State of the Preview Weekend

[McCloude]

Quote from WHA.

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Folks,

I'll be expanding this as the weekend goes by but here's where we stand right now in terms of some of the issues that have been discussed, tossed around, thrown like a spear at our heads since the Preview Weekend started:

1) We peaked last night at around 30K concurrent players across our servers, that is obviously a great number. During that time the servers performed extremely well in terms of CPU usage and we never once came close to max usage so we know that we will meet our server cap populations for launch.

2) Regarding overall server stability we've pretty much exceeded our expectations. We've only had two full server crashes across all servers since we began. Neither crash was due to player load, CPU overload, code going brain dead,etc. but due to a minor issue on our part. The same is true for region crashes of which we only had two. Unfortunately, we had more scenarios crash (20) than we like but the number is still quite low considering we've been running 15 servers for more than a day.

3) Client crashes (crashes to desktop) are down from the last stage of closed beta and thanks to all the people playing, we've already fixed two issues that have caused some of the CTDs. We're not there yet but we are in better shape than we were last month and we will be even better at launch. Even now the CTDs are lower than some games were at release but having said that, it's not good enough for us and CTDs are issue #1A for us right now.

4) Pet AI and pathing is severely broken. The Preview Weekend patch (3.3) unfortunately borked the system. This is issue #1B for us. Even though this is a beta and new bugs/issues are to be expected, we messed up on this issue. We expect a quick turnaround on this next week. So please accept my apologies for this one, it should not have happened.

5) On the subject of graphical quality, SLI, etc., the problems that some players have reported are being focused on as well. From what we've been able to gather so far (other than on SLI which is a known issue), there is something weird happening with a small percentage of graphic cards as well as a possible issue which crept into this patch. We'll know more about it this week.

6) On some targeting issues, we're looking into that as well.

7) Regarding the GCD, we are not going to remove the GCD but we are continuing to look into some of the issues that have been reported with its use. As our closed beta testers have reported, our Combat Responsiveness Code made a huge difference to the game's feel and we're going to continue to look at the GCD and see if it needs tweaking along with any bug fixes that need to be done. I'll be posting more about this as well in the coming days/weeks. While the bugs with the GCD isn't our #1 priority, making combat feel even more responsive and fun is a major issue so it will continue to get looked at and tweaked over this last month and beyond.

So, that's it for now, more to come as the PW progresses as things arise. Overall we are thrilled with the response to the game on the Web, to our in-game surveys and from our feedback/bug tools. I'm glad we still have almost a month before launch but I am also quite happy where we are other than the problem with pathing/AI for which again I offer my apologies.

Mark

[moRacca]

I'm happy to hear that they are fixing the bugs that plagued me during the beta test. I can only hope the servers will be back online soon.

[immortal]

Pretty sure servers don't come back up until open beta starts on the 7th, although I could be wrong.

[RobinHood525]

Originally Posted by immortal

Pretty sure servers don't come back up until open beta starts on the 7th, although I could be wrong.

Yea i am pretty sure your right =)...

[moRacca]

damn...what should I play instead for two weeks becomes the question.

[Penz]

Originally Posted by moRacca

damn...what should I play instead for two weeks becomes the question.

Disgaea 3 is really fun. And on the 7th of Sep you will have Spore coming out also

Course if you want to get more WAR in your vain's, can always check out my warhammer episodes over at gamesnark.com

Ohhhh, Another sweet game would be hello kitty online...except its not quite released for play thou... Sorry Pedro....You'll have to wait like the rest of us.

[Atmat]

Originally Posted by moRacca

damn...what should I play instead for two weeks becomes the question.

you should prepare beeing AFRL a looong time
(away from real life)
getting some food/drinks,enough power for your PC,maybe a pot that will take some time.
after that you can play some game like wc3,CS,C&C,maybe Metal Gear solid until the time is over.

[Picky]

Quote from WHA...

Folks,

Well, things have been, as usual, busy here at Mythic so I have lots of news to share. So, without further ado and no SNL references, here's the update on my update:

1) Significantly improved NPC pathing - Okay, in all fairness it wouldn't have taken much to improve on what we showed you folks during the PW. However, the NPC pathing is back to where it needs to be and while it still isn't perfect, well, it's a heck of a lot closer than it was just a short time ago. We identified a whole lot of bugs and squashed them.

2) Improved pet commands and responsivness - Well, pretty much same as above. Pets will no longer act as if obeying an order from you was the last thing in this world that they wanted to do.

3) Fixed an issue with textures blurring - Nothing like looking at textures through a blurred lens to make things look really sharp eh? Major improvements in and more OTW.

4) Enhanced Global Cooldown Mechanic - Well, for one the GCD actually shows the correct cooldown time and not the rounded up cooldown time (Hey, what a great idea, let's make it seem slower than it is. WOOT!). The slop timer is working fine right now and we'll continue to look at making the GCD and combat in general more responsive.

5) Continuing to improve Client Stability - As always, lots of fixes going in here. The client is supposed to be more stable (and looks like it so far) but until we get the masses back in...

6) Added new Graphics Settings and seeking more feedback from testers to guide future improvements. You asked for it, you got it. Well, in all fairness we were going to put these in anyway but it never hurts to nudge us a bit at times.

7) Target Nearest Target improved - Yeah! One of my pet peeves addressed.

8) Renown Gear changes and Potency of Potions increased. Tweaking, adding, subtracting, in other words (don't say "nerf", we're still in beta!) balancing.

9) Increased bonus for medal winners in PQs. PQs are supposed to be fun, joyous and not grindy. We'll continue tweaking and changing them wherever we need to do that to make it so #1. (okay, a ST reference)

10) Added more loot bags in Tier 1 PQs - Boy, it's going to be rather crowded when we launch so we just upped the loot for the Tier 1 PQs. We'll do the same to T2 as needed. And when the rush is over, we'll tweak downwards.

So, in terms of some other good stuff, lots and lots and lots of bugs fixed and lots of new stuff added to the ToK. But wait, there's more and we'll address some of it next week as well as more coming info in the next update.

Oh, and there's still no such thing as a miracle patch so don't expect one here. Just a ton of fixes, additions and adjustments. We have another major patch coming as well before launch. We don't believe in miracle patches (miracle whip is a whole other subject) here at Mythic but simply hard work and a talented team.

Much respect to my team that is really doing one heck of a job getting things ready for launch.

Mark

I think the point 9 will make some people happier.

[OctoberWater]

Originally Posted by Picky

I think the point 9 will make some people happier.

you have no idea... I won't say it again here... cuz I know I have bitched about the loot system for PQs in at least 3 threads already

[Picky]

Originally Posted by OctoberWater

you have no idea... I won't say it again here... cuz I know I have bitched about the loot system for PQs in at least 3 threads already

Well deal is I don't really think there will be a perfect loot system for PQs with the base system they have right now. Whatever they do there will always be problems. They can add more bags but in the end the ones finishing on top of the chart will always get better loot making people who are at the bottom of the chart QQ. If they would happen to put the same loot bags for everyone to bring more happiness to people at the bottom of the chart the players on top of the chart would QQ that they aren't truly rewarded for their efforts like they should be

They can put less randomness but the less randomness there is the more chances there is for farmers to get all the loot from certain PQs. I'm sure you'll start seeing soon enough after the release farmers playing 3-4 chars at once just to get 3-4 bags repeatedly from a few specific PQs.