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old A little advice to DC

TobyInChina
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@user DC:
Please don't ban me.
Recent DC's attitude towards CS2D is negative.
I'm really disappointed.
I think CS2D is a very promising game.
If the matching system can be perfected, it is similar to CSGO.
If there is a rank system.
I'm even willing to pay for the game.

But DC feels that the game is old, he is reluctant to try, he is afraid of failure, he feels that change is futile, there is a Chinese saying that a person is not old, the mentality changes is really old.
CS2D Chinese Station is hold competitions every year. Although the number of people is small, we never give up publicizing this game. At the peak of the number of people in this game, I gave DC a lot of suggestions through email, but he rejected them one by one.
Until now, Chinese translation is incomplete, many systems are in English, but DC ignored them.
In a year, only a few bugs were fixed and no new features were released.
If DC thinks the game is dead, open source, one thing I hope DC can stick to, don't say anything frustrating.

old Re: A little advice to DC

sac op me
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I am the host of the China competition, hello dc! I don't know if there are still players in the other areas, but I will insist that I also want to host a world-class game, thanks to dc for creating the game. It can also have life.
Sry my english is so bad，the word using translating

old Re: A little advice to DC

DC
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@user TobyInChina: You don't have to ask to not be banned. Please stop that nonsense. It's ridiculous.

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But DC feels that the game is old

It's not a feeling. It's a fact that the game is over 15 years old.

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he is reluctant to try

Invested many hours to polish the game for Steam. Time I actually wanted to invest in Stranded III. Steam release only led to a very short increase in popularity.
Only legit conclusion: The game is not interesting enough for the majority of people. Therefore it doesn't make sense to dedicate my entire life to that single game only.

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he is afraid of failure

That's an unjustified claim. Does a person who is afraid of failure release games to the public? I don't care about failure. If a concept works I stick to it. If a concept stops working I move on.

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he feels that change is futile

No, I just don't want to work ONLY on CS2D for my whole life. I want to work on new projects as well. Please accept that. You have no choice anyway.

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CS2D Chinese Station is hold competitions every year. Although the number of people is small, we never give up publicizing this game.

I'm glad to hear that! You are doing a great job and I'm thankful for that! It's amazing √

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At the peak of the number of people in this game, I gave DC a lot of suggestions through email, but he rejected them one by one.

I don't remember your suggestions but I always evaluate suggestions and there certainly were good reasons to reject them. I'm sorry if you feel ignored or misunderstood because of that.
I also might have rejected some ideas just because implementing them is too much effort. Like said above I don't want to (and can't) invest an infinite amount of time to improve CS2D.

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Until now, Chinese translation is incomplete, many systems are in English, but DC ignored them.

I do not speak Chinese. I can't translate the game. I asked people to translate and I added the translation provided by the community to the game. I'm sorry if the translation isn't good but I can't improve it myself.
Moreover some parts of the game (e.g. additional options) can't be translated. Doing so would be crazy effort and isn't worth it. All ESSENTIAL parts of the game should be translated though and I'm think it's well enough translated to be understandable if you don't speak English.

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In a year, only a few bugs were fixed and no new features were released.

And this is an OUTSTANDING achievement. Only very few games get updated after 15 years!
Again: I want to work on other projects. Sorry that I don't work on the same free game exclusively for over 15 years.

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If DC thinks the game is dead, open source

This has been tried with an old version of CS2D. As far as I know nearly nobody really cared or made something big/substantial with it.

Open sourcing CS2D would only allow cheaters to ruin the game even further. Being destructive is always way easier than being constructive.

Based on my experience I can tell that it is EXTREMELY unlikely that someone WHO IS ABLE TO (!) wants to pick up that code base and make something better from it. Without any doubt it would be easier to create a new game from scratch. What I'm saying here is based on way over 15 years of software engineering experience. I'm NOT saying it because I'm seeking for excuses to not make the game open source. I'm saying it because I'm 100% confident that it is absolutely true. Open sourcing CS2D would not change anything to the better.

Thank you user TobyInChina for your advice. I know you only want the best for CS2D.
edited 2×, last 11.10.19 11:45:09 pm

old Re: A little advice to DC

SQ
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@user TobyInChina:
I have been working on something new & refreshing regarding CS2D, but I have very little time to finish it lately. I might find more time when I finish main priority work stuff. Don't really want to show it until it's nearly very good state. I'm not very into mentioning it either for a long time.

old Re: A little advice to DC

Pagyra
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Translated using google translator and maybe a many words, a little incomprehensible and messy.
user DC has written
No, I just don't want to work ONLY on CS2D for my whole life. I want to work on new projects as well. Please accept that. You have no choice anyway.
...
Sorry that I don't work on the same free game exclusively for over 15 years.

