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CCP don't know how their game works? (Not angry thread)
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Hannott Thanos
Notorious Legion
#1 - 2012-04-27 07:32:28 UTC
I simply want to share my very recent experience regarding something related to the title. Me and a few others are making a game at Funcom in Norway as a final student project. We are a team of 3 programmers and 1 designer, so all the testing have been done by ourselves. Well, yesterday we invited 8 more or less non-gamer friends to test our game for usability. I'm being modest when saying, we didn't know jack **** about our own game P. So many things we had tested ourselves and had found to be so simple, where impossible for the testers to find out how to work out. As an example, our player character had to get 5 times its HP, we cut the enemies to 40% and reduced their damage to 50% after the first 4 had completed testing.

Granted, CCP is composed of more than 4 people,but at least I know why sometimes there can be some really stupid suggestions about balancing coming from CCP. Players know best! so if anyone from CCP reads this, give us more ridiculous suggestions like the one about rig changes. It inspires so many people to come up with their own ideas and it's great for any game. I don't know wth I'm doing. I just program stuff and playtest it, and ofc I'm awesome at my own game, playing it the way I think it's supposed to be played.

Lots of love to all of CCP for making the greatest game ever!



Oh, and for all you programmers out there. We had to hack our tutorial together, and we had to call a function TutorialStep(16); and it for some reason gave us back 14. Due to time issues we made a nice little
if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;
hidden away somewhere it should not be. We laughed so hard at this. Made me feel awkward afterwards. Hope someone else can appreciate the fun in this PRoll

while (CurrentSelectedTarget.Status == ShipStatus.Alive) {

     _myShip.FireAllGuns(CurrentSelectedTarget);

}
Valerius Kavees
Ministry of War
Amarr Empire
#2 - 2012-04-27 07:42:35 UTC
kudos for understanding CCP's hardwork...
Klotzak
Imperial Academy
Amarr Empire
#3 - 2012-04-27 07:49:44 UTC
Well no ****. Client knows bezt.
RubyPorto
RubysRhymes
#4 - 2012-04-27 07:53:31 UTC
Hannott Thanos wrote:


Oh, and for all you programmers out there. We had to hack our tutorial together, and we had to call a function TutorialStep(16); and it for some reason gave us back 14. Due to time issues we made a nice little
if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;
hidden away somewhere it should not be. We laughed so hard at this. Made me feel awkward afterwards. Hope someone else can appreciate the fun in this PRoll



That sounds suspiciously like a GOTO, but then I know just enough programming to get in trouble, not to actually do anything fun.

"It's easy to speak for the silent majority. They rarely object to what you put into their mouths." -Abrazzar "the risk of having your day ruined by other people is the cornerstone with which EVE was built" -CCP Solomon
Roll Sizzle Beef
Space Mutiny
#5 - 2012-04-27 07:54:19 UTC
Various CCP has said time and time again, they love to watch the community do things with their content they never dreamed of. That's why the game is in ever constant flux. Change one thing effects a dozen others. It's never ending.
Hannott Thanos
Notorious Legion
#6 - 2012-04-27 07:58:45 UTC
RubyPorto wrote:
Hannott Thanos wrote:


Oh, and for all you programmers out there. We had to hack our tutorial together, and we had to call a function TutorialStep(16); and it for some reason gave us back 14. Due to time issues we made a nice little
if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;
hidden away somewhere it should not be. We laughed so hard at this. Made me feel awkward afterwards. Hope someone else can appreciate the fun in this PRoll



That sounds suspiciously like a GOTO, but then I know just enough programming to get in trouble, not to actually do anything fun.


Hehe. It was made to jump to a specific place in a swich-case because the function returned 14 instead of 16, and we had no time to figure out why it did. All the function did was take the argument and set it and print it, so this was a rather strange one. Will have to do some investigation next week

while (CurrentSelectedTarget.Status == ShipStatus.Alive) {

     _myShip.FireAllGuns(CurrentSelectedTarget);

}
Adriel Malakai
Shoulda Checked Local
Break-A-Wish Foundation
#7 - 2012-04-27 08:17:44 UTC
Roll Sizzle Beef wrote:
Various CCP has said time and time again, they love to watch the community do things with their content they never dreamed of. That's why the game is in ever constant flux. Change one thing effects a dozen others. It's never ending.


Except for CCP Greyscale. He just nerfs the **** out of anything he can find that the players came up with.
Akirei Scytale
Okami Syndicate
#8 - 2012-04-27 08:21:47 UTC
Hannott Thanos wrote:

if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;


The only possible explanations for that are a prank, malice, or alcohol. Seriously.
RubyPorto
RubysRhymes
#9 - 2012-04-27 08:22:59 UTC
Hannott Thanos wrote:
RubyPorto wrote:
Hannott Thanos wrote:


Oh, and for all you programmers out there. We had to hack our tutorial together, and we had to call a function TutorialStep(16); and it for some reason gave us back 14. Due to time issues we made a nice little
if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;
hidden away somewhere it should not be. We laughed so hard at this. Made me feel awkward afterwards. Hope someone else can appreciate the fun in this PRoll



That sounds suspiciously like a GOTO, but then I know just enough programming to get in trouble, not to actually do anything fun.


