MAG

[patsu]

Played MAG a bit on Tuesday. I can see the appeal. Got a few sniper kills and such myself, playing Valor in defense on a friend's account. Made some use of terrain, taking a bellfrey position towards the latter part of a match. Not sure if I can make the transition from U2 though. The lack of cover and smooth vertical terrain traversal made it pretty cumbersome. Hiding behind cover and not being able to poke over and take shots is plain wrong! I also didn't like the grenade mechanics. The cheap instant-drop of U2 is a pleasant ommission, but I couldn't arm and fire a grenade in the thick of battle.

You can only go up if a structure has ladder. But unlike U2, it is hazardous. As a sniper I do use high grounds from time to time despite the exposure. I have to make sure I can gain enough advantages for the team though (e.g., trying to hold the objective longer).

The cover mechanics and vertical traversal are part of the whole game design and balance. So we may not do the games justice by splitting up the micro-features.

I'm also not sure how the massive forces really affects the game. We were defending A and B, only there was a clear division between the two battles. Whatever was going on in B was no concern to me. In terms of game action, the number of players surely isn't as important as the player:map density and respawn speed? A small map with 16 players will have more encounters than a huge map with 256. I guess MAG can add more hazards, with a few players on sniper duty still leaving a defensive force, whereas in a smaller game, the sniping players would mean less troopers. But if respawns are close and fast enough, the trooper force will still seem heavy. I also suppose you could have an army actually organise itself into a full rush. If all 32 of the opposition approached the same one objective, they'd have more chance of capturing it if the defensive force are split between the two.

Yeah, we talked a little about the focus on 256 players earlier on. It's short-selling the game. The player count only matters when:
(A) The leaders do their job (e.g. combine squad power to overrun enemies).
(B) In the final objective where everyone focuses on the same singular target.

To the average joe on the battlefield, it's the amount of mayhem caused by other players that will slap them in the face first. But these pychological "effects" are only apparent in the Acquisition and Domination game modes.

Both those modes have rather different feel compared to Sabotage and Suppression. It's like being a warzone reporter scurrying through a battle field with heavy machine guns firing at you, and assorted bombardments nearby, plus smoke and even poison smoke obscuring your view. Everywhere you run to is not safe.

All that said, I wouldn't mind something new to U2. I've pretty much got as far as is worth anything. Games need more progress options. MAG's levelling and points would offer that.

That's how I roll it. These days, I mix U2 co-op and MAG, but mostly the latter. There is a new rule starting yesterday. I force myself to stop at 3 games in MAG. I almost fell sick because out of the last week, I stayed up 3 nights to play MAG (and ahem... work) in the office.

I am trying to build a tier-1 tricked out sniper rifle, and a tier 3 mother-of-all sniper rifle. Will skip tier 2 since I hear it lacks the firing rate and magazine size of the tier 1 rifle, but is not as deadly as tier 3. Tier 3 is a one-hit kill rifle, with limited magazine/ammo.

 

[patsu]

Finally, someone at Zipper speaks up:
http://www.joystiq.com/2010/02/11/interview-zippers-alan-van-slyke-on-mags-past-present-and-fu/

Long replies !

Yesterday, we got a chance to speak with Van Slyke once more -- this time about the pressures associated with developing a game of this (forgive the pun) magnitude, whether the game's rigorous beta testing paid off, and how one of MAG's three factions has evolved into an unstoppable victory machine.

Now I know why they need the beta, but I don't think they should do this again next time:

You know, the scale of the game brings a lot of challenges unto itself; I mean, testing, right? So we are a 100+ person studio, and we have 256 player maps. We had to really beg, borrow, steal a lot of resources to fill up games and to stress test the game and make sure it was stable, and to make sure it played well at high densities. We used a lot of clever ways to do that, too. A lot of time, what we would do is we'd break the platoons up and test individual platoon areas. With less frequency, we would fill the entire game up by employing other Sony development studios.

We also used beta probably more than we have in the past as a testing tool, to give us a lot of high player load, high game counts that we could parse through all the data, and look at the heat maps, and see exactly what's going on. It's something we just couldn't replicate internally as you could with a smaller game or a single player game.

Challenges in handling PS3:

Zipper has a history of being pretty prolific. When you guys were working on the SOCOM series, you were knocking out a title or two every year. MAG took a little bit longer to develop – was that because of the game's size, or because it was Zipper's first project on the PS3?

It was more of the latter, and a little bit of the former. When we came in, the PS3 wasn't quite ... you know, early dev kits, early code base, new tools, new pipelines, new thinking, wiping the slate clean, new networking layer, right?

