NCSoft Share in freefall since Dec 2012

[The Fifth Horseman]

I don't know jack about Crysis, but what I played of the early Tomb Raider games made me hate them.  The graphics weren't interesting and (more importantly) the control was atrocious.  The new game is the only one of the series I've enjoyed, and it wasn't because of realistic hair models (which weren't nearly as realistic on the 360) but rather because the gameplay wasn't an ongoing battle against bad controls, and it happened to be punctuated by some cinematic moments which amused me (even when they were extraordinarily cliche).

I actually liked Legend and Anniversary. The controls in the original series were clunky enough to convince me against trying to play them for more than a quarter of an hour.

[JaguarX]

It will get better one of these days I think.We'll reach a point where assets are so common that real world objects don't even need to be remodeled anymore.

And we will also probably eventually teach computers how to decorate a building for us just as easily as it can put trees and grass on a landscape. We can just build the basic layout and then an algorithm will choose the best places to put plants, furniture, light fixtures, etc.

They already have computers that do that.

[Thunder Glove]

To be fair, graphics have always been the emphasis in marketing, as far back as the early 1980s. Making graphics "better" or "more realistic" has always been emphasized.

To be sure, gameplay complexity increased with graphic complexity for a long time.  Intellivision was capable of more complicated games in addition to just better-looking ones, and the NES was capable of more sophisticated gameplay than any of those early consoles.

That said, however, there seemed to reach a point where the balance tipped, and now the companies are spending so much time on creating graphics that it hurts the rest of the game development.  (I think that point was this generation, moreso with the PS3 and Xbox 360 than the less-powerful Wii, but it also may have come late in the previous generation)

The big blockbuster games now have to be smaller and simpler because it takes too long to make graphics for even the few areas they have, and they try to pad the gameplay out with multiplayer and draconian unlock requirements.  (For example, this is specifically the reason that Square will not remake Final Fantasy VII with current-gen graphics: they said it'd take five years just to match the graphics of the rushed and thrown-together tech demo back when the PS3 was introduced, and at least a decade to make it if they want the best the PS3 is capable of)

I don't think that's going to change any time soon, unfortunately.  Or ever.

[Shenku]

They already have computers that do that.

In fact, I think Minecraft already does this to a small extent with the way it "seeds" the world environment (including buildings, towns, and dungeons, if you check certain boxes when creating a new world) to be either completely random, or controllably dynamic by using keywords to generate everything according to an algorithm(the later of which always generates the same terrain so long as you use the same key words, useful if you find a nice one and want friends to try it). Say what you will about the gameplay itself(most people I know don't like the game at all), but they made a very impressive game technologically and functionality wise.

I imagine it's a matter of time before seeding worlds like this makes its way to more graphically pleasing environments and games that have more than just billions of boxes.

[Codewalker]

That tech is actually "older than dirt" as it were, though its first uses were more out of necessity. Off the top of my head I remember the Starflight games packing a huge galaxy full of procedurally generated worlds to explore onto a floppy disk.

Later on there was a 3D shooter with a German sounding name that escapes me that used fractals to generate all of the textures at runtime and was also ridiculously small (single 1MB file if I recall),

[The Fifth Horseman]

That tech is actually "older than dirt" as it were, though its first uses were more out of necessity. Off the top of my head I remember the Starflight games packing a huge galaxy full of procedurally generated worlds to explore onto a floppy disk.

IIRC, Elite was one of the earliest games to use procedural generation.

Later on there was a 3D shooter with a German sounding name that escapes me that used fractals to generate all of the textures at runtime and was also ridiculously small (single 1MB file if I recall),

.kkrieger. It's 96 K, but users some 2 GB of HDD space to store the generated content.

[Shenku]

That tech is actually "older than dirt" as it were, though its first uses were more out of necessity. Off the top of my head I remember the Starflight games packing a huge galaxy full of procedurally generated worlds to explore onto a floppy disk.

Later on there was a 3D shooter with a German sounding name that escapes me that used fractals to generate all of the textures at runtime and was also ridiculously small (single 1MB file if I recall),

Wasn't implying that Minecraft was the first, just that the technology already exists. Game developers just need to choose to apply it. Only reason I chose Minecraft as my example, is because it's one that I'm sure more people are familiar with.

[JaguarX]

Wasn't implying that Minecraft was the first, just that the technology already exists. Game developers just need to choose to apply it. Only reason I chose Minecraft as my example, is because it's one that I'm sure more people are familiar with.

Yeah heard of it but never been in it. From what I gather it's like the landscaping mode of Sim City.

[Codewalker]

.kkrieger. It's 96 K, but users some 2 GB of HDD space to store the generated content.

Yep, that's the one. It's smaller than I remembered. :)

Lot of cool stuff like that came out of the demo scene in the 90s as well.

Wasn't implying that Minecraft was the first, just that the technology already exists. Game developers just need to choose to apply it. Only reason I chose Minecraft as my example, is because it's one that I'm sure more people are familiar with.

Was just adding some trivia that people may or may not be aware of. I've always been a fan of procedurally generated content, but with hard disk space being cheap most developers instead opt to just bloat things because it's easier.

[Shenku]

Yeah heard of it but never been in it. From what I gather it's like the landscaping mode of Sim City.

Sorta. It's mostly just an objective-less sandbox game where you mine for materials and build things. The only real goal defined by the game is to try and not die(drowning, fire, lava, falling, monsters, starvation), for the most part. I think more recent updates have added some form of "quest" where you have to find some hidden dungeon to find and defeat a dragon, but beyond that there's no goals but what you choose to make. I haven't played in quite a while though, so I don't know how much new stuff has been added since I last played...

