G0RF posted:

Holograms

Beet Wagon posted:

G0RF posted:

"But we have the hologram gadget where you can put up a hologram version of yourself and you can be off sneaking somewhere else. We actually have some gadgets which are good for stealth and distractions. We're going through and reactivating and polishing them from Star Marine and they will also debut with Star Marine.We are going to have definite things that will help you with hiding your radar and noise signature, or heat signature, and stuff like that. So we definitely want that."

Space Skeleton posted:

A lot of sci-fi properties do this where they are hanging on to 1980s and 1990s ideas of what sci-fi is but a lot of the gadgets end up being lower tech than real things we have now. Classic example is anything Star Trek still using communicators, datapads, tricorders and so on when we have smartphones now which do a lot of that stuff but better, there are even phones which take different kinds of scientific measurements.

Tippis posted:

The thing is, we're not really talking about “true” delta patching, like the bitmask updates of a bygone era — we're talking about the same kind of delta:ish updates that everyone has been using since, oh, the release of WinNT or so. In other words, it's a matter of rebuilding/appending a container using new files, not updating the files individually or the container as a whole.

CryEngine PAK files are just zips with custom headers. There are a bajillion different libraries that let you do that, a large portion of which will let you do it with encrypted packages as well. That part is not a problem and it does not break delta patching as it exists today. All it does is require the patcher to contain the keys needed, which somewhat defeats the purpose of the encryption… but then, that purpose is defeated by default by this being an actual mass-market game.

Encryption would be handy if you didn't want people to get to the stuff inside the PAK files, but you do. They have to be able to play the game, and that content has to be decrypted and loaded into memory. As such, anyone with access to the PAKs will be able to extract the content — directly from memory if need be. Protection is inherently self-defeating and pointless.

There was some old unsourced claim floating around that CIG wasn't actually that stupid. Instead, they just used signing (but no actual encryption), supposedly to maintain integrity of the PAK files and prevent cheating. Or some such. The problem with that is that it also serves very little purpose. You cheat through memory injection anyway. And that's actually harder than defeating the signing would be. The same non-issue for a delta patcher would apply here: you can still have the patcher update the PAK files just fine, and then re-sign the whole thing when it's done, and the “insecurity” comes with the patcher requiring a signing key to do so, so you could dike out that key and sign tampered files. But again, why bother when you can just do memory injection if you're that determined to cheat — there are automated tools available to do so.

So of those requirements, the first one is handled by relying on standard OS API calls and not being a fucktard Windows-95 era programmer who gets flummoxed by a sandboxed environment the likes of which has existed since the late 1970s (and early 2000:s on the WIndows side). The second is handled by not relying on outdated assumptions about string types and hard-coded ASCII. The third is handled by licensing any kind of professional archiving library — hell, even the free ones will do this without fault. The fourth one is not a problem, since the CDNs just have to hold the updated files, build lists, and checksums — all of which can be auto-generated by the build process.

This is a Network IO 101 programming course lab problem. In fact, it's not even that, because that IO will be handled by pre-existing libraries. It's a “how I use third-party library 001, durrrrrr” programming course lab problem. It should be doable in, oh, two hours — never mind two weeks (or two years). And they're failing at it. Yes, the translations may take a while, but that's assuming you're so far along that you feel you need localisation for your testing environment… and they're not.

…in fact, since we're talking about a testing environment they shouldn't even be using the PAK files to begin with. That's where this whole thing first becomes stupid. They're (pre)alpha testing — an environment where you expect tons of updates on a daily basis. The engine can operate from a pile of files in a regular directory structure, and the PAK files is just a way to hide all of that and allow some “neater” access as well as some (potentially) faster data streaming. If people cheat, so what? It's a testing environment and what they do in that world is irrelevant. In fact, you may even learn something from it. If they want your assets, they have them already — you agreed to hand them over when you allowed them into your testing environment. If you're afraid that people will look at your files and laugh, then it won't help because you can just extract them anyway. People have been doing so from day one and you can't stop them because you must grant them access to those files as part of allowing them to use your software.

Since they have exactly zero need for PAK files, they have zero need for delta patcher — they just need rsync. Their “delta patcher” problem is not a two-week job — it's a 5 second job that consists of “click on rsync download link.” They fail even at that. While I admit that it's perhaps not the most user-friendly utility there is, they still fail at using loving rsync. That's how utterly incompetent and stupid everyone related to software development and project management at CIG is.



…yes, this level of utterly headless fucktardness triggers me.
And these amateurs this gaggle of dribbling morons are trying to make an MMOFPS&FS. They're not even amateurs, because while it is often used in a derogatory way, that term still ultimately denotes someone who has some level of interest, insight, and competence, just not on a professional level.

Colostomy Bag posted:

I'm sure Vic feels grief.

aleksendr posted:

I agree, and done well you get a wonderfull feeling of "retro tech", the best recent example being "Alien - Isolation". Or take "Rebel Galaxy", the moment you boot it up you instantly get the feeling "Trucker in space" and that feeling is there everywhere, from the music to the bar where you meet npcs.