We pretty much wiped the slate clean to build this game, and the studio was making the transition from the PS2 to the PS3 as well. Really, the first eighteen months of the project was standing up core technologies, and just building our run-time engine, building our tool chain, building our renderer, and things like that. It took some amount of time just to get the core engine running on the PS3 before we even had guys up and running around in the game and could actually start laying down game mechanics on top of the core engine that design had been pondering for some time.

A lot of it was just that the studio was setting up the foundation for migrating to the PS3. And then on top of that, there was a small additional expense incurred. I think we were quite efficient in building MAG, but there was definitely an additional expense incurred just in the learnings and scale of the game we were building, that probably no one else has tried to do. We definitely took a little bit of extra time and care and after each event, or after each showing, we would kind of go back and rethink what we were doing and refactored what needed to be polished up and refactored to make them fun at that scale.

On SVER...

A lot of players have been complaining about the factions being somewhat unbalanced – S.V.E.R. in particular seems to be dominating all of the contracts every time I hop on the game. Do you think that has something with them being a stronger team? Or do you think there is some kind of balancing issue that has cropped up since launch?

It's actually kind of both. We've already released two or three patches post-launch. It's hard for me to remember because we always have a couple cooking in the oven here that we haven't released yet. We have two that are in the pipeline that'll be released in coming weeks – actually, my community manager will probably kill me for saying that, but we have a number of patches that are already baking.

So, even though I think we've done a good job balancing each faction's gear and weapons and maps, I think what we're seeing are slight imbalances, in the short term.

But I think it's both. It's that, actually, if you look at the faction numbers, by percentage, by distribution, they're really like within a percent or two of each other; kind of 33, 33, 33. They're really close, but there definitely is the perception that S.V.E.R. is more powerful and we spent a lot of time internally looking at that and we'll definitely be reacting to that. I think that the current belief is that there's a couple of S.V.E.R. maps that are slightly easier to defend and so they end up defending it more often, and then they end up winning slightly more often, and then they gain slightly more experience, and then they're slightly higher levels and it kind of cascades.

So, even though I think we've done a good job balancing each faction's gear and weapons and maps, I think what we're seeing are slight imbalances, in the short term. The early experience curve is where people are really jumping ahead – the earlier part of the experience curve is far more conservative then the later part of the curve. So, in other words, to get from 1 to 20 is probably the same amount of experiences to get to from 50 to 51. I think you're seeing people jump out five levels, and then have five extra experience points, and then it feeds on itself a little bit.

When there's the slight perception that there's something different, then people will want to go to that faction, right? And so will the most talented players, the most hardcore players who are watching the forums, it'll imbalance it slightly more. It's something we're definitely aware of, and we've already got a number of fixes in the pipe. We're definitely committed to making sure all the maps, factions and gear is perfectly balanced.

Talking about platform approach:

Do you foresee MAG being sort of a platform? You spent three years developing it, and built your own tools from the ground up to make it – do you see it being something that's going to be around for a while?

It's funny that you use that word, because that's exactly how I, and I think the production team envisions it: As a platform. It's like, yeah, we made a big investment, we had a lot of learning, we built a lot of tech, and we have this awesome multiplayer platform that we can build upon and add new gametypes to. The possibilities are endless for us, and in many ways, even though we just released the game, looking forward for us is super exciting, knowing what we can do with the engine we have today.

Do a LBP for shooter !

 

[macabre]

I`m in veteran mode now. Starting over with the cheap guns was weird. I`m going with the MG again to rack up points again as fast as possible.
Good thing is that the respec points also reset so I can try some different things, maybe the sniper stuff for a while.
But finally I will return to the commando class I think, that was the most fun. Need to be at least Level 35 again though to get a decent commando build.

 

[patsu]

You're not going to try other factions ?

I think it's easier to rake up points with commandos (or rather wielding machine guns). I got my sniper stand tonight. The next upgrade is either a high power scope or an aim assist. Do you know which one is more worth it ? I intend to get the aim assist, and then get the other flexi scope later.

Oh and welcome back, Crayon !
[size=-2]He lent his PS3 out for a year. ^_^ You lot are very generous.[/size]

 

[macabre]

Maybe I`ll switch one day. Depends on how the clan is doing. If other people will change or how many of them will stick with the game eventually.

 

[patsu]

What did you focus on in the previous build ?

