NS2 "remastered" in 3~4 years?

MisterYoonMisterYoon Join Date: 2012-08-18 Member: 155747Members
Although there are still enough players playing the game, it's hard to expect that this amount of players (app. 0.5k concurrent weekends) will stay till end of next year.

There are some reasons why so many people left the game like some of balance / stomp / hardcore issues. But most importantly, as everyone has always noticed, the main reason was the poor optimization/engine performance of NS2.

No doubt NS2 has superb gameplay which other games have never had or won't have. It is more than special and despite of possible complication around this kind of gameplay, dev team and CDT dev team have done very good job. No doubt the game is a masterpiece. This is why i miss so much the first one and half year where NS2 was so alive that we experienced competitive plays etc. which we'll not see for quite of while.

So i really hope to see remastered version of ns2 (probably/better converted to another engine) in the future,, when the game becomes completely dead. So that people who haven't heard of this game, or people who got serious disappointment from early broken stage of the game will gain interest again and try the game. As the game at the moment is already quite stable(has been stable for quite long time already though) which will make the remastered version of NS2 not suffer anymore from tremendous amount of refund and loss of players just like the launch on 2012 and also as noone would doubt the gameplay will still be fresh and awesome enough to interest many new gamers in the future, NS2 would probably gain superb success if once gets remastered and republished.

I would gladly give my money for that if needed.
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Comments

  • SquishpokePOOPFACESquishpokePOOPFACE -21,248 posts (ignore below) Join Date: 2012-10-31 Member: 165262Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    I'm not too keen on sequels on multiplayer only games. If there would be a sequel or remaster, it should be separated by more than 3 years. Starcraft to Starcraft 2 is the perfect time period, I feel.

    Also, why not stick to what we have? CDT has been promising so far. Ideally, this game will continually evolve over time. Eventually, UWE may even make NS2 free.
  • Cannon_FodderAUSCannon_FodderAUS Brisbane, AU Join Date: 2013-06-23 Member: 185664Members, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    I have been very much against making NS2 F2P, but have slowly been changing over to yeah, may be it will work. I quipped on the next patch thread, that I wish we could relaunch the game with all the optimisation being done by the CDT, but UWE probably doesn't have a marketing budget for that sort of thing. So I guess F2P is pretty much the only way to push this (or you can make a lower price of entry - say $5-10). I love this game, and will play it until there is no server left, but at the same time I want UWE to do well, because they have really been the model indie developer as far as I am concern.
  • Cannon_FodderAUSCannon_FodderAUS Brisbane, AU Join Date: 2013-06-23 Member: 185664Members, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    @d0ped0g may be the NS2classic mod can be revived?
  • NordicNordic Long term camping in Kodiak Join Date: 2012-05-13 Member: 151995Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    Hey look, another this game is dying/dead thread under a new name. I haven't seen one of these in awhile. These have been popping up since the game launched.

    This game wont die as long as the CDT keeps doing great work. Performance has gotten a lot better in recent CDT patches. In the next patch there should be more performance improvements. If you watch trello you can see that the CDT has some pretty big plans that look really exciting.
  • meatmachinemeatmachine South England Join Date: 2013-01-06 Member: 177858Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    edited March 2015
    If a mod was created for NS2, with most of the old NS1 mechanics (NS2C with all the modern graphics etc?) I would love to give it a try.
    I'm a little attached to the NS2 movement mechanics though, they'd have to stay :X
  • RaZDaZRaZDaZ Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167331Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited March 2015
    F2P would do nothing, absolutely nothing. The audience that this game has been marketed to and the majority of people who would be interested in a game like this have already bought this game on steam or tried it during the free weekends.

    If they liked the game enough to stick around then they would have. The only thing to bring in more players and get them to stay is optimization and a matchmaking system but unfortunately, not really feasible. Additionally, new maps, hats and skins, an actual meaningful progression system would help but the fundamentals need to be in place to casual players for enjoy it.

    This game is essentially StarCraft 4v4 where you have players ranging from bronze league, never played an RTS before to people who are top tier koreans who dominate even foreign (outside korea) professionals. This is what the feasible skill-range in NS2 is on any given server during a sale, it can be that ridiculously imbalanced. If a rookie happens to come across a server with a few hardcore, skilled veterans and some rookies, average players, he would have a seriously negative impression of the game and won't stick around. I can't see how any sort of modern competitive game would be able to justify that.

