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Comments
If you can not pick up on "as fast as a flash" referring to speed then I don't know what to tell you. And I know the progress of 1 coder/animator 1 mapper and 2 modelers (the amateur team I was talking about) And how they do weekly dev hangouts which are streamed and they present just loads of information on what they are doing and what they plan to do. It is also a source mod they are working on. https://www.youtube....h?v=4MXEuyPx9-8.
Using what I said to you constantly through out your response makes you look like a child. I addressed how your comments looked like they were half assed by some 4chan user. And stop referring to updates that are what, 1-2 years old? That does not count as active development.
Okay, do you know what feedback is? "devs don't seem to care" is generalized feedback which means there is hardly ever any information given out or updates made which gives the appearance of a non-motivated team.
The difference in this case is they are all passionate about the game to the degree that they are willing to get on the devs bad side to see success for the title. And in that game theres actual incentive to get on their good side.
Perhaps I wouldn't be a "scrub" to PVKII development if they gave out information that didn't date back to 2013 that wasn't a map update. And I'm not going to try and explain to you the existence of peer influence.
I'm not sure why I expected a better response from you. "I care more about the game than you" what kind of asinine response is that. That has nothing to do with anything and isn't even represented as fact either. Myself being caught up with other things does not mean I "do not care as much". Also I've run very large communities that exceed the player count of this game entirely, its not a big deal. Perhaps a small community benefits more from it however its not an indication on how much you care, just showing that you like people to play on your servers. If you care so much about the game then where is your feedback? where is your contribution to this very topic other than "I help fight against stack in-game". All you have done is posted half assed responses where you didn't even fully understand what you read, and doing a poor job at defending the dev team. Negative Feedback/Criticism/Well thought out suggestions is(are) far more important than "I luv dis game don't be mean to devs".
All that community contributed stuff is good but only goes so far (especially when you barely ever see a server that isn't 24/7 arena/island). These are not hyperbole suggestions, they are more than realistic. When it comes down to it with such little information/updates its hard for players to keep playing a game that isn't even finished(And poorly balanced). There isn't enough depth to the game to keep people interested. That is the very reason this thread exists in the first place.
Why on earth did you edit all his quotes to sound like Leetspeek...?
FUF!
What is life without fun.
We frankly lack the manpower. As this is a hobby project for us, we spend as much time as we can and for most of us that time is very limited. Getting new talent to work on the mod with us also proves a bigger difficulty than one might imagine.
Colonel Sanders reached out to many artists, maybe dozens in just a month. He does his best to find new applicants and then help them set up the tools they need to create content for us. But most artists are frightened away, when they realize how convoluted the content creation pipeline for Source is.
So in the end, we hear your "complaints" that development is too slow. We feel the same way, but can't help it. You can help though. If you know artists experienced with Source and the content creation pipeline accompanying it or even artists not yet experienced with it, please, ask them to apply here.
Here's my thoughts:
While Steam has a HUGE, MASSIVE userbase, the problem I see is that PVKII is getting overshadowed by all the games being released on Steam. Remember when PVKII was released on steam and they even made an announcement about it to everyone who logged in as part of the Steam news or whatever?
When Steam first came out, it was 100% Valve games, so everyone who played HL, HL2, DoD, CS, etc was familiar with the massive modding community. It was easy to notice your friends playing mods and join them.
Nowadays, how many of your friends are playing Source games? HL2? HL1?
The largest Valve games on Steam are Counter-Strike (including CS 1.6, CS:S, CS:GO, CS:CZ), TF2, and Dota.
I must admit, I haven't played PVKII much anymore because there's so many games I own and keep buying because of the sales, and since PVKII doesn't get any recognition on the store page since it's Free, it doesn't even show up in the top 100 sellers or the F2P category.
What's missing, in the simplest of terms, is people have not heard about this game. No more coverage of this game since it's not in the greenlight category.
If the PVKII team is able, perhaps they can release the game on XBox Live Marketplace, PSN, and WiiU as a downloadable game. That would give them some money to develop, and raise awareness of the game in the console world, but also PC world.
Co-Lead | Level Designer
That would be nice, anything to give PVKII some more facetime.
