Perpetuum. Its setting is a far away planet inhabited by robots

[Falwell]

CCP should just buy this out if it's done competently and merge it into Dust.

[Venkman]

Looks way too shiny to be set in Eve space

[Ghambit]

/neckcrow

I dont believe there's an NDA for this and they are accepting new testers as of late in anticipation of a large patch today.  (I just got in)  It intrigued me... we shall see.  I like mechs, bots, and things that go bleep and blip and are teh shinay.  I liked EVE notsomuch, but this seems more visceral.

Here's more info. via tuts:
http://perpetuumzone.com/node/44

A GM's blog:
http://gremrod.wordpress.com/

[Stabs]

There was an interview with them on Massively's podcast a few weeks ago.
http://www.massively.com/2010/04/28/massively-speaking-episode-97-perpetuum-online/

It is very like Eve and influenced by it. They acknowledge that. On the other hand just using robots instead of spaceships makes it more of a departure from the original than many WoW-clones have managed.

I think there probably is a market for an Eve where you don't start 5 years worth of skills behind the elite. I also think that playing a clone of a sandbox game should allow for a more different experience than playing a clone of a theme park.

Personally I'm enjoying Eve too much to want to play another version. If I had burned out on Eve I'd be tempted by this though.

Afterthought: I'm almost tempted to get an account just for skill training. So if I ever do want to play it I'll have an advanced character. My more sensible side thinks that's a terrible thing to admit.

[Draegan]

I signed up.  I remember looking at this when the thread started.  Looks pretty cool.

[Nebu]

I think there probably is a market for an Eve where you don't start 5 years worth of skills behind the elite. I also think that playing a clone of a sandbox game should allow for a more different experience than playing a clone of a theme park.

I think that you're correct.  The only problem that I see is one that alienates new players.  I played EvE fairly early on.  While I could still participate in the pvp and the economy, I was always reminded that by coming in late I was already behind.  You got this same feeling in Atitd.  While sandboxes are a wonderful departure from games on rails, I don't know how you can effectively create them without newcomers immediately recognizing their disadvantage. 

I'm definitely going to keep my eye on this though.  While I'm not a fan of the backdrop, I am willing to support their effort to be derivative in a different way. 

[Malakili]

I've never understood that mentality in EVE.  Sure, you're "behind" but you can easily participate in just about every possible activity in the game in just a couple months, and in many case straight from day 1.  It just never really bothered me that I'd never have as many skill points as the guy who had 50 million when I started.  I think the system in place is fine.  You can get plenty good at things really quickly, and if you play for years and years you eventually are spending huge amounts of time for small % upgrades.   

[Nebu]

I've never understood that mentality in EVE.  Sure, you're "behind" but you can easily participate in just about every possible activity in the game in just a couple months, and in many case straight from day 1.  It just never really bothered me that I'd never have as many skill points as the guy who had 50 million when I started.  I think the system in place is fine.  You can get plenty good at things really quickly, and if you play for years and years you eventually are spending huge amounts of time for small % upgrades.  

This flies in the face of the point of pvp and is the reason why MMO's and pvp largely don't mix.  PvP is supposed to be about the better player winning the greatest majority of the time.  If you're going to handicap a player, it should be the established player facing a penalty to equalize the fight.  In MMO's it's the other way around.  

One of the primary reasons that WoW pvp is so terrible is precisely because of this.  If the level/power disparity isn't enough, good gear can turn a shitty player into a God.  Levels and equipment should offer a wider variety of options in PvP, not the ability to faceroll-to-victory.  

[Malakili]

I've never understood that mentality in EVE.  Sure, you're "behind" but you can easily participate in just about every possible activity in the game in just a couple months, and in many case straight from day 1.  It just never really bothered me that I'd never have as many skill points as the guy who had 50 million when I started.  I think the system in place is fine.  You can get plenty good at things really quickly, and if you play for years and years you eventually are spending huge amounts of time for small % upgrades.  

This flies in the face of the point of pvp and is the reason why MMO's and pvp largely don't mix.  PvP is supposed to be about the better player winning the greatest majority of the time.  If you're going to handicap a player, it should be the established player facing a penalty to equalize the fight.  In MMO's it's the other way around.  

