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Demigod: Beyond

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Demigod: Beyond

from JoeUser Forums

I’m on the plane on my way back from GDC and was thinking I hadn’t made a Demigod journal in awhile.

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Brad Wardell, President & CEO of Stardock and the publisher of Gas Powered Games’ Demigod.

One of the big questions I get from Demigod players is – what’s next? 

Right now, there is no definitive answer to this. But what I can tell you is what we hope to do on Stardock’s side of things to help Demigod in the future. 

So what I am putting forth here is a vision of what we would like to see happen with Demigod.

Let me break this down into 2 parts:

1. Improving the game itself

2. Improving the Multiplayer experience

Improving the game itself

As modders are aware, Demigod can be heavily modded using LUA.  I have talked about the idea of letting the community have more input into Demigod’s “unofficial” evolution in the future with Chris Taylor (CEO of GPG) at various times and he has been enthusiastic to the idea. 

It is our intention to work with the modding community to incorporate many of the community improvements into the game.

I would like to see it where a future demo of Demigod allows people to play with users who have the full version (demo players would have fewer Demigods and fewer maps) so that the MP community could be greatly expanded.  However, to make that worthwhile IMO item #2 needs to be addressed.

Improving the multiplayer experience

It is no secret that I’ve been somewhat of a critic of Demigod’s online experience.  The sausage factory of game development sometimes results with non-ideal solutions.

However, in my opinion, Demigod represents a fundamental opportunity to demonstrate the upcoming Impulse::Reactor features that are making their showing in Elemental.

In Demigod, Impulse::Reactor is only used to display available games and accepts XML data uploaded from Demigod.  The actual connectivity (getting players connected in the lobby) is a custom solution we developed AFTER Demigod shipped to replace the licensed system that originally came with the game.  The lobby itself and such is provided via LUA scripts.

By contrast, Impulse::Reactor’s upcoming MP solution is designed to provide a lot more MP functionality for developers.  For instance, tournaments, match making, ladders, scoring, etc. are all handled by Impulse::Reactor itself instead of being implemented by the developer (the developer simply includes the DLL.

Now, Impulse::Reactor can’t magically address everything.  It still requires the developer to submit the stats to the server (an ongoing issue for hard core Demigod players)  but what it can do is greatly ease the implementation of a given game by eliminating the current lobby and allowing for a lot more MP options that are currently in the game.

When would all this happen? Honestly, not for awhile because right now, everyone is just tapped.  GPG is working on Kings and Castles and Stardock is working on Elemental.  But there’s a lot of things that can be done between now and this time with the first item.

 

image

Impulse::Reactor is designed to allow developers to implement advanced multiplayer features into their games with minimal effort.

102,112 views 52 replies
Reply #26 from Demigod Forums Top

Any reason why there wasn't a single player or online campaign? I'm just curious the game is still awesome to me.

Reply #27 from Demigod Forums Top

Shazam.  Someone make me a new map.

 

The end.

Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #28 from Demigod Forums Top

Thanks for the update. It's just a shame there isn't an easier/cheaper way to make new maps or the community to make them, that's what gave Renegade more life, get Aircraftkiller on the case.

Even if the community did the bulk of the design work and just submitted the maps for quality control. I'm not even talking about new art for the maps, just a way for the community to set up there own tower/crystal/citadel/portal/lane locations on pretty much a blank canvas or pre existing one may prove interesting. I think it's new maps the game needs rather than new demigod's. Sure the bug fixes should be expected but any new content can't really be on the cards I know if there isn't a $ justification for doing so. Capitalism is a hard task master.

 

Reply #29 from Demigod Forums Top

If the game came with a map editor / modding UI and the ability to download mods you don't have on the fly (think WC3), this game would receive the breath of life from God himself.

Reply #30 from Demigod Forums Top

I agree.  Would it not be easy to set that up?

Reply #31 from Demigod Forums Top

Programming is hard work, and because the game is already out, it wouldn't be profitable to give it a big update like this. I trust SD would probably do something of this scale if they weren't joined at the hip with GPG for Demigod.

