Basic question about ED is it MMO or Co-op single player.

[Arthur Shappey]

Elite: Dangerous is neither single-player, MMO, or any other weird combo. It just _is_. Any other form of imagining is merely a delusion. Admittedly a delusion that might give great pleasure/frustration.

I think many of us would like to feel it defies definition. Certainly defies polite definition...

 

[Kayweg]

Maybe we need a completely new type of definition, but really, is it that important.

Not important for any game individually, no.
But definitions per say are an important factor in communicating, as they portray a generally accepted understanding of what we're talking about.
With that undermined, misunderstandings and miscommunication are much more likely.
That's of no consequence when it comes to gaming i reckon, worst that can happen are a few forum discussions or a request for a refund.
Elsewhere however, different matter.

 

[babelfisch]

Just a few examples for early 'MMOs'

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

*cough*....Planetside 2....*cough*.....Falcon 4 (a 2 decade old game)...*cough*...Armed Assault 1,2 and 3....*cough*....Player Battlegrounds

Planetside 2
2000 people per continenent but only tracks the people that are in view, you cannot shoot anyone that isn't in your view so even area effects wont effect people you can't see.

Falcon 4
Pretty sure this has a similar system to planetside 2. Not too sure how many people per server. I very much doubt you will get 100's or thousands of planes in one area.

ARMA
Constant complaints about the netcode due to lag and it probably works in a similar way to planetside 2 but I am not sure. You will normally only get 80-100 per server.

Player Unknowns battle grounds
Has a maximum of 100 people per server and also region locked to keep lag down, even then it is still bad.

I wouldn't call any of those massive apart from planetside 2 and then even that cheats.

These games keep the amount of people per server really low to avoid issues with lag. Now if we did the same with ED, only 100 people per server, how much more empty would the game feel. While we only get what is it a max of 30odd in our own instance, we can jump to another system and see another completely different set of 30 odd people in the game and so forth or go from 30 in supercruise and when jumping to normal space another 30 or so.

Games like EVE have massive space battles but you get constant lag and they have to slow everything down. I play lotro and you still get rubberbanding in server client games and they only track what is in your vascinity.

 

[Kayweg]

Planetside 2
2000 people per continenent but only tracks the people that are in view, you cannot shoot anyone that isn't in your view so even area effects wont effect people you can't see.

Falcon 4
Pretty sure this has a similar system to planetside 2. Not too sure how many people per server. I very much doubt you will get 100's or thousands of planes in one area.

ARMA
Constant complaints about the netcode due to lag and it probably works in a similar way to planetside 2 but I am not sure. You will normally only get 80-100 per server.

Player Unknowns battle grounds
Has a maximum of 100 people per server and also region locked to keep lag down, even then it is still bad.

I wouldn't call any of those massive apart from planetside 2 and then even that cheats.

These games keep the amount of people per server really low to avoid issues with lag. Now if we did the same with ED, only 100 people per server, how much more empty would the game feel. While we only get what is it a max of 30odd in our own instance, we can jump to another system and see another completely different set of 30 odd people in the game and so forth or go from 30 in supercruise and when jumping to normal space another 30 or so.

Games like EVE have massive space battles but you get constant lag and they have to slow everything down. I play lotro and you still get rubberbanding in server client games and they only track what is in your vascinity.

How well (or bad) it works has nothing to do with the genre definition though.

 

[UnhappyDev]

How well (or bad) it works has nothing to do with the genre definition though.

Exactly.

Games like EVE have massive space battles but you get constant lag and they have to slow everything down. I play lotro and you still get rubberbanding in server client games and they only track what is in your vascinity.

'Lag' and 'Technical Issues' should be defining features of the modern MMO genre.

 

[Jex =TE=]

On a WoW server there may be about 6000 people I can potentially meet. In ED I can potentially meet all other players. I can't meet them at the same time, but I can meet them.

If I happened to like someone on a WoW forum and wanted to play with them, there would be a good chance one of us would have to switch servers. Perhaps both, if the server was full. It's like ED with PG only.