One of the primary reasons that WoW pvp is so terrible is precisely because of this.  If the level/power disparity isn't enough, good gear can turn a shitty player into a God.  Levels and equipment should offer a wider variety of options in PvP, not the ability to faceroll-to-victory.  

Only in 1v1 PvP.  EVE PvP is about who brings the best group, has the best intel, has the best position, and a host of other things.  You can participate in "end game" PvP on day 1-2 with a tackling ship.   This isn't a property of just EVE either, you see it in pretty much every team game out there.  Sure, better players help your cause, but we see "inferior" players winning games in every sport every year because they had a better plan to deal with the opposing team.  No, you aren't going to win 1v1 on your first day of EVE agianst a guy who has been playing for 5 years, but you sure as hell can be on a winning side in a battle. 

Obviously if purely skill based 1v1 deathmatch PvP is what you want, EVE isn't your game, but that isn't really the point.  If thats what you want Football isn't your game either.

[ajax34i]

I've never understood that mentality in EVE.  Sure, you're "behind" but you can easily participate in just about every possible activity in the game in just a couple months, and in many case straight from day 1.

My current complaint is, actually, that it takes longer than the 4-or-so months it takes in WoW to get to "the average" gear level of other players (which, currently, is T2 guns on battleships, or T2 guns on T2 ships, or dreads/carriers).  I might be wrong in my calculations, but it seems to be about 6 months to shore up support skills and the T2 guns of choice, and another 2-3 months to train up the prerequisites for flying your (sub-capital) ship of choice.

It's not really about being able to participate, it's about the perception that you're behind because of the skills, and the perception that it takes longer than the other MMO's to catch up, sort of.

But anyway, back to Perpetuum, sorry about the tangent.

[Draegan]

I've never understood that mentality in EVE.  Sure, you're "behind" but you can easily participate in just about every possible activity in the game in just a couple months, and in many case straight from day 1.  It just never really bothered me that I'd never have as many skill points as the guy who had 50 million when I started.  I think the system in place is fine.  You can get plenty good at things really quickly, and if you play for years and years you eventually are spending huge amounts of time for small % upgrades.  

Many MMOG players want to get into a game and be the best, or at least compete to be among the best.  Whether they can or not, they want to think that if they just try hard enough they have the opportunity to do so.  With EVE's system it's impossible, so most players think, "Fuck it, why bother."

Everyone here knows they can have fun day 1 on EVE and participate.  However that requires you know people, or you know what you're doing.  If you take my experience as an example,  I have had access to join many corps through F13 and other message boards that are very active.  So I know people.  But I didn't know what to do to get to the fun unless someone took the time to take me under their wing and show me/tell me exactly what to do.

If you don't have that support structure and that person to get you kick started these games can be incredibly difficult to start with once the game is established.

Edit to add:
As far as time to catch up to "average players", I don't know about EVE, but in WOW you can do it in a month if you play a lot.  A week or two to level to 80 then two to four weeks to gear up.

[Mrbloodworth]

Hay guys. This game has robots.

[Malakili]

Hay guys. This game has robots.

I love robots.

[Ghambit]

[There is no NDA]

I'll talk to the GMs (who are always in-game) and see if I cant get a beta block for f13 people.  It's a fairly hands-on, smallish beta.   I think there were like 50 of us online last night (unless there were people I couldnt see, which if it's like Eve is quite likely).  I played until I passed out last night, so... the game doesnt suck outright.        

I joked in chat that they should've bought a BattleTech license and just called it InnerSphere Online or some such.  They very well could've, but unfortunately now the lore and design are pretty well wrapped up in an original IP, which isnt half bad btw.  Sci-fi is an acquired taste as always.

At the core of their design is their skill point system.  It differs with Eve's in that you ALWAYS generate skill points regardless of if you use them or not, i.e. you dont actually train anything until you're online.  While offline or online you generate 1 EP (extension point) per minute.  Then spend as you will on any of your characters, whenever you feel like it.   It's flat out an awesome skill point system and alleviates the retarded skill-game meta that Eve's system created.  They also did away with learning abilities... so EVERYONE generates the same EP regardless and no skill's EP can be changed.