    I only hope that a remaster or a sequel of NS implements a proper matchmaking system, I don't care if you like the server based stuff, any competitive game that doesn't want to die in the space of a few years NEEDs this type of environment for people to play especially in games that are very complex like NS2. A dedicated server list could still exist but have the option to queue into matchmaking.
  • BeigeAlertBeigeAlert Texas Join Date: 2013-08-08 Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
    RaZDaZ wrote: »
    I only hope that a remaster or a sequel of NS implements a proper matchmaking system, I don't care if you like the server based stuff, any competitive game that doesn't want to die in the space of a few years NEEDs this type of environment for people to play especially in games that are very complex like NS2. A dedicated server list could still exist but have the option to queue into matchmaking.

    It's tricky. Kind of a Catch-22. We need matchmaking to get more players... but matchmaking simply cannot work without more players. I mean... first of all, you'd probably be waiting for matchmaking in the ONLY queue for a good 30mins - 1hr, then get thrown into a match with the only other 15 people who were in the matchmaking queue. Not exactly balancing anything. :(
  • Cannon_FodderAUSCannon_FodderAUS Brisbane, AU Join Date: 2013-06-23 Member: 185664Members, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    @BeigeAlert so true. Have an awesome! I think on the /r/gaming subreddit, someone posted a link to what matchmaking means when you have 10 000 concurrent players (at work, so can't get link), but it makes an interesting read.
  • bizbiz Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167386Members
    performance/netcode is definitely a huge issue

    but i think the biggest problem is that a team-based RTS is being shoved into a FPS-style server system and it just doesn't work consistently enough

    matchmaking doesn't need to involve xbox-style matchmaking. RTS/TBS games with minuscule player counts have had some sort of team-setup match-formation process for decades. it just means getting the basic things right like playing full matches instead of joining games in the middle and having some organized way to make teams so that they don't completely suck.

    looking back, i don't really think any of the gameplay/balance changes mattered too much. every game is still fun/unfun based on how the teams end up. i had terrible games in 2012. i had fun games in 2012. i had terrible games in 2014. i had fun games in 2014. as long as most games are effectively over and decided within the first 5 minutes, it just doesn't matter what the balance of mid-game/late-game tech is like or if the game has twice as many maps

    ignoring the teams and just enjoying killing things might be fun for a while, but i don't think that approach works on this engine or in anything that is a RTS
  • FrozenFrozen New York, NY Join Date: 2010-07-02 Member: 72228Members, Constellation
    This games just alot more boring than NS1 on top of the performance stuff. NS1 had an open world feel in a lot of cases, so it was fun to play on pubs in more ways than one. In NS2 I only have fun in pubs if I'm winning
  • krOozekrOoze Join Date: 2014-04-24 Member: 195593Members
    biz wrote: »
    performance/netcode is definitely a huge issue
    Also it does not help, the internet ping has not improved that much since 56kbit modems.

  • [AwE]Sentinel[AwE]Sentinel Join Date: 2012-06-05 Member: 152949Members
    There were many ns1 vets who just wanted to play their beloved game with better grafics and together with more players. We all voiced concerns about ns2 changing to a boring and less flexible/diversified version of ns1 during the beta and we all got verbally silenced and insulted from a mass of casual players and change-is-good-fanatics with thought-terminating cliché slogans. And who is still here playing in the shambles? Not the thousands of casual players. But at least they left the money on the doorstep, right? Right?
  • RaZDaZRaZDaZ Join Date: 2012-11-05 Member: 167331Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited March 2015
    BeigeAlert wrote: »
    RaZDaZ wrote: »
    I only hope that a remaster or a sequel of NS implements a proper matchmaking system, I don't care if you like the server based stuff, any competitive game that doesn't want to die in the space of a few years NEEDs this type of environment for people to play especially in games that are very complex like NS2. A dedicated server list could still exist but have the option to queue into matchmaking.

    It's tricky. Kind of a Catch-22. We need matchmaking to get more players... but matchmaking simply cannot work without more players. I mean... first of all, you'd probably be waiting for matchmaking in the ONLY queue for a good 30mins - 1hr, then get thrown into a match with the only other 15 people who were in the matchmaking queue. Not exactly balancing anything. :(

    I'll assume you missed the "remaster or sequel of NS" part because I already stated that implementing into NS2 is a waste of time at best. If a sequel is to be made then I simply cannot understand why you would not have a proper matchmaking system if the population of players is sufficient enough to sustain that design.
  • DaphistoDaphisto Hive Janitor Join Date: 2002-11-16 Member: 8917Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    I've played NS1 since pretty much when it came out (check my Join Date here), played the NS2 beta, saw NS2 launch and saw NS2 die (or dying, I guess you could say).

