Thoughts on multiplayer

Everything having to do with OpenMW's TES3MP branch.
Dasher42
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Joined: 22 Apr 2015, 16:41

Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by Dasher42 »

I've been eagerly watching this project for a while, and I'm wondering where the thought is on multiplayer. I know it's far on the outside of the milestones for 1.0. It's also pretty obvious that a lot of scripting, story, and mechanics are designed for single-player.

I'm wondering if the way to a multiplayer mode is to, instead of pushing OpenMW to a multiplayer state while trying to keep full compatibility with all of the scripts, to start from a multiplayer engine like that in Ryzom Core and port into it until everything that isn't truly single-player specific is running. That way, single-player is unhindered from its goals, and nothing has to be adapted that isn't multiplayer-ready.

I'm sure there's been plenty of thoughts, but as an outside project, does this make sense?
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Okulo
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Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by Okulo »

I don't think that would be the way to handle the creation of such a large project. This is one of those things where I'd just start over from scratch, ie. start with the concept, down through the requirements, specifications, the design, and only then start development.

Thing is, OpenMW has a pretty clear-cut goal for v1.0: "Make it like Morrowind". But this... this is an entirely new way to look at Morrowind and requires much more extensive planning.
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Zini
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Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by Zini »

OpenMW multiplayer would basically mean MW with followers where the followers are players instead of NPCs. Everything else would require a complete rework of the content, at which point it doesn't really matter if it is done in OpenMW or a multi-player engine. If on the other hand the players form a single party that shares state like quest progress, guild membership and reputation, a limited number of adjustments to the content should do the trick.

That being said multiplayer is indeed low on our priority list, because

a) it would get in the way of 1.0 and stuff planned for the near future after 1.0

b) none of the current developers is particularly interested in multiplayer
MithrilLeaf
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Joined: 25 May 2014, 19:53

Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by MithrilLeaf »

Morrowind could really only work as a multiplayer game in my mind as a coop session of up to like, 4 people and most aspect of play shared.
SquireNed
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Joined: 21 Dec 2013, 22:18

Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by SquireNed »

That said, at the very least the opportunity to put multiplayer in the OpenMW engine, even if it's not used with MW content, is something that would be helpful for original games built using the system.
Dasher42
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Joined: 22 Apr 2015, 16:41

Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by Dasher42 »

I concur with all of the above observations, really. With the 3D engine moving to OpenSceneGraph, I'm still keen to ponder what adjustments to the engine would allow something a bit more ambitious. I'm happy to research this and dust off my C++.

I used to code a MUD, a cousin of CircleMUD, Death's Gate, and LexiMUD, so this is my way of being interested and appreciative of what the team's doing. So, I've got your git repo cloned, source compiling, and Ryzom Core's too.
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Pop000100
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Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by Pop000100 »

Morrowind online is a mod that allowed a coop-like session but it was full of bugs so much it only gets a honorable mention whenever the topic of multiplayer come up. me personally would love multiplayer its odd that a portion of fans of a game series based on a tabletop setting are against multiplayer. I understand multiplayer is a very low on the project's priority list but it is the reason I found the project like 4 years ago(I was like its never going to finish they haven't even done the skinning yet at that time, here I am now.)
SquireNed
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Joined: 21 Dec 2013, 22:18

Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by SquireNed »

Pop000100 wrote:Morrowind online is a mod that allowed a coop-like session but it was full of bugs so much it only gets a honorable mention whenever the topic of multiplayer come up. me personally would love multiplayer its odd that a portion of fans of a game series based on a tabletop setting are against multiplayer. I understand multiplayer is a very low on the project's priority list but it is the reason I found the project like 4 years ago(I was like its never going to finish they haven't even done the skinning yet at that time, here I am now.)
I think the big issue with OpenMW and multiplayer isn't that people are anti-multiplayer so much as there are significant and realistic questions about how to implement it. Look at something like Just Cause 2's multiplayer mod; you can put in a lot of fun stuff, but it may not be practical or feasible to have an identical experience, and Morrowind doesn't have the same sort of mood and feel that allows for multiplayer anarchy to be as gratifying. That means that you need to sync elements of the world, and that's where you start having questions about how that gets done, how you handle a ton of singleplayer-focused game mechanics, and stuff like that.

I'm all for OpenMW as an engine getting multiplayer functionality, just because it'll make it viable for more games down the line (which then makes OpenMW get upgraded more, and so the cycle continues), but Morrowind itself may not be able to be translated well into multiplayer; any efforts to do so should be at least partially separate from the core OpenMW development because it will be largely a "season to taste" thing rather than the nice, clear-cut mechanics duplication that has made the OpenMW project so successful.
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NatalieN
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Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by NatalieN »

FYSA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uq6bAEQ0fyg

Looks like somebody's putting in some work. Reddit thread.
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DestinedToDie
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Re: Thoughts on multiplayer

Post by DestinedToDie »

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