MASSIVE TALKING CHAPTER THREE : TECH'''
Massive Entertainment Reveals
19, June, 2006
Note: Blue marked questions are by Timeline, Regnum-Irae
With Lead Game Designer Magnus "Soundboy" Jansen, Lead Programmer Niklas Hansson and Technical Director Niklas Westberg
1. Are some Masstech parameters configurable by the users?
There are a number of things that are highly configurable per map such as lighting, fog, water appearance, post effects (bloom, saturation, contrast), the sky and clouds. These things are not editable from within the game, but will be accessible in the mod tools. Hard core modders will also be able to add new game content like units, animations and particle effects.
Not to forget our physics system that will allow you to create and modify explosion, create structures you can drive through with your tank and so on. Basically the entire WIC technology is written from the start to be extremely data driven. Almost nothing is written in code. So anything that we can change you will be able to play with too.
2. What is the hardware average requirement to get fluency game sessions?
The game engine in WIC is very scaleable, so if you want to sacrifice some eye candy for speed the game will be able to run smoothly even on older machines. For example in Medium graphics mode it will run nicely on around a 2,2 ghz machine with a 128 MB video card. The video memory is the most limiting factor since we have such high detail textures in WIC. So we have to scale those down for the low-end video cards . But I'm running the game in medium right here and it still looks beautiful. Of course all these numbers are work in progress. And as were currently entering the optimization phase I can promise you that we will make sure that this game runs as smooth as it possibly can.
3. Can it affect (or be affected by) the Internet speed someway?
We will not support playing WIC over a dial-up connection. If you have a broadband connection it will not matter if you have a 0.25 or 10 Mbit connection. Enough is enough.
If you are planning on hosting a server for a 16 player game however you might require some more bandwidth than the minimum spec. However we are currently optimising our network traffic to make sure that the load will be as light as possible.
With regard to internet lag our games so far has played very well even with high pings (for example transatlantic games) And WIC is not shaping up any differently in that regard.
4. What weather effects are able to be created in the engine, and will this have an effect on gameplay like it did in GC2 (where units had a shorter view/fire distance).
Weather has no effect on gameplay. We instead opted to focus on the visual impact of weather to create beautiful maps that feel homogenous. All weather effects are 3D objects so that the artists can create any weather effects they want in our tools. So there is no hard limit on what type of weather effects you can achieve.
5. Also will rain (if it is in) be dynamically modelled from the clouds, and will it be possible to get above the clouds with the camera?
There is no technical limitation or game design convention that dictates that you cannot fly above the clouds, but on most of the maps you are well below the clouds.
6. Weather: Is it randomized as in is it randomized how heavy rain is, how many clouds there are etc.
This is set per map rather than randomized. Our map designers spend hours and hours to make lighting and weather effects set the look and mood we want for each map. Randomization could give you a different look every time you run a map but we’d rather have the map look fantastic every time.
7. Will units be able to interact with the terrain? (use a rock for cover, get inside a building, etc...)
All game entities are physically modelled and a rocket can’t move though rocks any more than a jeep can. Marines can run and hide in a forest, but a tank can’t get there (until you give the forest a taste of napalm, that is). Marines can hide in buildings, which gives them a tactical advantage.
8. Can we change the skybox? If so how?
The skybox is a mesh object so you could do pretty much anything you want with it (including changing the texture, of course). We also have a dynamic clouds system which in combination with a beautiful skybox can produce a very nice atmosphere.
9. Will be the GFX compliant with 'DX10' (DirectX10-Compliant Windows Vista) and/or with Common Pipelined DirectX 9.x?
The game will run DirectX 9 under Windows Vista (and XP too of course).
10. How dynamic is the AI? Will it rely on scripting or will it be able to surprise us?
The AI is fully dynamic and will rely on team play in the same way as human players do. It analyses the battlefield in a similar way to that of humans players and makes decisions based on its current strength and disposition and known enemies. The AI will work as a fellow commander and respond to your requests, if it can fulfil them and they are not too far from what the AI is doing at the moment. The AI will also send requests to fellow human commanders if it can’t handle the situation it is in. So for most of the time you are fighting a fully dynamic opponent but at certain missions it will be constrained by scripts to achieve those special moments required to tell the story.
11. And what is the preferred drink coffee or cola ? (just have to ask )
Well our friends at “Espresso House” across the street would probably run out of business if it wasn’t for Massive Entertainment.