My walk-n-snipe tactics isn't doing so well. It take 3 tier-1 sniper bullet to kill a man, but they can kill me in 2 shots with their machine gun. Need to keep my range and rough it out until I can get the tier 3 rifle after *7* points (Argh !). All because I skipped tier-2 rifle.

 

[obonicus]

I wonder if they're going to tone down the MGs.

 

[patsu]

I hope not ! I switch to my MG when we get to Objective C. I become a beast there. ^_^

Save me $$$ upgrading the MG. I want to spend all on the sniper rifle in the mean time.

 

[obonicus]

The only reason you'd use the AR is if you're going commando and want the suppressor. The only sniper rifle worth using are the heaviest ones.
The MG does more damage, has a bigger clip and is incredibly stable with upgrades, you can actually snipe folks with it.

 

[Dregun]

VERY Long post.

I had a dream about a War game that allowed for a great amount of people to play it..MAG is so close to doing it right now.

I would love for them to create a new game mode, a mode that encompasses all of the modes right now. A mode that is an all out war that could potentially last for days, with a thousand people contributing to the overall success or failure of their faction. The game is on a "Time" schedule; meaning defenders don't win by overtaking the attacking team; they win if they can hold them off for a set period of time (I'm thinking 48 hours)

Have the "Beaches of Normandy" type of start, the attacking faction starts out like sabotage trying to move across the map to push the enemy back and acquire new spawn points. 256 players on one map trying to move the defenders back (4 maps total), 12 objectives in each map that need to be held in order to complete the first wave of the invasion. (Envision bowling pins, the first is the hardest to secure and requires more people, then it branches off). Each objective that is held makes it easier to hold the other objectives; so that in the beginning multiple platoons or squads would be needed to overtake the first few objectives (or hold the objectives) so that other objectives could be held or taken easier. Once this goal has been reached it now becomes the attackers base; meaning all new players start at this position. You join the fight, no matter where in the battle or how close to victory you might be..this is your landing point when you first "log in" to your war!

From this location vehicles (tanks, jeeps, possibly even transport aircraft..etc etc) are required to move forward/advance in a timely fashion. Now if your clan/squad wants to play the game you spawn at this location; you are a new squad/platoon that just arrived to this war as if it happened in real life. After traversing through the map you will exit the "safe" zone and be told you are about to enter the "Field of battle", this is where the game would load again but only if every member of your squad/platoon is at this point. Now it starts with both sides having tanks, jeeps etc etc again 4 x 256 player maps. So although your war is contained on your screen to 256 players in actuality 1024 people are responsible for you to move to the last stage of battle. You will be allowed to move between games/maps; to offer assistance (using air transportation could hide loading) but your entire squad or platoon must move and be room on the server for you to do that! You could run across the map to the predetermined "Connection" point if you so choose, but using vehicles or air-craft would be much faster and safer.

Now you need to secure all 4 maps for your Faction to advance to the final stage, your spawn points are continuously moving forward as long as you have control over certain objectives. Conquering this portion of the game should take less than 1 day. Finally once this has been completed you move to the final stage of the game, you are now invading the opponents stronghold/country/base whatever.

This map again is split into 4 x 256 player maps, but instead of them being side by side as if you they spread out.. picture 4 boxes lining up to form a cross, but with an empty box in the middle (would be the 5th box). The empty box in the middle represents the Defenders base/stronghold, this is the locations in which the defenders spawn.. As the attacking forces move forward they eliminate spawn points for the defenders, meaning less and less defenders are available to hold off the attackers; however spawn points for the defenders begin to show up BEHIND the attackers. At the end of the map, when you get to the main spawn point of the enemy you are greeted with a giant wall/building. You can only see one side of it but it is massive and is tall. This is a "Lord of the Rings" moment when you have to full on assault that section and inflict enough damage onto it to "secure it". You now have to control it and wait for the other maps to control their sides as well, once all sides have been secured (meaning all anti air defenses have been destroyed) you have 2 minutes before an air strike takes out the entire building. They have 2 minutes to recapture 2 sides!

This would also create a new game mode, a RTS type for players who want to have an overhead view of the war; ordering entire teams to different locals to secure objectives etc etc. They could also start new medals like "Top Sniper", "Top Medic", "Top Engineer" etc etc for the people in those categories who did the best job during the entire war.

