Project Reality is killing itself. From a fellow asset whore point of view.

[Wicca]

I think Project Reality is a great game, still offering some of the best gameplay you can get anywhere on the internet. Save maybe Eve-Online & Arma3 clans.

Squad is not up to the task of replacing Project Reality, nor will it as their developers have stated.

I think Project Reality is just a victim of time, as most newer engines have better functionality and better graphics, we don't get new players to deal with the churn because of that.

People tend to be attracted by looks, and stay because of gameplay, I can't sit here and argue that Project Reality is an attractive game, but it has a shitton of gameplay. Still that won't bring in a large number of people which this game sorely needs.

Asset whores VS Infantry Whores, Squad Leaders VS Commanders. Snipers VS Grunts. etc etc. PR has a lot of extremities in the roles you can play, which makes it a game with a lot of depth. That's why we still see so many people still playing it.

[Graysun]

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[Graysun]

Originally Posted by Rhino

How people run and orginaise our servers is mostly out of our hands and most would complain that we the Devs have to much control over how servers are run with our server rules...

I do not blame you guys and this was not just a post bashing DEVs, mainly just an overall post about many aspects of PR, especially focused on how the natural game aspects/mechanics hurt the community.

Originally Posted by Rhino

In future releases, I hope we can really expand the "Vehicle Warfare" game mode to something that's actually worth playing and that will allow players to get their "Asset Fix" so to speak, as well as hopefully being a half decent seeder layer.
If you've seen what I have done a little in the past with the Falklands VW layer you might get a bit of an idea of what I'm hoping for, but still hoping to expand a lot on top of that concept since the core gamemode is still pretty broken (flags can't be capped once the server gets a bunch of players in etc) and also expanding the same sort of concept across more maps and sub-modes of VW I have in mind
But a lot has to come together for this to happen so can't promise anything, but I do hope this might rectify these problems somewhat.

Unfortunately vehicle warfare will never give asset whores the same "fix" because the whole fix itself comes from the very small amount and importance of the vehicles in a match. VW does not offer the same feeling as a 50v50 AAS, but I could not tell you how to replicate this to be actually worth it. I can tell you however that when VW is set late at night or for seeding the only maps played are jets or 1 man tank maps. The selection is very few because the others require full crews and no one wants to do that in the situation that it is played. I think we would love to play the other great maps but they need the 1 man crewed vehicles as well.

Originally Posted by Rhino

I'm sorry but that simply isn't true. We do not favour any individual clans or communities above others, many of them would argue they should all have bigger voices in what we do and some indervdidual devs may be part of a clan/community but that hardly impacts on anything we do.

At the end of the day, it's the same as it has always been, we make the game WE, the Devs Want.

I do not think the case is that you favor certain clans or communities more than others but it is for sure that some of the DEVs definitely have alone time with some in teamspeak/discord so what they say/want is obviously seen in the game more. With a community/playerbase this small why is that even needed? We should all be able to easily voice important issues and pole/vote on them through a method on the forums. So yes, you make the game but are you making it for the players to enjoy or for the DEVs to enjoy? There has been a few things that it is very obvious the majority of the player base does not like. Iron sights on Bijar is a great example. You guys have done a great job implementing newer factions into older maps and this is really refreshing to the maps gameplay. I think this could be done to MANY more maps. Muttrah with new factions or assets? Sounds awesome and probably wouldn't take much dev time at all? I am not for deleting the current standard layouts but maybe for sure making alt layouts with new factions/assets for the very old maps. I also believe many INS exclusive maps could really make some cool AAS battles.

Originally Posted by Rhino

Ummm, like who? Got any examples?

I think the comments answer this for me.

Originally Posted by Rhino

That simply isn't true... While yes some testers might be friends and friends of friends of some of the team, the reason someone is picked for being a tester has nothing to do with that. Being a tester is not about getting your hands on the latest content before anyone else, it is actually hard, tedious work making sure everything works right and most people do not turn up for a second test session when they find out what testing is really about, which is often things like sitting there getting shot over and over again to test weapon damages etc, etc. If going through lists and lists of possible things to test and then writing up all your findings after and creating issues on our bug database (redmine) on all of them for the devs to fix sounds like fun to you then your more than welcome to apply and if there are no security concerns etc with you being a tester you can have your chance to help weed out the bugs from the game.

