Injustice Developments: Hector Hints at "brand new" Online Mode

[Invincibeast]

I can't wait for this game. Still waiting for the Aquaman confirmation

 

[TargetAudience]

I find it unfortunate that this is community relations for NRS.

Thats NRs for yall... they somehow think its funny to do the opposite of what we the fans want..... I Guess they dont know its only trolling if you are joking...

 

[GGA soonk]

Thats NRs for yall... they somehow think its funny to do the opposite of what we the fans want..... I Guess they dont know its only trolling if you are joking...

Right. People can sit here and say he's joking, but look at the current game. Is he, really?

 

[The Borax Kid]

An NRS rep joking with the community in a manner a huge portion of our members do every day and it's never frowned upon, and all of a sudden, people get disrespected.

I would hope game dev pr is of a higher quality than the shit talking and juvenile behavior one could find everyday on this board.

Many other games I follow, for instance, actually have devs answer questions even if they have to be super vague about things due to confidentiality agreements.

But instead we get a big "fuck you" for pointing out how factually shit MK9's netcode is. That suggests to me they won't solve the problem.

 

[hecterrific]

I find it unfortunate that this is community relations for NRS.

Haha dude! Really?! How many times have I been to GGA? How many tournaments have I seen you at and talked to you and everyone else from GGA?

Everyone by now should know my sense of humor and know I like to joke around.

 

[randomdude]

and... it's on!

 

[hecterrific]

Thats NRs for yall... they somehow think its funny to do the opposite of what we the fans want..... I Guess they dont know its only trolling if you are joking...

I think the real issue that a majority of people expect gameplay in online to operate exactly as it would as if you were sitting next to someone on the same console. There are many different ways to explain this, but I will try to simplify it as best as I can.

It takes time for data to travel across the internet, and in fighting games, which are predominantly very twitch-gameplay based and broken down to 10ths of a second, that time delay can have a very real impact on how the game "feels" to you. It's just the way the universe works.

We have many programmers who work night and day for years on end dedicated to improving the netcode. It's kind of disrespectful to just have people randomly say "The Netcode is Shit" or "NRS doesn't know what they are doing" or "They don't care." That's simply not true. Our online programmers take their work very seriously. So yes, if I am a "troll" because I defend our guys, then ok, I'm a troll.

Until we live in a world where every single person has access to Fiber Optic lines and there is no interference and no obstacles for the data to get through in real time to different players consoles across the world, you'll have to trust that the guys are working their hardest to make it as good as it can.

 

[GGA soonk]

Haha dude! Really?! How many times have I been to GGA? How many tournaments have I seen you at and talked to you and everyone else from GGA?

Everyone by now should know my sense of humor and know I like to joke around.

Hey man, it's the internet, you never know. If you're just joking, cool. Some people took it that way, others didn't.

I think the issue with the online being terrible probably has more to do with gamespy than it does your programmers. Hopefully that won't be an issue for Injustice.

 

[Ninj]

I think the real issue that a majority of people expect gameplay in online to operate exactly as it would as if you were sitting next to someone on the same console. There are many different ways to explain this, but I will try to simplify it as best as I can.

It takes time for data to travel across the internet, and in fighting games, which are predominantly very twitch-gameplay based and broken down to 10ths of a second, that time delay can have a very real impact on how the game "feels" to you. It's just the way the universe works.

We have many programmers who work night and day for years on end dedicated to improving the netcode. It's kind of disrespectful to just have people randomly say "The Netcode is Shit" or "NRS doesn't know what they are doing" or "They don't care." That's simply not true. Our online programmers take their work very seriously. So yes, if I am a "troll" because I defend our guys, then ok, I'm a troll.

Until we live in a world where every single person has access to Fiber Optic lines and there is no interference and no obstacles for the data to get through in real time to different players consoles across the world, you'll have to trust that the guys are working their hardest to make it as good as it can.

Never met you, and I'm not saying to be offensive or mean, though it is a bit of reality: I understand that NRS programmers work hard. The fact of the matter is that DOA5's net code is excellent. I can go 15+ games without hitting a laggy fight on PS3, where people think it's funny to be on a wireless connection. This is impossible in MK9. Clearly something went awry.

People who enjoy playing fighting games at the highest level need the ability to play eachother in as close to an offline setting available. Clearly it can be done. I can only speak for myself when I say that it's roughly 95% pointless to play online in MK9. I wish it weren't so, because it's a great game despite its quirks. I think that when people, myself included, bash on NRS's net code it's because they don't want to see MK9's strangely terrible online experience be a reality in Injustice.

