Mythic PKs Microsoft. Gets Phat Lewt.

[HaemishM]

True, in reality, single-player AI really isn't all that advanced. But compared to MMOG AI, single-player is rocket engines to MMOG's neanderthals.

[Alluvian]

I have not seen much advance in AI since Halflife and Thief 2.  The AI in thief 2 was very buggy at times (same bugs seem to still live in thief 3) but it showed a potential to take into effect so many different variables to set it's current state.  The reaction to the data was not always that great, but it was definate a technological advancement.  As a comparison I don't see anything in Thief 3 AI that was not there in Thief 2.  Tweaked abit more, and maybe I am forgetting things about thief 2. It has been awhile and I never got anywhere near finishing it.

For cooperative groups I have not seen much advance past Halflife.  The pathing and group tactics in that game were pretty new for it's time, but nowadays I just keep seeing the same thing over and over.  Where is that next jump forward?  If some of the stuff they had in E3 2003 demos is true it COULD be halflife 2, but I have a hunch most of the stunning AI there was scripted.

I am thinking about the scene where there was a gunfight in a street, and then the guy ducked into a building.  The AI tried the door a few times but the player was standing in the way (door opened inward).  The AI then moved to a window and started shooting in.  The player ducked behind a desk and pushed it against the door.  It was JUST in time as the AI went to try the door again when the player stepped away.  With the door blocked the AI went back to firing through the window.  That is some pretty good AI, but my inner sceptic thinks scripting.

There is also the strider alien which is super tall with spindly legs and on the audio of the demo they were talking about how the AI was in three parts for the creature.  Each leg having separate pathing so that it could step forward and the head pathing behind the legs so that it could crouch below things or extend over other things.  Each part of the three communicated with each other so that if one part could not find a way through the other two would stop and look for alternate paths.

If that stuff actually works realtime it may be our next big AI jump.  I am skeptic though.  I have this suspiscion that the E3 demo in 2003 was heavily scripted and one of the reasons for delay was that they could not get the AI up to snuff anywhere near the original release date.

[HRose]

Instancing can get around lots of those issues just by not having to stress the servers out.

Yes, and here you confirm what I wrote. Instancing is a profitable workaround but isn't about addressing the real problem to move further.

Instead of surpassing the obstacle they are going backward.

[Dark_MadMax]

- Database and server structure for massvie persistent worlds are  already well developped

 - We already have technology(both server and client side)  to have large amounts of people in the same palce at the same time  

 - UI design ,player tools , AI are nothing hard or new to implement  ( in the same amoutnas in needed for perfect mmorpg). -Those elements in fact are alredy implmented balanced and polished  multiple of times in other genres.

No, no and no.

Just to prove the point, I'll use Star Wars Galaxies as an example. They used one of the most (according to them and the manufacturer) advanced databases (Oracle). It fucked up royally and I think is still giving players problems.

 Well u using bad example.  I would state DaoC as an example of a game which handles massive scale battles  well enough .  Eve as a game which handles enourmous database and massive amount of people on same server. Planetside even handles massive twitch combat .

 Tools/UI... - any RTS ,new hybrid FPS ( savage)  has a very well developed , balanced ,playtested and proven UI / tools .

 It used some of the most advanced AI routines for mob behaviour. None of these things are set in stone technologies, and the progress on these areas for MMOG's is actually at a quite nascent state. For single-player games, AI is quite advanced, but can't be for MMOG's because they haven't figured out ways to make AI that good work on such a grand scale. Similarly, even advanced MMOG clients like SWG with all its
graphics horsepower can't properly render too many players on screen without bringing server and client to their knees.

 Again thats according to swg devs .- Its just a marketing hype , imho SWG devs were pretty  incompetent in many areas despite  loads of cash the project had . Saying "advanced AI "and  showing it is 2 different things.

 Advanced AI is in Pod Bot (bot for CS) , in UT 2004 . There are tons of awesome scripted AI engines (practically every CRPG,RTS).  

 But again we dont need any advanced AI for mmorpg imho - primitive scripting is good enough . - EQ didnt have any half competent AI ,yet with scripts they managed to create pretty interesting and chalenging mob encounters. Point of mob AI is not to provide challenge - its to provide story and quest background . Real challenge should in competition with other players.

 SWG client isn't "advanced" -its pretty antiquated and poorly executed actually .  If you want see advanced engine check Dark and  Light -thats advanced .

Instancing can get around lots of those issues just by not having to stress the servers out.

  Even SB has no big problems by now handling 200-300 people at the same time  -and this is buggy ass  bastard engine which has inherent flaws.  

  What about planetside? -which not only manages to handle truely massive battles -its also manages to handle em with collision detection and twitch combat!  It even has integrated voice communication for gods sake! Now tell me  what technology we exactly missing?

Saying technology "is not good enough" is just a poor excuse for incompetent design.

[Alluvian]

It even ash integrated voice communication for gods sake! Now tell me what technology we exactly missing?

Don't completely ruin your point with features that are not worth shit.  The integrated voice in planetside sucks ass.  Nobody uses it, everyone I ever played with ran teamspeak.

Planetside can do what it does only because everyone looks the same.  For a PVP game, blatent cloning is acceptable, but most won't want to all look the same in any even moderately pve game.  How well PS handles those battles is very dependent to what kind of connection you have on the other end as well.  I never have much problem with it, but others I know can't run planetside worth shit once battles get bigger than a few dozen.  It isn't their systems either, but lag.  Some bad connection between point A and point B.

