the server would most likely get way too confused.

Also Ace of Spades had a destructible battlefield, but not in this caliber. You saw things cumble down, but those were just effects, basically, from a game standpoint, the thing stopped existing as soon as you cut the structure down, it had no collision box whatsoever.

Making this an FPS would take away the uniqueness that comes with the physics engine. Furthermore, the concept of the game would be entirely gone with it, namely the puzzle mechanic, which is on its own, very unique in its design.

Yeah, I'm afraid multiplayer is only possible via streaming. This ain't Minecraft. The voxel density is much higher, and with much more information in it with a very high state change rate than in Minecraft. It would break the internet!

You either stream via xCloud/Stadia/GeforeNow. Or form your own computer for every additional player. Voxels should contain much more final data than triangles for rendering. So, rendering from a different camera angle for additional players is just a matter of sampling. That's why Nvidia got some new tech for more advanced texture rendering for triangle based engines. It renders whole shaders into an actual texture. A second camera would only require to sample that texture instead of rendering the whole shader again.

It seems Stadia/XCloud found its killer app. Or rather killer engine. Atomontage Engine will be next some time in the future: https://www.atomontage.com/

[TwentyOne]

Originally posted by Monk:

Originally posted by TwentyOne:

the problem here would be that switching it to a multiplayer would most likely ruin the physics component of the game, as it would require a more deterministic physics engine, otherwise you'd have different results on the different clients, and the server would most likely get way too confused.

Also Ace of Spades had a destructible battlefield, but not in this caliber. You saw things cumble down, but those were just effects, basically, from a game standpoint, the thing stopped existing as soon as you cut the structure down, it had no collision box whatsoever.

Making this an FPS would take away the uniqueness that comes with the physics engine. Furthermore, the concept of the game would be entirely gone with it, namely the puzzle mechanic, which is on its own, very unique in its design.

Yeah, I'm afraid multiplayer is only possible via streaming. This ain't Minecraft. The voxel density is much higher, and with much more information in it with a very high state change rate than in Minecraft. It would break the internet!

You either stream via xCloud/Stadia/GeforeNow. Or form your own computer for every additional player. Voxels should contain much more final data than triangles for rendering. So, rendering from a different camera angle for additional players is just a matter of sampling. That's why Nvidia got some new tech for more advanced texture rendering for triangle based engines. It renders whole shaders into an actual texture. A second camera would only require to sample that texture instead of rendering the whole shader again.

It seems Stadia/XCloud found its killer app. Or rather killer engine. Atomontage Engine will be next some time in the future: https://www.atomontage.com/

I mean, again, the main problem here wouldn't be the rendering or the status changes, but rather the method of the physics themselves. I'd guess that this game uses nondeterministic physics calculation, which also include some random variables, which causes the physics to look more real as it's different every time without doing super fine calculations, which would cost way too much computing power than any PC could afford. However, the problem with that are the random elements, as this would mean that the clients wouldn't be able to calculate the physics on their own without causing way too much discrepancies between the different clients (like the breaking of the barricades in R6S, which use nondeterministic physics and thus causes the different clients to not see what the other client is seeing. So the only reliable way would be to transmit the results of those calculation from the server to the client, whoich could cause horrendous lag due to the sheer size increase of the packages.

Due to that, many multiplayer games incorporate deterministic physics calculation, which will always output the same result as long as nothing changes in the scene. That allows PC to do those calculations on their own, instead of having to wait for the server to send those infos with the normal packages. However, these physics calculations will just not look as realistic as nondeterministic physics, simply because in order to achieve the same level of realism, much more factors would have to be incorporated into these calculations, making them even tougher to compute quickly, which would result in either the physics, or the whole game, lagging, both options that wouldn't be worth the trouble.

This isn't a problem due to the engine, but rather due to the computing power we currently have access to, and the limit of the players' internet speeds.

[Torx]

Originally posted by TwentyOne:

Originally posted by Monk:

Yeah, I'm afraid multiplayer is only possible via streaming. This ain't Minecraft. The voxel density is much higher, and with much more information in it with a very high state change rate than in Minecraft. It would break the internet!

You either stream via xCloud/Stadia/GeforeNow. Or form your own computer for every additional player. Voxels should contain much more final data than triangles for rendering. So, rendering from a different camera angle for additional players is just a matter of sampling. That's why Nvidia got some new tech for more advanced texture rendering for triangle based engines. It renders whole shaders into an actual texture. A second camera would only require to sample that texture instead of rendering the whole shader again.

