It did happen. Or it pretty much happened - NS2C wasn't exactly the same as NS1, it added some small elements like whip upgrades, but it was basically the same game. Unfortunately people never really rallied around it and it's died out now. There are actually more people playing NS1 than NS2C, so you have that at least.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited March 2014
I'd recommend the newly available UE4 thats incredibly cheap ($19 a month), easiest thing in the world to use and gives full access to the source code... buttt last i checked almost every Unreal engine game after UT2k hasn't been able to handle fast moving entities well. Hell, even slow moving entities (like chivalry or sanctum) still suffer from stuttering and skipping.
I have no idea how fixable such a symptom like that is, however..
Hmmm, CryEngine then? CryEngine SDK is free for non-commercial things and if for commercial, indie devs can use low-cost ($10 per month), royalty-free, licensed version.
I find the SDK quite fun just to mess around in and is very easy to use.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
I think the SDK doesn't give you full access, so yeah, you could go with the paid version.
Just keep in mind that while their editor is easier to use, and their engine definitely handles fast moving entities better... that what you get isn't as robust as UE, regarding the amount of tools and what not. Be prepared to have to spend more $ on 3rd party tools, from what i hear.
In any case, either would be such a monumental undertaking for anyone when what you want already exists right there with NS2c.
The only thing needed to make it more like NS1 would be unlocking the server update rates.
it does give full access. I have used it for 2-3 years (excuse my memory). The only difference is whether you use it for commercial reasons or not.
I think Cryengine has many tools (a lot which I have no idea how they work). You can try it out yourself, get it from crydev.net if you wanna mess around.
Anyways, you are probably right that there is very low chance anyone will try to port NS1 over.
A lot of the ns1 players didn't transition over to ns2. Most of the Icelandic players (Around 70-80 that was part of my community) actually pre-ordered the game. After they tried it out I saw the comments that they didn't like what became of ns and didn't stick around. Its a shame because they were really exited about ns2 until they saw the final product.
Even though its just one small community I'm pretty sure there were a lot of similar cases, just checking the initial pre-order numbers vs the overall playersbase from the beginning shows it.
That's a big reason for ns2c was never played actively. Most of the players that tried it out never played ns1 and didn't want to re-learn everything. There simply weren't enough players.
Soul_RiderMod BeanJoin Date: 2004-06-19Member: 29388Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
NS2 Classic mod is still a fully working mod. It just doesn't have many players. Generally, remaking a game in the engine of it's sequel, normally falls flat on it's face. It is just the way things go. People either prefer the original, or don't mind the sequel, but as it's a different engine etc, the remake of the new game never feels exactly right.
That said, xDragon did a great job, and it is still possible to get the odd game of NS2c going.
Yeah but NS1 is pretty old gfx. ah well. Maybe we should restart NS1 project on ns2?
EDIT: People still playing NS1?
Yes.
And it doesn't matter how beautiful the game looks, it is still one of the best multiplayer game out there. And with a great (if not the greatest) atmosphere, gameplay, controls and engine.
By the way it still has its charms graphically.
I have a solution for you. There's this game, you may not have heard of, which was actually based on NS2, but with lower system requirements, lower quality graphics, and far fewer players, BUT it may interest you. It's got this strange name, erm what was it? Ah yes, that's it: Natural Selection 1. It's even free (those crazy developers!) and downloadable on Steam. I don't like what the devs did, dropping Spark for the HL1 engine, but well, you may like it.
I played NS2c a few times, back in the days when other people were playing it as well.
It was tons of fun, no idea why people stopped playing it. And many other cool mods, like Factions and Last Stand.
The thing is, mods especially suffer when player base is low. At this point we aren't gonna get much more players anyways so lets look forward to Subnautica.
I'd recommend the newly available UE4 thats incredibly cheap ($19 a month), easiest thing in the world to use and gives full access to the source code... buttt last i checked almost every Unreal engine game after UT2k hasn't been able to handle fast moving entities well. Hell, even slow moving entities (like chivalry or sanctum) still suffer from stuttering and skipping.
I have no idea how fixable such a symptom like that is, however..
T:A didn't have too much stutter that I remember.
I've played an incredibly early alpha (talking maybe 10-15 hours spent on it total by one dude over a couple days) for a UE4 engine game with a quake-ish movement controller that had no stuttering at all, and we're talking bhop speeds waaaaaaaaaaaaaay faster than the NS2 fade.
I was experementing with some NS2 assets in Unity a long time ago, and one thing that can give things an NS1 feel is the lightmaps. Unity can do some nice ones.
Sadly, I can't think of a single NS2 mod game that took off. Even combat has next to no players. Even if I find a server with people on it, its usually empty by the time a map or two goes by.
