Severus Smith
ZionTCD
Legacy Rising
177
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Posted - 2013.03.08 18:23:00 -
[1] - Quote
Noc Tempre wrote:Actually, it really does feel like they are doing nothing. This game has been in development since before 2009. Hell, there was a working demo that had features working that we are missing now (like deployable structures, aerofighters, building interiors, layered objectives, more complete warbarge, etc). DUST was built for CARBON; which is CCP's own in house game engine. To justify the engine development costs they planned to use CARBON in all three of their titles (EVE Online, DUST 514, World of Darkness). However WoD got severely downsized, EVE Online went back to focusing on Spaceships and DUST 514 had a "sudden" engine change. I have a theory that Sony is the reason behind all this.
My guess is that CARBON, in its current state, is incompatible with the PS4. Here's what I've got:
- CCP decided they wanted to make an MMOFPS (DUST 514). So they built CARBON.
- Once CARBON was completed, several years ago, they began the bulk of DUST 514 development using it. They also bought White Wolf and began building the World of Darkness MMO using CARBON.
- CCP completed the majority of DUST features (like deployable structures, aerofighters, building interiors, layered objectives, more complete warbarge, etc) on CARBON in early 2012 and began internal testing.
- CCP planned for DUST (using CARBON) to enter closed Beta stage after E3 2012. They entered into server contracts to setup the battle hubs, began advertising, acquired any needed licenses, etc.
- CCP released CARBON to EVE Online via Walking in Stations.
- Sometime between the above and E3 2012 Sony released to developers that the PS4 would not be backwards compatible with the PS3. This f***ed CARBON. They could either release the game only on PS3 and try desperately to rewrite CARBON in time for PS4 or port to a new engine. Sticking with CARBON would mean that they'd have to have two engines in house and they'd have to sprint to convert CARBON to PS4 before Q4 2013. That's expensive, risky, and could halt development of DUST 514 until after the new engine was made putting them severely behind estimated financials.
- After cursing Sony out extensively they chose to port to Unreal 3. This allowed them to continue DUST development on U3 while updating CARBON for PS4 on the side. It also gave the ability of a PS4 release using Unreal 4 if CARBON was not finished being upgraded.
- Due to CARBON rewrite World of Darkness gets severely downsized and EVE Online "refocuses" on spaceships.
- E3 2012 came around and they showcased the Unreal 3 powered DUST we have today.
- Since they already had signed multiple server contracts for the Battlehubs, had invested advertising, and had other testing resources they released DUST 514 to closed Beta after E3 with a limited Unreal 3 build.
- 3 months ago they went to Open Beta because they needed to test Unreal 3 compatibility with Tranquility. (They already know CARBON works, it runs on EVE now for walking in stations). They stated that they weren't exactly ready for Open Beta at that point, but enforcing the NDA on the EVE side would have been impossible so they had to go Open Beta.
- They are currently in mad sprints to port the remaining features from CARBON to U3 so they can release. In the meantime, to cover these unforeseen development costs they are advertising AUR purchases during BETA. (25 developers = ~$200,000 per month) and (10,000 Merc Packs a month = $200,000). Even if they don't get 10,000 packs a month some of the costs are mitigated.
Summary
I am assuming that they are farther along on things than we can see. Everything is probably working in house on CARBON and they're just doing a mad dash to finish ports of everything to Unreal 3. I'm guessing that the next build will be released around Fanfest and will give a full release date for either Q3 or Q4 2013.
Again, this is all assumptions I have made. I am a software development contractor in the Oil / Gas / Energy Industry so I've seen my fair share of crazy timelines, setbacks, and sprints. The above make sense and is reasonable. CCP uses Agile development, so it fits their release structure thus far. It also makes sense why they seem so out of touch with whats happening in game for us. They're used to CARBON, that's what they've been developing for, and porting from CARBON to U3 is the most critical thing right now. More critical than damage mods, or HMG imbalance, or any of the infinite little issues we're whining about on the forums. Once everything is ported over and working they'll move into balance mode.
Does it suck in the interim, yes, but if my assumption is correct then it isn't really their fault. Other than that they assumed the PS4 would support CARBON in its current form and it doesn't. Though Sony seems to have pissed off many developers with its lack of backwards compatibility - so CCP isn't alone.
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Severus Smith
ZionTCD
Legacy Rising
179
|
Posted - 2013.03.08 19:50:00 -
[2] - Quote
Noc Tempre wrote:You are trying so hard but unfortunately you are wrong. The PS4 is an x86_64 architecture. That means Trinity2 would work natively with no change in code. Furthermore, UE3 is dead simple to port stuff into. Now granted, there is a HUGE amount of work going into working with the CELL architecture and network code, but at the end of the day, that doesn't explain the lack of content, since engine optimization and netcode are independent teams.
If the game was sitting on a hard drive somewhere then my opinion drops even further. They missed their deadline, they missed the joint marketing campaign, and they showed an exceptionally poor build off to the PS+ members. If the game is significantly more complete then we have seen, they are shooting themselves in the foot epicly. DUST has lost it's core vision and is very much in danger of never being successful. Yeah... realized this after submitting my post. Was looking for PS3 to PS4 incompatibility reasons and realized its due to PS3 being CELL and PS4 being x86_64. They could have an internal CARBON build that's waiting on the PS4 release and are using UE3 in the interim. I don't know.
Either way, I just find it very odd that they suddenly switched from CARBON to UE3. Even being dead simple to port to the licensing on UE3 alone is immense. UE2 is ~ $750,000 and cost estimates for UE3 are pretty hard to come by. Why would they suddenly switch? Why license an engine when you have one in house? Perhaps Sony's developer estimate for PS4 release was pushed back a year from 2012 to 2013? Maybe CCP banked everything on XBOX 360 support for x86_64 and was screwed when Microsoft didn't play nicely and had to turn to Sony?
Something just doesn't add up. You don't just swap engines right before release unless something catastrophic happened. And since everything is NDA we can only guess at what caused the switch. There are only two players, CCP and Sony, one of them is to blame. And I have more faith in CCP than Sony.
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