I know that this is only a hobby for you, but on the other hand, from the moment you decided to offer other people to play your games, it has become your responsibility.
I am sure that you know in advance that the Blitmax engine is very limited. And now seeing a huge number of templates and blueprints of 2D shooters in the Unity or UE4, I’m sure that reconstructing CS2D based on them would take short time.
I understand that it is possibly difficult in your life conditions, which are not known to me, but anyway I have also repeatedly suggested trying to create a team from a group of enthusiasts. CS2D brings together interested people from different countries, and often in altruistic impulses and motivated by the desire to somehow get a little fame or complicity, they agree to spend a considerable amount of time and effort creating masterpieces for free. Why don't you want to help them and yourself?
As far as I know, you never tried to create a team that would be involved in the development and maintenance of the game without your participation. Except rare cases with user EngiN33R, user SQ and some others.
And now you make a similar mistakes with the Stranded series.
One person cannot develop projects as planned, need more and more free time for that. But that should be easy done by a team of like-minded people.
So I think you could very well create several teams of proactive users who can help you with the implementation and support of your projects.
One of the problems of CS2D is that the game has no marketing, no one was engaged in its popularization. I remember that some people tried to make streams, different media content, but these were unofficial attempts.
In same way only thanks to the users it was possible to push through your decision to enter Steam. If you recall, you decided on this for more than one year.
It would be quite possible to introduce monetization and donation systems into the game, if the same skins, maps, access to public VIP servers (everything that had already been tried in other shooters) were conditionally paid (I mean the extremely low price), then:
1 It would be more difficult for people to leave the project for which they spent their time. More than this people like to invest and see results and improvements.
2 Part of the funds could well go to a symbolic payment for the services of a team or a stable test server
3 It would allow sifting out explicit junk content
4 Getting even a miserable profit, many creators of better content with their work will help maintain the interest of other users in the game.
5 Pay for regular advertising in various services like Google ads
6 So on ... ?
Evaluating myself, I am sure that many users are happy not only for money or fame, but also just to feel useful and necessary. But that need to make some events.
Recently, in a conversation with the user Gaios, I realized for myself that sometimes I agree to spend some my free time to help him or some of my other familiar CS2D users for free, simply because I perceive them as friends of interest, our work in CS2D made us friends, I am sure that I am not the only one.

user DC has written
The game is not interesting enough for the majority of people.

When I came to this game, I was very embarrassed by the cartoony style of graphics, although the game itself seemed serious to me (before I got involved in it, I knew many who played it, saw several similar alternative games, and when I got involved I actively advertised it in the local network of his city and even held several local championships). Later, I became interested in the game, joining in the possibility of a deeper change in the game. I started creating maps, skins, scripts and mods.
So I was able to evaluate the effect of graphics on the basis of changed skins for my work (many users liked the style which I presented, but I have not uploaded the full skin pack to a file archive yet), I also tried to show with my mods that CS2D can be converted to other genres. I tried to do this in contact with other more experienced users and even tried several times to create teams. Unfortunately, the game did not progress and this was the reason for their departure. Thanks to them for their help and experience. I don’t have enough motivation to finish what we started once, but I still hope change that and will try to do it later.
So I also realized that no one is engaged in graphics, sounds, maps and scripts in the game (yes, some people made some content, sometimes very cute and impressive, but ... this is not enough).
Currently, many people evaluate games in terms of attractiveness - graphics, sounds, gaming capabilities. All this is practically absent in CS2D - the cartoon style is wretched, yes it may be pleasant to some or be funny in some moments, and was in demand due to the simplicity of execution at the start of the game, but even the originals of the idea of ​​the cs series were partially had realistic and synonymous graphics. Now these are the requirements of the trend have: detailed graphics (including image transformation, shaders, parallax, texture and bump mapping, particles and fog, reflections, various options for mixing and changing textures, etc.), various sound distortions and output options, a learning mode with plot elements to engage novice players, the system ratings and achievements to maintain interest and motivation ... and various gameplay modes.
I think CS2D is probably one of the famous 2D shooter in the genre, but therefore, in my personal opinion, the main outflow from the game comes from the realization of the frivolity of the project tied to the game style and its stagnation. For all this time, the game has not changed visually,yes, many users will say that under the pressure of the public you add some effects of light shade, 3D and others, the possibility of creating HD skins, but standart graphics as well as the sounds, mods or gameplay mechanics did not change at all.
The skins have same 3-layer (with NPCs, buildings and hostages still 2 or even 1), lights and shadows do not affect players and objects, in fact hitboxes are squares, player shadows and fog based on one sprite, ... you can list a lot, most of the ideas submitted by the players were not implemented. So just need to change that.
Yes, you will again point out the limitation of the Blitmax engine, so maybe you can try to listen us and create a team with which will be possible to transfer CS2D to the engine with great capabilities.
In addition to gaming features, the game provides opportunities for creativity. So all the main content (except for some standard files) was created by the users; this is not only good thing, but also bad. Indeed, after the appearance of new versions, no one is engaged in changing old files. So CS2D community does not have an established development team that develops a game, that fix old content for current version, which deals with various events in the community, which filters out explicit slag content from the file archive. Moreover, at this moment most of users are not motivated to make high-quality content, there are no various events specifically aimed at demonstrating the possibilities of maximum quality, there is no rating for the quality of the content that will give an understanding that this is done well and that should be considered.
There are many things that will improve the perception of the game and this is connected not only with the game itself, but also with its support, at the moment this is not, or is being done informally.