SWG has huge problems with large groups because of the sheer amount of data that has to be transmitted for each player model.  All the minute facial detail, all the clothing options.  Once battle starts it gets even worse.  Now you have all different body hit locations with UNIQUE armor with different resistances to every single damage type.  Everyone is firing a gun that does WIDELY variable damage depending on the unique circumstances of it's crafting.  It is not the planetside calculation that you just got hit by a cycler while wearing your stock armor.  You just got hit by a unique gun while wearing unique armor and everyone else around you is also unique in the same way.

To many this is not worth the loss, but it is just the way the crafting in the game works.  The game was built from the ground up to specifically NOT allow large scale battles.  So while your arguments about SWG's problems are very valid, there are very logical and easy to understand reasons behind it.  For the record I don't think any of that overly complicated weapon and armor system has ANY place in a starwars game.

[schild]

It even ash integrated voice communication for gods sake! Now tell me  what technology we exactly missing?

A spellchecker.

[Phred]

[quote="HaemishM
Just to prove the point, I'll use Star Wars Galaxies as an example. They used one of the most (according to them and the manufacturer) advanced databases (Oracle). It fucked up royally and I think is still giving players problems. [/quote]

Oracle is an industrial strength database, but it's also like trying to use a semi truck and trailer for drag racing, which means it doesn't really handle lots and lots of small transactions very well without lots of hackery to reduce the cost of setting up and tearing down sessions. Definately a case of picking the wrong tool for the job.

[HaemishM]

Well u using bad example.  I would state DaoC as an example of a game which handles massive scale battles  well enough .  Eve as a game which handles enourmous database and massive amount of people on same server. Planetside even handles massive twitch combat .

DAoC could NOT handle the battles well upon release, nor could it handle them well at the same point in its lifespan that SWG is at (about 1 year after release). It was better than SWG, but still not what you'd call smooth. As for Planetside, every anecdote I've ever heard says that without 1 GB of RAM, forget smooth large battles.

 

 But again we dont need any advanced AI for mmorpg imho - primitive scripting is good enough . - EQ didnt have any half competent AI ,yet with scripts they managed to create pretty interesting and chalenging mob encounters. Point of mob AI is not to provide challenge - its to provide story and quest background . Real challenge should in competition with other players.

NOT if your game is a PVE-only or PVE-predominant game. Not all games are about competition between players. In games where you have to do a significant amount of PVE, you damn well better have some good AI.

EQ had pathing (bad), and it "cheated" to make encounters more difficult. Things like aggro that specifically targeted the way players played (i.e. healers generated more aggro than tanks, magic-users generated more aggro just from casting, people sitting in fights generated more aggro).

 SWG client isn't "advanced" -its pretty antiquated and poorly executed actually .  If you want see advanced engine check Dark and  Light -thats advanced .

Did you hear that sound? It was the sound of your argument shooting its retarded self in the foot. Or the face, because either one is about as effective.

Dark and Light is not released. In other words, it isn't an advanced engine, it's an advanced IDEA. Until it's being hammered by thousands of cockgobblers with credit cards, it is nothing more than vapor.

And please, learn to type. Your posts hurt.

[eldaec]

DAoC could NOT handle the battles well upon release, nor could it handle them well at the same point in its lifespan that SWG is at (about 1 year after release). It was better than SWG, but still not what you'd call smooth. As for Planetside, every anecdote I've ever heard says that without 1 GB of RAM, forget smooth large battles.

The daoc server I have characters on crashes whenever around 300 people are in the same place. Meaning every relic raid and occaisionally on keep raids.

This leads to an interesting forum whine stalemate. Certain realms insist the only way to take relics is at 6am, and then call the other realms lame for repeatedly bringing the the server down in prime time. Wheras other realms insist on always raiding (and failing due to server crash) at primetime, then whining at the other realms for lame out of hours raids. It's probably the solution that keeps everyone happiest - as this is the only way everyone can have something to whine about.

As for the 1Gb thing - well this appears to be about the limit for large smooth battles even in modern single player games these days. /shrug

Though why devs refuse to include *really* low detail settings for people with sub-Xbox level PC specs I'll never know.

I seem to remember Raph saying on the pre-launch SWG boards that he'd told the client graphics engine guys that in the case of large battles he didn't care if everyone turned into stick-men, just so long as in all cases the client runs at a sensible minimum frame rate. That's the right idea - shame it didn't seem to work out.

[Pug]

Though why devs refuse to include *really* low detail settings for people with sub-Xbox level PC specs I'll never know.

When all you have is a polished turd the last thing that you want to do is take away teh shineÿ.

Part of DAoC's problem is that you actually can fit 300 people into one spot. There's no collision detection or land features to prevent that many players from occupying a small area.

I'd rather play a fun game where everyone looks alike than a poor excuse for a game that has millions of unique ways to dress your Barbie doll. The technology to support massive numbers of players in a single online world has surpassed my expectations, now all I need is for someone to figure out how to make a game that has massive numbers of players sharing a single world fun to play.

[HRose]

DAoC could NOT handle the battles well upon release, nor could it handle them well at the same point in its lifespan that SWG is at (about 1 year after release). It was better than SWG, but still not what you'd call smooth.

Well, right now DAoC handles battles of 200 vs 200 without crashing on Merlin. On some situations it crashes due to other bugs when the numbers climb but the situation is already very good.

The wall you hit here is about the client. And with "New Frontier" the lag is multiplied for 10 (and more due to horrible memory leaks).

[eldaec]

The client lag wall is in there too; which gets worse with every expansion.

But on certain servers the actual server crashes when too many people stand in one place. It typically means downtime of about 15 minutes for everyone located in a specific realm at the time (dungeons, toa, SI, and mainlands are all separate realms for server purposes). Not disasterous for normal play - but it stops any relic raids dead, since everyone logs in one at a time and gets killed by NPCs.