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Post by hardly on Aug 13, 2014 21:06:55 GMT
Well as a company we're sort of just recovering from the mobile launch. As an aside, I know anything to do with the mobile game and it's business model is an unpleasant topic for you guys and... well, I'd very much rather not get involved in talking about it. You guys are very welcome to but I will be bowing out of any conversations about how you guys feel about it. I don't have much control over it and it's pretty painful for people to hear people crying for the blood of your organisation (even if they say they have no problem with me personally). And I'm not even going to say you should or shouldn't cry for blood. You have your reasons, I'm familiar with almost all of them. But really, I just can't get involved. Anyways. So some people are looking at the analytics coming in from that. Some people are planning what the next move is for the mobile version and getting on with that and we just had a meeting about the next thing for the PC version (well, the one after the next one). Some pretty exciting stuff there but I feel that it's George's job to break that kind of info to you guys so you'll have to wait for him to tell you about it. I guess that's more of an overall but it's vague now that I look at it. I really don't have many more details about it. I might have got the wrong impression but I have to say 22cans sounds likes a very insular and fragment workplace for a team of just 22cans. I've worked in groups of 50+ people and felt like I know what individuals are working on and how to contributes to the goal. I can only suggest you guys play the game more at work (on PC) and sit around and talk about what it's like. Everyone should be contributing to the design not just the big heads. If something doesn't make sense don't let it go unchallenged. Gameplay trumps everything. If people are getting fobbed of with answers like "it just has to be like that..." or "it will make sense later" that is the path to a crap product. I've seen that attitude in my work places and it's always a bad sign. Sorry if we come off as being a rabid mob. We don't want 22cans to fail, we want you to succeed. There are specific design decisions and strategic decisions we take issue with but we don't hold you responsible for that bro. Just play the game. All we want is for it to be fun and we can work together community an cans on that. Id love for 22cans to throw ideas on the forum for us to chew over. That way we can really test stuff before it gets implemented. |
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Lord Ba'al
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Post by Lord Ba'al on Aug 14, 2014 11:57:52 GMT
Raspofabs, did it really take you two days to build the prototype in python?
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Raspofabs
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Post by Raspofabs on Aug 14, 2014 12:25:30 GMT
Raspofabs, did it really take you two days to build the prototype in python? The python prototype was done in pyglet using the core of a mincraft clone I was beginning to build at home. On the Friday, I was given a few images, the like of which you can see if you google for "terraced land". On the Sunday, I presented this:  and then mid week while I was adding sculpting tools and some really trivial AI and house building stuff, it was looking like this:  It took a couple of weeks to get that to look like it was a game, and at that point we switched to using C++ as land regeneration was getting slow and we needed something that could show animated characters (we started by just hacking together an FBX importer). |
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Lord Ba'al
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Post by Lord Ba'al on Aug 14, 2014 12:41:50 GMT
Those graphics already look decent enough for me to accept them when playing a game. (the second pic, the first pic not so much)
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Raspofabs
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Post by Raspofabs on Aug 14, 2014 13:28:54 GMT
Those graphics already look decent enough for me to accept them when playing a game. (the second pic, the first pic not so much) The second image had the land generated by gradient height maps, not voxel height maps, which were almost impossible to use in game because they made it really hard to pack plots, which in turn lead to large uninhabitable land that looked perfectly habitable. I still love the look of that map, but we had to abandon it. |
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Lord Ba'al
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Post by Lord Ba'al on Aug 14, 2014 13:47:30 GMT
Those graphics already look decent enough for me to accept them when playing a game. (the second pic, the first pic not so much) The second image had the land generated by gradient height maps, not voxel height maps, which were almost impossible to use in game because they made it really hard to pack plots, which in turn lead to large uninhabitable land that looked perfectly habitable. I still love the look of that map, but we had to abandon it. Well what if you were to rethink the whole plots concept and forget about everything that's been implemented in godus and go back to just that landscape. What solution might there be to allow houses to be built on that land? For example, do plots have to be square? Theoretically they could take any shape I would think. Are plots even needed at all? |
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Post by Danjal on Aug 14, 2014 13:51:15 GMT
I kinda agree there, the plots are so utterly awkward because the houses are all smaller than the plots and just kinda haphazardly form in random directions.
Leaving out the desire for a more organized build (something that many people automatically would do if they form a town or community, you're not gonna get front doors in all random directions...)
There's no reason why the plot system works the way it does right now.
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Lord Ba'al
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Post by Lord Ba'al on Aug 14, 2014 13:54:27 GMT
I was in this case not criticizing godus for this implementation but more picturing the project as still at its very conception. Sort of like, if you take this landscape prototype as something you had built at home as a hobby and you were looking at expanding it with some sort of population, what options would you have?
