[Merged] Co-Op Multiplayer as some potential future stretchgoal?

[Troller]

They already don't have much to support the development of this game, comparing to other games, like Dragon Age(which only had 3 classes)

so I think stuff like multiplayer, "tea parties" shouldn't really be discussed here, we should focus only in important aspects of RPG: gameplay and historytelling.

[Karranthain]

I'm very much against it - I think I'd rather have a longer, more satisfying solo experience instead of a half-baked (because that's what it'd amount to at best) multiplayer.

[morhilane]

Voted no. With a limited budget, I prefer they put the money in content and fleshing out the new IP...and maybe created mod-tools.

[Blablachar]

No multiplayer please- as above, rather concentrate on awesome C&C, dialogs and fleshing out the core game.

[Tychoxi]

man, it looks like I missed on something (never did multiplayer with any Infinity Engine game) but I can't see how such a deeply single-player focused game could work with co-op! How do you handle dialogs, companion interactions, making choices? Is the "second" player a "spectator" during those events? I could see something like IWD or ToEE (though I barely remember ToEE to be honest) working somewhat better with co-op, but I'm thinking the experience of Project Eternity will be more akin to Arcanum, Torment and BG...

Edited September 17, 2012 by Tychoxi

[Sensuki]

I love Multiplayer too, but I don't really think this game needs it.

[Umberlin]

I'm really not on board with this idea that some publishers/developers have in their heads right now that everything needs multiplayer to be considered good, it annoys me even more that some reviewers have actually bought into that nonsense.

[MustahKrakish]

Myself and five other friends all play through Baldurs Gate/Neverwinter Nights/Icewind Dale/etc games together, and the second co-op is confirmed we're dropping cash on this game.

 

Until then we're in limbo.

[AzureWolf]

With 40% of responders wanting multiplayer it's a must at this point. The next stretch goal, mac porting, caters to ~10%, and a later one, linux ~5% of potential customers. For those complaining about development time, why complain about multiplayer when porting will take up more development time anyway? Go rage against that.

 

Look if this is done anything like the IE games, multiplayer will be awesome and seamless from the singleplayer.

[Alweth]

I've been reading through many threads and it seem that the community is split in half on multiplayer. There is nothing I want more than to be able to explore this wonderful new world with 5 of my friends. Did co op not work well with the old IE games? Why are so many of you so against it?

 

It seems like the people who are against multiplayer never tried BG and company's multiplayer. It wasn't perfect, for sure, but you can see all the posts in here from people who played and enjoyed IE multiplayer and want some more.

[Alweth]

There seem to be some major misconceptions floating around this subject.

 

The truth of the matter is:

 

1. There is not a direct correlation between the amount of money spent on "singleplayer" and how good the singleplayer experience will be. In fact, studies have shown that especially when doing creative work more money can lead to poorer performance.

 

2. The people who would work on enabling multiplayer functionality, ie. the base engine programmers, would almost certainly not be the same people who are designing the gameplay, writing the story, designing areas, drawing art, or doing just about anything else that would add to the singleplayer experience once the core engine is fully functional. So coop can be added while the mythical "singleplayer game" (as if it was a different thing than the coop game in the IE games) continues to be improved.

 

3. Thus the oft repeated claim that money spent on including coop will directly detract from the singleplayer experience is false.

 

 

4. Adding IE style coop will not affect singleplayer design at all, since it was just singleplayer with the ability to allow multiple people to control the multiple characters. Thus people who talk about "the singleplayer game" as though it's something separate from the whole game with coop included don't know what us IE coop fans are talking about.

 

5. The idea that there's a recent fad of tacking on multiplayer to singleplayer RPGs might be right (Mass Effect 3?), but that's not what supporters of Project Eternity coop are talking about. Baldur's Gate, the game that started it all, was made when LAN and especially Internet play was the new cool thing. That's probably one of the main reasons it even had coop, and it rocked. It was the RPGs that came later that wimped out and left it out.

 

6. If anyone wants to bring up the limited budget thing again, they're going to have to tell us what the budget for Baldur's Gate 1 was.

[Tiliqua]

Good points Alweth, it seems that the debate is being hijacked by people who don't play multiplayer, probably don't like mmos either. For me the greatest aspect of gaming is the social capital that is created by playing with other people. Single player games are so last century.