I think the most adequate solution to get more people to play this mod is through audiovisual advertisement. Source Filmmaker videos show how strong the TF2, L4D2 and Portal communities are despite the actual games no longer being frequently updated, and with the proper models and maps optimized for the tool, and talented animators which input a lot of effort at making coherent narratives with characters from a specific universe, a PVKII-themed video can even make it's appearence at the Saxxy Awards, if it gets enough popularity to do that so.
Other thing that we need to improve are the inside jokes; yeah, the SpongeBob fish screaming My Leg everytime the player dies is funny, but in order to reach a bigger cult status than we already have, something more can be brought up. Look at Odin's Pizza Place and how silly it sounds. It might be a very old joke but it still has it's charm. Mutated Walrus Hamsters is also hilarious considering that it's unlikely that concept sees the light of the day.
These are just my opinions, I haven't lurked around this place for quite a long time until now, but these are my opinions into how to improve a little bit this mod's status.
I always played on 24/7 Island Party and other Island Servers. Barely Arena/Cathedral servers. Oh, wait. I didn't played the new Fort map yet.
We extort, we pilfer, we filch, and sack,
Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.
Maraud and embezzle, and even high-jack,
Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.
- The Devs still care about you guys and PVK.
- Release cycles are indeed too long but with some people having Jobs + Families it is the way it has to be at times.
(Even we get frustrated with how long it takes to get out an update at times to you guys)
- The Source development pipeline scares a lot of people away.
(We've had some devs / applicants start the creation process then just give up or stop something halfway, which is completely fair)
- With the mass availability of Unity, UDK and CryEngine, a lot of fresh talent are familiar with those engines and prefer them. Especially due to the pipeline / toolset.
The Source engine toolset is now very dated and frustrating for some which creates a problem for retaining and attracting talent.
- Some characters have been re done / restarted upwards of 3 times, switching different devs working on them.
- Healers and additional supporting characters were rough concepts.
- Balance changes and Combat system improvements are definitely needed and known within the Dev team.
- 95% of Mods end up just as clay renders of models and ideas but don't make it further.
- Quite a bit of successful mod / total conversion teams have moved on to retail projects, PVK has continued for free for quite a long time.
- Odin's pizza place is my favorite food provider.
- You are no man and I shall feast on your bones.
--> If you know anyone who would like to contribute to development or you think might be a fit and passionate about PVK, please have them apply <--
"I don't know, it doesn't feel like the game is that dead. I mean, the amount of players hasn't changed that much over the last few patches, has it?"
--> You weren't there from patch 2.0 - patch 2.2.
- Reaching enemies beyond your weapon model isn't a problem(you're just bad at dodging!)
- Archer isn't overpowered
- Higher post count is equivalent to higher skill, experience and knowledge in-game
2.2 was many many years ago
A dead game would've stopped by then
http://steamcommunit...m/groups/aclans Join and be pro today!
"I like axes"
--kokoronokawari
loli loli loli loli loli loli loli loli
True. It's dying.
- Reaching enemies beyond your weapon model isn't a problem(you're just bad at dodging!)
- Archer isn't overpowered
- Higher post count is equivalent to higher skill, experience and knowledge in-game
I am one of many people who keeps coming back to this forum in order to check on updates. I saddens me that people think this game is dying. In my opinion: its not, but it sure can use a helping hand or two.
Yea i agree it makes them leave pretty fast lol
Some of us manage to find time everyday to chip away at tasks. It's going to take some time before the next release, so we our organizing more ways to keep fans in the loop. You guys need to see more life, more changes, and on a consistent basis.
Co-Lead | Level Designer
My insight from being on the team.
During my time from approx October-Dec in 2012, the development was nearly halted to zero because the only active dev I knew of was Akz (coder); there was a massive focus on adding maps instead of finishing the Man-At-Arms (which was already modelled and animated for about 6 months prior to this).
It is already admitted above that the team even still 1.5 years later doesn't have the "man-power" to finish mostly this class. And I think it that is true prior to my time on the team as well. It's certainly been much slower the last 5 years, and I'll get to that in the history overview below. They have a good portion of maps they are holding back in the meantime that they COULD release, but it wouldn't be the update people REALLY want.
