It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Actually I find the fact that they have Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier running operations interesting. Two people that understand the business world and how to make it work.....
High hopes for these guys.
how so?
I am not asking to be difficult I literally just dont know anything about these twos past successes and i bit lazy to look (although I did start)
Looking at it from a purely business stand point. That is great a PHD in Ai, and all manner of accomplished artists, and I would never try to take anything from the years of hard work all these individuals have put into their craft, but without a solid business team, as we have seen in the past, the chances of something like this going very far are not good.
Actually, one company that comes to mind immediately is CIG. They have a business model that is nothing short of spectacular in how abortive it is. I feel if they had actual leadership in place, that company would be much closer to a completed product than they are right now. However, I digress.
Novaquark has a different approach (on paper I have not spoken to one member of this team, although I want too for a paper I have due) in that the founder is the boss, however the business team should be advising on where the ship will go next. I don't really want to get into a lecture on this, lets just say I feel like Novaquark has their head int he right place as far as how to manage production. If nothing else they have the right people in place.
I dont think (not sure though) that this is an answer to my question though.
I am asking what has Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier done in the past that would give someone the indication that they are understanding business anymore then anyone else?
it appears to me that what you are basing it off of is one what one has said rather than what one has done in the past.
Not to pick on you specifically but a pattern i have noticed with gamers is that they often praise to high highlights those that have not created anything yet but like what they hear, then once they start creating something they start to complain until they can find a new developer who is saying what they will do in the future but not what they have done already. I dont understand the phycology of the pattern but I have seen it literally for years.
Well Benoit for one, has over 10 years experience in Managing start ups. Has an MBA (in Business obviously)and a Master's in Engineering Years of experience in Project Management and Business Management. Was ACOO for Gostai as well. So the Business side of things is in good hands with a very experienced Business Manager like him. Through all my years of visiting with studios and working with people in the industry every company that I have seen actual make it in the business long term has had a very capable Business Development Manager. Benoit is one of those.
Thanks for that mate, I was not going to do all of his homework for him, honestly I am sick to death of his nonsensical bs and I only entertained this particular question because it sounded sincere. I should have known he just wanted to argue and not look anything up.
@SpottyGekko Yes, that is the comparison I was trying to make. Thank you as well.
After looking at Benoit's Linkdin page i have to say, its an impressive looking history, i think its fairly safe to say the guy knows what he is doing, i can't see someone like him being involved in anything shady. It is easy to be disillusioned though, given recent history with NMS etc. but sometimes, things really are as they appear to be, and they do appear to be legit, impressively so. O.o
The fact that they've done so much work already (2 years) before going for a KS is also a good sign, imho.
It looks like Benoit risked his own money before asking for crowdfunding.
Actually I find the fact that they have Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier running operations interesting. Two people that understand the business world and how to make it work.....
High hopes for these guys.
how so?
I am not asking to be difficult I literally just dont know anything about these twos past successes and i bit lazy to look (although I did start)
Looking at it from a purely business stand point. That is great a PHD in Ai, and all manner of accomplished artists, and I would never try to take anything from the years of hard work all these individuals have put into their craft, but without a solid business team, as we have seen in the past, the chances of something like this going very far are not good.
Actually, one company that comes to mind immediately is CIG. They have a business model that is nothing short of spectacular in how abortive it is. I feel if they had actual leadership in place, that company would be much closer to a completed product than they are right now. However, I digress.
Novaquark has a different approach (on paper I have not spoken to one member of this team, although I want too for a paper I have due) in that the founder is the boss, however the business team should be advising on where the ship will go next. I don't really want to get into a lecture on this, lets just say I feel like Novaquark has their head int he right place as far as how to manage production. If nothing else they have the right people in place.
I dont think (not sure though) that this is an answer to my question though.
I am asking what has Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier done in the past that would give someone the indication that they are understanding business anymore then anyone else?
it appears to me that what you are basing it off of is one what one has said rather than what one has done in the past.
