egosoft.com

Okay I know there have been many threads about this. I think I asked once a couple years ago. This time is a little different. I am not asking if you will. Im asking for a honest and reasonable detailed reason for why you all will NOT do multiplayer?

It doesn't need all sorts of new fangled features or shininess. It doesnt need to support five million simultaneous player connections... You all could take x2. Change absolutely NOTHING about how the game works. Just add netcode with the ability to run a persistent server. I mean it could cap out at 20 players at a time. i dont care. Just give us a little chat feature and the ability to be in the same x2 game... And I would buy the game again. Without complaint. You could do something that simple and I would be happy. Hell I bet at least 80% of your fans would be.

So my question is why not? Is the Ego in egosoft making you wait till you all can confidently manage a uselessly large mmo, cause I can say we got that and dont need another. Smaller scale more personal community would rock. Is it an irrational fear of netcode? You cant take the idea of sharing your x-universe? I mean you dont have to USE multiplayer.. Just let us have it!!! Wait... Is it the boggyman? Did he say he would come and take you all away if you added multiplayer?

Jokes aside what is it really? You already have the perfect game world built. What makes persistent multiplayer servers so hard? Please help me understand.

another multiplayer thread

I tried searching for a decent answer already. But mostly all I found was "no". Or brief comments that sounded like the excuse of a lazy bum. There is just too much detail in the X universe games for them to be lazy. Im just hoping to learn why.

If anyone knows of a thread with an answer worth reading please toss in a link!

http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=243321

you didnt do much of a (google) search did you?

Roh81 wrote: I tried searching for a decent answer already. But mostly all I found was "no". Or brief comments that sounded like the excuse of a lazy bum. There is just too much detail in the X universe games for them to be lazy. Im just hoping to learn why.

If anyone knows of a thread with an answer worth reading please toss in a link!

I can tell you now that its due to the game engine having to be changed to much and the game play being designed for single players. How would you get seta to work? without it the game would be very dull with travel times being massively increased.

What do people like the OP think will come from threads like this?

Egosoft dev: "Quick, look at this forum post - a handfull of people want Multiplayer, quick ring the publisher and tell them Rebirth wont be realeased by their deadline, we have Multiplayer to add."

@ OP - And who will publish this Egosoft multiplayer game you have in mind and fund the project? You?

You just asked Egosoft if there scared of netcode, if it's so easy then why don't YOU make a multiplayer mod for X2? Then you can show everyone how easy it would be to code.

Roh81 wrote:You all could take x2. Change absolutely NOTHING about how the game works.

Yeah, it's only over 5 years old and doesn't work well with Vista/7 (savegames and screens in program folder among other ugly things), has lots of stuff hardcoded that were/are scriptable/modable in recent games (=much more difficult to modify even for Egosoft, high risk of introducing new bugs), and the code has rot for the past years and probably not even the programmers themselves remember what they did in it. And with the completely outdated graphics it will be fun to find a publisher for it, not to mention advertise it. Now that's a good starting point.

Just add netcode with the ability to run a persistent server.

"Just". Just like that?
Have you, sir, ever worked on big code projects? And/or programmed client-server programs?
It doesn't work "just like that". It takes a lot of time, and thus, it's expensive. So, you need to find a publisher. Last statement of CBJ was, yes, all theoretical problems are solved, no, we don't need your advice how to do it; we just need the money to do it, because we don't want multiplayer so badly we'd live under a bridge for it.

Meh I could deal with travel times being on the same scale and not having seta. Jump drives might take a little tweaking. But it is a hardcore kind of game anyways. And a lot more rewarding then most.

And no I did not do a giggle search. I used the forum search. Not much of a forum crawling and I dont do very well with them.

because they dont whant to do multiplayer, they what to do an MMO and charge every month, thats why.

Every game seems to be taking this direction.

the way x series work, the code MUST be changed from foundation to suit multiplayer, because how to OOS works, it won't work well when 2 players are playing in same world at same time
and you lose ability of seta, don't tell me you don't care, ask youself how many games you have played without using seta even once?
and because the way x series are set up, multiplayer means mandatory dead is dead mode, I don't think that will please most players

Actually item malls seem to be more popular now. But well.. At least that would be an answer I could understand. If it was coming from them.

The thread Merroc already linked you to has a link to CBJ's multiplayer FAQ in it. CBJ (unlike most of the other moderators and admins) actually works for Egosoft. That being the case, how are his answers somehow "not coming from them"?

@ LTerSlash

they what to do an MMO and charge every month,

Where do you get this from?

