Optimization Info from senior designer TheRightHand/Kayd Hendricks

[SusanCS]

 

[ThzNutz]

holy crap---no wonder they "dont communicate more"---i sure wouldn't. good read from TRH tho, and thanks for the post

[iAmE]

42 minutes ago, ThzNutz said:

holy crap---no wonder they "dont communicate more"---i sure wouldn't. good read from TRH tho, and thanks for the post

No wonder?

If I saw more of these posts on other relevant issues, I'ld be a lot less salty about having 4 month support ticket turn around, Eels destroying everything in the water and Flyers being gutted for no real reason. 

[ThzNutz]

1 minute ago, iAmE said:

No wonder?

If I saw more of these posts on other relevant issues, I'ld be a lot less salty about having 4 month support ticket turn around, Eels destroying everything in the water and Flyers being gutted for no real reason. 

if playing an early access game made me that salty i'd consider other methods of entertainment to each their own tho.

the eels are pretty OP and pretty useless in PVE

[ciabattaroll]

7 minutes ago, iAmE said:

No wonder?

If I saw more of these posts on other relevant issues, I'ld be a lot less salty about having 4 month support ticket turn around, Eels destroying everything in the water and Flyers being gutted for no real reason. 

Not entirely sure why you think that the technical game designer would be in charge of knowing how swamped support is with responding to submitted tickets.

[iAmE]

5 minutes ago, ciabattaroll said:

Not entirely sure why you think that the technical game designer would be in charge of knowing how swamped support is with responding to submitted tickets.

If I saw more posts like his on other subjects, I would be a lot more forgiving about the gamebreaking bugs and issues. I'm not implying that he knows. 

It's just that posts from the developers that actually contain anything worth reading about the game, design direction or even state of the game at large worth reading (like that one was), are few, and very far between. 

[powerstuck]

13 minutes ago, iAmE said:

No wonder?

If I saw more of these posts on other relevant issues, I'ld be a lot less salty about having 4 month support ticket turn around, Eels destroying everything in the water and Flyers being gutted for no real reason. 

It's useless giving any critic, no matter how constructive it could be. There are thousands of defenders of the devs and of the game on every of those. The game is EA, that's the 2017 word for ''Everything is allowed''. 

I bet Trump is soon to fire some nukes and when they blow above America he's gonna say ''Stop complaining, they were early access''.

[iAmE]

2 minutes ago, powerstuck said:

It's useless giving any critic, no matter how constructive it could be. There are thousands of defenders of the devs and of the game on every of those. The game is EA, that's the 2017 word for ''Everything is allowed''. 

I bet Trump is soon to fire some nukes and when they blow above America he's gonna say ''Stop complaining, they were early access''.

I'm not sure. I'm able to post criticism on the forums without being banned or outright attacked at every turn, so the forums are certainly improving compared to what they were once. I'm certainly proof that these forums can allow for some voice of dissent/flame/rage, because lately, it feels like that's all I've been doing. 

[MoneyCorrupts]

Sounds like procrastination.

Again, Ark will never release

 

 

 

[mleii]

8 minutes ago, iAmE said:

If I saw more posts like his on other subjects, I would be a lot more forgiving about the gamebreaking bugs and issues. I'm not implying that he knows. 

It's just that posts from the developers that actually contain anything worth reading about the game, design direction or even state of the game at large worth reading (like that one was), are few, and very far between. 

I agree with a bit of this sentiment.  I wrote him telling that I enjoyed his discussion on the topic.  It reminds me of the things I like about the Astroneer team and their talks about the game implementation and design aspects.  Though at this time I expect the "crunch" to get things done is high and one of the reasons we don't normally get these sorts of discussions.  I'm actually surprised we even saw that level of discussion as they seem to be pretty tight lipped.  Though I do see a concerted effort on Jats part lately to dialog more here on the forums and elsewhere and I appreciate that.

[ciabattaroll]

5 minutes ago, powerstuck said:

It's useless giving any critic, no matter how constructive it could be. There are thousands of defenders of the devs and of the game on every of those. The game is EA, that's the 2017 word for ''Everything is allowed''. 

I bet Trump is soon to fire some nukes and when they blow above America he's gonna say ''Stop complaining, they were early access''.

That's ridiculous. We allow for people to vent and voice differing opinions and even harsh criticism, so long as that criticism comports with community guidelines so basic that even a caveman can follow them, and if they post these in the appropriate section on the community hub.

Back on topic, I do hope people take the time to take this all in to get a better understanding of what's involved with creating assets.