Not to pick on you specifically but a pattern i have noticed with gamers is that they often praise to high highlights those that have not created anything yet but like what they hear, then once they start creating something they start to complain until they can find a new developer who is saying what they will do in the future but not what they have done already. I dont understand the phycology of the pattern but I have seen it literally for years.
Well Benoit for one, has over 10 years experience in Managing start ups. Has an MBA (in Business obviously)and a Master's in Engineering Years of experience in Project Management and Business Management. Was ACOO for Gostai as well. So the Business side of things is in good hands with a very experienced Business Manager like him. Through all my years of visiting with studios and working with people in the industry every company that I have seen actual make it in the business long term has had a very capable Business Development Manager. Benoit is one of those.
Thanks for that mate, I was not going to do all of his homework for him, honestly I am sick to death of his nonsensical bs and I only entertained this particular question because it sounded sincere. I should have known he just wanted to argue and not look anything up.
@SpottyGekko Yes, that is the comparison I was trying to make. Thank you as well.
After looking at Benoit's Linkdin page i have to say, its an impressive looking history, i think its fairly safe to say the guy knows what he is doing, i can't see someone like him being involved in anything shady. It is easy to be disillusioned though, given recent history with NMS etc. but sometimes, things really are as they appear to be, and they do appear to be legit, impressively so. O.o
The fact that they've done so much work already (2 years) before going for a KS is also a good sign, imho.
It looks like Benoit risked his own money before asking for crowdfunding.
agreed that is a big deal, well not the 'own money part' but the fact that they already have a strong baseline code base done
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Actually I find the fact that they have Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier running operations interesting. Two people that understand the business world and how to make it work.....
High hopes for these guys.
how so?
I am not asking to be difficult I literally just dont know anything about these twos past successes and i bit lazy to look (although I did start)
Looking at it from a purely business stand point. That is great a PHD in Ai, and all manner of accomplished artists, and I would never try to take anything from the years of hard work all these individuals have put into their craft, but without a solid business team, as we have seen in the past, the chances of something like this going very far are not good.
Actually, one company that comes to mind immediately is CIG. They have a business model that is nothing short of spectacular in how abortive it is. I feel if they had actual leadership in place, that company would be much closer to a completed product than they are right now. However, I digress.
Novaquark has a different approach (on paper I have not spoken to one member of this team, although I want too for a paper I have due) in that the founder is the boss, however the business team should be advising on where the ship will go next. I don't really want to get into a lecture on this, lets just say I feel like Novaquark has their head int he right place as far as how to manage production. If nothing else they have the right people in place.
I dont think (not sure though) that this is an answer to my question though.
I am asking what has Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier done in the past that would give someone the indication that they are understanding business anymore then anyone else?
it appears to me that what you are basing it off of is one what one has said rather than what one has done in the past.
Not to pick on you specifically but a pattern i have noticed with gamers is that they often praise to high highlights those that have not created anything yet but like what they hear, then once they start creating something they start to complain until they can find a new developer who is saying what they will do in the future but not what they have done already. I dont understand the phycology of the pattern but I have seen it literally for years.
Well Benoit for one, has over 10 years experience in Managing start ups. Has an MBA (in Business obviously)and a Master's in Engineering Years of experience in Project Management and Business Management. Was ACOO for Gostai as well. So the Business side of things is in good hands with a very experienced Business Manager like him. Through all my years of visiting with studios and working with people in the industry every company that I have seen actual make it in the business long term has had a very capable Business Development Manager. Benoit is one of those.
Thanks for that mate, I was not going to do all of his homework for him, honestly I am sick to death of his nonsensical bs and I only entertained this particular question because it sounded sincere. I should have known he just wanted to argue and not look anything up.
@SpottyGekko Yes, that is the comparison I was trying to make. Thank you as well.
