Update the Game Engine

[Damionic]

I was going to write another suggestion on armour colour changes, but then I was thinking it's easy to do that on other games.. Why not here?

It's the engine..it needs updating as at the moment it's holding the developers and the game back.

Colour changing is very complecated
New classes and PrE's are being chopped and downgraded to "fit" the old engine.
There is no updates to the game like physics(tm) from Nvidia
Things take far too long and are drawn out and are half-baked once they arrive.

Now I know next to nothing about game engines apart from that they are expensive.. But this game is years old with it's old engine and newer games with better engines are doing a better job then what DDO is offering.

DeathknellQ

[Ziindarax]

I was going to write another suggestion on armour colour changes, but then I was thinking it's easy to do that on other games.. Why not here?

It's the engine..it needs updating as at the moment it's holding the developers and the game back.

Colour changing is very complecated
New classes and PrE's are being chopped and downgraded to "fit" the old engine.
There is no updates to the game like physics(tm) from Nvidia
Things take far too long and are drawn out and are half-baked once they arrive.

Now I know next to nothing about game engines apart from that they are expensive.. But this game is years old with it's old engine and newer games with better engines are doing a better job then what DDO is offering.

DeathknellQ

Hmm... A stronger engine would make the game better... and it would unleash more possibilities.

There are some problems with this though. The first problem is that the dev's would need more time to get acquainted with the engine (as well as modify it for their purposes), and the second is that it might make DDO require a stronger PC to run it..

[Damionic]

It's the old saying "keep up or die" The PC Req shouldent be an issue as by today's standards it's set very low (my PC is average by enthusiast standards and I have everything set to max with no problems)

As for devs having to relearn/update their skills.. This should be a givern as not keeping up in this day and age is a one way ticket to unemployed. New game developers will need people in the "know"

[BattleCircle]

Methinks a new game engine would mean a new game.

Rewriting all the code for the current game would certainly suck big ones.

[Damionic]

Methinks a new game engine would mean a new game.

Rewriting all the code for the current game would certainly suck big ones.

That's not really a bad thing as it's already a new name.. Why not a new game as well?

[Freeman]

That's not really a bad thing as it's already a new name.. Why not a new game as well?

Putting a new engine in an existing game isn't like putting a new engine in a car. Once you replace the engine, you'll have to recode virtually everything to work with the new engine before you could start adding new functionality. The cost, in both time and manpower, for doing that in a game that already has years of development built on the current engine is usually prohibitive. That's why you see so much engine reuse, and rarely, if ever, hear of a major game's entire engine being replaced.

[Requiro]

New engine is cool from players perspective. But for Developers it very risky, because:

1. Require lots of time
2. Require lots of money

And new engine, will not guarantee that they gain more money/players. That’s why this kind of change will never happen, unless game start loosing players... rapidly.

EDIT:

In short why develop microsoft windows 7(tm) when windows 98(tm) is good enough.

Well... If DDO has 90% of ALL players from ALL games then you will see new engines every 6 month

[Kaeldur]

I don't see what's so wrong with the current engine, specially considering MMOs, which have a huge complexity attached to it that single-player games don't. How many MMOs with WASD controls do you know? Most are click-based (yuck!). And it's even cooler that you can play it with your GamePad =)
Graphics are nice when you put it at maxed quality. And light enough to play on very old computers when you lower graphics. Gives access to a huge range of people, because unlike in the US, top-level hardware is very expensive in certain countries...
We have lag sometimes in certain quests (notably Shroud), but even that has reduced a huge amount ever since the double-strike mechanism.
I think the engine is fine...

[Uska]

That's not really a bad thing as it's already a new name.. Why not a new game as well?

Because a new game would most likely be based on 4E and I would have to call in the Sulaco and nuke both turbine and WOTC from orbit to stop that abomination just to be sure

[CrescentCalling_5]

Hmm... A stronger engine would make the game better... and it would unleash more possibilities.

There are some problems with this though. The first problem is that the dev's would need more time to get acquainted with the engine (as well as modify it for their purposes), and the second is that it might make DDO require a stronger PC to run it..

I just wanted to correct one of your points.

While it's true that the dev's would have to get used to the newer engines, lately a lot of game engines are steering farther from the old "dump bells and whistles and make the consumers get the hottest pc to play our game" idea to a more "strength + efficiency = power" concept.

Updating the engine to something more powerful doesn't necessarily mean creating a more taxing game, it could mean the exact opposite! People being able to play the game with a far slower connection due to efficiency of data transfer in the client and server. If the dev's try to aim for an engine that is both more easily updateable and more efficient, then the only downside we'll ever really see is a slow-down in the next few updates after the engine is implemented. Probably followed by much faster updates later on.

[Lorz]

Now I know next to nothing

DeathknellQ

Fixed that for ya OP.

[Damionic]

Fixed that for ya OP.

I could do the usual and flame you for your misguided attack.

But no, I'm going to come at you with this..try knowing nothing.. You will find it very difficult!