[Umberlin]

In the end I wouldn't want co-op for the main campaign. The only sort of co-op I'd take part in is co-op in player DMed stories created by the players via an included toolkit. If you had an NWN like toolset and DM toolkit to create and run your own campaigns for players to take part in I'd be all for it. I am not for just adding on co-op to the main singleplayer experience though.

 

A well designed toolset with a DM toolkit attached to run campaigns you've created for a few people though? That's another thing entirely. And I'm all for it.

[Ieo]

There seem to be some major misconceptions floating around this subject.

 

The truth of the matter is:

 

1. There is not a direct correlation between the amount of money spent on "singleplayer" and how good the singleplayer experience will be. In fact, studies have shown that especially when doing creative work more money can lead to poorer performance.

 

2. The people who would work on enabling multiplayer functionality, ie. the base engine programmers, would almost certainly not be the same people who are designing the gameplay, writing the story, designing areas, drawing art, or doing just about anything else that would add to the singleplayer experience once the core engine is fully functional. So coop can be added while the mythical "singleplayer game" (as if it was a different thing than the coop game in the IE games) continues to be improved.

 

3. Thus the oft repeated claim that money spent on including coop will directly detract from the singleplayer experience is false.

 

 

You actually provide the means to counter your own argument:

 

Yes, there would be a different team involved, but the new team would have to be hired with the funds in the first place. If Obsidian already had a dedicated game-networking team to begin with, this would be less of an issue, but I doubt they do otherwise this would have been on the table in the beginning. So with a finite monetary pool, that alone does actually lower resources for the other devs responsible for world-building and the single-player experience, like hiring more coders and more QA. Certainly at the current and even projected numbers, this project isn't going to be rolling in ridiculous amounts of money to make the risk of #1 a truth, compared to the costs of other games past. No, I haven't seen exact BG numbers myself, but there are other numbers floating around in comparison. (Second link detailing what Brian Fargo would do with $2.5m is pretty interesting. The industry does not habitually publish figures.)

 

http://www.rpgwatch....80&postcount=33

http://www.rpgwatch....t?newsbit=19389

http://www.1up.com/n...dgets-secretive

http://www.cinemable...gets-39474.html

http://www.develop-o...-as-high-as-28m

http://digitalbattle...e-budgets-ever/

http://www.computera...ant-innovation/

 

 

P.S.: Splitting off "point #3" separately like that is rather disingenuous and weakens your rhetorical structure.

 

4. Adding IE style coop will not affect singleplayer design at all, since it was just singleplayer with the ability to allow multiple people to control the multiple characters. Thus people who talk about "the singleplayer game" as though it's something separate from the whole game with coop included don't know what us IE coop fans are talking about.

 

It may not necessarily affect the design. You'd see less content without the companions, by choice. And then without extant infrastructure, to hire more devs to make multiplayer, that's less investment elsewhere. See above.

 

5. The idea that there's a recent fad of tacking on multiplayer to singleplayer RPGs might be right (Mass Effect 3?), but that's not what supporters of Project Eternity coop are talking about. Baldur's Gate, the game that started it all, was made when LAN and especially Internet play was the new cool thing. That's probably one of the main reasons it even had coop, and it rocked. It was the RPGs that came later that wimped out and left it out.

 

6. If anyone wants to bring up the limited budget thing again, they're going to have to tell us what the budget for Baldur's Gate 1 was.

 

See above. Also, what? BG started it with a tacked on implementation and then NWN (whatever number) was developed from ground up to include it, and that franchise was hailed to be a much better multiplayer experience. Dev interview

 

 

Tiliqua. You're in the wrong forum looking at the wrong game, then. Haven't you tried MMOs? Believe me, those are faaaaar more "multiplayer" than something like co-op. And the best part is that a bunch are totally, legally free. If you're so against single-player, this really isn't the product for you, and you'd be happier if you went away and looked at games actually designed to be fully networked.

[Tiliqua]

 

Tiliqua. You're in the wrong forum looking at the wrong game, then. Haven't you tried MMOs? Believe me, those are faaaaar more "multiplayer" than something like co-op. And the best part is that a bunch are totally, legally free. If you're so against single-player, this really isn't the product for you, and you'd be happier if you went away and looked at games actually designed to be fully networked.

 

I'm in the right forum, talking about the right game. I played all of the BG and IWD games on multiplayer and know how much it enhanced my gaming experience by sharing it with other people. I'll still play Eternity even if it is only single player, (especially as I've already made a $25 pledge), however this must be the time and place to argue for content.

 

I had no idea there was only one way to think, thanks for the protip.