After looking at Benoit's Linkdin page i have to say, its an impressive looking history, i think its fairly safe to say the guy knows what he is doing, i can't see someone like him being involved in anything shady. It is easy to be disillusioned though, given recent history with NMS etc. but sometimes, things really are as they appear to be, and they do appear to be legit, impressively so. O.o
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
Actually I find the fact that they have Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier running operations interesting. Two people that understand the business world and how to make it work.....
High hopes for these guys.
how so?
I am not asking to be difficult I literally just dont know anything about these twos past successes and i bit lazy to look (although I did start)
Looking at it from a purely business stand point. That is great a PHD in Ai, and all manner of accomplished artists, and I would never try to take anything from the years of hard work all these individuals have put into their craft, but without a solid business team, as we have seen in the past, the chances of something like this going very far are not good.
Actually, one company that comes to mind immediately is CIG. They have a business model that is nothing short of spectacular in how abortive it is. I feel if they had actual leadership in place, that company would be much closer to a completed product than they are right now. However, I digress.
Novaquark has a different approach (on paper I have not spoken to one member of this team, although I want too for a paper I have due) in that the founder is the boss, however the business team should be advising on where the ship will go next. I don't really want to get into a lecture on this, lets just say I feel like Novaquark has their head int he right place as far as how to manage production. If nothing else they have the right people in place.
I dont think (not sure though) that this is an answer to my question though.
I am asking what has Samantha Belhassen and Benoit Pothier done in the past that would give someone the indication that they are understanding business anymore then anyone else?
it appears to me that what you are basing it off of is one what one has said rather than what one has done in the past.
Not to pick on you specifically but a pattern i have noticed with gamers is that they often praise to high highlights those that have not created anything yet but like what they hear, then once they start creating something they start to complain until they can find a new developer who is saying what they will do in the future but not what they have done already. I dont understand the phycology of the pattern but I have seen it literally for years.
Well Benoit for one, has over 10 years experience in Managing start ups. Has an MBA (in Business obviously)and a Master's in Engineering Years of experience in Project Management and Business Management. Was ACOO for Gostai as well. So the Business side of things is in good hands with a very experienced Business Manager like him. Through all my years of visiting with studios and working with people in the industry every company that I have seen actual make it in the business long term has had a very capable Business Development Manager. Benoit is one of those.
Thanks for that mate, I was not going to do all of his homework for him, honestly I am sick to death of his nonsensical bs and I only entertained this particular question because it sounded sincere. I should have known he just wanted to argue and not look anything up.
@SpottyGekko Yes, that is the comparison I was trying to make. Thank you as well.
After looking at Benoit's Linkdin page i have to say, its an impressive looking history, i think its fairly safe to say the guy knows what he is doing, i can't see someone like him being involved in anything shady. It is easy to be disillusioned though, given recent history with NMS etc. but sometimes, things really are as they appear to be, and they do appear to be legit, impressively so. O.o
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
Yup, they have shown they have the technical expertise to make this ridiculously ambitious design work. Now all that remains is to see whether they have the creative skills to make it work in an entertaining way !
The former does not guarantee the latter, but it's a good basis to start from.
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
.... ridiculously ambitious design work.....
based on what is currently in the market I dont find their goals to be 'ridiculously ambitious' at all. Its basically taking Space Engineers as is throwing in a little bit of Emperium and increasing the number of possible players.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
.... ridiculously ambitious design work.....
based on what is currently in the market I dont find their goals to be 'ridiculously ambitious' at all. Its basically taking Space Engineers as is throwing in a little bit of Emperium and increasing the number of possible players.
Neither SE or Empyrion are MMORPG's, let alone MMORPG's supporting a record-breaking number of players in the same game world. Those games are simple in comparison to what DU will be attempting.
DU will supposedly have everything SE and Empyrion have, but a more sophisticated implementation of it. On top of that, they intend to have complex and extensive social systems to support player groups, politics and territory control. Making all those systems work in a game world with potentially thousands of players simultaneously is a very ambitious undertaking.