By the way, remembering the Stranded series and construction mode from CS2D, or even Carnage Contest -
why don't you want to try to combine all these ideas and make a survival sandbox MMORPG with a top down view and shooter elements?
Depending on the settings, map or mod, you could make a variety of servers and game rules.

old Re: A little advice to DC

DC
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@user Pagyra:
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I know that this is only a hobby for you, but on the other hand, from the moment you decided to offer other people to play your games, it has become your responsibility.

I do feel responsible. I'm updating the game way over a decade now. At the same time you can't force me to make updates for it. That's my very own choice.

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I am sure that you know in advance that the Blitmax engine is very limited. And now seeing a huge number of templates and blueprints of 2D shooters in the Unity or UE4, I’m sure that reconstructing CS2D based on them would take short time.

No, I did not expect CS2D to become a popular game 15 years ago and that at some point BlitzMax might not be the best choice anymore. There was not a single thought about making it future proof.
Btw: Unity and UE4 would be a horrible choice as an engine for CS2D. Also it would take a lot of time to rewrite a game with the complexity of CS2D (just take a look at the script command list to get an idea of the complexity). If you think that recreating this with another engine takes "a short time" then you have no idea about software development.

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I have also repeatedly suggested trying to create a team from a group of enthusiasts

I'm not interested in working in a team. I explained that in great detail many times already.

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And now you make a similar mistakes with the Stranded series.

Again: Working alone is my preferred way of working in my free time. Working in a team would be stressful and less fun to me. Therefore from my point of view it's not a mistake but the only right thing to do.
Of course for everyone waiting for the game it's a bad thing but that's how it is. It's my hobby and I won't change to a way of working I highly dislike.

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One person cannot develop projects as planned, need more and more free time for that. But that should be easy done by a team of like-minded people.

Thinking that everything works better, is easier and faster in a team is a very huge mistake. Many software projects fail because teams fall apart. Teams cause a lot of coordination overhead as well. Working in teams in fact often results in slower progress and software with a lower quality.

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So I think you could very well create several teams of proactive users who can help you with the implementation and support of your projects.

I'm not interested in managing teams. I'm interested in developing games. On my own. That's my hobby. I don't want to change my hobby. Sorry.

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One of the problems of CS2D is that the game has no marketing, no one was engaged in its popularization. I remember that some people tried to make streams, different media content, but these were unofficial attempts.

That's true and I admit that I'm very bad at marketing. I'm also not very interested in it which is why I basically don't do any marketing at all.

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It would be quite possible to introduce monetization and donation systems into the game, if the same skins, maps, access to public VIP servers (everything that had already been tried in other shooters) were conditionally paid (I mean the extremely low price)

CS2D is using copyrighted material from Valve. So no, earning money with it is not possible without permission from Valve. Also you see the numbers of players. It won't generate any meaningful amount of money.

So in short
• I do NOT want to work in a team or to organize teams to work on the game
• I do NOT want to make CS2D a paid game in any way

Regarding the remaining stuff you said: Yes, of course. It would be possible to make the game look more fancy and everything but that would take a lot of time and I'm currently not willing to invest that time.

If you guys really like CS2D so much and believe in its future: Why don't you just create your own CS2D-like game which is better? It is up to you. You really don't need me for that. I won't stop you. You shouldn't call it CS2D though and you shouldn't make it based on a real 3D game because that limits your opportunities a lot (from a legal perspective).
In fact I would even be willing to support you. You can always ask me here in the forum how certain things in CS2D work and are implemented.
edited 2×, last 12.10.19 12:12:52 pm

old Re: A little advice to DC

Xirot
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Totally agree with user TobyInChina:, maybe DC should hire members who could help, we all had good times playing the game and I'm pretty sure there will be guys who would enjoy helping the community to make the game cool again.

old Re: A little advice to DC

DC
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@user Xirot: Hire from what money? Also thanks for entirely ignoring EVERYTHING I just said. I'm used to it.

It's always like
"hey make a team so shit gets done faster" - "I do not want to work in a team" - "hey make a team so shit gets done faster"

old Re: A little advice to DC

Xirot
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user DC: i've just mentionned that if you gave up updating the game (maybe soon you will?) there are many who could do this for free.

old Re: A little advice to DC

Hador
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And there have been a handful of revival projects, which have all failed because working in a team is a shitload of work and no one has the time to develop such a sophisticated game in their free time within a reasonable amount of time.