I personally am not into testing stuff like that, but I do know a few players who for sure are and were laughed at for even attempting to join the elite test team. Honestly is the type of attitude what you want representing you guys? Pretty sure "security" reasons had nothing to do with their help not being accepted. I also think that maybe some requirements for these players that have a voice in what is what should be made, like being decently active in the game itself.

Originally Posted by Rhino

lol. I think you find that when Devs don't want to work on this anymore they simply leave. I myself wish I had more time and energy to work on the mod than I do as, like many of us, we enjoy the making part as much as we enjoy playing with what we have made and seeing the community enjoy it.
I am starting to have some time coming back to be able to work on PR again after about two years of r/l stuff getting in the way of me being able to do any real significant work for PR which has been seriously frustrating for me but now I hope to make a few last contributoions before I have to move on at the very least and PR inevitibly dies, how long that will be I don't know, that all depends on you, the community more than anything else.

I personally do not have access to know if this is true or not but it does seem like there are a few gatekeepers that either are staying around for something, or would feel bad about leaving but no longer care about or play the game. I get it, this is a free game that has probably taken hundreds of hours of DEV time and when you do not play anymore it is probably pretty hard to keep making content for. Either way, I cannot say whether that is having a negative impact of development or not.

I really appreciate the time and effort for your response, and sorry I am getting back a little late. I wrote a response earlier and accidentally deleted it when I was editing it it.

[Graysun]

First of all thank you for your lengthy reply, I really appreciate you taking the time to thoroughly read and respond to my post.

Originally Posted by Veterans-Gaming

Do you have any suggestions or solutions to offer, or is this just commentary on what you do not enjoy about Project Reality these days?

Well, it is very hard to make suggestions when they don't even get approved by the forums moderator so no one gets to see them . Not even sure why this a thing. Honestly that is exactly why this was posted in discussion.

Originally Posted by Veterans-Gaming

As someone who promotes a community of teamwork based gameplay in combined arms style wargames, I personally find it hard to take seriously such opinions coming from the stated perspective of a PR player who literally refuses to play a different role in the game when not getting the asset role they prefer, as you said, "afk all game because you didn't get your asset again then come back next game from being afk and dont get your asset again you start getting mad", meaning you will occupy a slot that a person who could be actually playing the game should have access to in a petulant protest against not getting to play with your favorite toy. I do not mean to be rude, but this is how that statement comes across. This is disregarding efforts to "seed" a server to grow it's current player base for a period - sitting and doing nothing for the above reasons just seems petty as there are many entertaining roles to play in PR... but I guess that's just "my" opinion, and I don't mean to counter your valid opinions with my own

So, you get me wrong here. This whole post is not about myself but also how I see others including some of my friends play. There are those who only play CAS and will wait afk all game just to try and get it the next game. I am not at that point yet lol.

Originally Posted by Veterans-Gaming

I can sympathize - I enjoy the crazy races in GTA V Online, and so any updates or changes to them literally affect my entire experience of that game, even though it's just a portion of the whole game like certain vehicles are in PR - a part of the whole experience, but not all of it. But you say these things as if there used to be a time when anyone who wanted to get their CAS action on had no serious competition to claim that asset in any given round or on any given server -- and this is stated by you during a time that is admittedly lower in overall population than the "golden age" of PR days past you so fondly compare to. It's always been a first come, first served claim process on most every server, and that is not different today - any specific examples of a server doing otherwise would be just that, overly specific examples not equal to your general statement about the difficulty of getting one's favorite asset in a round.

So what I mean by this is, there are specific groups (I AM NOT EXEMPT) that seriously go for the same assets every game, this was easily fixed by going to the next server a long time ago. Now there is only 1 full server at a time so every group is now in one server, much more competitive for it. I brought this up to show how there is no room for noobs trying to use them haha.

Originally Posted by Veterans-Gaming

I just wonder of you have any insights into what could possibly change about PR that would stop it from "killing itself" or how a combined arms game could cater more to both vehicle regulars and infantry regulars alike?