Haha, I've already tried to spark conversation with one of the devs during an AMA on the MassivelyOP forums. They keep sayings like, "there is no limit", but please don't buy into this. What they are showing here can be done easily with a few months of coding. I've developed tech like this myself for aeronautics companies before. There ARE limits to a game like this, and especially if it's multiplayer. Most games require physics, whether they're governed by a server or by a client; multiplayer games even more than others. Trusted-Client architecture for a game of this proposed magnitude is unrealistic, as a single planet could easily demand 40GB of RAM for its physics handling. The most recent commercial project I've coded on is a small indie MMORPG called Project Gorgon. The physics for a single zone, most of which are a 2048x2048 block of terrain, a few buildings, and a few props utilizes 2GB of RAM (minimum) per physics instance with a single player occupying physics. The physics are server-maintained, and work quite well.
For a game of this size it's practically impossible to trust a client with the handling of 40GB of RAM. In order to handle it without incident, you'd have to implement a proximity system where a single player would only handle physics within some radial distance or even cap it to a certain percentage of their RAM, CPU, and GPU specifications. Once players were close to each other, the load would be slowly balanced between them, with offsets being made accordingly. The biggest issues arise when someone with an incapable machine is tossed into the balancing. They can't be allowed to exist as a physics entity at the other players' expense, and must likewise be responsible for carrying some of their own weight. Therein, leading to their machine dramatically debilitate the entire system. This is the same reason I told my friends that bought into No Man's Sky as a multiplayer game, that it was impossible. The trusted-client architecture for a game like that would result in its absolute destruction, and there is now way that physics for a single cluster of solar systems in universe could be handled without petabytes of RAM and unrealistically powerfully CPU clusters.
I've been programming for 21 years now, and I've worked in just about every programming field since I started: security, recovery, maintenance, client, server, the list goes on. I'm urging people to not buy into this as a multiplayer game without playing a full demo of the game which actually utilizes some manner of multiplayer-with-physics, and seeing how it performs. I did the same in many forums about No Man's Sky, and I was I was disregarded and told I had no idea what I was talking about. Hopefully people will read this, do a lot of research, contact other knowledgeable veteran coders, and understand how it all works before funneling money into this. Sorry for the rant, I was doing my best to be informative.
Haha, I've already tried to spark conversation with one of the devs during an AMA on the MassivelyOP forums. They keep sayings like, "there is no limit", but please don't buy into this. What they are showing here can be done easily with a few months of coding. I've developed tech like this myself for aeronautics companies before. There ARE limits to a game like this, and especially if it's multiplayer. Most games require physics, whether they're governed by a server or by a client; multiplayer games even more than others. Trusted-Client architecture for a game of this proposed magnitude is unrealistic, as a single planet could easily demand 40GB of RAM for its physics handling. The most recent commercial project I've coded on is a small indie MMORPG called Project Gorgon. The physics for a single zone, most of which are a 2048x2048 block of terrain, a few buildings, and a few props utilizes 2GB of RAM (minimum) per physics instance with a single player occupying physics. The physics are server-maintained, and work quite well.
For a game of this size it's practically impossible to trust a client with the handling of 40GB of RAM. In order to handle it without incident, you'd have to implement a proximity system where a single player would only handle physics within some radial distance or even cap it to a certain percentage of their RAM, CPU, and GPU specifications. Once players were close to each other, the load would be slowly balanced between them, with offsets being made accordingly. The biggest issues arise when someone with an incapable machine is tossed into the balancing. They can't be allowed to exist as a physics entity at the other players' expense, and must likewise be responsible for carrying some of their own weight. Therein, leading to their machine dramatically debilitate the entire system. This is the same reason I told my friends that bought into No Man's Sky as a multiplayer game, that it was impossible. The trusted-client architecture for a game like that would result in its absolute destruction, and there is now way that physics for a single cluster of solar systems in universe could be handled without petabytes of RAM and unrealistically powerfully CPU clusters.
