Are there any plans to boost the game?

It was stated that it's an indie game and should not be held to other major backed/published games and have the same expectations. Some wanted to say it "wasn't" an indie game for some reason.

 

OK, so what does that have to do with the OP?

 

Well, if you have been reading, the discussion incorporated many things, including backings. But hey, feel free to go back through it all and follow it. It does tie in. It's not like it has diverged and we're talking about favorite movies now. Advertisement, promotion, production, publishing, costs, funding, etc etc, all tie-in to the OP and discussion.

 

ok, I understand. Its a free for all now. I used to get moderated for off topic stuff. My apologies.

 

It was talking about boosting the game, steam numbers and development all on the first page. Just because its not focused on the other topics mentioned in the first post, it does tie in to one of the parts of the post. It's an organic discussion and is broader than what people realize. Apologies if you were looking for something else.

 

I understand perfectly, again, my apologies.

 

Im

I'm sorry you had a bad welcome back you and your boys. I'm curious though you said you lost your deed? It should be in your bank. They have mostly been working on the systems getting them in the game. Optimization had to happen later. I've been here since 2013 and it has been a tough ride I will admit but I am so not sorry for my pledge tier. I still see so much potential. The long awaited fishing update I've been waiting for is coming in R58. Our music system is so much fun. I love syncing music. It is one of my favorite things to do. I even have a concert hall and theater. If your son's don't have good computers have them turn down their settings on the video and turn off shadows. This game demands more ram than many things due to all that has to load. We really like our stuff. Best wishes to you and your son's. I hope you are able to give the game a chance. Your feedback is appreciated. Let me know if I can ever help.

 

The point is that even on overkill hardware there are performance issues - The game is just poorly optimized and nowhere near release. Many that do try it in its current state are left with a sour taste. There is a plethora of entertainment out there (heck - even just games) competing for a persons time and most new players are not going to stick around.

 

Really? On overkill hardware? What exactly is your performance issue? I run fine on a 4-yr old rig, properly maintained and optimized for gaming. The game's been optimized a good bit. I'm sure it can still get better over the years, but to make such *wrong* blanket statements about the game is an injustice to the game. Those trying to find 150+ fps in a game like this are going to be sorely disappointed if that's all they are basing this improper conclusion on. It's been that way for years. Having interactive enviornments and lots of decor/placeable loot helps bog things down in these kinds of games. Not like a first-person shooter/arena match game, as an example. It's not the same beast at all...

 

This is a key observation. Almost none of the sandbox will be experienced for a long period for a good portion of players.

So in my case, that means that 99% of of what I've spent my time doing is never seen by many reviewers and players.

 

This is one of the problems that comes up regularly on this forum. Someone cites an issue, then someone else cites how it's not an issue for them... with the inference that it's not a real issue.

You see it on other threads where people state (and quite rightly), that not many people are playing. Cue someone saying, "I saw tons of friends online tonight..." as if there's no issue at hand.

To return to this topic, performance has been a bugbear for many, many SotA gamers for many years. It can't all be down to poor hardware/maintenance/optimisation, etc. There's an actual issue to hand.

 

Right, lots of people have experienced performance related issues, including myself. But the point is, this game is *not* like other smooth performing FPS games. This game has tonnes of items and content, that takes time to load each and every model data each time you enter the viewable area (hence going into the busy part of town is where you usually notice a lot of choppiness).

All those fast performing games don't even have 1/10th of the items, details, and content.

Sure, there could be room for further optimization, but it could also be an inherent limitation of the Unity game engine so there's nothing Portalarium can do (except port it to a new engine), or more likely some combination of many different factors.. nobody knows for sure, except for the devs.

I just wish people would be more understanding and cut them some slack instead of being so critical and judgmental.

 

Or lack of knowledge on how to do things...
Plenty of people complain that their computer can't run the game properly and it comes down to:
1.) Type of computer they are playing on and hardware. Sometimes you have to lower the bar on older rigs and optimize it the best you can until you get something better.
2.) Some people have no idea how to optimize their systems for games. There are still people who do not even believe in rebooting their computers.
3.) Conflicts in programs and/or corrupted data.
4.) Yes, sometimes it can be the game, be it bad data on it's end or not playing well with certain drivers on your end.

I've been troubleshooting and working on computers since the 80's. I see these kinds of things all the time and people never want to believe it's on their end. "Oh I can play 'X', 'Y', and 'Z' with no problem... why can't I play 'S' the same way?" Never realizing any of the important stuff like, different engines, different setups, try optimizing for "THAT" particular game, clean your rig... the game you played well from 3-4 years ago is not the same as the one you're trying to play today. So yeah, when I see posts saying higher end machines cannot play this game well, I will call them to task. My daughter's 7-yr old computer can handle this game as well. Mine's a 4-yr old rig and my wife's Nvidia 1080 ti w/ 32GB of RAM definitely can handle this game. I've already stated her computer had a hangup once where her drivers reset their configurations and I had to go back in and manually change them and until I did so it had severe choppy lag. Afterwards, smooth sailing running 2 instances of the game and other stuff in background (her FB browser, apple/itunes/discord, etc). So depending on what they are calling "overkill hardware", I'm gonna call it out and it's probably because their systems are not tweaked/optimized well.