So, currently it takes a lot more skill to wipe infantry out in CAS than it does in a tank right now. Tanks can take hits for days while it can be extremely easy to knock out a jet/heli the short few seconds you see it. Asset timers need to be adjusted to this issue, or some things need to be rebalanced. I currently do not think a jet should share a 20 minute timer when it has much more odds against it to survive than a tank right now. Heavy attack helicopters DO need to have that 20 minute timer though because it is much easier to wipe a team with a cobra than a jet.

Originally Posted by Veterans-Gaming

I'm fairly proud that another one of the VG guys has been able to demonstrate these qualities and is now working on a team to help make his ideas to improve parts of this game into a reality. There is your regular player who is not merely some friend of the Devs who now has RCON tags. He's not alone, but that's my example from our group - he wasn't an asset whore, he's an infantry guy, for the record.

That last sentence is what really makes the difference in this game, notice infantry groups and players get along much better. There is very rarely drama among an asset whore and an infantry player.


Again thanks for taking the time to respond.

[Graysun]

Originally Posted by Filamu

Asset whores of course prefer 4Ks, but if you really think that you wouldn't lose players if only 4Ks were played on full servers you are sadly mistaken. Old PR mostly had 1Ks and 2Ks, only 4K map was Kashan. You can't really talk about "old PR" when you have played for a year.

You mean the days with apaches and tanks on small maps with 64 players? haha.

[Walmarx]

Asset Whores have inherited the earth. I still check PR SPY regularly, and everytime I do the popped servers are on 4K AAS maps. I have to work very hard to restrain my disdain for the type of players your post focuses on, as I (mostly unjustly) blame them for the state of the game at present. Does Insurgency even exist anymore?

[parch]

Originally Posted by Graysun

I do not think the case is that you favor certain clans or communities more than others but it is for sure that some of the DEVs definitely have alone time with some in teamspeak/discord so what they say/want is obviously seen in the game more. With a community/playerbase this small why is that even needed? We should all be able to easily voice important issues and pole/vote on them through a method on the forums. So yes, you make the game but are you making it for the players to enjoy or for the DEVs to enjoy? There has been a few things that it is very obvious the majority of the player base does not like. Iron sights on Bijar is a great example. You guys have done a great job implementing newer factions into older maps and this is really refreshing to the maps gameplay. I think this could be done to MANY more maps. Muttrah with new factions or assets? Sounds awesome and probably wouldn't take much dev time at all? I am not for deleting the current standard layouts but maybe for sure making alt layouts with new factions/assets for the very old maps. I also believe many INS exclusive maps could really make some cool AAS battles.

I really like how you are trying to pitch some of your ideas while you're at it. Very subtle.
And those influential clans or communities? It only took 50 pages of them bitching on forums to revert weapon damage changes. Of course it was probably the same vocal group that made devs implement them in the first place.
If only there was a place on this forum that was dedicated to posting suggestions...

[GAJAN]

Originally Posted by Filamu

Gajan, there is nothing wrong with 2Ks on a full server. Sure, 1Ks can't be played, but 2Ks usually offer better inf gameplay due to more cover and more detailed areas.

Asset whores of course prefer 4Ks, but if you really think that you wouldn't lose players if only 4Ks were played on full servers you are sadly mistaken. Old PR mostly had 1Ks and 2Ks, only 4K map was Kashan. You can't really talk about "old PR" when you have played for a year.

Of course a balance is needed. As an inf player I'll play a 4k map here and there, especially if they are made so that inf actually can move around (I.e not bijar), the same way an asset player have to accept to go a little closer on a 2K.

I just say that I remember that about 4km before a year you coludnt see 2km maps ofren

[Rhino]

Originally Posted by Graysun

Unfortunately vehicle warfare will never give asset whores the same "fix" because the whole fix itself comes from the very small amount and importance of the vehicles in a match. VW does not offer the same feeling as a 50v50 AAS, but I could not tell you how to replicate this to be actually worth it. I can tell you however that when VW is set late at night or for seeding the only maps played are jets or 1 man tank maps. The selection is very few because the others require full crews and no one wants to do that in the situation that it is played. I think we would love to play the other great maps but they need the 1 man crewed vehicles as well.