Reply #32 from Demigod Forums Top

Well, I think that SD learned /alot/ by publishing Demigod. I think that Elemental will show a massive improvement from the mistakes that GPG made that SD has learned from (eg, they are writing the netcode from the ground up themselves instead of plugging in a random library).

Demigod did 2 things really really well:

- Balance

- Gameplay (it's so much fun to play).

 

Everything else... Elemental can benefit from and stuff.

Plus, we'll get a few good features through Elemental (like any improvements through Impulse Reactor).

Reply #33 from Demigod Forums Top

Gameplay

gameplay = the 1 reason I'd think any of us are still around today.

Reply #34 from Demigod Forums Top

I'm interested to see how Elemental will change the TBS genre.

Reply #35 from Stardock Forums Top

I sincerely hope more is done with Demigod, a Map editor would go A LONG WAY. :)

Reply #36 from Demigod Forums Top

As has been covered many times, the Maps are not created on a Tile system like Warcraft 3 and so we'll never see a Map Editor. They are created as complete 3D Models and use a file format that requires an incredibly expensive licence/program combo to utilise, essentially meaning only GPG can make maps for Demigod. Since Demigod's online community is very small, making additional Maps and additional Demigods past the two we've already received isn't cost effective for GPG. I doubt we'll ever see any additional content, which is quite sad :(

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Reply #37 from Demigod Forums Top

Since Demigod's online community is very small, making additional Maps and additional Demigods past the two we've already received isn't cost effective for GPG.

UNLESS - there was a big demand from the SP community who apparently have overwhelmingly purchased the game.  Shame those folks aren't all that active in the forums, though.

Reply #38 from Demigod Forums Top

Hahaha! Nice, now just get GPG to sign off on it.

Reply #39 from Demigod Forums Top

I'm not sure enough people play Demigod for GPG to sign off on it. I'll be happy if they do, though.

Reply #40 from Demigod Forums Top

Well, since we're taking single player, all they can use as a reference point is sales since most people who purchased Demigod don't play Multiplayer, and apparently Demigod sold quite well. It'll never happen though; Gas Powered Games do not support their products long term and Demigod is nearly a year old.

Reply #41 from Demigod Forums Top

If I were to hazard a guess, I would say that online players probably outnumber singleplayer players at the moment. I would have a hard time seeing how people could still be playing it considering how easy the AI is.

Reply #42 from Demigod Forums Top

Oh I agree completely, however Brad mentioned that only a small percentage of copies of Demigod ever tried to connect to the internet, leading to the idea that most people must play this in Single player. I would be hard pressed to only play this in single player, there's just not enough in it.

Reply #43 from Demigod Forums Top

I beat tournament mode with the initial eight in two hours the day I got it. I was kind of disappointed until I went to the single player.

Reply #44 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting Epiphenomenon, reply 41
If I were to hazard a guess, I would say that online players probably outnumber singleplayer players at the moment. I would have a hard time seeing how people could still be playing it considering how easy the AI is.
Some people are REALLY bad. I was trying to get a few people to buy the game and just ended up letting em keep the install I put on their system as I knew they wouldn't have fun online.

I'll tell you, being a gamer...its VERY hard to watch a non-gamer game.

Reply #45 from Demigod Forums Top

It's much harder to watch someone do math who is clueless. Or program. Or write a paper. Or read out loud.

Reply #47 from Demigod Forums Top

Sounds good :)

 

I will probably start playing Demigod more in summer. Those are my plans at least :D.

Reply #48 from Demigod Forums Top

These are some good news!

I think there should be a real Singleplayer mode and/or campaign. Demigod impresses with nice areas and awesome characters and there should be a balance between singleplayer and multiplayer. The mythological stuff is really a good base for this. The current singleplayer mode is more or less disappointing and optionally in my opinion.

Reply #50 from Demigod Forums Top

Now that Elemental is right around the corner, maybe in the next few weeks demigod can get a bit of acknowledgement that it is not dead in the eyes of StarDock?