If they did that then I for one would NOT indulge.

Subscriptions is one reason why I have never played Eve online etc.

I don't mind paying for extra content , if price is low enough.

Pirate hater wrote:

Roh81 wrote: I tried searching for a decent answer already. But mostly all I found was "no". Or brief comments that sounded like the excuse of a lazy bum. There is just too much detail in the X universe games for them to be lazy. Im just hoping to learn why.

If anyone knows of a thread with an answer worth reading please toss in a link!

I can tell you now that its due to the game engine having to be changed to much and the game play being designed for single players. How would you get seta to work? without it the game would be very dull with travel times being massively increased.

This is really the worst post about multiplayer because.

1. Its a new engine so no excuses on that front.
2. Seta is gone so no excuses on that one.
3. New gameplay is for x rebirth so no excuses on that one either.

Reasons i think their is no mp is because.

1. When ES hear mp they think mmo which we fans are mostly against we do not want that type of mp we just want small mp maps to play in with mates. Or the lesser option which i want is just a combat mp as in one sector sized maps of say 10 diff mp maps that randomly switches per round and duke it out with ur fav ship and therefore no trading type of mp gameplay just pure combat.

2. ES have no experience with mp and i have no idea if they even can code mp code or if they have to get someone new in to code it that knows network code. As ES have only done sp games for now.

3. Money which is usually the always given reason but tbh if they wanted mp in they could ask for more money off the publisher or find a diff publisher who would give them more, deepsilver aint the only pub around.

Hardly new , when the game has been in development for about 6 years !

Skeeter wrote:

Pirate hater wrote:

Roh81 wrote: I tried searching for a decent answer already. But mostly all I found was "no". Or brief comments that sounded like the excuse of a lazy bum. There is just too much detail in the X universe games for them to be lazy. Im just hoping to learn why.

If anyone knows of a thread with an answer worth reading please toss in a link!

I can tell you now that its due to the game engine having to be changed to much and the game play being designed for single players. How would you get seta to work? without it the game would be very dull with travel times being massively increased.

This is really the worst post about multiplayer because.

1. Its a new engine so no excuses on that front.
2. Seta is gone so no excuses on that one.
3. New gameplay is for x rebirth so no excuses on that one either.

Reasons i think their is no mp is because.

A couple of points.

1. the original post is about X2 or X3 getting multiplayer not X4.

2. X4 sounds very different. I am not that interested in X4 now they have released some info.

Skeeter wrote:2. ES have no experience with mp and i have no idea if they even can code mp code or if they have to get someone new in to code it that knows network code. As ES have only done sp games for now.

The only network stuff Egosoft ever did was the Devchat. And boooy, that's a messy piece of technology…

3. Money which is usually the always given reason but tbh if they wanted mp in they could ask for more money off the publisher or find a diff publisher who would give them more, deepsilver aint the only pub around.

Money doesn't grow on trees. As CBJ said, a multiplayer wouldn't boost the sales numbers noticable, so it would be wasted money from the publishers point of view.
Why invest in a multiplayer, if people are buying a cheaper produced singleplayer game anyway? That's not profitable, and profit is everything that counts.

And I doubt they can switch publishers "just like that". We don't know what contracts Egosoft and Deep Silver have. Does Egosoft even own the X brand? Does the contract have a minimum term? Etc. pp.

My bad, didn't read the op properly i thought he was going on about no mp for the new game.

Money which is usually the always given reason but tbh if they wanted mp in they could ask for more money off the publisher or find a diff publisher who would give them more, deepsilver aint the only pub around.

In one of the other posts on this subject, it was pointed out that Egosoft did request funds for giving X-R a multiplayer option. DeepSilver, the publisher, denied the request. I'd assume they crunched the numbers, weighed the costs for the current single player version in development and the additional cost for multiplayer functionality against the projected revenue for the new game, both single player and multiplayer. Money currently available for the development cycles also has to be considered.

As far as just going out and finding a different publisher willing to foot the bill, first any contractual obligation with DeepSilver would have to be bought off. That would probably include reimbursing DeepSilver for all current costs to develop Rebirth. (Just a thought, but if ES had that kind of cash, they wouldn't have to ask for money to implement mp.)

Then another publisher would have to be convinced to take on a niche game and commit money to it. Not a simple task on any point.

I am quite happy with the present symbiotic relationship between Egosoft/Deep Silver etc.

Ok,the distribution network might not be up to scratch for some countries , hence Steam ,Gamersgate and Impulse.

Otherwise,why fix what's not broken?