Like I said, it would be a major rework of the game mode, not just a reboot of what is already there, but yes it won't offer the same thing as AAS but be far more playable and enjoyable.

Originally Posted by Graysun

I do not think the case is that you favor certain clans or communities more than others but it is for sure that some of the DEVs definitely have alone time with some in teamspeak/discord so what they say/want is obviously seen in the game more. With a community/playerbase this small why is that even needed?

Even the smallest changes to core gameplay need to at least be discussed and approved by the internal team so even if "certain clans" do have the ear of one or even a few of our devs, they still need to post these ideas on the internal forums and make a compelling case as to why to implement them. Many devs have felt over the years, including myself at many times, that it is to hard to make changes to the core gameplay of the mod. Hell there is one idea I've been pushing for, for about two years now about the introduction of a new "Medium Anti-Tank" kit to bridge the gap of the limited amount of HAT kits and to give our recoilless rifles and other AT weapons / Warheads more exposure (most at just alternative HAT kits that never see the light of day like the SMAW for one of many examples) but that has met stiff resistance for being included, mainly for artistic reasons but also gameplay ones (but most of the team are for it in terms of the gameplay side) and as such, still hasn't seen the light of day even thou to implement it with a few placeholders, isn't that hard.

Originally Posted by Graysun

We should all be able to easily voice important issues and pole/vote on them through a method on the forums.

We do at times but their worth is very questionable, like for example when I did the initial poll about "Helictoper Rolling Wheels" when doing initial public implementation/testing for them on The Falklands choppers, it got a lot of support with almost 72% voting in favour of them: https://www.realitymod.com/forum/sho...d.php?t=116072

But then after full implementation into v1.0 and players getting a full taste of them, there was a massive backlash even after giving them this initial trial phase on the Falklands to see if they liked it and we ran another poll a few weeks or so after v1.0 to see what the community thought then, and in that poll, only 14% approved of it.
https://www.realitymod.com/forum/sho...d.php?t=121276

Originally Posted by Graysun

So yes, you make the game but are you making it for the players to enjoy or for the DEVs to enjoy?

As I said before, we make the game we, the devs, want, and always have, although yes we do listen to the community on top of it and as demonstrated above, often side with the community too.

Originally Posted by Graysun

Muttrah with new factions or assets? Sounds awesome and probably wouldn't take much dev time at all?

Muttrah, ideally I would like to do a big overhaul of the map at some point but doubt I'll ever get round to that.

As for adding new factions, I am really against the whole "oh let's shove these factions on this map just because we can" approach... There has to be a good reason in my book for those factions to be on that map before implementing it and then if it is done, it needs to be done right.

If we were, let's say, to replace the USMC with the British Royal Marines on Muttrah then, first of all, you would really need to replace the USS Essex with a British Assault ship of some kind. In the past maybe we could have just got away with shoving a ski jump on the end of the Essex and giving it a new paint job and calling it an Invincible class, as I did on the Falklands, but the Invincible and even Ocean class (the next best contender for the Essex to pretend to be) have been retired out of service. As such you only have the Albion-class LPD or worse yet, Bay-class Landing Ship, both of which would need new models made for them, a hell of a lot of work...
Then ignoring the issue of the assault ship, the British don't really have any Amphibious Assault Vehicles like the AAVP7, in r/l they tend to stick more with landing craft like the LCVP Mk5 and LCU Mk10, and the best thing they have ingame for assaulting from the sea that they can assault from the sea with is the vBF2 RHIB. So their assault paths from the sea are very limited...
As such they are really just limited to helicopters, and while we have a pretty good selection of helis, ignoring that the Lynx AH.7 has been retired now and replaced with the Wildcat (which is basically the same thing, just very modernised) and also ignoring the "Merlin Lag" the Merlin has, and the Chinook can only be used somewhat limited like the MV-22 due to its size, if the teams choppers fail then all they have to fall back on is the RHIBs and w/e ground forces might have made it ashore and hopefully got some FOBs up, unlike the USMC who have the armoured AAVP7s to help them out.