One last thing, to help insure that the people who are playing in a war get the chance to finish the war across multiple days they offer "War Times". As in the war takes place everyday between 3pm EST until 11pm EST for that particular war. When you enlist to partake in that battle you cannot join another "WAR" that is scheduled in the same time slot until the current war you are in is finished. If you and your squad log in and want to play in your war but the server is full they offer a couple options. 1. Join a platoon with a spot for you and when spots open up your squad members automatically join in to take that spot (or you join them depending on configuration). 2. Your squad can play another game (Acquisition, Sabotage etc etc) until space opens up for your whole squad to join. The game can have "cut off" points for the amount of players who are allowed to sign up for the war so that 3000 people don't try to play a WAR that has a limit of 1000 players, basically that would help people play the war they signed up for. Also they could "De-list" from the war, removing them from the war freeing up a slot in that time period.

After playing the first Battlefield game I have been waiting for a game to "go to the next level" and recreate a war for people to play. MAG is so close to doing it but just needs a little more planning!

 

[patsu]

The only reason you'd use the AR is if you're going commando and want the suppressor. The only sniper rifle worth using are the heaviest ones.

Yes, that's why I am going through the painful route of upgrading my sniper rifle.

The MG does more damage, has a bigger clip and is incredibly stable with upgrades, you can actually snipe folks with it.

I got hit quite a few times from far by MG and suspected so. I will be able to stay out of their range one day !

 

[patsu]

VERY Long post.

Heh heh, the MAG warzone is very authentic and robust. Yes. That's why I thought they should give the users some flexibility in scoping out their campaigns.

The current way point system is too limited. They need a full fledge command, control and communication system.

Have this vague idea of a LBP for FPS, but need to sort through the details.

I also think that they can expand the game more by designating a small team to keep adding cool gadgets and skills to our Barracks.

EDIT: They may also need a tons of small squad actions to help train people for the shadow war.

 

[patsu]

The Skill Tree:
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/02/mag-developer-tips-the-skill-tree/
(Video inside)

Looks like very basic stuff. I have not respec yet since I know what I want to try exactly:

“Hey there, this is Jason and it’s a fact that the skill tree is the heart of your character, and the place where a soldier’s identity is forged. Specialization is the name of the game here, as becoming comfortable with a particular weapon set and support role, and then spending skill points wisely to improve upon those skills will help you become an effective combatant and squad mate. Following these few tips will help you become a force to be reckoned with out on the battlefield.

Choose your weapon. Rather than spend precious skill points across several weapon types, pick one and spend points to continually upgrade that category’s weapon selections, attachments, and skills.

Choose your role. Electronics warfare? Combat medic? Field engineer? Explosives expert? MAG is all about teamwork, and a balanced squad is a good squad. Decide on your “support” role immediately, and just like when specializing with a weapon, continually spend skill points to improve that skill set rather than scattering points across disciplines.

Save your skill points. Just because you leveled up and have a shiny new skill point to spend, that doesn’t mean you have to spend it “right now.” Decide first what your next ‘must have” skill is and save up for it. That new foregrip attachment for an assault rifle or the electronic sensor jammer may be worth the wait.

Respec early and often. Your current Respec points are shown in the “Skills” tree. When you have enough points, opting for a respec will reset all purchased skills and give you all of your earned points back to spend again; it’s basically a do-over. This is a great opportunity to hone your specialty and personal play-style to a razor’s edge.

Be prepared for an ever-changing battlefield by “packaging” new skills and equipment together as loadouts in the Armory. Use attacker and defender skill sets as a starting point, and build from there with your specialties. Packaging up gear skills into an easily selectable loadout can make all the difference when a stealthy assault on an AA Battery is called for, or when a last stand against heavy APC’s can mean the difference between victory or defeat.

In closing, the key is to maximizing the skill tree is to choose your weapon, choose your role, then work up the ranks to become effective at both, while using the respec function liberally to find that perfect combination for your play style.”

 

[obonicus]

It's worth respeccing because you can optimize your points. The medic thing I think is the best example. Early on you'll want the regular resurrect and med-kit, but when you move onto the upgraded rez you can skip the regular one and save 2 points.

AR also has it a bit, if you want to go for scope rather than reflex sight, you can skip the reflex. MG again is much more straightforward (and point-inexpensive).

 

[patsu]

I haven't upgraded to the tier-2 resurrect yet. Only the tier-1 resuscitate (Med-kit).

I may respec after I get the tier-3 rifle. I already skipped tier-2 to optimize my point allocation. It's all very lean now.

We'll see. I may give up Claymore if I find more and more people have the ability to disable it. It's extremely useful now though.