Potentially has no meaning LOL.

Statistically you are highly unlikely to ever meet all of the user base and factually you can't even meet more than a handful online at the same time. Fdev somehow managed to mess up TCP that bad you can't even get 20 people to connect successfully.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

How well (or bad) it works has nothing to do with the genre definition though.

Exactly.

 

[babelfisch]

How well (or bad) it works has nothing to do with the genre definition though.

He never said that, I suggest you read what we have been talking about

 

[Han_Zen]

Planetside 2
2000 people per continenent but only tracks the people that are in view, you cannot shoot anyone that isn't in your view so even area effects wont effect people you can't see.

Falcon 4
Pretty sure this has a similar system to planetside 2. Not too sure how many people per server. I very much doubt you will get 100's or thousands of planes in one area.

ARMA
Constant complaints about the netcode due to lag and it probably works in a similar way to planetside 2 but I am not sure. You will normally only get 80-100 per server.

Player Unknowns battle grounds
Has a maximum of 100 people per server and also region locked to keep lag down, even then it is still bad.

I wouldn't call any of those massive apart from planetside 2 and then even that cheats.

These games keep the amount of people per server really low to avoid issues with lag. Now if we did the same with ED, only 100 people per server, how much more empty would the game feel. While we only get what is it a max of 30odd in our own instance, we can jump to another system and see another completely different set of 30 odd people in the game and so forth or go from 30 in supercruise and when jumping to normal space another 30 or so.

Games like EVE have massive space battles but you get constant lag and they have to slow everything down. I play lotro and you still get rubberbanding in server client games and they only track what is in your vascinity.

Theoretically lag is less on a P2P system than on a client/server system. A direct line is shorter than a detour via server. The advantage of the client/server when it comes to lag, is that you are less hurt by other peoples poor connection. In P2P it will hurt both players.

All online games will have to abide to the laws of physics though. An object moving relative to you at 1000m/s, will be 1m off it's 'real' position, for each ms latency. There are of course ways to 'cheat' a bit, but that really only works if the object is moving in a straight line. This 'cheating' is essentially what gives rubber banding. The game guesstimates the object position, gets it wrong and corrects.

Relative speed must go down if total latency is allowed to go up.

Should we have real slow ships and much more players in the instance, to MMO it up?

 

[Jex =TE=]

I think you will find that a lot of those art assets are copy and pasted. If you are talking about assets you can move around in then ED trumps nearly every game ever made (maybe not NMS, but the planets are tiny in NMS) by just landing on any average sized planet, then include all the planets to that too.

As to the division, that game world is tiny compared to ED, so it is much easier to fill it up with stuff. In ED you have lots of different internal types of station a number of different out sides of the stations, all the ships, all the internals of the ships, the thargoid bases, the guardian ruins, the ruined ships, all the different types of mega ships, the flora on certain planets, the thargoids, planetary bases, planetary outpost, skimmers, player avatars and all the different versions we have, the UI. I'm sure there are a lot more that I haven't though of.

Now just imagine putting all those things into a tiny map the size of the division.

But that's not what I'm saying and why the Division is 60GB and ED is 10? All the things you stated, the Divison does more of - more UI for a fact. It has a mass of interiors, more so than the handful of the 4 types of interiors. All the cars have interiors as well and yes, both game copy/paste assets - I'm talking about assests and trying to point out that what you think of as gamesize doesn't matter because the world is virtual meaning size has no meaning.

Ubisoft could have ran an algorithym to put 10 trillion milles between each block on that map. Would it still be "bigger"?

ED on the other hand as very little art assets when compared to The Division - it's a smaller game by approximately 50GB. A handful of ships, a handful of planets, a handful of stations. PG is PG - nobody is crafting that it's generated procedurally. They all have the same 4 textures though (or is it one now they're all biege)?

 

[CMDR Zadian Lichtfrost]

…

Should we have real slow ships and much more players in the instance, to MMO it up?

Hey we could call it "time dilatation" and let everybody wait a few seconds before moving an other 10m

 

[Jex =TE=]

I was talking about the BGS side, we are all connected to the servers and they do scale. That has nothing to do with P2P.