Also please make a real training mode. Again, not to be offensive. Reality is that the MK9 training mode is absolutely useless in achieving the goal implied by its name - training.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

[Alien Substance]

I just wanna ask, is this new online mode related in any way to King of the Hill?

 

[Euphoric]

Endless Lobbies pls.

 

[THTB]

Hey man, it's the internet, you never know. If you're just joking, cool. Some people took it that way, others didn't.

I think the issue with the online being terrible probably has more to do with gamespy than it does your programmers. Hopefully that won't be an issue for Injustice.

That could be the issue.

I know you can't divulge any info regarding the usage of Gamespy or not, but I wonder if you guys tried playing around without using it as a medium.

 

[shaowebb]

We'll wait till we have it to really know is my mentality. All I know is NRS promised a lot of focus in the online for this and they are paying attention enough to put things like frame data in the movelist for guys like us. I highly doubt they'd put in something like frame data and ignore the online talk we've all mentioned so I have some faith in where their efforts are going.

 

[trufenix]

Never met you, and I'm not saying to be offensive or mean, though it is a bit of reality: I understand that NRS programmers work hard. The fact of the matter is that DOA5's net code is excellent. I can go 15+ games without hitting a laggy fight on PS3, where people think it's funny to be on a wireless connection. This is impossible in MK9. Clearly something went awry.

People who enjoy playing fighting games at the highest level need the ability to play eachother in as close to an offline setting available. Clearly it can be done. I can only speak for myself when I say that it's roughly 95% pointless to play online in MK9. I wish it weren't so, because it's a great game despite its quirks. I think that when people, myself included, bash on NRS's net code it's because they don't want to see MK9's strangely terrible online experience be a reality in Injustice.

Not that it lets them off the hook but its a common misconception you can just slap a better "netcode" on a game. Many devs simply ignore netcode until late in a games development (resulting in a sub par performance), and most of the time its way too cost prohibitive to do that kind of maintenance post-release. This is why all SNK's console releases have had such a shitty excuse for it.

"Netcode" isn't just a couple lines of code that namco or sega or capcom knows that no one else does. It has to do with how the game is built from the ground up (is it ready for dropped frames, ready for missed inputs, adjustable graphics pipe, sound, etc), and how much of that infrastructure was baked in from the start. Even with those concessions, there's no telling how good its going to handle the real world because fighting game players simply do not accept the level of latency that is perfectly tolerable in most other online genres.

Rest assured, if a fighting game is brand new, or simply sporting a brand new engine, it is bound to have questionable netcode. You can't name a single example that didn't/doesn't. The games out now with great netcode are the ones that had established engines whose devs had the opportunity to rip them apart and hook in the internet. MK9 was a new game with new engine and new netcode and it did not stand the test. I look forward to Injustice being a huge step forward, what with the network engineers having nothing else to do but optimize.

 

[Ninj]

snip.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trivializing the work involved. My main point is - it's a group of people's jobs to do this. They clearly failed on MK9's (for whatever reason) and my hope is that they have learned from MK9 and don't repeat that same failure in Injustice.

 

[insignis]

Not that it lets them off the hook but its a common misconception you can just slap a better "netcode" on a game. Many devs simply ignore netcode until late in a games development (resulting in a sub par performance), and most of the time its way too cost prohibitive to do that kind of maintenance post-release. This is why all SNK's console releases have had such a shitty excuse for it.

"Netcode" isn't just a couple lines of code that namco or sega or capcom knows that no one else does. It has to do with how the game is built from the ground up (is it ready for dropped frames, ready for missed inputs, adjustable graphics pipe, sound, etc), and how much of that infrastructure was baked in from the start. Even with those concessions, there's no telling how good its going to handle the real world because fighting game players simply do not accept the level of latency that is perfectly tolerable in most other online genres.

Rest assured, if a fighting game is brand new, or simply sporting a brand new engine, it is bound to have questionable netcode. You can't name a single example that didn't/doesn't. The games out now with great netcode are the ones that had established engines whose devs had the opportunity to rip them apart and hook in the internet. MK9 was a new game with new engine and new netcode and it did not stand the test. I look forward to Injustice being a huge step forward, what with the network engineers having nothing else to do but optimize.

MK9 runs on Unreal Engine 3 which isn't new. or the problem is more deep than it seems?
also as I remember, Boon noted that MK9 wasn't online oriented and that's why it's awful.