[powerstuck]

3 minutes ago, ciabattaroll said:

That's ridiculous. We allow for people to vent and voice differing opinions and even harsh criticism, so long as that criticism comports with community guidelines so basic that even a caveman can follow them, and if they post these in the appropriate section on the community hub.

Back on topic, I do hope people take the time to take this all in to get a better understanding of what's involved with creating assets.

I never you guys (the Community Mods) didn't allow discussion. What I said is there is a ton of players that will defend everything that is wrong with the game just because it's in EA stage. 

As for the topic, I also hope people understand that there are ways, not all that hard, that could improve the quality of life, game wise. You know, giving a few of these improvements some work and getting them live, I honestly it would give some breathing air to devs instead of getting more and more pressure every day. 

[ThzNutz]

2 minutes ago, powerstuck said:

I also hope people understand that there are ways, not all that hard, that could improve the quality of life, game wise.

if we still had like 40 dinos to go i would agree that maybe a little more focus on optimizing/bug fixing would be a good thing, but only if it did not detract from content progress. at this point we have 9-10 left? i say get the content in and then throw everything they have at the Beta process, which is i think what they are going to do. at any rate, it is coming, and i for one think its gonna be good

[iAmE]

1 minute ago, ThzNutz said:

if we still had like 40 dinos to go i would agree that maybe a little more focus on optimizing/bug fixing would be a good thing, but only if it did not detract from content progress. at this point we have 9-10 left? i say get the content in and then throw everything they have at the Beta process, which is i think what they are going to do. at any rate, it is coming, and i for one think its gonna be good

That's another point that rubs me the wrong way. Do they even plan to have a beta phase? Customer support considers the game to be in a pre-alpha stage. The developers have stated they wanted to release the game and ship it like a year ago, and have released like four separate release dates. They've done major balance changes before, but have never finished them, and now they're nerfing more dinos because of a mess their last balance attempt created. They haven't exact explained why the flyer nerf is necessary beyond "They don't find it fun". 

 

The lack of communication is killer. 

[ThzNutz]

33 minutes ago, iAmE said:

It's just that posts from the developers that actually contain anything worth reading about the game, design direction or even state of the game at large worth reading (like that one was), are few, and very far between.

i agree, and i wish that there could be more posts like his, i just love reading about the technical aspect of things. been promising myself i would get hot and heavy with the dev kit/UE4 editor or maybe even Unity if for no other reason than to have a better understanding of things.

[ThzNutz]

1 minute ago, iAmE said:

released like four separate release dates.

meh, that is common for games and really isnt a big deal. maybe you didnt wait 6 years for HalfLife2?

the balance issues/nerfs etc that are such an issue only affect Official servers, which is the place for the developers vision for their game. they listen, they implement users ideas/suggestions (sometimes to their detriment) but at the end of the day it is their game and i hope they follow the vision they had when they started it all, regardless of how long it takes.

i for one can wait. 

and as far as lack of communication? that is a recent development with all the social media crap, everyone thinks they need to know exactly what is going on and when. not so they can go "oh kewl, thanks for telling us" but so they can have their own opinion on it. i remember waiting a month for the next PC Accelerator to find out what was going on with a game i was interested in--getting to play it before release? LMFAO

anyways, not snappin' at you or anything, just sayin

[iAmE]

1 hour ago, ThzNutz said:

 

and as far as lack of communication? that is a recent development with all the social media crap, everyone thinks they need to know exactly what is going on and when. not so they can go "oh kewl, thanks for telling us" but so they can have their own opinion on it. i remember waiting a month for the next PC Accelerator to find out what was going on with a game i was interested in--getting to play it before release? LMFAO

That's an odd way to put it.

 

Realistically, this game is above, and beyond, what the game would ever be, if it wasn't for the large infusions of money brought by the EA sales of both the base games, and the DLC. I don't necessarily feel the need to be updated on each and every thing. That's silly. While I enjoy technical and design decision posts (Such as that by TRH), there is vital information that, as people who purchased shares in an early access game, we are, at least, somewhat entitled to.

How is the game doing. Is it in Alpha. Is it in Beta. When's the projected release date?

The game is, in multiple places, patently broken. PvE bosses can't be beaten without relying, largely, on exploits. The official PvP servers are pretty much universally controlled by a single group, and dead because of the sloppy implementation of Cross Ark Transfers. We recently had one of the largest waves of widespread cheating the official PvP networks has ever seen post BattlEye, and it largely contributed to the prior mentioned groups control of official PvP. 

