What was the reasoning about TCP/IP being real time only?

[securityguard]

What technical constraints were there that required this horrible ordeal?

What was the reasoning that real time mode would be playable in multiplayer, when you cannot pause or do anything remotely constructive beyond a platoon of units?

Why, if we cannot have full replays, are we forced to use 14mb PBEM files to play turn-based?

Why is the AI so horribly bad that, even when facing each other from roof-top to roof-top, they have no LOS and twitch around like crazy?

My thread on targetting AI that got ignored:

http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=52;t=001801

Why are the TO&E so god damn amazingly strict in scenario editing that deleting each unit you don't want is a hassle and a half?

Why are quick battle TO&E's so amazingly boring, with virtually little or no variation (even when choosing Combatants, which should have stuff like small IED's on defense but never do)?

Why can't we choose QB maps? What's the point of even making a QB map if you cannot choose it?

Why package a game with a very small amount of scenario and hardly any QB maps, when we cannot generate maps anymore?

What did the beta testers say about AI pathing?

Why did I buy this game.

[ July 27, 2007, 04:31 PM: Message edited by: securityguard ]

[MHertogh]

Whhhaaaa TCP/IP is Real time only?

@#%! Guys what were you thinking. It is not WeGo then, it is called Play by E-mail. And Single player should not be called WeGo either Single Player is Igo.

Don't advertise WeGo and then not describe that it is not what your other games are. Now I understand why everyone who plays plays it real time, because you killed WeGo!

Grrrr I try and try to give you guys the benifit of the doubt but man it seems so #$%@ deceptive.

[Vikkelä]

Stop complaining and learn to play. Seriously.

[securityguard]

Originally posted by Vikkelä:

Stop complaining and learn to play. Seriously.

what, in my post, defines my ability to play the game

dont be daft

[tdkpetrus]

Originally posted by Vikkelä:

Stop complaining and learn to play. Seriously.

Ok. Out of all the answers you could have given, this is certainly the most immature and infuriating. A long time fan is venting his (very justified) anger about an absolutely critical missing feature, and some other really annoying and logically barely explicable omissions and misbehaviors, and you go all "LOL L2P" on him? Come on...

That said, the 2 scenarios I tried in multiplayer so far were not enjoyable at all. The whole interface and camera control is just WAY too clunky to make it enjoyable, and I actually do not want to play realtime. Ever.

I really hope this gets added soon, because not adding it at all would ruin a game that has some awesome potential.

[Guest Guest]

deleted per user request

[Vikkelä]

The reason I wrote that crap was perhaps that every time I see something negative posted about CM:SF I start crying. And that makes me sad and angry.

[securityguard]

Originally posted by AdamL:

Huh? Yeah that's an odd omission.

Um... it's pretty hard to keep track of everything in real time mode I'm finding already. Also, you can't go back and see the cool moments you miss

The AI orders are in there and they follow them. You can't tag them with conditional orders but can go right into the game and give them their first set of orders anyhow.

I will admit, in WE-GO mode the AI is much easier to handle. It begins falling apart rapidly in real-time, however, because one lone stryker goes tac-ai crazy and you're focusing on other elements. I think it's one reason why I feel so grumpy about TCP/IP only being real-time. Actually, I don't feel grumpy, just ripped off.

[Bahger]

I feel for you. 14MB is a helluva size for a PBEM swapfile and, personally, I don't want to play MP in this like it's Company of Heroes. FWIW, I bet PBEM works great, it's one of the glories of CM1. But if you do not have a broadband connection you're doomed.

[securityguard]

Originally posted by Bahger:

I feel for you. 14MB is a helluva size for a PBEM swapfile and, personally, I don't want to play MP in this like it's Company of Heroes. FWIW, I bet PBEM works great, it's one of the glories of CM1. But if you do not have a broadband connection you're doomed.

14mb is huge for even a broadband connection. Depending on your upload, thats almost 1 minute per turn

[ParaBellum]

One minute? With my crappy DSL connection it'll take 15 minutes to upload such a file... not to mention the fact that quite a few email accounts limit the size of attachments to 10 MB...

[SimHq.com Tom Cofield]

Originally posted by Vikkelä:

The reason I wrote that crap was perhaps that every time I see something negative posted about CM:SF I start crying. And that makes me sad and angry.

First off, you are dealing with people who have played the CM series since the beginning.

People get a 'new' game in a series expecting it to have both new features and improvments to the old standbys, not to have features that were in the older game left out.

Maybe the developers didn't think people would want the older style of gameplay in TCP/IP but many (including myself) do.

I hope it comes along in another patch. If enough of us want it I am sure Battlefront will make it happen. I remember when TCP/IP wasn't availabe in the first game, it came along shortly afterward.

It will in the traditional manner in this one too-I hope.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Bahger:

I feel for you. 14MB is a helluva size for a PBEM swapfile and, personally, I don't want to play MP in this like it's Company of Heroes. FWIW, I bet PBEM works great, it's one of the glories of CM1. But if you do not have a broadband connection you're doomed.