Hehe. It was made to jump to a specific place in a swich-case because the function returned 14 instead of 16, and we had no time to figure out why it did. All the function did was take the argument and set it and print it, so this was a rather strange one. Will have to do some investigation next week


I understand why you did it. Shortcuts aren't just for the lazy, they're also good for the:

  • Overworked
  • Inebriated
  • Time-Constrained
  • Budget-Constrained
  • Priority Sensitive
  • Under-Slept
  • Hungover
  • Humor Value


And I've taken shortcuts for all of those reasons (and more,

"It's easy to speak for the silent majority. They rarely object to what you put into their mouths." -Abrazzar "the risk of having your day ruined by other people is the cornerstone with which EVE was built" -CCP Solomon
Hannott Thanos
Notorious Legion
#10 - 2012-04-27 08:26:55 UTC
Akirei Scytale wrote:
Hannott Thanos wrote:

if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;


The only possible explanations for that are a prank, malice, or alcohol. Seriously.

Hahaha, yeah Oops

Well, we were 15 minutes overdue, and the testgroup had to start testing, so there you have it. Will sort it out later I hope.

We also had to do some Player.BluePlayer = config.Load(RedPlayer). Why? i don't know why, but it worked!

while (CurrentSelectedTarget.Status == ShipStatus.Alive) {

     _myShip.FireAllGuns(CurrentSelectedTarget);

}
Corbin Blair
Doomheim
#11 - 2012-04-27 09:32:17 UTC
RubyPorto wrote:

I understand why you did it. Shortcuts aren't just for the lazy, they're also good for the:

  • Overworked
  • Inebriated
  • Time-Constrained
  • Budget-Constrained
  • Priority Sensitive
  • Under-Slept
  • Hungover
  • Humor Value


And I've taken shortcuts for all of those reasons (and more,

Shortcuts are never good for anyone. They're a short sighted band-aid lazy and/or incompetent people use instead of solving the root problem from your list. If you're hung over at work and under-slept the answer isn't shortcuts. The answer is signing up for AA meetings cause what the **** are you doing going out drinking all night on a Wednesday?
Planetarian
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#12 - 2012-04-27 09:51:03 UTC
You're a student. That explains a lot :)

If you're reading this you've come to my signature, which has little relevance to this post
RubyPorto
RubysRhymes
#13 - 2012-04-27 10:07:13 UTC  |  Edited by: RubyPorto
Corbin Blair wrote:
RubyPorto wrote:

I understand why you did it. Shortcuts aren't just for the lazy, they're also good for the:

  • Overworked
  • Inebriated
  • Time-Constrained
  • Budget-Constrained
  • Priority Sensitive
  • Under-Slept
  • Hungover
  • Humor Value


And I've taken shortcuts for all of those reasons (and more,

Shortcuts are never good for anyone. They're a short sighted band-aid lazy and/or incompetent people use instead of solving the root problem from your list. If you're hung over at work and under-slept the answer isn't shortcuts. The answer is signing up for AA meetings cause what the **** are you doing going out drinking all night on a Wednesday?


So you fully solve every problem you encounter immediately, no matter what constraints you're operating under, never use any kludge or temporary (or maybe less temporary) patch to "make it work for now while I figure out what's happening?" Sounds like fun.

I work in a world where sometimes making it work *right now* is often more important than figuring out exactly why it's not working *right*, and if my shortcut to fixing it for now ends up "good enough" for the job, then figuring out why it's not working right becomes a lesser priority. But then, I don't work in IT, so I don't know how much free time you guys have to figure out problems that aren't immediately pressing anymore.


As for the alcoholic comment; 1) Who said I was drunk on a Wednesday, 2) If I can adequately produce the *result* needed while hungover, then the methods don't much matter, 3) Alcoholism requires more than simply drinking to excess, it also requires that that drinking negatively impact the life, relationships, or work of the sufferer, and 4) What the **** are you doing judging a stranger's actions based on a context free bullet point. As an aside, I don't show up to work hungover, but you certainly show up riding high.


Y'know, on a horse.

"It's easy to speak for the silent majority. They rarely object to what you put into their mouths." -Abrazzar "the risk of having your day ruined by other people is the cornerstone with which EVE was built" -CCP Solomon
Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#14 - 2012-04-27 10:31:49 UTC
Hannott Thanos wrote:
Akirei Scytale wrote:
Hannott Thanos wrote:

if(TutorialStage == 14)
TutorialStage = 16;


The only possible explanations for that are a prank, malice, or alcohol. Seriously.