I've been programming for 21 years now, and I've worked in just about every programming field since I started: security, recovery, maintenance, client, server, the list goes on. I'm urging people to not buy into this as a multiplayer game without playing a full demo of the game which actually utilizes some manner of multiplayer-with-physics, and seeing how it performs. I did the same in many forums about No Man's Sky, and I was I was disregarded and told I had no idea what I was talking about. Hopefully people will read this, do a lot of research, contact other knowledgeable veteran coders, and understand how it all works before funneling money into this. Sorry for the rant, I was doing my best to be informative.
Yeah, I noticed Bluedrak42 on Youtube really picked their presentation video apart and explained how he thought they produced a lot of their effects and presented it as actual game play. There's now an ongoing feud between them.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
I commented on the same controversy of DU here but it's not really concerning besides maybe their staff not being the best at dealing with skeptics like bluedrake.
Seeing as Eve is a game that exists, and SC is one that is still in development, release currently unknown, and DU is a game still in the early stages of development and release still years away, i can only admire your godlike perspicacity.
I have read gaming journalists speak of potential for so many games that still haven't reached their potential that the word is getting a negative cling to it.
So far the best kickstarters and early access have been games with limited goals, a fun rpg, simulating physics for going into space, creating a prison. The reason why elite: Dangerous got released so quickly while star citizen feels years away from launch is that elite dangerous didn't try to create everything.
The reason why so many people ended up disappointed with NMS is that instead of trying to do a few things great (exploration and crafting) it tried to be so many things that just turned out to be boring or not really existing.
In the end you got to ask yourself, would you rather have a game with limited scope but where everything is really fun to do and you get to play it in a few years or have a huge amount of stuff where nothing reached its potential and take forever to be delivered.
Iselin: And the next person who says "but it's a business, they need to make money" can just go fuck yourself.
I've been programming for 21 years now, and I've worked in just about every programming field since I started: security, recovery, maintenance, client, server, the list goes on. I'm urging people to not buy into this as a multiplayer game without playing a full demo of the game which actually utilizes some manner of multiplayer-with-physics, and seeing how it performs. I did the same in many forums about No Man's Sky, and I was I was disregarded and told I had no idea what I was talking about. Hopefully people will read this, do a lot of research, contact other knowledgeable veteran coders, and understand how it all works before funneling money into this. Sorry for the rant, I was doing my best to be informative.
Indeed, I couldn't agree more.
That's why I rarely donate to crowdfunding projects. The few I've supported were very modest in their goals and succeeded 100% in delivering. I won't be backing DU's KS, but I will be following the game with great interest.
That said, I wouldn't dismiss NovaQuark's claims out-of-hand. Just because things were never possible before doesn't mean they'll never be possible. Tech evolves, and humans are very good at finding new ways to tackle old problems.
I too have 25 years of experience as a developer, but I don't believe I know everything. Human ingenuity can be surprising sometimes. I'm highly sceptical about DU's scope and complexity, but I'm hoping they can deliver at least half of what they're promising...
It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Pretty much spot on.
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support. Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design. Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money. Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Pretty much spot on.
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support. Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design. Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money. Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
This makes the assumption that the business person is designing the game. That definitely would be a bad thing, but it's not likely. The best business people surround them with the best people to do the job at hand, not do it themselves. If they are the smartest person in the world, the company will have problems.
However, hopefully, with a great business person at the helm, you get a team with great designers, developers, artists, etc.
That's all theory, though, I can't really think of a game designed by a business person, so I can't speak to that. Examples? I do remember some horrible attempts at running a company by a designer/developer. There's actually a few cases of that I can recall, (Chris Roberts, Brad McQuaid, Richard Garriott). However, in each of these cases, these people ended up stepping down and allowing a business person to run the company, for the better of the company. I'm sure there are examples of the opposite side, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
.... ridiculously ambitious design work.....
based on what is currently in the market I dont find their goals to be 'ridiculously ambitious' at all. Its basically taking Space Engineers as is throwing in a little bit of Emperium and increasing the number of possible players.