As far as lack of *seeing* players, it's a lack of knowledge as well. Some people don't even know about the see "local players" window (numpad 0) to show everyone in the nearby region (in multiplayer mode... I don't think it shows for single/party mode). Players don't even consider those playing in other modes as well, especially offline. Would be nice if SotA had an option to show current user numbers but think people would still complain if they saw themselves running solo with no one around (some don't even realize they are in single/party mode either). I've had days where hundreds were on my friends list and even more on "local" window, so many you couldnt keep up with they would either swap between zones, or go in/out of range of "Local players" detection and yet they would say nobody was on and that they hardly see anyone.

As far as performance over the years, yeah.. and it has gotten better and they *HAVE" worked on optimization and have done a pretty good job so far. If you're not playing the game currently or any time in the past 6 months and just basing your statements off the game you played early on 4 years ago, yeah.. but then how can we take a complaint seriously when there is a serious lack of rationale, reasoning, and consideration. And it's happened far too many times in these forums and off-site too.

 

Stop and consider, that's not a unique selling point around here. Plenty of people here were playing on computers in the 80s. It's not the first, or even 101st, rodeo for a lot of people here.

I just say that to, again, counter this idea that just because someone has 'x' experience means there's no issue. Performance has been an issue for plenty of PC-literate people around here.

 

And yet there are still plenty that are clueless, especially when it comes to their computers. I'm sure a good bit know how but it doesn't mean the general populace does. All it takes is to read their posts if you have experience in understanding these things.
I know a lot of IT/Support people deal with these "PC-literate" people as well... and it's never on their end. That being said, there has been performance issues that have been worked out over the years. Load times are vastly better, still can be improved. Some npc towns, definitely. Some bugs with certain PoT's as well with odd lag no matter the rig you have as well. So I'm not saying it can't be improved upon.. I am calling BS on poor performance, can't play, etc etc that gets called on high end gaming rigs for this game saying it's "the game's fault".

 

You don't know that and stating it doesn't make it true. You don't know this team then and what other game is like it and will be like it especially if it is allowed through all the negativity to get the fixes and upcoming features we all want. It's crazy to say something like this.

 

A whole bunch of these can be expressed with the word "Freedom". Shroud of the Avatar is Freedom in MMO form. With the Freedom to play Single Player too, if you really want to.

 

Sorry you were disappointed and have problems.

I know there's still quite a few sticking points, but believe it or not we've come a long way even in the last year. Lately brewing came in, costumes for the cultists (I never realized how big of a deal this would be until I saw them for the first time), an ever expanding (and now stupidly huge) number of recipes, the pattern system, huge amounts of other work.

I was getting 5 FPS in Novia Market 6 or 8 months ago on a GTX1080. Now it's running around 30 I think. Load times have gone through the floor, they used to be 45 seconds +, now on my system I don't have time to stand up before the next scene is loaded.

So what I'm getting at is, work is happening. It's a huge game, seriously huge, and so there's still lots of areas that are rough. But a whole bunch have been polished up and are continuing to be polished.

If you don't feel like you can do it now, give it another shot in a few months, or in the fall. Maybe those sticking points will be fixed for you.

 

Totally agree, spot on. If your point is to constantly give the devs a pass because of funding or because it's indie and not listen to players that have legitimate complaints about the game play, defects and quality then you will be bored playing by yourself until they can't afford to keep the servers online.

My hope is this turns around, and the developers see people like me who have been a loyal fan of the series from the start complaining. You guys may not agree with my complaints, or write them off as an "indie" title, but none of that makes me want to play, which is what we the game needs.

 

Honestly, I apologize in advance if this comes off as rude but you are part of the problem. I am a senior network architect for one of the largest healthcare providers in the US, I have a ton of useless certifications, and I too have been working on PCs since the 80's. What might have clued you in was the picture of 4 c64 games and my desk on page 8. I promise you my PC is fine.

To constantly write off peoples issues as PC problems is just not helpful, What is probably more on point is someone else mentioned players expectations may be set to high. If I drop 5k on a desktop setup (highly optimized, not a single unneeded windows service running in the background, correctly configured nvidia drivers, etc...) I expect it to run correctly. I want the settings on best, I want the peripheral lighting working without dropping the frame rate to 30 (known issue).

This argument is tired, and what its doing is disregarding my legitimate compliant because you think I do not know how to optimize windows. Why do you not review all of the release notes, that show the dev's still trying to optimize the game? Games run on many different engines just fine on my PC, and aaa titles on best settings (without even shutting down extra windows services or even closing browsers and apps) consistently run over 120 frames per second. What this comes down to is the players have issues with the game, WHO ARE NOT HATERS AND WANT TO SEE IT SUCCEED and people are giving the devs an excuse for poor performance, bugs and oh but it's an indie title, we don't expect it to work right. That is what is losing players.