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Raspofabs
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Post by Raspofabs on Aug 14, 2014 13:55:26 GMT
The second image had the land generated by gradient height maps, not voxel height maps, which were almost impossible to use in game because they made it really hard to pack plots, which in turn lead to large uninhabitable land that looked perfectly habitable. I still love the look of that map, but we had to abandon it. Well what if you were to rethink the whole plots concept and forget about everything that's been implemented in godus and go back to just that landscape. What solution might there be to allow houses to be built on that land? For example, do plots have to be square? Theoretically they could take any shape I would think. Are plots even needed at all?   So, yeah, it's possible. But I'd probably lock the land around the houses (near doors and walls) so the game wouldn't be broken by nearby sculpting. |
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Post by 13thGeneral on Aug 14, 2014 15:51:40 GMT
Yes. Yes! Yes!! THAT is what I was hoping for with regard to structures when I backed this. Structures that work with the landscape instead of being dependent on strictly flat areas and restrictive designated plots; the key word here is 'organic'. I wasn't sure it was possible though, since I have never seen it in any game, and what we currently have sort of solidified my concern. I wasn't entirely unhappy with the result, but a bit disheartened it lacked a lot of creativity - and is a bit awkward and restrictive. But you're saying it's still.potentially possible to move closer to this? What could be done to address this to make plots be more versatile? I'm not a huge fan of locking the layers, but I understand the necessity in regards to the set structure plots. Is there a way to make the structures more organically dependent on the layers, sort of altering shape as the land changes?
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Post by hardly on Aug 15, 2014 7:28:22 GMT
So 22Cans just out of interest is there a analytics report there telling you how many followers have been sacrificed? If so can you please share some stats - total number, number per minute, average per play, most people sacrificed by any one PC player? Stuff like that.
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Post by rubgish on Aug 19, 2014 11:52:13 GMT
Has 22cans moved fully into the PC sprint section now, or are they still working on post-iOS cleanup stuff?
A while back we were told that the aim was for the PC dev branch to get updates roughly every week. Obviously with the iOS focus this never happened, but can we expect to go back to that when the PC focus starts?
Peter again mentioned the multiplayer hubworld launch in a recent interview, stating it's about a month away. No doubt this is unrealistic, but do you think we'll see it launch this year?
George, you've moved to strategic planning of stuff, is this for working out 22cans viewpoint around multiplayer release?
How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
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Post by Danjal on Aug 19, 2014 13:31:09 GMT
I'd assume they're in a bit of a limbo right now. Not yet fully committed to the PC sprint because they have to handle the aftermath of the iOS release.
Alternately they are wrapping up their business and we will soon here that 22cans is officially closing down... Wonder what Bryan will have to say about that...
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Post by 13thGeneral on Aug 19, 2014 14:57:29 GMT
So 22Cans just out of interest is there a analytics report there telling you how many followers have been sacrificed? If so can you please share some stats - total number, number per minute, average per play, most people sacrificed by any one PC player? Stuff like that. Personally, I've probably sacrificed somewhere in the ballpark of 1-2 thousand - probaly more (at least a couple hundred every few hours) - so if that's any indication... those will be some staggering stats. As has been said before, once people realise the strategy works, and they come to terms with essentially murdering thousands of simulated people, they quickly jump on board and the game becomes much, much easier; it's a no-brainer, working strategy. I never run out of belief now, rarely getting below 100k - simply by sacrificing a few hundred, trade the gems for belief (125gems=50k belief), drop a few fountains and happy trees and set them off every time you use the PoD (or when the Assholi celebrate), and you're golden. It's so broken and exploitable, it kind of makes me sad. |
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Post by Danjal on Aug 19, 2014 17:38:09 GMT
More, far far more... for me...
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Lord Ba'al
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Post by Lord Ba'al on Aug 19, 2014 22:57:13 GMT
How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? Not an awful lot if he was a character in godus. |
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Post by dozvati on Aug 20, 2014 14:47:52 GMT
Personally, I've probably sacrificed somewhere in the ballpark of 1-2 thousand - probaly more (at least a couple hundred every few hours) - so if that's any indication... those will be some staggering stats. I've sacrificed 3x as many followers as I have actual followers.  |
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Post by 13thGeneral on Aug 20, 2014 14:51:42 GMT
Personally, I've probably sacrificed somewhere in the ballpark of 1-2 thousand - probaly more (at least a couple hundred every few hours) - so if that's any indication... those will be some staggering stats. I've sacrificed 3x as many followers as I have actual followers. You know what? It never occurred to me to select the PoD and check it's info. XD I'll have to do that when I get home tonight. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2014 14:54:52 GMT
Personally, I've probably sacrificed somewhere in the ballpark of 1-2 thousand - probaly more (at least a couple hundred every few hours) - so if that's any indication... those will be some staggering stats. I've sacrificed 3x as many followers as I have actual followers. You have caused 3 unhappiness! How could you?!?!? |
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Post by Danjal on Aug 20, 2014 15:09:34 GMT
I'd love to see the actual values behind that.
I've seen various of these markers on both happiness and unhappiness effects - but no distinct pattern in their effectiveness to judge a value.
Its funny how hard 22cans tries to keep values and such away from the uses, as they are afraid that if the user gets too much information they get scared away.
Yet at the same time they don't really have the AI to have a lot of things done automatically, so they keep handing direct control over things to the player or make the actions dependant on the leash.
For a game where you
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