    I've played and analyzed many other games that have huge growing audiences and I think if the NS2 devs would apply similar meta-game mechanics to their game, they could have a game that was a lot stronger and more commercially successful.

    Suggestions:
    - Integrate cosmetic unlocks properly (not what UWE is currently doing with the steam store and purchasable skins). This would include things like receiving credits in between rounds (probably more credits for wins than for losses), where players could use the credits to purchase in-game cosmetic items within the game, such as new marine heads (several male, female, maybe robot/droid head options), weapon skins, new weapon models, new marine body models/skins, marine badges, alien skins, new alien models, voice packs, etc. Attribute a rarity to each cosmetic unlock. Consider allowing the purchase of battle crates which contain a random cosmetic unlock with a higher chance of getting a rare unlock. Players could also, optionally, spend real-world money to buy cosmetic items instead of using their earned in-game credits to buy them with.
    Play games like CS:GO, Payday 2, Warframe, Battlefield 4/Hardline to see examples of these types of meta-game mechanics that are used to attract and keep players interested in your game.

    - Integrate after-round progress mechanics. Again, this one is pretty much a must have to keep players playing your game. Basic stuff like XP that is gained after each round and each player having a persistent player level should be implemented. The player level would be linked to the available options of cosmetic items that can be unlocked at a particular level (for example, the marine head with the beard and battle scars might only be unlockable by players at Level 10).

    - Remove commander on both sides (gasp, I know right?). Give players team res, similar to how the gorge worked in NS1 (there was no alien commander in NS1) but also allow them to have their own player res. Imagine an NS2 world where pub play didn't involve 5-10 minutes of down-time in between rounds as one side (or both sometimes!) tries to find a commander (as we've seen by now, no amount of telling people to do the commander tutorials will fix this). This one is huge. As much as it sucks to get rid of the commander, the down-time on public play and new-player drop-off that it causes is the game's own worst enemy.

    - Go free-to-play. After a proper meta-game has been integrated, free-to-play is the quickest way to open up your game to the masses and see how many of them feel your meta-game and base game is strong enough to keep coming back to. Without implementing the aforementioned points, going free-to-play would probably have about the same player drop-off rate as the paid game.

    That's a start, at least.
  • krOozekrOoze Join Date: 2014-04-24 Member: 195593Members
    edited March 2015
    @Daphisto please no. I don't want another tablet-like artificial stat addiction game. But yeah - make it free - just download and play. Ask for money if you need money (maybe I am naive?). Offer new maps and engine changes sponsorships, (fair) cosmetical changes, plushies, useless symbolic stuff for donations... maybe make it Steam-optional to appeal to customers of gog.com and such.
  • cooliticcoolitic Right behind you Join Date: 2013-04-02 Member: 184609Members
    edited March 2015
    d0ped0g wrote: »
    Would prefer NS1HD tbh. That's what most people wanted from ns2. Getting a remastered version of NS2 would be akin to Nintendo remastering Super Smash Bros Brawl, rather than Melee.

    I wish we had Melee HD. IMO SSB4 was worse than brawl and melee. (diddy kong, dodge roll frames, counters, rosalina)
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    Well, Kouj, I have a hard time accepting that as a reason just given the success of other mods like NS2stats or Shine or even Comp mod.
    Difficulty in maintaining doesn't seem to be the determining factor in popularity, provided there's someone involved still.
  • Kouji_SanKouji_San Sr. Hινε Uρкεερεг - EUPT Deputy The Netherlands Join Date: 2003-05-13 Member: 16271Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
    Weren't most mod very dependent on NS2 lua and the engine, where the one you mentioned (except comp mod?) were more separated from the main constantly changing code base? Probably will be corrected on this though, I honestly don't know. All I know and judge on is based on the sometime quite vocal complaints from those modders (smaller teams who were a bit fed up and such :P)
  • HeatSurgeHeatSurge Some Guy Join Date: 2012-09-15 Member: 159438Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    edited March 2015
    I don't see the point of any "remaster." This is as good as it can be and imo if there's ever a NS3 it might be a good idea to go back to the drawing board in some respects.

    The remakes of old 90's games are only popular because the resolution and GPU processing ability increased significantly, and because of nostalgia. Textures mostly really looked significantly like crap in the late 90's compared to today. In 10 years, I can't predict what it will be like, but my feeling is we'll be moving more towards "massiveness"/scale and arguably more elaborate shaders/light realism (raytracing tech etc.)/particles stuff than better textures/moar polygons. Increasing polygons and making textures better has pretty badly diminishing returns, although (some gameplay and other choices aside) RAGE's textures were pretty damn sexy for their time, and still are in some ways. Carmack was onto something there.