Nobody really cares about the BGS though and especially not as an MMO enabler. The BGS is a glorified text changer.

If it has nothing to do with P2P then I suppose in an MMO you don't need to meet anyone then.

A bus is still a bus, right? Even if it's missing the engine and wheels.

 

[Jex =TE=]

Ah yes, PUBG... A game that gets even worse critics than ED because of their poor network infrastructure (at least last time I checked)...

And when was the last time you checked?

BTW it does fine and does not get worse critics than ED because PUBG actually works. You do know it has over 2.6 million concurrent players right? If you think ED could even handle a 10th of that without collapsing in on itself and causing a black hole I'd say you were barmy!

 

[babelfisch]

Nobody really cares about the BGS though and especially not as an MMO enabler. The BGS is a glorified text changer.

That's simply not true.

f it has nothing to do with P2P then I suppose in an MMO you don't need to meet anyone then.

A bus is still a bus, right? Even if it's missing the engine and wheels.

Not sure what you are trying to say or if you just missed my point.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

Nobody really cares about the BGS though and especially not as an MMO enabler. The BGS is a glorified text changer.

If it has nothing to do with P2P then I suppose in an MMO you don't need to meet anyone then.

A bus is still a bus, right? Even if it's missing the engine and wheels.

I care about the BGS, it's where 90% of my fun in-game comes from. It's a vital component of the game and without it the game would be pretty dreadful. And as to meeting people, I have met 1000's of players. Not too sure why you are having issues. Maybe look at your network settings.

 

[babelfisch]

And when was the last time you checked?

BTW it does fine and does not get worse critics than ED because PUBG actually works. You do know it has over 2.6 million concurrent players right? If you think ED could even handle a 10th of that without collapsing in on itself and causing a black hole I'd say you were barmy!

Right now, 56% all time and 46% recent reviews on steam, seems to be a very bad game. Just for your information, I don't take steam reviews seriously, but since people always bring them up to show how bad ED is, why shouldn't I?

PS
In theory Elite can handle an infinite number of players because their server scale, I already said that earlier.

 

[-VR- Max Factor]

And when was the last time you checked?

BTW it does fine and does not get worse critics than ED because PUBG actually works. You do know it has over 2.6 million concurrent players right? If you think ED could even handle a 10th of that without collapsing in on itself and causing a black hole I'd say you were barmy!

Technically there is no reason why ED couldnt handle that amount of players.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

I don't have a magic answer to this; But.. Let's take Everquest as an example. I assume, everyone agrees it was one of the founding games of the MMO genre..

It could cope with thousands of players on the same server. For example, quite often, I would bring my shammy to the Guild Halls or Plane of Tranquility and cast speed and mana buffs on hundreds of players at a time. No lag, no connection issues.

As game architecture progressed, larger and larger numbers of online players could co-exist on the same server. True direct interaction, trading, grouping, raiding, all at the same time, without hiccup.

ED on the other hand, falls over as soon as you get a couple of players in the same instance. MultiCrew constantly falls over with just 2 players. ED is just not built to be MMO friendly. Not just the net architecture, but also the basic design. Example: Goto any combat CG. Enter the HazRez and try to get a few bounties while the other 2 wings clean up. Anyways that OT.

Look, if we are going to discuss this, you have to drop the hyperbole. It doesn't help have a constructive debate.

Also, there is a big difference in network requirements for a point and click game and a game like ED which has much higher bandwidth requirements. C/S or P2P - that data has to go somewhere. Planetside as noted does it, but that's the exception, not the rule.

And again, you still don't say what the minumum is for it to qualify in your eyes. You are talking about hundreds... ok, is that the requirement, hundreds in the same area? Ok, congrats, you've just disqualified hundreds of MMO games from being classified as MMOs. Want to come down on that number?

 

[Jex =TE=]

No, it doesn't run on it's own, without player input it's static AFAIK.

I thought it ran all the orbits in real time or do we not even get that?