[Desmond]

I strongly support Multiplayer and advice people to get away from the Idea of an MMO (MASSIVE Multilayer Online). No one wants that in this game.

 

When we talk about multiplayer we mean one the one hand the classic coop style from BG and IWD on the other hand the NWN Mutiplayer which includes the BG and IWD style of MP even extends it. (Persistent Worlds, Battle Arenas, Coop Multiplayer, Dungeon Master support and much more - all created by the fans!)

 

NWN Style Multiplayer only makes sense if there is a good Modding tool for creating our one content. With out Modding it would be complete pointless. But look at what a good Modding tool can do. There are single player/coop Adventures for thousand of hours for NWN and NWN2.

 

I can imagine a Modding tool at 4.000.000 $. This would mean there is enough money for a über single player game and with the modding tool there will be the possibility of thousand of additional hours of adventures made by the community. This will attract a lot of people to the game and every one will benefit. (It is hard to imagine, that modding tools will cost more than 500.000$ for development and the devs could use them for expansions. )

 

And after this i would set Mutliplayer for 5.000.000 $ and a Dungenmaster client at 6.000.000$ .

 

This are big numbers but with this the community would not only get a awesome game but also a platform for being creative and to experience great interactive RPGs. Nothing comes so close to a real live Pen and Paper session like playing NWN with a Dungeon Master.

 

Also this high stretch goal would guarantee that Multiplayer is only added if there is enough interest in it. But the promise of a Dungemaster Client would attract a lot of people.

[casa]

Haven't you tried MMOs? Believe me, those are faaaaar more "multiplayer" than something like co-op. And the best part is that a bunch are totally, legally free. If you're so against single-player, this really isn't the product for you, and you'd be happier if you went away and looked at games actually designed to be fully networked.

 

Haven't you tried BG/NWN? Modern MMOs are exactly the point why many people would love that kind of multiplayer again, MMOs are no alternative at all. For me, at this time there's no alternative to NWN(2) simply because no other game ever had it's unique multiplayer, and believe me people were looking and hoping for a newer game to switch to for years. I don't think anybody wants a MMO or tacked-on multiplayer like in Mass Effect, that's a totally different subject and indeed nothing to waste resources on.

[Lostbrain]

Personnally, not interested. But why not if the funding allowed it.

[Pnj]

I wish there would be multiplayer, a toolset and dedicated server.

 

Come on we need a new neverwinter night !

 

It would be the new standard for CRPG.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Pnj

[Desmond]

Just look for your self what a good toolset and a thriving community has created:

http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=nwn2modulesenglish.list&show_days_back=10

 

This wouldn't have bin possible with out the multiplayer component.

[Tycho]

I want a Multiplayer like Neverwinter Nights, with Gamemaster Mode etc. So you can create your own campaigns and play them with friends...

[Zeliarden]

I asked about multiplayer on the kickstarter page

"We are not currently supporting multiplayer, however. Multiplayer adds a lot of complexity and testing requirements, so we want to be sure about being able to support it before adding it into the project."

[Grimlorn]

No multiplayer. This is a classic RPG with a low budget. How would they be able to afford that? How would they even implement that? This is RTwP combat. Not real time combat like Diablo. How do you expect them to create multiplayer?

 

You guys need to think before asking for so many dumb things. They can't afford to give you everything you desire and they're not obligated to either. Fallout cost 3 million to make 15 years ago. What makes you think they can afford to put all these things in the game?

[Desmond]

So this means they are really looking in to it. Promising.

 

Edit:

NWN is RTwP and has a very successful Multiplayer. Read the posts before telling us that we are asking for dumb things.

 

Obsidian has experience with this kind of Multiplayer.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Desmond

[Kakei68]

I'd really love a multi co-op option in this game !!

Co-op games are far too few those days and it really adds a lot to a game to be able to play it with friends (online or not, LAN is even better !!)

 

I played NWN in co-op and it was really awesome, i really hope something will come out in this one.

Solo shouldn't be forgotten of course, co-op game must be a kind of add-on, you choose to play that way or not.

 

NWN multi system should be chose as base system and maybe making something new and exciting from it.

 

Co-op system should be just some programming to add to the solo mode (maybe some stats adjustment, drop random system and some other things ...) nothing out of budget but i'm no developer so i can't judge work it needs but it really adds to the gameplay and i would be the first to play it co-op only

 

No need of some maps/quests/campagne editor that would be out of price, just some co-op mode to start with and editor if funds are enough.