Let's see, the "feel" of the game is of course much like Eve's only in 2 dimensions (yes, you feel restricted, but this is good in some ways).  Even the music is similar, very soothing.  There's click2move and WASD.   Most actions can be done w/o ever pushing the keyboard.  Indeed, there's something relaxing about just Ratting bots or mining plants 'n stuff.  That being said, it's definitely more visceral than Eve.  You need to pay more attention as the game is much deadlier...  resources, ammo, energy and the like are at a premium so you can't just macro it up - Like Eve though, this probably becomes less of a problem later on.   Also, there's foliage and terrain restrictions to movement/combat:  if you've got foliage in your LOS your to-hit is penalized and terrain limits your movement depending on which spark/bot you have.  Hit % is simply based on the size of the target/dispersion lvl of your weapon (so rate of fire is very important).  Speed or "signature" does not factor in, however there is ECM and such in the game along with targeting abilities.

Chargen is more complex than Eve's in that you have a few more Corp./school choices at the beginning which creates a few more "tiers" of possible builds.  Also, you're given a few thousand EP of the bat, so you must know from day 1 where to put them.  The avatar generator also has a few more choices, so it's easier to create someone/thing different...  more like ChampO in this regard.  That being said, you rarely SEE your avatar since he's locked in an orbital control station.

Back to "learning."  There are these funky Energon-cube lookin things you farm off of other bots that you can either sell or imbibe.  If you imbibe them you will learn something.  What that something is only Fate knows.  So basically, if you want to focus on making small kinetic bullets, you need that particular piece of knowledge up to 100%.  This involves using these cubes and hoping it's for that particular skill.  Obviously, if you loot laser-oriented bots though it's more likely you'll get the kernel that shows you how to make lasers.  THEN when you want to make something you have to reverse engineer the components, which means you need the component first along with a "Decoder" that allows you to understand the tech.  If you dont want to go through this trouble you can use a Prototype Facility to make a one-off, but it's prohibitively costly.

There's recycling, refining, factory production runs... yada yada.  Same as Eve.  The Market though isnt as complex...  no fancy bar-graphs or market analyses.  It's just buy/sell.  Currently, it's fairly sparse of items because the beta is small... which also means things are relatively expensive.

Also, this game is starting out similarly to Eve.  Small foreign indy studio.  Not a lot of money.  Sleak, simple design with the potential to easily add a lot of bells and whistles.  Since it's an Eve-clone it's also a fairly extensible game... meaning 3rd party progs. and add-ons.  I'm assuming it's coded in Python, which is also nice.

I'll talk more on it later, but so far I like it as a casual spreadsheet MMO.  It's tighter than Eve, not as mindnumbingly large and political and you see the fruits of your labors a bit better with a bot as opposed to a ship.  The zones are sharded, so no real one-world... kinda like Eve sectors.  It's basically a mecha dollhouse made with the Eve engine.  OH!  And they'll be adding jumpjets at some point.  

edit:
Graphically, the game is fairly nice and stylized... Eve influence again.  They've been playing with them lately though, instituting fog and weather effects... so it's a bit touch a go.  (they need to do away with the fog, badly)  Also, there is brown.  At least in the starter zone.  We'll see how brownish it stays.

[Draegan]

I'd really like to get in and check it out tonight.  Can you get me in?    If you can PM me and I'll give you the email address attached to my reg.

[Cadaverine]

Sounds pretty nifty.  Still waiting for them to accept my beta app, so I can play robots.

[Ghambit]

I sent mails to a DEV and a GM, so we'll see.  Would be nice to fire up a corp in here and I think these guys could use some quality input.  Maybe one of them will join f13 as well.
Oh, I'm ingame as "PhantomPhreak".  Asintec corporate elitist with a penchant for shooting things and getting paid for it.