Not having a broadband connection in the modern age is going to doom you no matter what.

Chat services like ICQ offer file transfer for free; it is possible to find such services in lieu of email. Perhaps some software whiz out there can do for PBEM what ModManager and CMMOS did for mods. Solutions are better than complaints.

I agree all this stuff would be nice to have in the v1.0 out of the box; reality is it isn't.

The hard truth is that an up to date rig is necessary to play, and I think the reality will be, if not in this game then certainly in the future, that broadband will be an essential for downloading patches, updates, PBEM files - one day even for scenarios, if not CM then in whatever follows.

[Battlefront.com]

I'll get back to you with a more technical answer about WeGo TCP/IP very shortly, but I can answer the technical issues about PBEM file size.

Most of you guys have seen, or taken part in, the wonderful multt-hundred post threads about PBEM sometime ago. Therefore, there should be no surprise about any of this for anybody that has. In case you missed the many discussions that were had, allow me to paraphrase:

CM:SF is pushing so much more data than CMx1 it isn't even in the same ballpark. There is simply no way to shrink that file footprint. Sorry, but if you have 1 liter of water you need a 1 liter container. Trying to fit it into a thimble, no matter how much you want it to fit, just is not physically possible. So the file size is what the file size is because that is what the file size must be. No amount of complaining can change that because it isn't possible for us to change it. Well, not without gutting the game and turning the clock back 4 years (which we aren't going to do, obviously).

When we first noted this issue we presented it to you guys. I'd say about 2 years ago. I said we might not be able to do PBEM because of it. Well... the fustercluck that followed was as empassioned as it was insane. We kept saying that the file size was beyond our ability to influence unless we started hacking out and limiting game functions. Since that wasn't part of our design goal (i.e. to hobble our game to allow for PBEM) we said that PBEM may not be practical. The consensus was that we should include PBEM no matter how big the files. And so we did.

To recap...

File size is not within our power to control in any practical way

File size is already compressed, so it is as small as it can possibly get

PBEM was included, despite this, because the overwhelming majority of the hundreds (felt like thousands) that took part in this discussion said they would rather a fat PBEM file than none at all.

That's the deal. If you don't like it there is nothing I can do about it, so there really isn't much point complaining.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

I think you guys might find it funny to know that I have a crappy little piece of copper connecting me to the Internet. Yup, 28.8 on some days, 33.3 if I am REALLY lucky. I love MP games and yet here I am, zero ability to play them except for PBEM. I don't blame the game developers, I blame my (deleted) local cable that couldn't be bothered to drag a line 2/3 of a mile further when they were stringing 3 miles of cable, or my local phone company that won't put a booster so I can get DSL.

Steve

[BFCElvis]

Sorry I can't address all of your questions in the time I have securityguard but I think it is important that I talk about the big one. TCP real time. The answer to your question is in another persons question. A while back Steve got into a big debate here on the forum about the possibility of PBEM not being included in CMSF. At that time he said they weren't far enough into building it to know if they could even do PBEM and if so what other issues might come up from it. One of the possible issues he pointed out was that the PBEM file sizes might be so large that people would not be able to easily email them back and forth to each other. The response from the forum members was essentially "we don't care how big the files are just please don't exclude PBEM". So that is what they did. And sometimes (not normally) the files can be 14MB. I never had one that big. Most of mine have been in the 6MB range with the biggest coming in at almost 11MB. By comparision in CMx1 the bigger files were usually in the 1MB range. But BFC included PBEM anyway with CMSF because they were asked to include it regardless of the size of the files. Which brings us to your topic question (you can probably see where this is going). WEGO TCP is pretty much a PBEM/file swapping setup. How do you think WEGO TCP would go over with the crowd if each turn took 15 minutes to transfer as ParaBellum points out the email would take? Probably not very well.

I hope that explains the dilema and the reason. Your topic title for this is : "What was the reasoning about TCP/IP being real time only?" Assuming that was not a rhetorical question I hope I have given you the reasoning.

[BFCElvis]

DAMN!!!!! Steve posted while I was typing mine!!!!! Way to steal my thunder Steve. But I am glad to see my assumption was correct.

[securityguard]

Originally posted by Elvis:

WEGO TCP is pretty much a PBEM/file swapping setup. How do you think WEGO TCP would go over with the crowd if each turn took 15 minutes to transfer as ParaBellum points out the email would take? Probably not very well.

I hope that explains the dilema and the reason. Your topic title for this is : "What was the reasoning about TCP/IP being real time only?" Assuming that was not a rhetorical question I hope I have given you the reasoning.

That cannot be true at all. How on EARTH do we play real time, without desync, PERFECT synchronization with no lag (tested it - 5 games, no lag, perfect games) yet we cannot do a turn based mode? Hell, it's barely turn based in CMX2: You do a real time mode first, THEN it allows you to playback the footage. You know, I would be happy with a mode in TCP/IP that was real time but paused every 60 seconds. I don't understand this at all, but there is something definitely wrong with the technical side of things if a turn based turn is 11mb yet we can play real time consistently.