 

[trufenix]

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trivializing the work involved. My main point is - it's a group of people's jobs to do this. They clearly failed on MK9's (for whatever reason) and my hope is that they have learned from MK9 and don't repeat that same failure in Injustice.

They can do better, but I don't think they failed. Failed is unplayable. Failed is beyond repair or tolerance. Failed is abandoned and ill concerned. MK9 online was never tourney calibur and it was frought with bugs from day 1, but they stuck with it, patched it again and again, and it got pretty solid. All for free, during an aggressive DLC / Patch schedule. I don't think people give NRS enough credit for making games that rival giants like Capcom, Namco, and Sega with a fraction of the resources.

MK9 runs on Unreal Engine 3 which isn't new. or the problem is more deep than it seems?
also as I remember, Boon noted that MK9 wasn't online oriented and that's why it's awful.

And all UE3 games are created equal? Did you read my post? UE3 doesn't come out of the box super awesome. Just look at the trail of tears on the Wikipedia page (Go Silicon Knights!). Even if awesome UE3 games just happened by magic, the kind of online issues present in "good" UE3 games like Gears or Borderlands or Transformers would NEVER fly in fighting games, competitive or otherwise. If an fps loses a spray of bullets or drops a couple players during match making, fps players shake their heads and respawn. But fighting game fans demand perfect anti airs, combo consistency to a frame, links, and no slowdown ever.

Again, I'm not marginalizing their problems. MK9s netcode it started off REMARKABLY shitty and even in the end its still missing a lot of stuff I'd like, but it (eventually) got well above the line of acceptable online video game.

 

[TargetAudience]

I think what people take issue with is the question of why they are able to have a more enjoyable online experience with other fighters, and not have a similar experience with MK 9--not a perfect experience or an identical experience to offline. It's hyperbole to say we need the most optimal internet connection in order to enjoy games online when there are many examples of good performing games on the current service that we have now in the US at least.

Most of us know you guys work hard, so I'll just say keep working hard, and just know that everyone (your supporters and detractors) just wants you guys to make very strong games (Not just the story mode) that can also be enjoyed online. That's all we want.

We're not just a bunch of assholes, or ungrateful dicks. We just have high standards. I'm sure you guys can appreciate that, as well. We expect the best from you and the rest of the team.

QFTT

I was gonna say something similiar but he beat me to it.

 

[Ninj]

trufenix as someone who was very interested in the tournament scene and going to majors and supporting the game long term (which is what NRS wants)...they failed me. I don't have 8 hours a day to play video games. That said, if I had the ability to consistently play under low-latency (read: ping of ~50-100 max), I could make the time I do spend count and get better. So by the standards of allowing people without a scene right next door to them to get better and therefore want to go to tournaments, yes they failed.

By the standards of going online, forgetting skill and mashing buttons to see who wins, they did spectacularly. I'm not saying NRS failed as a company to make a good game. I'm just saying that they legitimately have a shitty online experience for the game, and that detracts from the ability of their playerbase to get better.

A shitty training mode also detracts from this in a big way.

Case in point - I hope NRS makes Injustice with tournament play in mind. SFIV clearly was geared to be built and patched in that direction, and it's insanely popular. MK9 could've been the same thing if they had taken their own game seriously enough to think about it in terms of tournament play.

 

[KiD INsAnitY]

It runs on a modified version of unreal engine 3 to fit a fighting game so technically it's not built from scratch new but somewhat different then a non fighter game that runs the engine

 

[trufenix]

snip

I guess my question is what is your idea of "taking their own game seriously enough"? Did they not provide the first game EVER in the series that was competitively viable offline or online? Did they not improve upon MKvDCs online many times over? Did they not take the series in better places and directions than ever before? Did they not top every other fighter released in the past two years content wise?

Its this kind of all or nothing rose tinted revisionist mindset that gives the FGC a bad name. SF4:AE2012 is the 5th content redesign, 3 of which they made us pay for. TTT2 is on its third, two of which (And one incoming) are arcade only, and thats if you don't consider it a bloodline rebellion facelift, which was itself the 3rd incarnation of T6. PSAS had a 6 month beta, and its got ghost players winning ranked matches. DoA5 and SC5 launched with horrendous console specific connection issues. And SFxT shipped without the ability to play fucking sound online. Like, someone actually said, "this is acceptable".