One extreme example I've found of what people do, was a group of people who setup a multiplayer server/mod where they built a full scale replica of the USS Enterprise D from Star Trek the Next Generation, complete with every deck, room, and turbo-lifts(using water to ascend/descend between decks). Another example I can think of would be something like a group who were recreating Winterfell from A Game of Thrones. Some people make stuff that's pretty impressive, but a lot of things people make makes you wonder if those people just don't have lives...

[Codewalker]

The other thing about Minecraft is the huge modding community. The game is written in Java and "mods" are born out of class replacements based on running the code through a decompiler / deobfuscator, but it's pretty amazing what they've managed to come up with.

It's a lot of fun building giant machines and factories with the IndustrialCraft / Buildcraft stuff. If you have RedPower installed you'll even get volcanoes generated in the world and can mine one out to take over for your underground lair...

[TimtheEnchanter]

Populating algorithms for something like Sim City or Mine Craft though requires far less intuition though than one that would work for an actual 3D-modelled environment like a modern FPS.

Minecraft is amazing. I'm not a player, because it would swallow up every shred of free time I have. But I have a heck of a lot of respect for that game. It's a huge slap in the face to all the corporate bigwigs who have a very narrow vision of what is needed to make a successful game (most notably, awesome graphics).

Lego had a short-lived MMO and it's sandbox capabilities were amazingly limited. Minecraft is what that game should have been.

[Shenku]

Populating algorithms for something like Sim City or Mine Craft though requires far less intuition though than one that would work for an actual 3D-modelled environment like a modern FPS.

Depends on how you do it. CoH for example used a lot of modular level building elements for the mission maps (including different tile sets, i.e. office building, caves, sewers, exc.), and these pieces could be swapped out, re-ordered, and moved around pretty easily. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to apply some kind of algorithm to randomly generate vast networks of these types of pre-built rooms together to make semi-dynamic maps for a FPS.

All you need to do is setup the different archetypes of rooms to make it possible. Halls, small rooms, large rooms, ramps/stairs, dead ends, closets, doors, elevators, exc. Once you have those all planned out, you just setup the algorithm to identify which parts connect where, how to prevent rooms improperly clipping into each other, and how big of a map the engine would need to generate. After that, it's a simple matter of just creating variations of those rooms so it doesn't appear repetitive, yet stays uniform, and figuring out where objectives are eligible to be placed in a balanced fashion.

Outdoor environments might not require much different, if only a few more calculations to generate the terrain and determine where roads, structures, and environmental props can/can't be placed. Heck, it may even be possible to do both at the same time to generate interiors for the buildings.

[FatherXmas]

I find this hilarious, these guys have the commercial knowledge of a knat !!!!

According to a few friends who work on the stock market NCSoft shares plummeted after they shut down City of Heroes and haven't looked like recovering since.

Game Producers across the world take head : Screw with our games and the public will screw you...

I can see NCSoft doing a come back just to try and rescue there now ailing image as a leading MMO provider, given that it is widely acknowledge CoH/CoV was the market leader in it's particular MMO Genre. (DC and UO don't event come close in term of game satisfaction)

I forgot to deal with the OP.

Dec 2012

NCSOFT low for the month - 144,000; high for the month - 165,000; start of the month - 161,500; end of the month - 150,500

Price when the OP posted - 155,500.

Yea, big decline there.

Now if you go back to Aug 31 when the announcement was made then yes, there's been a decline.  On Aug 31st the stock closed at 252,500.  Of course a week later the stock closed at 286,500.  Of course the decline had nothing to do with waning Aion sales or Blade & Soul not spiking their income with new revenues or simply a let down from years of hype.  It had nothing to do with the fact the stock had been steadily falling from it's high since mid October the year before because there was no objective reason for the price to be that high to begin with.

No it's all due to the closure of an "overseas" game that was less than 2% of their annual sales for 2011 and the vocal protest of it's loyal playerbase in western media.  A region whose sales have shrunk 60% between 2009 and 2011.  A region that in 2011 was a distant 3rd to Korea and Japan in terms of income (less than 1/3rd of Japan's income).

No, it was a "the Emperor has no clothes" moment in Korea that put NCSOFT stock on a freefall from it's high in Oct of 2011 and the lack of perceived success of B&S, because it was so over hyped, as well as the fact the last two big titles in Korea from NCSOFT (Lineage II and Aion) added significant new revenue and not just shift it around, that Sparta kicked the stock over the 200K ledge down to the current 150-160K range.  A number by the way that is supported a lot more by actual objective analysis than the emotional momentum play that drove the stock up from 150K to 380K for 2 1/2 years.

[SARobb]

It will get better one of these days I think.We'll reach a point where assets are so common that real world objects don't even need to be remodeled anymore.

And we will also probably eventually teach computers how to decorate a building for us just as easily as it can put trees and grass on a landscape. We can just build the basic layout and then an algorithm will choose the best places to put plants, furniture, light fixtures, etc.

There are actually several add on products to some of the more standard 3D design packages (maya/3dS and others) that already do that sort of thing.  It's quite awesome, designate a plane as a 'road' for example, and tell the engine how many cars you want on it and when you render *poof* there they are.  They can even be animated if you're proficient enough with the software.

[Ice Trix]

You've all probably seen this picture

Nope, haven't seen it, and enjoyed looking at it. Very true.