[Michael Dorosh]

In short, pretty is, as pretty does. Telephone poles and stop signs and spent brass from every soldier's rifle look great in the game; transferring them from point to point each turn is kind of a killer...

Technology leapfrogs expectation; as broadband technologies increase in their ability, game designers will keep pushing the microprocessors that run the increasingly sophisticated games. Check out the memory lane thread; in my short lifetime I went from playing Tank-Pong on a ROM unit connected to my TV to this.

The PBEMs and RTS TCP games I've had with Elvis have been a blast, incidentally.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by securityguard:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Elvis:

WEGO TCP is pretty much a PBEM/file swapping setup. How do you think WEGO TCP would go over with the crowd if each turn took 15 minutes to transfer as ParaBellum points out the email would take? Probably not very well.

I hope that explains the dilema and the reason. Your topic title for this is : "What was the reasoning about TCP/IP being real time only?" Assuming that was not a rhetorical question I hope I have given you the reasoning.

That cannot be true at all. How on EARTH do we play real time, without desync, PERFECT synchronization with no lag (tested it - 5 games, no lag, perfect games) yet we cannot do a turn based mode? Hell, it's barely turn based in CMX2: You do a real time mode first, THEN it allows you to playback the footage. You know, I would be happy with a mode in TCP/IP that was real time but paused every 60 seconds. I don't understand this at all, but there is something definitely wrong with the technical side of things if a turn based turn is 11mb yet we can play real time consistently. </font>

[securityguard]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by securityguard:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Elvis:

WEGO TCP is pretty much a PBEM/file swapping setup. How do you think WEGO TCP would go over with the crowd if each turn took 15 minutes to transfer as ParaBellum points out the email would take? Probably not very well.

I hope that explains the dilema and the reason. Your topic title for this is : "What was the reasoning about TCP/IP being real time only?" Assuming that was not a rhetorical question I hope I have given you the reasoning.

That cannot be true at all. How on EARTH do we play real time, without desync, PERFECT synchronization with no lag (tested it - 5 games, no lag, perfect games) yet we cannot do a turn based mode? Hell, it's barely turn based in CMX2: You do a real time mode first, THEN it allows you to playback the footage. You know, I would be happy with a mode in TCP/IP that was real time but paused every 60 seconds. I don't understand this at all, but there is something definitely wrong with the technical side of things if a turn based turn is 11mb yet we can play real time consistently. </font>

[BFCElvis]

This is fairly easy to answer also (if Steve doesn't beat me to it again). In real time the information is constantly being sent back and forth between the players. Much smaller packets of information so it looks seemless. In WEGO you are sending a full minutes worth of information with each turn and then you are back to the larger file sizes being tranferred.

What I can't answer for you is why it can't just pause every 60 seconds or 30seconds or whatever. That is a completely different issue. I am only talkingabout you initial post about why WEGO is not included in TCP. Franky I rarely pause anymore with single player as it is and you may find yourself not pausing real time either once you've played the game for a while.

[Dr. Zoidberg]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

I think you guys might find it funny to know that I have a crappy little piece of copper connecting me to the Internet. Yup, 28.8 on some days, 33.3 if I am REALLY lucky. I love MP games and yet here I am, zero ability to play them except for PBEM. I don't blame the game developers, I blame my (deleted) local cable that couldn't be bothered to drag a line 2/3 of a mile further when they were stringing 3 miles of cable, or my local phone company that won't put a booster so I can get DSL.

Steve

I've been in that same boat, but count yourself lucky that you get atleast 28.8. We used to get 24 here when we remembered to hop on one foot while sacrificing a goat at 6:03am, 21.6 if the goat wasn't cooperative.

I can see houses out the window that have always been on high speed, just across the river. Fortunately we're with a wireless company now, so dial-up is just a terrible recurring nightmare.

But it's no laughing matter.

I wonder, did you ever struggle through TCP/IP in CMx1? Fond memories of taking my turn and then going off to amuse myself for 5 or 10 minutes

[securityguard]

Originally posted by Elvis:

This is fairly easy to answer also (if Steve doesn't beat me to it again). In real time the information is constantly being sent back and forth between the players. Much smaller packets of information so it looks seemless. In WEGO you are sending a full minutes worth of information with each turn and then you are back to the larger file sizes being tranferred.

A 60 second turn in CMX2 over PBEM averages 8mb-11mb. That is barely skirting it for my 40kb/s upload over transfer. Yet, TCP/IP was completely flawless for me. If it can transfer 60 seconds of real time to both computers in perfect synchronization, I don't get why 60 seconds of real time computed in bits would be any worse.

[gibsonm]

I must say I’m disappointed too.

Ah well back to CMAK for multiplayer (apart from maybe “hotseat” games).