And do you remember how much T6's online sucked? DoA4? Vanilla SF4? Vanilla Marvel? How much does KoF13s online suck? Did any of that "detract from the ability of their playerbase to get better" or does it just suck balls to be a fan with no free time and live in bfe? At some point we (as consumers) have to take responsibility that we can't have every goddamned thing, and just because they can't give us every thing doesn't mean they hate us or don't give a shit about their products.

I mean look at this thread. 2 whole pages, literally every other post is a crack about how unbearable MK9's netcode is or how bad Injustice's will invariably be. And when Hector drops a joke, one of the communities most senior members gives him shit about it. While he could do the same thing on a casual site like MKO or TRMK and they would eat it up. Such are the standards of the "scene" they have failed.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I can see both sides of the issue, but my summation is this:

1) Great netcode is an iterative process.. You might not get it right the first time, but you keep improving it and learn from your mistakes.

2) Creating a game is a complex process, and people need to chill out on flaming NRS for not being 100% perfect in the first tourney-viable game in years.. It's a great game, and hector has already explicitly stated that they are looking to improve on most of the complaints people had with MK9.

So I recommend taking a deep breath.. Being patient, and enjoying Injustice once it arrives

 

[MKF30]

Said before, say it again. ALL games lag online don't care what the game or genre is. I was playing Halo 4 other day at friends place with fios, people leave and it lagged for a bit after it.... But I do hope it's better online then MK but MK is average imo, played better, played worse online. All they(all developers) need to do is have private servers, like PC games do. Of course this will cost more money but come on...WB I'm sure can afford it...of course all that being said, it's NOT that easy...

I wonder what the new mode will be. Since people are talking about the negatives of MK 9 online, I'll talk of the positives I hope Injustice has too, tag modes are fun as hell with a friend. Although, I DO hope in MK10 and perhaps in Injustice they make a 2 player co-op online vs the arcade ladder, that would be sick. That MK introduced that no other fighter did. The KOTH rating system, 0-10 is awesome among the funny animations. I hope it's something like that, very original and cool. But of course, we all want a better netcode. Unfortunately no game online is perfect.

I can see both sides of the issue, but my summation is this:

1) Great netcode is an iterative process.. You might not get it right the first time, but you keep improving it and learn from your mistakes.

2) Creating a game is a complex process, and people need to chill out on flaming NRS for not being 100% perfect in the first tourney-viable game in years.. It's a great game, and hector has already explicitly stated that they are looking to improve on most of the complaints people had with MK9.

So I recommend taking a deep breath.. Being patient, and enjoying Injustice once it arrives

Ahh, a post of reason!! I like you! We need more people like you instead of those who bash the online or bring up just the negatives, yet don't play it online anyway so by that logic I'd like to ask those guys "why do you care then"? Obviously offline or online is all some people have and/or prefer, MK9 is still a great game overall! Of course I could do without Kabal and KL lol but hey nobody is perfect, nor is every community.

 

[Via_Negativa]

Okay, to correct people on SC5 and TTT2's netcodes, they actually are the same netcode, and in truth, they are actually not great if you were to take away the huge buffer windows and apparently intentional natural input delay.

They work for the games that are designed around them.

This is completely incorrect so you aren't correcting people at all....
Your comment is true for SCIV only which does have a huge buffer window. Tekken does not....

Tekken uses a heavily modified version of this netcode. It's not exactly the same. They can't just translate it directly as the games work very differently at a basic engine level.

Tekken has 1 frame of input delay in The arcade and console versions. This translates into about 2 frames in a good 5 bar connection online. They can't do the trickery that they did with SCIV because it's an arcade game while I suspect SCIV was designed like that on purpose for online.

The developer's have also stated that Tekken uses about 5x more data to send than any other fighting game out there. All this is from the mouth of harada himself.

Because of the above I still can't fight people a huge distance in tekken but I can in SCV. Still Tekken tag 2 probably has the best netcode I have ever played in a game. I believe it's even better than GGPO.

Hope, NRS can pull it off something decent this time around. If they did copy namco's netcode and translated it to their games being 2D it would probably be even better.

my 2 cent's.

 

[THTB]

Tekken has 1 frame of input delay in The arcade and console versions. This translates into about 2 frames in a good 5 bar connection online. They can't do the trickery that they did with SCIV because it's an arcade game while I suspect SCIV was designed like that on purpose for online.

Then what's this shit about them finding extra input lag and whatnot for TTT2? Was that confirmed false or something?