Hahaha, yeah Oops

Well, we were 15 minutes overdue, and the testgroup had to start testing, so there you have it. Will sort it out later I hope.

We also had to do some Player.BluePlayer = config.Load(RedPlayer). Why? i don't know why, but it worked!


And 7 years from now you'll get to correct some completely unrelated feature and these conditionals will backfire in the most egregious ways.

Like all those "NO WAY WE DARE TO TOUCH THIS ANCIENT CODE" sections of EvE.

EvE Online portal | EvE markets tutorials
RubyPorto
RubysRhymes
#15 - 2012-04-27 10:47:51 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:

And 7 years from now you'll get to correct some completely unrelated feature and these conditionals will backfire in the most egregious ways.

Like all those "NO WAY WE DARE TO TOUCH THIS ANCIENT CODE" sections of EvE.


CCP Greyscale wrote:


On the first, if the starbase code was that robust, reliable and extensible they wouldn't break so often.

On the second, "I don't see how it could go wrong" is how all the really big disasters happen.


CCP Greyscale wrote:

We finally ran the test earlier this week, and the thing we were most anticipating breaking, broke. The fix is relatively straightforward, but it requires us running another upgrade test to confirm that the fix works.


Oh, POS code. Remember when it was just creating reaction products out of thin air, and not trying to burn down EvE? It's like the malicious little sister that you never wanted.

"It's easy to speak for the silent majority. They rarely object to what you put into their mouths." -Abrazzar "the risk of having your day ruined by other people is the cornerstone with which EVE was built" -CCP Solomon
Hannott Thanos
Notorious Legion
#16 - 2012-04-27 11:03:03 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:

And 7 years from now you'll get to correct some completely unrelated feature and these conditionals will backfire in the most egregious ways.

Like all those "NO WAY WE DARE TO TOUCH THIS ANCIENT CODE" sections of EvE.

This was during a usertest and we had 5 minutes between groups to fix it and rebuild the project. Go figure. Fortunately, we won't, and nobody else will, ever have to work on this project again. But if by freak of nature, anyone should ever have to, we will fix the code up next Tuesday Smile

while (CurrentSelectedTarget.Status == ShipStatus.Alive) {

     _myShip.FireAllGuns(CurrentSelectedTarget);

}
War Kitten
Panda McLegion
#17 - 2012-04-27 11:23:26 UTC
Hannott Thanos wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:

And 7 years from now you'll get to correct some completely unrelated feature and these conditionals will backfire in the most egregious ways.

Like all those "NO WAY WE DARE TO TOUCH THIS ANCIENT CODE" sections of EvE.

This was during a usertest and we had 5 minutes between groups to fix it and rebuild the project. Go figure. Fortunately, we won't, and nobody else will, ever have to work on this project again. But if by freak of nature, anyone should ever have to, we will fix the code up next Tuesday Smile


I understand it's just for school and all, but that's a bad habit to get into. If you're judged on your code as well as the user experience, there's no way you're getting an A with kludges like that. Plus you give programmers a bad name when you submit code like that.

Things that "just seem to work right" even though they shouldn't, and vice-versa, will bite you in the ass down the road.

(And programming under a deadline doesn't go away when you graduate)

I don't judge people by their race, religion, color, size, age, gender, or ethnicity. I judge them by their grammar, spelling, syntax, punctuation, clarity of expression, and logical consistency.
Hannott Thanos
Notorious Legion
#18 - 2012-04-27 11:26:40 UTC
War Kitten wrote:

I understand it's just for school and all, but that's a bad habit to get into. If you're judged on your code as well as the user experience, there's no way you're getting an A with kludges like that. Plus you give programmers a bad name when you submit code like that.

Things that "just seem to work right" even though they shouldn't, and vice-versa, will bite you in the ass down the road.

(And programming under a deadline doesn't go away when you graduate)


I am very well aware of your points, and they are valid.
In this situation, it was, fix it in 5 minutes or send the test-subjects home tho, so what else to do? I kinda posted it because I thought it was slightly funny, and hopefully I would get some similar stories which is always fun :)

while (CurrentSelectedTarget.Status == ShipStatus.Alive) {

     _myShip.FireAllGuns(CurrentSelectedTarget);

}
Krixtal Icefluxor
INLAND EMPIRE Galactic
#19 - 2012-04-27 11:46:23 UTC
I am most sure CCP is not enthusiatic about 'helping' any competition.

"He has mounted his hind-legs, and blown crass vapidities through the bowel of his neck."  - Ambrose Bierce on Oscar Wilde's Lecture in San Francisco 1882
MeestaPenni
Mercantile and Stuff
#20 - 2012-04-27 12:37:54 UTC  |  Edited by: MeestaPenni
Move along....nothing to see here.

I am not Prencleeve Grothsmore.
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