MAA Delay
From my own experience on the team, I remember offering to fix animations for the MAA since this was the main excuse for him not being released with the Sharpshooter. The other issue was that the MAA was using the Archer's crossbow instead of his own even though a replacement had been modelled. Back to animations though, I ended up redoing 4 animations because the originals were deemed to exaggerated or cartoony, but after doing this I couldn't get JRocket to devote 5 minutes to help me impliment the animations; by impliment I mean add them to the character script). Their files are all over the place on the SVN; it is very messy and confusing so I don't know where it is. He responds to PeePeeWilson with irritation about "having to hold my hand" and also doesn't help me so I ask Akz who is too busy with other stuff, but atleast offers to atleast re-enable the MAA who is currently disabled because his incomplete state bothers some very sensitive people. This is all orginally JRocket's responsibility, but he is said to be dealing with personal issues, I think financial if I remember correctly, but yet everyday it seemed like he was on Steam and playing games so I naturally suspect that lack of motivation was part of the reason. I don't condem him for that because it happens to us artists, but I didn't appreciate the response he gave when asking for help when it wasn't about me, when its his responsibility, it was ultimately about the MAA getting released which is what people want most.
I knew classes were what many people wanted most being a player of PVKII since it was released in 2007. After 7 years of interacting with the community, one does acquire a concensus on what people want from and think about the game. I say this very objectively because I personally never cared about the classes being unreleased. I can recall talking "Patrollin with Tolin" into playing this game, which he at the time felt was rubbish compared with the original PVK mostly because it was still missing 3 or 4 classes, whilst PVK of course had all 9 and could be enjoyed if you just stopped being a graphics fag. So I don't and previously didn't state this because its near and dear to my heart, it is because it is how alot of other people feel and is vital to the mod enjoying larger numbers of players.
Issues with the team
I understand developing rather well, because my experience isn't limited to my brief time in the PVKII team. I run my own project and know about setbacks, and struggles of all sorts.
I am a 3D artist, with an understanding of source engine and how code works and game engines in general. So I thought it was inappropriate that most of the active team were unqualified beta testers and not only that, but appearing to be calling the shots. This may have happened because of the projects many struggles where the "original" leaders seemed to be MIA.
Many of these beta testers weren't even qualified to be beta testers, which is indeed why I was brought in originally for my knowledge of source mapping. PeePeeWilson talked me into developing art for the project without the agreement of 'others'.
Lack of updates, especially classes are a major contributing factor to the decline. Some is just boredom with the game, which is inevitable. But there seems to be a problem with certain members of this team when it comes to accepting any form of criticism. Koko gave me similar defensive responses when I posted this. http://diftow.com/PVKideas.htm
None of the ideas were welcomed, and the blame for the project being dead was apparently the fault of me, MayDay and a few other "trolls" or highly skilled players that scared 13,000+ people away.
For ladder support, which was broken in one of the updates the only answer I got was "were removing all ladders from all maps, dont use ladders".
About the only area dev's agreed there was room for improvement was that the game was "too hard" and the blocking system needed to be simplified even more. Koko advocated for 1 direction, and Akz said maybe manual can come back if its only 2 directions but mostly was leaning towards Chivalry's system.
A brief overview of PVKII's history.
PVKII has been in development for over 10 years, and the first release with 3 classes was over 7 years ago (Jan 2007). Although they had a 3 year gap between starting and releasing it is forgivable, because starting a mod is always the hardest part so I'm definitely not criticising there. If you factor in the time per class, that speed was effectively 1 class per year since the project started. Official maps are Island, Saints, Fort, Temple and Desert Ruin so we have 4.
Tortuga was already in development and looks nearly finished at this time (Oct 6th, 2007), but there are unspecified "issues" with the original creator and the VMF hasn't been provided to complete it.
It was advertised as a 2.0 release and then never showed again until 2012.
Just over 1 year later (Feb 2008) 2.0 is released with 3 classes added (Captain, Huscarl, Archer). Incase some of those were already started during the first 3 years prior to 1.0's release, that's still 6 classes in 4 years, with the community only waiting 1 year between releases for 3 classes to be added. Arena and Forgotten are added to the list of official maps bringing the count up to 6.