It seems Stadia/XCloud found its killer app. Or rather killer engine. Atomontage Engine will be next some time in the future: https://www.atomontage.com/

I mean, again, the main problem here wouldn't be the rendering or the status changes, but rather the method of the physics themselves. I'd guess that this game uses nondeterministic physics calculation, which also include some random variables, which causes the physics to look more real as it's different every time without doing super fine calculations, which would cost way too much computing power than any PC could afford. However, the problem with that are the random elements, as this would mean that the clients wouldn't be able to calculate the physics on their own without causing way too much discrepancies between the different clients (like the breaking of the barricades in R6S, which use nondeterministic physics and thus causes the different clients to not see what the other client is seeing. So the only reliable way would be to transmit the results of those calculation from the server to the client, whoich could cause horrendous lag due to the sheer size increase of the packages.

Due to that, many multiplayer games incorporate deterministic physics calculation, which will always output the same result as long as nothing changes in the scene. That allows PC to do those calculations on their own, instead of having to wait for the server to send those infos with the normal packages. However, these physics calculations will just not look as realistic as nondeterministic physics, simply because in order to achieve the same level of realism, much more factors would have to be incorporated into these calculations, making them even tougher to compute quickly, which would result in either the physics, or the whole game, lagging, both options that wouldn't be worth the trouble.

This isn't a problem due to the engine, but rather due to the computing power we currently have access to, and the limit of the players' internet speeds.

I'm not a physics programmer, but aside that I'm a Functional Programmer (.Net F#), so a deterministic programmer, it's also needed for multi threading. But of course multi threading also opens up more processing power. So, these days, thanks to AMD, that may not be true anymore!?

I figure if the dev wanted to, he could. However, my point was that even if he decided, it wouldn't matter. Because it would break the internet for good either way. There may be only one single way around it whether the devs or we like it or not, or willing to kill some FPS or not.

Well. There is a second way depending on how much data that really is which only the dev can tell. One can make sacrifices depending on the needs of the game design.

If the smoke or any gas doesn't kill, it's accurate location ain't that important per frame. If broken line of sight ain't that important either, than smoke or gas not being the same on all clients is OK, too. So, there won't be a per frame update required anymore. Maybe instead, the engine would only send hints, so that the clients then try to adjust their volumetric computations towards instead. Just to prevent getting too off with the end results. Somebody will notice on the internet. Somebody always does... :)

[Ponlets]

i dont know why people want every game to be multiplayer

seriously stop pushing your trends onto an already unique game

and the idea for "streaming to add another player" is kinda stupid as that would still use the same cables to just be on the internet only via a different client

i personally would love this to be an FPS game and i can even see this having potential as a fun FlatOut style racing game with all the building destruction and because the AI already is really competent

i can easily see this as a Left for dead or Survival game as well as the foundation for nearly any game really

it can be the bones of a solid first person shooter like red faction geurilla but better in every way

it can be the bones of a racing game like Flatout Ultimate carnage or even a Burnout style game (imagine crash junctions in Burnout revenge but with the same destructive capacity of this game)

i mean really ... the physics in this game can be used to be the bones in nearly any game if done right

[AndroidApple]

i do agree and all but an FPS game really. I was thinking more sandbox, i love to express my creativity through destruction and good graphics.

[Naughty Ram]

A sandbox would be fun, but hard to make viable. Every building he has showcased is a legit building, with supports, rafters, foundations etc.... Would be an immense amount of work for just one person. To limit its scope to a more streamlined view is just over all more realistic for a single dev.

Something that could be fun with the destruction and fps aesthetic would be to have a base to defend. Key points in the base that need destroyed to cut off defenses.

Ex: Base is the where-house from the demo. The out lying buildings each have a computer that if destroyed, cuts off a defense, like friendly soldier respawns. Increasingly harder waves attack the base until the where-house is ultimately destroyed. In terms of sandbox, the could make pre-made defenses you can place down like sandbag walls, turrets, etc. This means that in the between waves, you could try to patch up the holes in the building etc.

In the reverse end, you could Rainbowsix it, and assault defended based, blowing your way through the walls to kill the leader/rescue hostage/Collect the intel.

[Corrie]

The last thing the world needs is another online, multiplayer FPS game.

[thizbe]

Bloodthorn i personally would be willing to place different sort of blocks to create a strong structure, maybe fire retardant insulation upgrades?

[tommy_beast]

Originally posted by Corrie:

The last thing the world needs is another online, multiplayer FPS game.

Totally agree. I don't understand why there are so many people who this game to be another multiplayer garbage.

[esx9]

I'm glad that the scope of the game is being kept small. I will buy this game just to mess around in the destructible environment and help fund future efforts with this kind of engine. I can't say I'm enthused about pulling levers and whatever but it's just a simple mechanic to make a game at all, hopefully this will bring a team together that can focus in the future on more elaborate efforts. Take it slow and don't bite off more than you can chew at one time.

[Michael Johnsen]

"The destruction alone will sell this game hands down."

You said it, OP. And he got an award for his current idea, so I'm sure he will stick to it for now.

[Eldershire]

I am personally hoping for dev tools.
The first thing I thought when seeing this was zombie survival, and I hope that can be created.