But in SC case the art direction and tone is all over the place. You get your "rusty bucket of bolt" feeling from some ships like the terrapin or starlancer but they fly in the same galaxy than the super advanced looking stealth bomber and the alien chinese flying fish.

Having a consistent tone is key to solid world building and "construction of the whole" in a multimedia art piece.

Meridian posted:

Hello Space Friends! Is anybody in here good/decent at Total War: Warhams? I would like to learn how to play the game but I have no idea what I'm doing. I just want to purge the xenos Greenskin filth.

Mr.Tophat posted:

I play greenskins almost exclusively friend, so if you ever want to fight greenskins all day, send me a PM and we'll duke it out so you can learn some stuff. I'm no expert, but I do have some knowledge.

Have you ever played any of the other Total War games?

G0RF posted:

His uptight religious mom doesn't get how important music is to him. He needs to rock so bad but she thinks it the devil's music. Surburban angst ensues. Something's gotta give.

For those not planning to see American Satan in theaters, the Canadian version is on YouTube and it still rocks.

Meridian posted:

I played a bit of Shogun 2, but honestly not very much. Always got distracted with other games or immediately felt like I was doing something wrong and just playing the first 20 turns over and over again.

Jack the Lad posted:

LegendOfTotalWar and PartyElite on YouTube do some good videos. HeirOfCarthage, too.

Meridian posted:

I played a bit of Shogun 2, but honestly not very much. Always got distracted with other games or immediately felt like I was doing something wrong and just playing the first 20 turns over and over again.

Percelus posted:

my favorite empire tactic is using maybe 2 units of flagellants to stop the enemy from charging in on my main line and while they pile in on the dumb unbreakable bastards i open up with artillery and skirmishers

Mr.Tophat posted:

I hear you. I still get that from time to time myself.

Watching other people's campaigns really does help. But there have been some changes. With the introduction of new races and factions, there are races who used to have a pretty reasonably difficult start which is now a lot more challenging. Empire in particular.

The best and most accessible campaign to get a feel for the game is by far Bretonnia. I highly recommend you play their campaign to get a feel of what mid and late game can do. Knights are an awful lot of fun to cycle charge (charge in, then retreat, then charge in again to get that sweet bonus damage)

If you're planning on playing vanilla get ready to deal with enemy agents assassinating or waylaying your generals. It's extremely loving annoying and I run a mod that removes that. Also, you're gunna have situations where you're chasing a stack across the map for loving ages if you don't auto it.

Rebellions can be a good thing. Raiding is awesome.

I would say more but I am dog tired right now and I'm not even certain I should be the one to try and help you with campaign matters. I play this game to smash hoards of greenskins at whoever will fight me. Crumpin' is fun yo

toanoradian posted:

Can someone explain what "delta patcher/ing" is? From Tippis's post I get that it's a thing CIG shouldn't do because they're in their rapidly changing alpha phase, and the security offered by PAK files is wholly superfluous to prevent cheating(?) and CIG should use "rsync" instead. So what is deltapatch and when is it okay to do? Googling the term lead to SC videos and something about hacking roms.

Also can you really do it in two weeks

toanoradian posted:

Can someone explain what "delta patcher/ing" is? From Tippis's post I get that it's a thing CIG shouldn't do because they're in their rapidly changing alpha phase, and the security offered by PAK files is wholly superfluous to prevent cheating(?) and CIG should use "rsync" instead. So what is deltapatch and when is it okay to do? Googling the term lead to SC videos and something about hacking roms.

Also can you really do it in two weeks

toanoradian posted:

Can someone explain what "delta patcher/ing" is? From Tippis's post I get that it's a thing CIG shouldn't do because they're in their rapidly changing alpha phase, and the security offered by PAK files is wholly superfluous to prevent cheating(?) and CIG should use "rsync" instead. So what is deltapatch and when is it okay to do? Googling the term lead to SC videos and something about hacking roms.

Also can you really do it in two weeks

toanoradian posted:

Can someone explain what "delta patcher/ing" is? From Tippis's post I get that it's a thing CIG shouldn't do because they're in their rapidly changing alpha phase, and the security offered by PAK files is wholly superfluous to prevent cheating(?) and CIG should use "rsync" instead. So what is deltapatch and when is it okay to do? Googling the term lead to SC videos and something about hacking roms.

Also can you really do it in two weeks

toanoradian posted:

Eait what fhe gently caress you need to download the entire game every update

toanoradian posted:

Eait what fhe gently caress you need to download the entire game every update

toanoradian posted:

Eait what fhe gently caress you need to download the entire game every update

Brazilianpeanutwar posted:

Is it any wonder no one plays this poo poo?

toanoradian posted:

Also can you really do it in two weeks

Toops posted:

if Star Citizen is anything, it's a mirror.