Neither SE or Empyrion are MMORPG's, let alone MMORPG's supporting a record-breaking number of players in the same game world. Those games are simple in comparison to what DU will be attempting.
DU will supposedly have everything SE and Empyrion have, but a more sophisticated implementation of it. On top of that, they intend to have complex and extensive social systems to support player groups, politics and territory control. Making all those systems work in a game world with potentially thousands of players simultaneously is a very ambitious undertaking.
So the entire 'ambitious undertaking' is nothing more than 1000 players online at once instead of 5. and in attention as far as a feature set I havent seen ANYTHING on their feature set that is more impressive then what SE currently has working. So that pretty much just leaves numbers of people and number of planets
really?
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Pretty much spot on.
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support. Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design. Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money. Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
Well put, and I agree, product is everything, but without leadership and business savvy, you can have the best artists, coders, community managers in the industry and your project still will not get where it needs to be. As a note, while it is commonly accepted that business persons are in business to make money one of the keys to doing that is being able to manage people and set realistic goals that can be achieved in fact, not just theory.
So, we can say a by product of the business mind is efficiency, reality and leadership with regards to good product. Well rounded companies have this and obviously the artistic talent to produce. On paper this is what I see, some very motivated experienced individuals, in the right place to make a game.
Now with regards to what @AaronVictoria said, if the technical/artistic side of the house is...umm full of crap we shall say, then all of my points are moot. I would however, expect that the business side of things would sniff this out or be made aware of it and start doing damage control. Again, we will have to wait and see but @AaronVictoria makes a compelling discussion point.
As a side note, good discussion, I am enjoying reading most of these posts.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Pretty much spot on.
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support. Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design. Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money. Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
This makes the assumption that the business person is designing the game. That definitely would be a bad thing, but it's not likely. The best business people surround them with the best people to do the job at hand, not do it themselves. If they are the smartest person in the world, the company will have problems.
However, hopefully, with a great business person at the helm, you get a team with great designers, developers, artists, etc.
That's all theory, though, I can't really think of a game designed by a business person, so I can't speak to that. Examples? I do remember some horrible attempts at running a company by a designer/developer. There's actually a few cases of that I can recall, (Chris Roberts, Brad McQuaid, Richard Garriott). However, in each of these cases, these people ended up stepping down and allowing a business person to run the company, for the better of the company. I'm sure there are examples of the opposite side, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.
examples of output is a good idea.
For me personally many of my favorite games are projects that have been run by developers with developers able to call 100% of the shots. The games I have been far less impressed with are games that are heavily managed by non-developers.
If one is more or less happy with the AAA market then yeah, likely they would enjoy such a model I however I do not
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
I do a fair bit of research on linkdin, and again I make my observation from a business stand point. As far as making a game, they have the talent, they have proven they (Novaquark) can make it playable, it remains to be seen if they will follow through, but as I said in a previous post, they have all the right people in the right places. We shall see what happens, I do wish Novaquark the best in this endeavor.
.... ridiculously ambitious design work.....
based on what is currently in the market I dont find their goals to be 'ridiculously ambitious' at all. Its basically taking Space Engineers as is throwing in a little bit of Emperium and increasing the number of possible players.
Neither SE or Empyrion are MMORPG's, let alone MMORPG's supporting a record-breaking number of players in the same game world. Those games are simple in comparison to what DU will be attempting.
DU will supposedly have everything SE and Empyrion have, but a more sophisticated implementation of it. On top of that, they intend to have complex and extensive social systems to support player groups, politics and territory control. Making all those systems work in a game world with potentially thousands of players simultaneously is a very ambitious undertaking.
So the entire 'ambitious undertaking' is nothing more than 1000 players online at once instead of 5.
really?
