All Posts by Polarization

8 years of hopes, dreams and fantasy based almost entirely on

8 years of developers talking vaguely and ambiguously with very little substantiation about how wonderful and awesome there game is.

Equals highly unrealistic expectations.

Anything that threatens those highly unrealistic expectations, like common sense or reality provoke angry emotional responses due to cognitive dissonance.

They also stimulate cult / faith based like behaviour, and the “us and them” mentality, the prophet Tasos insists the promised land that is perpetually just over the horizon will be coming soon, weak minded and emotionally unstable people or just the plain desperate are very susceptible to varying degrees to this.

The true believers and newly converted simply brandish their feature list Bible of developer quotes as “proof” whenever the accursed unbelievers and heretics dare to question their faith.

I agree if this game was not announced nearly 8 years before its current official release date and did not have 8 years of developer and community hype behind it.

It would only have the very minimal following that all amateur, first time and part time developed, extended/delayed, overly ambitious MMO projects with convoluted historys and extremly poor community relations that have not demonstrated much have, it would be very small and would be mostly Greek.

If Darkfall was announced today there would probably only be a single post on the open beta discussion board with a few incredulous responses, and the game would be forgotten again until beta actually started.

Keep the faith alive!, after all there’s always “next week” or if all else fails “soon” to believe in.

Whatever happened to “Beta in October”, or is that already forgotten, looks like it.

I wonder if AVE were just wrong like all the supporters, or if they were lied to.

The latest game play video shows why they have not shown a game play video before since the 2005 alpha one in my opinion.

Looks like they have spent most of the last 3 years just improving the graphics, I do hope they have not been attempting to polish a turd for the last 3 years.

The UI is identical to the UI shown in the screenshots from 2006!, after 2 years and they have not even worked on the UI, not to mention unbelievable things like place holder 1st person human hands for all races in a game that’s apparently feature complete and in the polishing and bug fixing stage 2 months from release.

The spells and skills names are still the same place holder names from the 2006 UI screenshots!, after 2 years they still have not named the spells and skills properly, unbelievable.

I can easily imagine that whatever we have not seen in this latest game play video (and that’s the majority of the games features listed on the official FAQ) are probably worse or even non existent.

But no need to worry because Aventurine recently officially said beta will be finished by December and the game will launch in 2008, its not like Aventurine have ever lied or missed a deadline before now is it.

And I’m sure if Aventurine has any setbacks they will be forthcoming and truthful with their community about any problems they might encounter and will explain the situation in detail, just like they have always done before.

I’m 100% confident that Aventurine will announce open beta/play testing will start today so they can get at least 1 month of beta actually using 1000's of  real people before release.

After all its been a month since they last updated their community which is set to become their customers in 2 months time, and that surely can only mean one thing, that everything is going perfectly to plan.

A community news blackout for a whole month, 2 months before launch.

You have got to be kidding me, absolutely outstanding.

Aventurines blatant disregard for its potential financial success is impressive indeed.

Only in Darkfallland are such things possible and accepted so obsequiously.

If things are not going to plan, saying absolutely nothing until the last possible moment is the worst possible thing Tasos could do at this stage considering how he has been assuring us everything has been going so well up to now.

I predicted a riot! (on the official community forums).
 

Originally posted by Greek_Matt

Wha...? I mean sure, blind patriotism is all well and good, but neither the Greek political climate nor their historical philosophical roots really have anything to do with the ability of an garage-band dev team (who are not all Greeks, not that that makes any difference at all) trying to pull a miracle out of their ass by claiming they have the greatest MMO ever and are ready to release it within the next two months.

I've seen plenty of shit things come out of Greece too, Darkfall is just going to be another one to add to the list. Either Tasos and his boys will crack under the weight of fan expectation (desperation) and release a broken, bug-ridden, poorly tested POS before the new year, or they'll delay it yet again for the hundredth time and go back to trying to bring their game up to something that at least looks like it was released this decade. Of course by then another decade will have passed, and they'll be back to square one. Again.

Unfortunately I think your on the money with this one.

Objectively looking at the latest game play video from the ADW event supports this very clearly in my opinion, and shows why they have shown so little of this game until now.

2 months from launch and they still have place holder human hand graphics in first person view for all races.

Still only Place holder names and stats for spell and skill icons.

Very poor and jerky animations, running animation is just walking animation but faster for example, no animations for mounting and dismounting, no or very poor transition animations.

Still running around in the same empty lifeless world with very few NPC’s and Mobs we have seen glimpses of before.

Exactly the same basic and very clunky UI we saw in a few screenshots from 2006, dragging each separate group member UI box and arranging them looks tedious for example.

Melee combat is just hack and slash single button mashing, no tactics or melee skills used, no blocking used or directional attacks.