These are serious issues that have existed for months without being addressed by the developers, or anyone with authority to comment on them. These are the kinds of issues that you would expect to be addressed in a Magazine (Like PAC), yet they're largely ignored in favor of making irrelevant fluff comments and posts. The end game content on both PvE and PvP, are completely broken. That's a pretty big issue, and it's been like that, for quite a while. That's what I want to see posts on. 

[powerstuck]

3 hours ago, ThzNutz said:

if we still had like 40 dinos to go i would agree that maybe a little more focus on optimizing/bug fixing would be a good thing, but only if it did not detract from content progress. at this point we have 9-10 left? i say get the content in and then throw everything they have at the Beta process, which is i think what they are going to do. at any rate, it is coming, and i for one think its gonna be good

Well, lets do the math. 

They do about 3-4 dinos per patch. 

So, at 10 dinos I expect them to take 3 months to release those 10 9-10 dinos. 

That puts us in June...to then expect hopefully to start some balancing stuff...

But, they barelly just started doing Tek stuff. Reading the list of things they are working on...they have at least 6-7 content patches...if everything goes as planned. So call it what ever phase you want...won't start before autumn of 2017, I expect it to last quite a bit (because there is quite a lot of balancing and testing to do). 

Games rarely survive 2 years, will this one ?

[Lewiatan]

6 hours ago, mleii said:

I agree with a bit of this sentiment.  I wrote him telling that I enjoyed his discussion on the topic.  It reminds me of the things I like about the Astroneer team and their talks about the game implementation and design aspects.  Though at this time I expect the "crunch" to get things done is high and one of the reasons we don't normally get these sorts of discussions.  I'm actually surprised we even saw that level of discussion as they seem to be pretty tight lipped.  Though I do see a concerted effort on Jats part lately to dialog more here on the forums and elsewhere and I appreciate that.

Jat took effort to post anything here lately, because community on reddit pointed out that developers do not talk with players on this official forum at all. I appreciate that effort, I hope It will be constant thing.

[szabiferi]

7 hours ago, ThzNutz said:

if we still had like 40 dinos to go i would agree that maybe a little more focus on optimizing/bug fixing would be a good thing, but only if it did not detract from content progress. at this point we have 9-10 left? i say get the content in and then throw everything they have at the Beta process, which is i think what they are going to do. at any rate, it is coming, and i for one think its gonna be good

Honestly, I think lots of people would be happy with 40 type of dinos what does not disappear randomly due to bugs. 

As Im working in IT industry as a QA lead, I know how the SW projects go... first content, then optimization, bugfixes depend on their severity and priority.

What I think WC does not really well is bug prioritisation. Issues where the customers lose hours/days of progress in the EXISTING CONTENT should be prioritized higher than features what cosmetic (for example, the hair thingie). 

You know, if content cannot be enjoyed because of existing issues, adding more content wont increase saisfaction - especially if the new content also impacted by the bugs.

I'm also aware that for marketing purposes the new content always stronger than the bugfixes  - cause you cannot advertise "we fixed 10 critical bugs", while you have marketing value when you say "we added 5 new dinos". Still the new dinos seems to be less and less interesting. I wonder how many people use the last 10 new dinos regularly. We collect them, try them out, then they go to the far corner of the bases, as they have no real use. 

Rex, Giga, Turtle, Quetz, Ptera, Wyvern for PVP + the old gathering dinos (Anky, Castro, Doedi) and basically thats all. Everything else tamed for kibbles or just for occasional use. 

[szabiferi]

4 hours ago, powerstuck said:

Well, lets do the math. 

[....]

Games rarely survive 2 years, will this one ?

I agree with your math, actually I think you ar even too optimistic... however I have full confidence in the game, it will surely survive for long, as content and gameplay wise it's like an MMO. Lots of thing to do, lots of time you can spend in it, and IF the devs wont burn out, there can be more thing to be added to have the game even better. For example, supporting the mods officially was an excellent idea IMO - however its questionable how succesful it will be. I have doubts, because 

The Center map example... afaik it was a MOD what got officially supported, and since then, its not really developed anymore (eg: no TEK tier on that map possible at all). Looks like modders burn out when th ehobby changes to paid work, and it seems even WC does not give enough resources to them to be able to cope with the increased responsibility (afaik The Center map still developed by ONE guy, who simply busy with adding the new dinos). 

[Lewiatan]

48 minutes ago, szabiferi said:

Honestly, I think lots of people would be happy with 40 type of dinos what does not disappear randomly due to bugs. 

As Im working in IT industry as a QA lead, I know how the SW projects go... first content, then optimization, bugfixes depend on their severity and priority.

What I think WC does not really well is bug prioritisation. Issues where the customers lose hours/days of progress in the EXISTING CONTENT should be prioritized higher than features what cosmetic (for example, the hair thingie). 