Making a game for such a low number of players wouldn't really be worthwhile, even for 1000 players is a low number. There isn't anything wrong with being ambitious however, it will be interesting to see how well they are able to bring those ambitions into reality. After the NMS debacle, i think we could use a little hope that a 'big' game of such scope is a possibility, i'll be keeping my fingers crossed at least.
It actually (and to be clear i am being very honest here and being polite about it) makes me nervous. I personally have found that the games I end up liking are the ones where developers rather than business folks are in charge. It is in fact the only thing about the project that makes me nervous. people who have a nack for business in my view rarely also have an understanding of good game design
Pretty much spot on.
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support. Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design. Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money. Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
This makes the assumption that the business person is designing the game. That definitely would be a bad thing, but it's not likely. The best business people surround them with the best people to do the job at hand, not do it themselves. If they are the smartest person in the world, the company will have problems.
However, hopefully, with a great business person at the helm, you get a team with great designers, developers, artists, etc.
That's all theory, though, I can't really think of a game designed by a business person, so I can't speak to that. Examples? I do remember some horrible attempts at running a company by a designer/developer. There's actually a few cases of that I can recall, (Chris Roberts, Brad McQuaid, Richard Garriott). However, in each of these cases, these people ended up stepping down and allowing a business person to run the company, for the better of the company. I'm sure there are examples of the opposite side, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.
Eve online was Designed by Simon and Schuster interactive, and then bought by CCP. Simon and Schuster are a division of CBS. So what you are saying is true, business leaders will surround themselves with the right people and get the job done, or in this case develop a good idea and then pass it off (sell it) to a competent organization that can take it where it needs to be. Arguably CCP did just that.
Artists types tend to surround themselves with like minded individuals and dreams. I understand that some people seem to like vaporware and or playing games that are dead, clunky and unfinished to each their own. I do not enjoy these games and numbers would seem to indicate I am not alone in that.
I also tend to think certain people on these forums post BS just to read what they type and to be generally disagreeable.
There are numerous examples of game developers/designers making complete asses of themselves trying to run studios. Very few examples of the art side pulling it off with any type of efficiency.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
Comments
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
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It looks like Benoit risked his own money before asking for crowdfunding.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
The former does not guarantee the latter, but it's a good basis to start from.
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Neither SE or Empyrion are MMORPG's, let alone MMORPG's supporting a record-breaking number of players in the same game world. Those games are simple in comparison to what DU will be attempting.
DU will supposedly have everything SE and Empyrion have, but a more sophisticated implementation of it. On top of that, they intend to have complex and extensive social systems to support player groups, politics and territory control. Making all those systems work in a game world with potentially thousands of players simultaneously is a very ambitious undertaking.
For a game of this size it's practically impossible to trust a client with the handling of 40GB of RAM. In order to handle it without incident, you'd have to implement a proximity system where a single player would only handle physics within some radial distance or even cap it to a certain percentage of their RAM, CPU, and GPU specifications. Once players were close to each other, the load would be slowly balanced between them, with offsets being made accordingly. The biggest issues arise when someone with an incapable machine is tossed into the balancing. They can't be allowed to exist as a physics entity at the other players' expense, and must likewise be responsible for carrying some of their own weight. Therein, leading to their machine dramatically debilitate the entire system. This is the same reason I told my friends that bought into No Man's Sky as a multiplayer game, that it was impossible. The trusted-client architecture for a game like that would result in its absolute destruction, and there is now way that physics for a single cluster of solar systems in universe could be handled without petabytes of RAM and unrealistically powerfully CPU clusters.
I've been programming for 21 years now, and I've worked in just about every programming field since I started: security, recovery, maintenance, client, server, the list goes on. I'm urging people to not buy into this as a multiplayer game without playing a full demo of the game which actually utilizes some manner of multiplayer-with-physics, and seeing how it performs. I did the same in many forums about No Man's Sky, and I was I was disregarded and told I had no idea what I was talking about. Hopefully people will read this, do a lot of research, contact other knowledgeable veteran coders, and understand how it all works before funneling money into this. Sorry for the rant, I was doing my best to be informative.