Target reticule covered by players character in 3rd person view going to get very annoying very fast.

Mobs and players warping and lagging and the game crashing or losing connection at the end , but I’m sure we wont see any of that come release.

Many major and minor inconsistent design and graphical decisions, from little things like the big silly “Flaming Skull” sign post in English for Orc Capital or the hover tanks and pirates of the Caribbean ships total immersion breakers for me, no hit animations when mounted, lacklustre spell effects etc.

So called Revolutionary advanced AI looks no different from normal FPS Bots.

In my opinion they have spent most of the last few years unnecessarily improving some of the graphics probably in a futile attempt to make this game appear competitive, because they are the only thing I have seen so far that has dramatically improved , but it appears they have neglected or have been unable to address rudimentary basics, and have made very questionable design decisions.

Everything else is mostly the same or has still not been shown in any detail, for example combat in the latest game play video is almost identical to the 2005 alpha game play video, still not seeing crafting, city building, resource gathering etc. etc.

I think all of the things they have not shown are probably all just as basic and rudimentary as the things they have already shown, or perhaps even worse or not even functional or even implemented yet.

This game could still be fun if it launches in 2 months and performs adequately technically, but the myth that its feature complete and is going to only be released finished and polished with everything that has been promised is obviously completely false.

Darkfall is either going to release unfinished but hopefully not also bug ridden and plagued by technical problems in under 2 months or its going to be delayed again.

Great to see Darkfall and Aventurine are potentially finally starting to get the media attention they deserve.

But I wonder if Aventurine are actually going to start trying to sell Darkfall to anyone else in the other 49 European countries they have a publisher for except Greece over the next 2 months before launch.

If not then I do hope this is not a sign they have finally started accepting more realistic commercial expectations for their product.

But if it is, Its common sense really though, no point wasting time and money trying to market and promote your product internationally if you don’t believe it will be competitive.

Much more sensible to just continue concentrating on a much less competitive domestic market where they obviously appear so far to consider the majority of their customers will be.

And I agree the majority of the 100k+ recent signups on the Darkfall forum are people who expect to play test Darkfall for free in open beta sometime in the next 2 months before it launches by the end of the year as the developers have officially announced they will be able to.

Very naïve to think that all of these will automatically become subscribers, or that the majority of them will even still be interested in Darkfall unless at least beta if not also launch happen by the end of the year.

Not to mention of course the game actually also being as promised.

This is a much better comparison for Orc lovers in my opinion, picks straight from whatever came up on google.

No AoC because no Orcs.

WoW

War

Darkfall

But there’s already over 100k registered users on the official boards.

Yes it took 7 years to get around 50k

But with the recent video, beta signup and 2008 release date it jumped rapidly over 100k

And I’m sure it will continue to increase as pre launch hype and forms of advertisement attract more, and interest might significantly jump again if more progress is made like open beta starts or release date is announced or Darkfall is launched at ADW.

And you have to factor in DF will apparently be simultaneously available to buy on the shelf’s of 50 European countries if AVE does their job.

And don’t forget the “oh free game to play” open beta factor, that gets a huge amount of people interested in any game no matter what it is.

So if Darkfall is everything its been promised and there are no problems for the 2008 launch then I can easily see them getting at least  50-100k people buying and playing.

Like Eve online at launch and they can then continue to grow from there, like Eve has.

Of course whether or not Darkfall will be everything promised, and everything else will go to plan for the 2008 launch remains to be seen.

An whether or not 50-100k or more subscribers will remain long term subscribers and if they will be able to build on that or not will also remain to be seen.

Andromedus1 if you read my reply’s to Aragon properly you will see I’m not talking about any of that or disputing it.

May I suggest you read xzyax’s post number 20 who does not appear to have any difficulty understanding exactly what I actually said.

If ten percent of total subscribers are on at anyone time then they need 100k

If 20 percent of total subscribers are on at anyone time they would need 50k .

So I think its doable if they can attract and keep at least that many.

That’s if the 10k user  per server concurrent is realistic.

Problem is with such a big world based on player interaction for alot of the core features they really do need alot of people per server to make the game viable in my opinion.

So getting the maximum amount of players per server as possible is vital to this game, if its  less then 10k, and we dont know if it will be, then it could have significant game play ramifications

Aragon100 you just don’t get it do you.

Can I respectfully ask if English if your first language, because I cant understand why you are failing to understand this.

Even when another user points out exactly what i was actually saying and points out your misunderstanding, you still appear unable to appreciate it.

All I can recommend is, go back to the start and read threw it again, then hopefully you might understand.

Or simply just read the post above your last one where I painstakingly explain in detail, point by point exactly what I was actually saying and not what you are continuing to insist you think I was saying.

