By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
SvennoJ on 31 May 2013
Edit Thread
Machiavellian said:
SvennoJ said:

Btw Fable pipe dreams can easily be done locally, all you need is a hdd. Updating world stuff for the time you have been gone is nothing new either. The scope can be much bigger with cloud computing, yet the bigger the changes, the bigger the download size as well. Personally I would prefer to find my world back the way I left it when I pressed save, but that's just me. (Keep it synched with the character's time frame)

As for Fable pipe dream, I do not see any RPG game even attempting that kind of persistent dynamic world today. From Skyrim to Witcher or even MMO type RPGs like Guild Wars 1/2. I do not believe the problem is as simple as using a HDD to store the world since that would not have been something Stopping Peter and his dream or any particular RPG today.  How many CPU cycles will you take away from the game to process and maintain the game state as things like planting a tree or destroying a village starts to impact the global world around you.  The best case would be MMOs in such a scenario and this could be something we might see with Lionhead new game.

Personally I would like to see the game world change with the actios I perform.  If I kill a village.  If I come back to that village later, I would like to see it overrun by monsters, or nature has taken over and now the bodies are decompose and the homes are taken over by overgrowth.  I would think the world would be much more alive if your actions actually had some impact to the point where unpredictable things could occur.

 

It doesn't take many cpu cycles to maintain an evolving world. It does however take a lot of extra artwork, plus all the detail in areas is balanced to keep the frame rate stable. A server can help with maintaining the world, and deliver some new artwork, the big cost is to make it. Advancements in procedural algorithms for graphics etc should help.

RPGs tend to keep a very controlled world with pre-defined changes. Much easier to keep the story in check. Evolving worlds are more a thing of strategy games. From dust is an outstanding example, but the amount of data going on in the simulation there makes it not suitable to transmit over the internet.
Terraria is a 2D rpg with a huge living world. Cloud compute might help with the water dynamics, I did find a limitation in the game that you can exploit to get replicating water if you connect a long enough stretch. Alhough cloud compute would be a bit of overkill as memory wise and cpu wise the game hardly registers on my modest pc.

The unfished swan has a very cool procedurally growing vines, and some other nice ideas for changing the world around you. It also showed it's limitations with it crippling the frame rate. It all comes down to load balancing. Dynamic data can quickly exceed your bandwidth and cripple the client with too much detail to render. Kind of the opposite of using cloud compute to get better performance.