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
So far the best kickstarters and early access have been games with limited goals, a fun rpg, simulating physics for going into space, creating a prison. The reason why elite: Dangerous got released so quickly while star citizen feels years away from launch is that elite dangerous didn't try to create everything.
The reason why so many people ended up disappointed with NMS is that instead of trying to do a few things great (exploration and crafting) it tried to be so many things that just turned out to be boring or not really existing.
In the end you got to ask yourself, would you rather have a game with limited scope but where everything is really fun to do and you get to play it in a few years or have a huge amount of stuff where nothing reached its potential and take forever to be delivered.
That's why I rarely donate to crowdfunding projects. The few I've supported were very modest in their goals and succeeded 100% in delivering. I won't be backing DU's KS, but I will be following the game with great interest.
That said, I wouldn't dismiss NovaQuark's claims out-of-hand. Just because things were never possible before doesn't mean they'll never be possible. Tech evolves, and humans are very good at finding new ways to tackle old problems.
I too have 25 years of experience as a developer, but I don't believe I know everything. Human ingenuity can be surprising sometimes. I'm highly sceptical about DU's scope and complexity, but I'm hoping they can deliver at least half of what they're promising...
Players want fun games at fair prices with fun mechanics, great usability and good support.
Developers aim for techlogical achievements based on good/bad game design.
Business people want to manage a company so that they can make money.
Game designers are the key to the balance between the above three.
When I look at a game the first thing I look at is game design. The second one is business model and company management. Devs come third. Sorry devs but I need an ejoyable product from a publisher that is able to stand the test of time so that they don't go bankrupt or get too greedy with their product if they can deliver at all.
This makes the assumption that the business person is designing the game. That definitely would be a bad thing, but it's not likely. The best business people surround them with the best people to do the job at hand, not do it themselves. If they are the smartest person in the world, the company will have problems.
However, hopefully, with a great business person at the helm, you get a team with great designers, developers, artists, etc.
That's all theory, though, I can't really think of a game designed by a business person, so I can't speak to that. Examples? I do remember some horrible attempts at running a company by a designer/developer. There's actually a few cases of that I can recall, (Chris Roberts, Brad McQuaid, Richard Garriott). However, in each of these cases, these people ended up stepping down and allowing a business person to run the company, for the better of the company. I'm sure there are examples of the opposite side, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.
Crazkanuk
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really?
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
So, we can say a by product of the business mind is efficiency, reality and leadership with regards to good product. Well rounded companies have this and obviously the artistic talent to produce. On paper this is what I see, some very motivated experienced individuals, in the right place to make a game.
Now with regards to what @AaronVictoria said, if the technical/artistic side of the house is...umm full of crap we shall say, then all of my points are moot. I would however, expect that the business side of things would sniff this out or be made aware of it and start doing damage control. Again, we will have to wait and see but @AaronVictoria makes a compelling discussion point.
As a side note, good discussion, I am enjoying reading most of these posts.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.
For me personally many of my favorite games are projects that have been run by developers with developers able to call 100% of the shots. The games I have been far less impressed with are games that are heavily managed by non-developers.
If one is more or less happy with the AAA market then yeah, likely they would enjoy such a model I however I do not
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
Artists types tend to surround themselves with like minded individuals and dreams. I understand that some people seem to like vaporware and or playing games that are dead, clunky and unfinished to each their own. I do not enjoy these games and numbers would seem to indicate I am not alone in that.
I also tend to think certain people on these forums post BS just to read what they type and to be generally disagreeable.
There are numerous examples of game developers/designers making complete asses of themselves trying to run studios. Very few examples of the art side pulling it off with any type of efficiency.
If you want a new idea, go read an old book.
In order to be insulted, I must first value your opinion.