    Even if the resolutions go to 64K or whatever K, and maybe there will be entire walls of houses as "screens" (Fahrenheit 451 much) I think doing an update for the purpose of "better textures/more detailed models" on this game will be laughable.
  • BensonBenson Join Date: 2012-03-07 Member: 148303Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    I dont think we need a re-release of NS2 so much as some publicity about how much the CDT has improved the game.

    They have made HUGE improvements to the game, and if the optimizations listed in the CDT trello are as good as they seem, it may be worth it to let some of the people who stopped playing know that the game runs and plays better (both server and client wise), and that they should come back. (5/5 people I bought the game for said that they stopped playing due to either server or client performance issues)

    We don't need to sell more copies, or rerelease the game, we need to bring back existing players.


    p.s. What is the "Prize for Valvetime" card all about?
  • HeatSurgeHeatSurge Some Guy Join Date: 2012-09-15 Member: 159438Members, Reinforced - Supporter
    Performance may be somewhat better, but loading times still more or less require SSD to be sane.
  • NotPaLaGiNotPaLaGi Join Date: 2014-05-29 Member: 196291Members
    IronHorse wrote: »
    I think those who have advocated for "NS1 with a graphics update" never really understood the reasons why that would have been financially a poor decision for UWE.

    Sure. Much better to market a whole bunch of new features and new engine, but run out of time/money to fine-tune it and release it before its ready. Then watch the majority of the player base leave because the game was still mostly a clusterfuck at release and even after the Gorgeous update. Talk about biting off more than you can chew.

    You're right, I don't understand that. Enough people were buying NS2 just based on the "hey cool a marines/aliens FPS/RTS hybrid". Remember, NS1 was like 10 years old at this point. More important to get a long-awaited sequel right. I was embarrassed that almost every FPS player I introduced NS2 to said "wow palagi this game runs like shit" and I had to be like "ya, do you know how to overclock a CPU?".
    IronHorse wrote: »
    Would a $25 NS1 port to source engine have been as successful as NS2? Highly doubtful.
    I disagree. I still think it would have been successful even launching in 2012, but not optimal. But you know what would have really made some money? A NS:Source engine port in like 2009. According to GameSpy, NS1 was one of the ten most played Half-Life modifications in terms of players. Then UWE could finetune Spark and really define their vision for NS2, and we could have seen an even more successful launch of NS2 in say, 2015.
    IronHorse wrote: »
    On that note, if some core players disagree and think it would have been successful, then why didn't NS2C go anywhere? I mean beyond competitive use.
    Did you just compare NS2C to a potential NS:Source port? Because those are two vastly different things. NS2C in my eyes was extremely limited by how bad the base game was at the time. Lipstick on a pig. The good news is the NS2 we have today is a far superior product because of the influence of things like NS2C. I just wish more people were around to enjoy it.
  • DaphistoDaphisto Hive Janitor Join Date: 2002-11-16 Member: 8917Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    krOoze wrote: »
    @Daphisto please no. I don't want another tablet-like artificial stat addiction game. But yeah - make it free - just download and play. Ask for money if you need money (maybe I am naive?). Offer new maps and engine changes sponsorships, (fair) cosmetical changes, plushies, useless symbolic stuff for donations... maybe make it Steam-optional to appeal to customers of gog.com and such.

    I wasn't talking about tablet-like artificial stat addiction gaming experiences. At all.

    I was referring to meta-game experiences that exist in popular games such as CS:GO, Payday 2, Team Fortress 2, DOTA2, Warframe, Battlefield, etc. Experiences that create large communities that feel like they are moving towards something.
    IronHorse wrote: »
    Today's gamers / customers are a different crowd.
    On that note, if some core players disagree and think it would have been successful, then why didn't NS2C go anywhere?

    With all respect to the developers, NS2C had equivalent gameplay to dozens of free-to-play browser-based shooters. Using the existing NS2 assets (models, sounds, etc.) and still charging a $15 price tag seemed anti-consumer.

  • MendaspMendasp I touch maps in inappropriate places Valencia, Spain Join Date: 2002-07-05 Member: 884Members, NS1 Playtester, Contributor, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Retired Community Developer
    edited March 2015
    Daphisto wrote: »
    With all respect to the developers, NS2C had equivalent gameplay to dozens of free-to-play browser-based shooters. Using the existing NS2 assets (models, sounds, etc.) and still charging a $15 price tag seemed anti-consumer.
    When they mention NS2C they don't mean Combat, they mean NS2: Classic, the NS1 remake mod for NS2.
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