CS2D was a fun game for an incredible length of time and now it's time to move on - anyone who feels differently is welcome to populate the servers and revive the game, after all it's still there and it still has an endless amount of resources through the file archive and stuff people privately archived over the years.

More >

old Re: A little advice to DC

mrc
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From my perspective the game just need marketing. I'm planning to pay some advertises.on Facebook and see what happens.

old Re: A little advice to DC

DC
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@user mrc: That's most likely wasted money. Consider what happened with the Steam release: Player counts went up like crazy (= many people tried the game again) but also dropped very quickly (= no long term motivation to keep playing).

old Re: A little advice to DC

ohaz
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user Pagyra has written
I know that this is only a hobby for you, but on the other hand, from the moment you decided to offer other people to play your games, it has become your responsibility.
Bullshit. Playing games (FOR FREE) that someone else develops is a privilege, not something you can request. DC said from the beginning that he was doing this as a hobby, he's doing it in his free time because he enjoys developing games. It's a privilege that you're allowed to play the games. He's not responsible for delivering a single patch or update. It's more than one could've ever hoped for that this game has been patched for over a decade, that's a way longer time than most freeware survives.
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And now seeing a huge number of templates and blueprints of 2D shooters in the Unity or UE4, I’m sure that reconstructing CS2D based on them would take short time.
hahahahahaha, have you ever developed something?

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By the way, remembering the Stranded series and construction mode from CS2D, or even Carnage Contest -
why don't you want to try to combine all these ideas and make a survival sandbox MMORPG with a top down view and shooter elements?
Depending on the settings, map or mod, you could make a variety of servers and game rules.
I just repeat my last statement. You make it seem like creating a "survival sandbox MMROPG" is easy. It's not. Well, it may be, if you want to deliver a shitty product. But DC wants to produce good stuff and developing a survival sandbox MMORPG that is actually good is not something that can be done in a few months or even years

old Re: A little advice to DC

Jawohl
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Honestly while on this subject, i feel like the only game that really needs a content update (aside stranded 3, naturally) is Carnage Contest, but being a such a neiche (and now rather old) game, the popularity is gone, aside a few of us veteran users here.

So while seeing CC polished with usable AI, more stable server hosting, and other little nifty features would be fantastic, i admit its a little late to be expecting anything.

Right now i just want to see @user DC: continue development with Stranded 3, as it is still very far from a complete release, and still a good year or 2 away from a playable version,

So best not to stress DC out any more than he already is

old Re: A little advice to DC

Pagyra
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I know the main problems of modern programmers - they don’t like to understand someone else’s code, they are mostly selfish, and they think the rest are the same as them, they can’t work normally in a team, they don’t know how to plan voluminous work, share and delegate work with other people, they believe that instead of using someone else’s code you need to write it yourself as it’s convenient for them, basically they don’t understand the modular approach to any problems.

https://lmgtfy.com/?q=top+down+shooter+blueprint same way for templates and so on, there are many ways to do game, and there is no problems, it needs only free time for that. So the easiest way is a scenario, ready-made parts (blueprints, parts of code and formulas, templates, etc.) and a team.

old Re: A little advice to DC

ohaz
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user Pagyra has written
I know the main problems of modern programmers - they don’t like to understand someone else’s code, they are mostly selfish, and they think the rest are the same as them, they can’t work normally in a team, they don’t know how to plan voluminous work, share and delegate work with other people, they believe that instead of using someone else’s code you need to write it yourself as it’s convenient for them, basically they don’t understand the modular approach to any problems.
Dude, I've been working for years in a team of 5-10 people, we review each others code daily (so we understand it), we plan all of our backlog together, we share work with each other and reuse as much as possible. It's called agile development and it's very much a thing for "modern programmers" as you call it. I see it the other way round - modern developers do MORE of what you said rather than less. And I still think that even with using blueprints or stuff like that, it's a lot of work.

old Re: A little advice to DC

DC
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@user Pagyra: I don't know which "modern programmers" you know personally but they must be very bad at their job. Being able to understand someone else's code and working in a team is an essential skill for everyone working in the IT industry. I fully agree with user ohaz here. I've been working in teams in my jobs for years. I know how to do it and I have no problems with doing it. Like the vast majority of all software engineers.

The point isn't that I wouldn't able to work in a team. I simply do not WANT to work in a team in my free time. I prefer to have maximum freedom and to be independent (from other people's work) in my hobby projects. That's my personal decision and you can't force me to do it differently.

It looks like you're very confident about what you're saying. Why don't you just create a game on your own / with a team then? I would be very interested to see how your approach works. But please stop telling me how to do stuff.
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