[PalmTrees]

I watched the agent creation tutorial and had definite Eve flashbacks. Ton of skills divided into three groups leaving you to wonder whether to specialize or hybrid with no way to know whether you're making a tank-mage or a gimp. Have they said anything about respecs or is it just wait for more points and use those to fix your mistakes?

[Malakili]

Oh, I'm ingame as "PhantomPhreak"

The King of Nynex?

Seriously though, I'm in if we get an F13 beta invite.  I've been looking for something MMOwise lately because I've been trundling around in WoW waiting for something worth while to come along, and this seems to have serious potential based on what you have to say about it.

[Nebu]

Better get me in before Malakili  I don't want him to have an advantage!   

[Malakili]

Better get me in before Malakili  I don't want him to have an advantage!   

[Ghambit]

There will probably be no EP respecs.  And it'd be somewhat counterintuitive if they did.
Firstly, you get EVERY skill available to you at the start, they just have to be unlocked via NIC (money) and certain pre-requisites (so there is no sifting through countless skill books to make sure you're doing the right thing), it's just "this costs 10k NIC and you need Industry 5" and that's it.  And since you generate EP regardless, there's no need for a respec.  Just wait and pump what you need.

One thing I'd recommend is taking your time in the beginning and looking everything over before spending your EP.

[Ghambit]

Okay, I have a beta block for 5 people (I will send in the request once we have 5 worthy bot operators).  Those interested, pm me with your email addresses and you'll be patched into the game.  Note: this is for constructive TESTING, not "review" purposes.  Dont bother if you just want to have a look-see.  The goal is to put the game on its knees (in true f13 fashion) and then beg for a fix.

Oh, and try to sign up ahead of time and have your account ready to go.  Then gimme that email addy.
And oh oh, I'd prefer it if you at least used vent or TS in some capacity... (I believe there are channels setup for the testers somewhere)

[Draegan]

I sent you a PM.  Let me know where to hook up on vent later tonight.  I should be home around 7PM Est or so.  I'm already registered with the email I PMd you.

[Nonentity]

I'll set you guys up a channel in vent, if you want.

Also, this looks neat, but I don't think i'm quite ready to hop in during the constructive criticism phase. I'll wait it out.

[Stabs]

I'm very interested but as I'm in a rather different timezone from you I'll apply to the beta separately. I think it would be a waste to snag one of your 5 spots for someone who's hardly ever on at the same time as anyone else.

If I get in I'll be in touch. I quite fancy getting heavily into trade and industry so hopefully I'll be able to make you some toys.

[Draegan]

This is good timing for me too.  I'm not playing any other MMOGs at the moment, or any other games either.  So I can put most of my gaming time towards it assuming the game works and isn't annoying to play.

[veredus]

Give a shout out when it's in preview mode. Would love to try this out but not enough free time right now to do real testing.

[Ghambit]

Need 2 more.

[Draegan]

I'm downloading the client now.  Which vent are we using?

Edit:
Any idea when the accounts will be confirmed?

[Ghambit]

Need 5 people b4 I can send him the list.  We have 4.  Need 1 more.  Also, it's most likely they wont be added until tomorrow afternoon because the DEV I was working with seems to be a "day person."

I'd THOUGHT that they had a beta channel, but for the life of me I cant find the info. on it.  Otherwise, we can play in the f13 vent if you have access.  Not a huge issue I guess at this point.

Note: game IS mostly feature complete... any testing at this point is mostly polish and debug (client seems perfectly stable also)

[Draegan]

I was hoping to get in tonight.  Just send them the 4 names and tell them you'll send another at a later date.  Someone would of posted already I would imagine.

[Cadaverine]

I'm kind of surprised that only 4 people have replied.  I'd have figured there'd be more than 5 people interested.

[Ghambit]

I'm kind of surprised that only 4 people have replied.  I'd have figured there'd be more than 5 people interested.

Most folks just want to play the game to have a look-see instead of "testing."  I can understand that, but it doesnt hurt to just jot down ideas and bugs on your secondary monitor while you play and then submit them.  If it was a huge beta for a huge game that's another thing, but this is rather "niche."

[Stabs]

OK, if we're short then count me in. PM sent.