But this is pointless and silly so I wont drag it out any longer, no disrespect intended.

Aragon your not reading my posts carefully, I’m not making any claims about what Darkfall is or will be based on quotes from 2001 or any other date.

That’s what you are trying to do.

I said the number of concurrent users predicted per server by the developers has changed in the past, its used to be much higher.

You said show me a quote to prove that.

I showed you the quote to prove that.

Then you said quotes from 2001 don’t mean anything because the game has changed, but you yourself are using quotes from 2001 to justify your belief and claims of what the game currently is or will be.

That’s an obvious contradiction on your part , but also irrelevant to what I was using the quote for.

I used the quote only to prove the developers estimations of concurrent users per server has changed in the past, that’s all.

And all I have said is considering it  has changed before, I personally think it may change again, possibly during beta when thousands of real players start testing the servers and their network code etc.

That’s all, hopefully this makes everything clear and we can just wait and see what happens.

Aragon your fundamentally misunderstanding.

I’m not saying developer quotes from 2001 or any other date mean anything about what the actual number of concurrent players per server is in the game now or will be.

That’s what your trying to do.

I’m saying quotes from 2001 show the developers have changed there claims or predictions about how many concurrent players per server will be possible in the past.

So its reasonable to think they may do so again.

So in brief, all things developers say will happen might change or might not happen.

As I have demonstrated in relation to this issue with the quote you requested.
 

Originally posted by Aragon100

 

It was the only one i found on the issue.

You on the other hand used it as something that is relevant to the game of today which it isn't.

So your and the developers claim that 10,000 concurrent users per server also from 2001 and razorwax is also not relevant to the game of today either then.
 

Nope I did not use is as something that is relevant to the game of today, your the one whos trying to do that.

Go back and read my posts, your not understanding them.

Originally posted by SignusM

EVE has 300,000 players on one server. You...are an idiot.

I think somebody else might be, no names mentioned, better check your figures before you start calling other people names, or perhaps knowing what you are talking about for a start might help.
 

So much about this company just boggles the mind, a lot of the things they have said in the past are preposterous and look more like idle boasting or extremely optimistic predictions and claims in my opinion.

But thats what makes it so fascinating.

I mean sure, it is possible everything they have said it true, and some how they have developed revolutionary groundbreaking technologies or new innovative ways of circumventing numerous technical problems that plague all online games but I just find that very hard to believe.

Many of the supporters take everything they have said over the last 7 years as gospel so its pointless trying to debate about the validity of the claims they have been making, they simply believe them based on faith, they don’t need empirical evidence.

So I think at this stage its best just to sit back and enjoy the show over the next few months.

Originally posted by gotha

didn't Wish achieve this before it ran out of funding and flipped and flopped.

Doesn't WWII online also boast this same ability with just as complicated combat mechanics if not more as DF is boasting?  and that was created when 2001?  i remember reading they had some problems but they were not problems impossible to overcome.

I was in Wish beta but I don’t remember anything about them achieving 10,000 concurrent users and that game was canceled after 2 weeks of beta, do you have source for this?

And wish did not have real time FPS type combat and many other features that DF has so its not a good comparison.

WWII online has always suffered from performance and network, latency and prediction code problems.

It also has a hardcoded maximum number of visible players well under the 100’s Tasos is talking about.

The number one player complaint for WW2 online apart from side balance has always been performance performance performance, the client and game is extremely taxing on system resources and causes most people to play with under 30FPS in “large battles” even with powerfull computers

It also suffers from lag problems that are inherent with all games with client side hit detection when ping times start going over 100 ms.

It also has very low level poly and textured models and generally very Spartan graphics to achieve this.

I played WW2 online for 5 years from release, they have achieved a great deal but its far from perfect.

DF with WW2 Online’s network code and servers, would fail miserably in my opinion, it just would not work becuase they are different types of games.

DF has to do so much better to achieve anything more then the sort of subscriber base WW2 online currently has.

If you look at the information I have found about the Developer who is responsible for this server technology I personally don’t think it is a very valid opinion, but of course it is a possibility that he “might advance the server technology” single handedly but I doubt it myself.

So I will wait and see instead of believing eveything the developers say without question.

Especially when they have already revised the number of concurrent users at least once already, so I see no reason they may not do so again, especially during open beta.

Originally posted by HYPERI0N

I thought it worth mentioning that EvE online's single server world can happily handle 25 - 30 Thousand people online at once.

 

So yea it is possable to run with 10,000 but it needs a scalable server with decent programming and the abilaty to add extra hardware when needed.

Eve is not a huge seamless world, its made up of lots of connected zones or nodes, not the same thing.