The current official map selection at the time is now "Arena, Island, Forgotten, Fort, Saints, Temple, Desert Ruin".
It is worth noting that there are also a greater number of community maps at this time of quality, and this remains the case until support for these maps are broken by future updates, probably the switch to Orange Box because it broke other things.
July 2008, 2.1 is released. We now have the maps Frostbite and Cathedral (which were apparently one giant map separated into two). With the addition of each map came any new gamemodes associated with it.
(Feb 2010) 2.3 is released and we see the addition of the Gestir class and the map Sandstorm. It is also the shift from the manual block system to auto-block because of the Gestir's animations not being designed in such a way that makes his block direction more obvious. This pissed alot of people off, but the community was already declining before this update came out so I don't blame it entirely, but I do think it contributed. What definitely was relevant is that people had waited 2 years and only got 1 class and grew both frustrated and bored. This was after all a much slower rate of progression for the releasing of classes and it is noticed.
These 2 issues were met by an update 11 months later (Dec 2010 - version 2.4) which didn't add another class, and didn't add any new maps. The update highlights were a new and larger voice library, shader effects, and changing Holy Grail mode to Trinket Wars. The voice changes were recieved with mixed feelings, some liked it and some didn't. The shader effects and slightly new gamemode were nice, but after almost 3 years people still have only a Gestir and Sandstorm to enjoy.
(Oct 24 2012) 2.5 is released. Tortuga, that map from 2007 is finally finished. This release is 3 new maps (townsquare, gravedanger, and town), and one very old one that has been polished up and finally released. So map update is far better than 2.3, but yet another 2 years to wait for the addition of only 1 class, the Sharpshooter.
To summarise, that is 4 years(2008-2012) for 2 classes when it previously took 4 years(2004-2008) to release 6 classes.
And if classes are what people want most, and there have already been a large variety of maps since 2008, why aren't classes getting primary focus instead of; new voices, new shaders/effects, new maps.
There are plenty of maps already that people do not play. Adding maps will not revive the community, finishing the game will. PVK-ONE started in 1999 and was done by 2001 with 9 classes and tons of maps.
This game is still beta after over 10 years.
PVKII has declined in popularity massively since its heyday and no Koko it's not trolls and this game is easier now than it was in its heyday.
Crazytalk's own words just 8 days after PVKII's first release gives great contrast to todays figures.
I recall 30-45 full servers with later versions of the game, and the PVKII community group boasting well over 10,000 members is a testament to the level of activity the mod used to enjoy.
Reason: Natural inevitable boredom that all games face, long waits on updates (4 years for 2 classes), poor priorities (cosmetic updates before maps and maps before classes), lack of motivation among some members the team is highly dependent on which leads into, over-dependence on unreliable people, too many beta testers or non-devs, and 'sometimes' lack of qualified leadership (not talking about the original leaders like Crazytalk, but instead these beta testers or contributors who can't code or 3d model but authority over devs and an opinion that is held above devs too).
EDIT: I once remarked to the team that if they were to give up on the project, would they make it open source so the community could carry it on. The universal answer was 'no'.
I asked this because I was told by PeePeeWilson that about half the team would leave after the MAA was released, cause that meant the project wasn't beta anymore, essentially finished.
That we'd only get new maps after that and no more classes after that because the focus would shift to a new original IP that they'd work on.
PVKII was born out of taking control of PVK-One when the devs 'abandoned' it. To deny this community the same should that happen is to deny the very action that made this mod possible.
If you do care about the community and the project, and it isn't entirely selfish interests, then you'd allow its legacy to continue beyond yourselves IF you should leave it in an unfinished state.
What urks me is the lack of acknowledgement of said problems. critisism is usually met with resistance and aggresiveness. or flat our deletion or removal
Fantastic! A fearsome and formidable force; frightening to the frantic masses of folk. With full fortitude he ferociously forays the futile and foul faggotry that fills this fortuitous fix. But in de facto, this fiend is but a faint fluent flame. but i forfend, for i for surely sound like a fool, flaunting my vocabulary so foolhardily. some make me a favorite and others title me as a freak. but you my friend, may call me Fred