Agreed, I already heard people calling it a "cheap asset flip", and honestly, I take personal offense from that statement. Fdev don't deserve that as they are putting a max effort to any and every one of their projects...
Using PlanCo assets in PlanZoo?
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This reminds me of the filesize debate when the TMTK came out. Logically, 3D files with multiple textures are bigger than "Blueprint" textfiles.
Though the perception of most people was "why are these so big, blueprints are way smaller, i'll just stick to them.."
classic case of reality vs. perception. But the work involved in creating a well-performing and good looking custom asset, few can imagine.
But that's often the case with anything 3Dmodelling.
If you look at the credits for a Pixar short, that's 150 people working on 3-5 minutes of footage,
but most people don't see how complicated it is, it's actually most obvious to the casual viewer if it's done badly.
But anything that's well done, or looks playful...well, there's loads of skill, experience and hours crunched into that, it just doesn't look like it.
I'm sure Frontier has done a lot of work under the hood.
With PlanZoo i would assume it maybe started as a dlc initially?
Then it became obvious PlanCo's performance limits would make it hard to realize properly?
I prefer it being a separate game, it can take advantage of newer advancements in the Cobra engine and Multi-core compliance(DX12).
And my guess is it will have hidden compliance to a possible PlanCo2.
just a hunch. ..or wishful thinking.
Not only is 3D modelling a time consuming task but also the animations are.
It may have started out as a dlc, we don't know that really but because FDev had bought the rights to various "Planet" names including Planet Zoo I'm more inclined to think that it was made intentionally as a separate IP.
And I do love that it's a separate game, I fully agree with you on that.
Around 350 was their entire head count, last I check, about 3 months ago. An they specifically stated to shareholders last year they weren't going to go on a hiring spree. Lying about those sort of things is a big no no.
Take away 100 people which are working on Elite Dangerous (confirm by devs and people who visited the studio), let say around 40 of them cover HR, social media and community management, licencing, merchandise, online maintenance, facility manager, IT team.
That leave 210 people, to work one PC dlc, JWE expansions dlc, JWE 2, Planet Coaster 2, Project Marconi, Jurassic World Survival.
Taking that into account, 50 people working on this might be a higher number than the real figure.
But there more.
Frontier has a dedicated team of people working on just improving the cobra engine and developing new in house technologies. So that even less people to work on PZ.
Now if it true JWS is in the work, an I believe it is, to be competitive in today's world of survival games (there a lot of them), that got to have second largest team at frontier already and could easily be their first game to cross a hundred million in sales, so they are going to be throwing a lot of resources at it. In fact I would bet that JW franchise license games, which is now by far Frontier biggest money spinner has the most resources devoted to it. At least a 100 people.
That leave roughly 100 people working on everything else going on at Frontier. So even 50 being devoted to work on PZ is on the optimistic side.
Now explain your reasoning on how you figure there more than 50 people working on the game?
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In short:
Number of Employees = 422 (30 November 2018)
Frontier Developments - Wikipedia
Edit:
On page 5: As at 30 November 2018, Frontier had grown its total headcount to 422 staff compared to 344 at 30 November 2017.
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My mistake,In short:
Number of Employees = 422 (30 November 2018)
It's even more by now but I don't have the exact number.Frontier Developments - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Edit:
On page 5: As at 30 November 2018, Frontier had grown its total headcount to 422 staff compared to 344 at 30 November 2017.
So 422, to developed the 5 games in production? even at that figure it still hard to imagine their many more than 50 people working on this project, with everything else in the roadmap.
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WingardiumLevicoaster
Volunteer Moderator
But each game shares company facilities staff, audio, QA etc. And staff can be moved as desired between projects.
You seem to know more about what Frontier are working on than they do! Where have all these new games come from? This whole PC2 is ridiculous, keep seeing it mentioned when unless I'm missing something there's been no evidence this is in the works. Knowles I think you're off on your numbers here and the statement "My personal feeling is that this is a fairly small and quick project for Frontier. Where they will mostly be using assets and technologies developed for other games with a few touch ups here and there" as mentioned is way off the mark.
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WingardiumLevicoaster
Volunteer Moderator
Code modules for certain features I'm sure could / will be used, but it doesn't mean that the game will be quick to make. There is still the code to plug in these 'pieces' i.e the game. The same QA, UAT processes need to be met as it's a new product.
There was a leak a couple of weeks ago on Reddit. Two of the things on that post have turn out to be completely true.
Obsidian ant talk about it here, 5 games and numerous DLCs.
An article about it here,
https://www.pcgamesn.com/frontier-roadmap-leak-deleted
An here the leak,
That a awful lot of stuff to be working on for 422 people, probably more like 370 once remove all non
developer staff.
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It will be a lot quicker than producing the game completely from scratch. An require less resources and time to do so. It also allow them to devote most of that time, resources and money to the most important part of the game, the animals.
So far it has been confirm 100% correct through, with JLE expansion being exactly what the leak said it would be and the name and announcement date of their next title being 100% right.
How many things in this leak has to be right before it is accepted as being real?
All of it.
And that is not because I don't believe it. But these things can change overnight.
There is no point in trying. Nobody @ Frontier will release info regarding this untill (close to) the gamerelease.
Keep in mind, a "leak" often can only happen, if it serves the "leak victim's" purpose, too. The video hasn't been blocked yet,
so it's safe to assume there is nothing sensitive or of strategic importance in there.
And i think it's logical, if FDev added another quarter more employees (as they did in the past year),
there are gonna be plans to extend project capacity.
EDIT: This thread is hovering in off-topic land for quite long now.
To add something to the initial discussion. I think it will be possible to cross-use assets and at some point, custom assets as well.
The shading won't be too different, it's gonna be a updated Cobra under the hood,
but apart from additional shaders, all PBR shaders are already there and the map values won't change dramatically.
(Refinement is the keyword, i would assume)
so it's safe to assume there is nothing sensitive or of strategic importance in there.
And i think it's logical, if FDev added another quarter more employees (as they did in the past year),
there are gonna be plans to extend project capacity.
EDIT: This thread is hovering in off-topic land for quite long now.
To add something to the initial discussion. I think it will be possible to cross-use assets and at some point, custom assets as well.
The shading won't be too different, it's gonna be a updated Cobra under the hood,
but apart from additional shaders, all PBR shaders are already there and the map values won't change dramatically.
(Refinement is the keyword, i would assume)
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They've answered questions in other threads. They should be able to say "definitely not" or "it's something we're looking into but it's too early know if it'll work properly yet" at least...
They won't say either of those things, because as often happens when they do say things like that, someone is always left disappointed. Better to say nothing at all sometimes.