You know, if content cannot be enjoyed because of existing issues, adding more content wont increase saisfaction - especially if the new content also impacted by the bugs.

I'm also aware that for marketing purposes the new content always stronger than the bugfixes  - cause you cannot advertise "we fixed 10 critical bugs", while you have marketing value when you say "we added 5 new dinos". Still the new dinos seems to be less and less interesting. I wonder how many people use the last 10 new dinos regularly. We collect them, try them out, then they go to the far corner of the bases, as they have no real use. 

Rex, Giga, Turtle, Quetz, Ptera, Wyvern for PVP + the old gathering dinos (Anky, Castro, Doedi) and basically thats all. Everything else tamed for kibbles or just for occasional use. 

I'm QA tester of another indie dino game Primal Carnage Exctinction. From my experience there are some bugs that are impossible to reproduce and we as testers are not able to provide useful data about it. They just happen out of blue. Critical bugs are fixed there asap having only 2 people working actively on game, but others such us black bushes or floating models have the lowest priority.

In ARK case such a big bug is disappearing dinosaurs. What data can we provide? That it was there and then it was not? Once it didn't disappear after leaving render distance, but other time it did? It's 1,5 year old bug that irritates people constantly. Now they took some effort to start fixing in. I lost to that bug 2 stegos, sarco and anky on official pve 417. I've never had this problem on unofficial server. Devs would have to add a code that gather information what's happening to dino entire time.

New content is nice, but it is meaningless if you have a bug that ruins your long term experience everday. You cannot build your software on buggy fundation in long run, it will come back to hit you hard and become fubar.

Regarding dinosaurs... I couldn't care less about them. They have the same primitive AI and only their unique anti-grindfest abilities encourage me to tame them, a beaver, a deer, doedicurus, anky, quezt, ptera, argentavis, barry and maybe Trex/Giga. And a utahraptor, because I love that critter in general. 

 

[powerstuck]

5 hours ago, Lewiatan said:

I'm QA tester of another indie dino game Primal Carnage Exctinction. From my experience there are some bugs that are impossible to reproduce and we as testers are not able to provide useful data about it. They just happen out of blue. Critical bugs are fixed there asap having only 2 people working actively on game, but others such us black bushes or floating models have the lowest priority.

In ARK case such a big bug is disappearing dinosaurs. What data can we provide? That it was there and then it was not? Once it didn't disappear after leaving render distance, but other time it did? It's 1,5 year old bug that irritates people constantly. Now they took some effort to start fixing in. I lost to that bug 2 stegos, sarco and anky on official pve 417. I've never had this problem on unofficial server. Devs would have to add a code that gather information what's happening to dino entire time.

New content is nice, but it is meaningless if you have a bug that ruins your long term experience everday. You cannot build your software on buggy fundation in long run, it will come back to hit you hard and become fubar.

Regarding dinosaurs... I couldn't care less about them. They have the same primitive AI and only their unique anti-grindfest abilities encourage me to tame them, a beaver, a deer, doedicurus, anky, quezt, ptera, argentavis, barry and maybe Trex/Giga. And a utahraptor, because I love that critter in general. 

 

Its hard to give any data to devs when they don't say what would they need as data. 

I'll take your dino disappearing example. Of course, it's hard what we could give as data. But if devs give us the basic needs they would like to have : When it occurred, where it occurred, what was the server lag (performance) before and after, was there a restart prior or after. Or even things as was the dino sitting on ground, on a foundation, on a ceiling, on a platform. Its just an idea, but maybe if 100s of players collected that data, devs could see a pattern. Once you have a little candle light in the distance, it goes a long way to help you orientate in which direction to keep walking. 

And it's not just disappearing dinos. 

How come two years into the development we still need to log out naked because we fall thru foundations and ceilings, yet a modder (Structure + MOD) was able to create similar structures that do not have that bug ? Sometimes, just fixing that one bug that everyone knows about...well it goes a long way showing you do listen, you do care, you do something about it. 

[ThzNutz]

13 hours ago, iAmE said:

That's an odd way to put it.

i wasnt so much speaking directly to you as i was kinda venting about the "communication" thing--i get what your saying too tho

 

[SusanCS]

A lot of it is not wanting to add the bug back in later, and thereby having wasted time etc... or so that's my take away from people. Basically if they fix a bug such as disappearing dinos, but it shows up again later after new systems and changes are added to the game they will count the previous time as wasted for development. If they were able to hire more engineers I'm sure it would be easier to duplicate time on the same bug during development, but alas so difficult to get people to move to Gainesville.