This thing here... it has the potential to become the Gran Turismo or LittleBigPlanet of the battlefield since they decided to go all out and do a large scale cooperation game. I urge the developers to experiment with giving strategic views/summary to players, and more command & control options to leaders, including locking down location of vehicles so no one can move them. Battlefield reports/intelligence may be interesting.

I think the shooting mechanics has been nailed down perfectly.

AR also has it a bit, if you want to go for scope rather than reflex sight, you can skip the reflex. MG again is much more straightforward (and point-inexpensive).

Yeah, I followed your advice. So MG stays in tier-1.

I didn't bother to upgrade AR at all since I use MG and sniper rifle exclusively.


EDIT: I have 2 sniper loadouts:
(A) Defensive: Heal others and myself. Claymore, sniper rifle with scope and stability stand, plus room for other more advanced rifle attachment.

(B) Aggressive: Heal myself only. Chemical grenade, RPG, sniper with lightweight, short-ranged scope

Have increased health for both cases.


I am very curious to see what happens if we have a full fledge system: Whether someone will spec a non-combat officer, with advanced capability in intelligence, command & control. These capabilities can change the tide of battles (because we can deploy more efficiently/effectively given more info). They will likely become the priority target.

Today, I know some clans will send in scouts to die, and linger in death position as long as possible to survey our internal situation. When you're near them, you get to hear what they report back to their comrades. Then everyone opened fire on the body to get him to respawn faster.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Respec early and often. Your current Respec points are shown in the “Skills” tree. When you have enough points, opting for a respec will reset all purchased skills and give you all of your earned points back to spend again; it’s basically a do-over. This is a great opportunity to hone your specialty and personal play-style to a razor’s edge.

I have a problem with this, like other point-based development titles. How do I know what I want to spend my points in if I haven't experienced different play styles? And how am I supposed to try different play styles if I can't freely choose weapons and skills? I could start the game as a sniper, then be stuck with that as I level my sniper skills until I get the chance to respec. I then respec as a tropper - oh no! I hate it. Now I have to slog through games waiting to get respec points until I can revert to a sniper. Maybe I'd prefer a more support-role class, but it's a gamble to try it.

Why limit people to respec points? Guild Wars had that, and after a while they dropped it and allowed you to respec whenever outside of missions. It was a far, far better system allowing players to explore and enjoy all the game's content. Sacred 2 on the other hand has zero respec'ing at all, and means players miss out on 80+% of the skill content and build options.
What would be so wrong in letting the players reconfigure their soldier any time between matches?

 

[patsu]

Don't know man. I think the developers want people to commit to something and stay with it for a short while. May be to force them to focus on cooperation instead of mucking around with weapon/skill combo at the onset ? Respec costs 3000 (at least for the first time). I have about 15000 respec points now.

Played with macrabre's clan again last night. Broke my 3-game-only rule 2 out of 3 nights. Stayed up until 7am again. My ranking is sinking (Ah !). 5 more points to get tier-3 rifle !

 

[cbarcus]

Don't know man. I think the developers want people to commit to something and stay with it for a short while. May be to force them to focus on cooperation instead of mucking around with weapon/skill combo at the onset ? Respec costs 3000 (at least for the first time). I have about 15000 respec points now.

Played with macrabre's clan again last night. Broke my 3-game-only rule 2 out of 3 nights. Stayed up until 7am again. My ranking is sinking (Ah !). 5 more points to get tier-3 rifle !

I think you're right about encouraging players to commit to specialties as it may add stability to gameplay. It probably would not work as well design-wise for a smaller number of players (say Battlefield).

I'd be playing MAG too if I could afford it, but being LTTP on this platform, I'm still exploring the potential of titles like Confrontation (still buggy, yet awesome game- and damn, nearly everyone has a mic!) and Killzone 2. I'd be careful about those long nights...how is that impacting the rest of your life? Don't burn yourself out, or MAG is going to lose a cool player and then we won't get those running updates from you at B3D.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Im tempted to buy this. But i dont really have time for gaming right now :S

 

[obonicus]

I think you're right about encouraging players to commit to specialties as it may add stability to gameplay. It probably would not work as well design-wise for a smaller number of players (say Battlefield).

I'd be playing MAG too if I could afford it, but being LTTP on this platform, I'm still exploring the potential of titles like Confrontation (still buggy, yet awesome game- and damn, nearly everyone has a mic!) and Killzone 2. I'd be careful about those long nights...how is that impacting the rest of your life? Don't burn yourself out, or MAG is going to lose a cool player and then we won't get those running updates from you at B3D.

I thought patsu gamed at work.