So to make the British work you would need to adjust the whole dynamic of the map to work really, which isn't as simple as just swapping out some assets, it takes a lot of thought on how to balance a map, especially asymmetrical ones like Muttrah, and to get it right is a pretty hard thing to achieve.
That is after either spending hundreds of hrs making new assault ship or ignoring that issue...

The same issues apply to basically every other faction and the Brtis would be one faction I would consider putting on Muttrah since they have pretty strong ties to Oman and have operated in Oman in the past as well.

Originally Posted by Graysun

I think the comments answer this for me.

Unless you consider normal forum users to be our Military Experts that have ties to the dev team, then no not really...

Originally Posted by Graysun

I personally am not into testing stuff like that, but I do know a few players who for sure are and were laughed at for even attempting to join the elite test team. Honestly is the type of attitude what you want representing you guys? Pretty sure "security" reasons had nothing to do with their help not being accepted. I also think that maybe some requirements for these players that have a voice in what is what should be made, like being decently active in the game itself.

Believe me or don't believe me, that's up to you but to my knowledge, we have never "laughed at" anyone attempting to join and if you have any proof that states otherwise, other than your friend's tales, then I would like to see it but otherwise I suggest you let the issue lie.
And yes testers are only taken from the community who are active in it, ie, play the game itself, those are the only ones who want to test anyways....

Originally Posted by Graysun

this is a free game that has probably taken hundreds of hours of DEV time

You horribly underestimate how much time has gone into making PR. It's easily thousands of hrs if not more. We have had countless numbers of devs over the years each devoting hundreds of hrs to the mod over its last 14+ yrs and that adds up to a hell of a lot. Not to mention the amount of time other mod teams etc have spent making assets we also use in exchange for ours etc.
I myself started working on PR in 2006 which has now been over 12 years I've been working on PR and for a lot of that time it has been my main dedication, as you can tell by my 46.6k posts, most are pretty long ones like this. I myself have put thousands of hrs into PR and while yes, I might be the longest-serving member of the team now, the other devs have all worked just as hard as when they have been around here and the amount of work we have all done for this mod is no small thing.

Originally Posted by Graysun

Well, it is very hard to make suggestions when they don't even get approved by the forums moderator so no one gets to see them . Not even sure why this a thing. Honestly that is exactly why this was posted in discussion.

Well firstly, this isn't a suggestions topic so it should not have been posted in there w/e.

Secondly, the reason why the suggestions forum is moderated, is because we have simply heard them all before, time and time again, and only actual new ideas that haven't been talked to death about get approved, and BTW they get approved by the DEVs, not by moderators. Yes even to this day we still get suggestions to add fast ropes....

As for the two suggestions you've posted over the years in the suggestions forum, the first about unbalanced assets on map isn't a suggestion, its a question about why they are there, and the second about having NATO etc factions fight each other is a re-suggestion that has been talked to death, try searching for those topics to see the responses to them if you still want an answer on it, hence the moderated suggestions forums and this topic:
https://www.realitymod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=18434



Anyways I hope that clears things up before.

[Filamu]

Originally Posted by Rhino

Secondly, the reason why the suggestions forum is moderated, is because we have simply heard them all before, time and time again, and only actual new ideas that haven't been talked to death about get approved, and BTW they get approved by the DEVs, not by moderators. Yes even to this day we still get suggestions to add fast ropes....

Just another case of devs not listening to the community. Fastropes would solve everything!

I've been working on PR and for a lot of that time it has been my main dedication, as you can tell by my 46.6k posts, most are pretty long ones like this. I myself have put thousands of hrs into PR and while yes, I might be the longest-serving member of the team now, the other devs have all worked just as hard as when they have been around here and the amount of work we have all done for this mod is no small thing.

And nearly all your posts are very interesting insights to PR. I, and I am sure many others, really appreciate them.
As we also do enjoy this game we have put way to many hours into, just because it is that good. People may say that the devs should listen more. But in the end, making the game they want, really has worked out. It probably have the most content out of every fps out there, and the best gameplay we want.