Soul_RiderMod BeanJoin Date: 2004-06-19Member: 29388Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
GorgeCraft has a reasonable number of players, but is essentially single player. MvM will be the acid test for mods. If that becomes successful, mods have a chance, if not, then we need to look at other avenues to expand the player base. I have a few ideas..
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
@MuckyMcFly
Titanfall has high velocity entities like fades, lerks, and leaping skulks?
Last i checked it, the fastest player entity in the game was wall running humans who didn't remotely move that fast.. ?
and there have been lots of reports circulating regarding hit detection that resembles early CS source days (= not good) and BF4 (terrible) http://www.titanfall-community.com/threads/micro-stutter-rubber-banding-lag-and-hit-detection-failures.1999/
and if you just google source engine hit detection .. well.. you'll find endless examples, so color me skeptical about that engine being able to handle NS2 gameplay.. :P
T:A had pretty shit netcode, since too much was predicted client side and subsequently what you saw client side was completely inaccurate. I think I still have videos of discs shot client side exploding on trees only to hit and kill a player 50 feet past the tree.
UE3 is arguably one of the worst PC engines for any serious FPS game, just because of how they handle input and frame rendering. That's ignoring the fact that it has no lag compensation by default, leaving that to the individual game maker.
Source can handle fast moving ents arguably just as well as goldsource, I remember some test mods with much high m/s than NS1 even which were fine, it just came down heavily to the tickrate of the mod when finalized, and also the SDK version used. Its important to note how hitboxes worked previously, and how they generally work now. Only quakelive uses an 'old' style hitbox currently afaik.
Comments
For more info go here: http://ns2cmod.com/
Ew.
Have you fired up hl2 lately? Or witnessed high velocity entities in multiplayer source?
EDIT: People still playing NS1?
I believe it's hit detection was bad due to something in lag compensation, but I'm not sure.
I have no idea how fixable such a symptom like that is, however..
I find the SDK quite fun just to mess around in and is very easy to use.
Just keep in mind that while their editor is easier to use, and their engine definitely handles fast moving entities better... that what you get isn't as robust as UE, regarding the amount of tools and what not. Be prepared to have to spend more $ on 3rd party tools, from what i hear.
In any case, either would be such a monumental undertaking for anyone when what you want already exists right there with NS2c.
The only thing needed to make it more like NS1 would be unlocking the server update rates.
I think Cryengine has many tools (a lot which I have no idea how they work). You can try it out yourself, get it from crydev.net if you wanna mess around.
Anyways, you are probably right that there is very low chance anyone will try to port NS1 over.
Even though its just one small community I'm pretty sure there were a lot of similar cases, just checking the initial pre-order numbers vs the overall playersbase from the beginning shows it.
That's a big reason for ns2c was never played actively. Most of the players that tried it out never played ns1 and didn't want to re-learn everything. There simply weren't enough players.
That said, xDragon did a great job, and it is still possible to get the odd game of NS2c going.
And it doesn't matter how beautiful the game looks, it is still one of the best multiplayer game out there. And with a great (if not the greatest) atmosphere, gameplay, controls and engine.
By the way it still has its charms graphically.
It was tons of fun, no idea why people stopped playing it. And many other cool mods, like Factions and Last Stand.
T:A didn't have too much stutter that I remember.
I've played an incredibly early alpha (talking maybe 10-15 hours spent on it total by one dude over a couple days) for a UE4 engine game with a quake-ish movement controller that had no stuttering at all, and we're talking bhop speeds waaaaaaaaaaaaaay faster than the NS2 fade.
I think it would be pretty doable.
Yes in team fortress 2 / half life 2 deathmatch /
What's wrong with them?
Yeah... Titanfall... :P
Titanfall has high velocity entities like fades, lerks, and leaping skulks?
Last i checked it, the fastest player entity in the game was wall running humans who didn't remotely move that fast.. ?
and there have been lots of reports circulating regarding hit detection that resembles early CS source days (= not good) and BF4 (terrible)
http://www.titanfall-community.com/threads/micro-stutter-rubber-banding-lag-and-hit-detection-failures.1999/
and if you just google source engine hit detection .. well.. you'll find endless examples, so color me skeptical about that engine being able to handle NS2 gameplay.. :P
UE3 is arguably one of the worst PC engines for any serious FPS game, just because of how they handle input and frame rendering. That's ignoring the fact that it has no lag compensation by default, leaving that to the individual game maker.
Source can handle fast moving ents arguably just as well as goldsource, I remember some test mods with much high m/s than NS1 even which were fine, it just came down heavily to the tickrate of the mod when finalized, and also the SDK version used. Its important to note how hitboxes worked previously, and how they generally work now. Only quakelive uses an 'old' style hitbox currently afaik.
And yea this thread made be lol overall.